Well the flight over here was a little iffy. First we got a big snow storm at home which piled 12 inches of snow on the ground the day before we left. So we go to the airport a little earlier than usual just to make sure that we can still leave. Turns out our flight from Louisville to Atlanta was the only one that hadnt been cancelled for the enitire day. We were lucky and apparently meant to go on this trip. But we werent totally out of the clear. The plane was delayed about 2 hours. Which could have been a problem for our connecting flight but we had a 4 hour layover in Atlanta and so we were able to get food and sit in Atlants for a few minutes before we had to board. So it all worked out really well. The 11 hour plane flight was LONG.. REALLY LONG. Everyone had their own individual television screens and was able to choose to do several things like watch movies, play games, listen to music, or watch an episode of a television show like House or Eureka. So I first watched Enchanted. Love that movie. Then I tried to sleep but that didnt work out well on account of mom getting really sick. She was sick for about an hour but once she vomited she felt a lot better. Sorry for the gory details! Before mom got sick we had dinner, there was choice of pasta, chicken, bread and butter or cheese and crackers. Mom had the pasta, grandma had the chicken and i had the bread and butter! I think that we eventually all got some sleep, but not much and it was very crowded on the plane. They had breakfast which was like self serve bananas and muffins. Pretty good actually. I actually first looked at the clock when we were five hours into the flight. So after that i tried to sleep more and ended up watching The Game Plan. During that movie is when i got my best sleep on the plane! After watching The Game Plan we were served a lunch of sorts, they offered pizza but mom, grandma and i just ate the fruit that they gave us. Then we made it to Tel Aviv. Actually we were 30-45 minutes early in arriving and Alia was not yet at the airport, so we were able to exchange money and kind of just cool for a few minutes. Alia picked us up and took us around a dark Tel Aviv. Interesting but really at that point i was ready to kind of sleep!! But was glad for the tour this morning. We had dinner and hung out and then slept.
This morning, we were all woken up by the burglar alarm which was set off by grandma. She didnt realize that the downstairs living room type thing was out of her zone. But it was not a terrible wake up call! We had breakfast and loaded 6 grown people into a small VW Jetta. We were squished. Grandma was sitting on my lap. So we went to drop Ibrahim and Yusef off at school and Alia took us to a hotel so that we could see about tours to Jerusalem. She then went off to work and we booked our tour and walked from Tel Aviv to Jaffa. It wasnt a long walk and it was along the Mediterranean Sea which was nice. It kept looking like it was going to rain but never did, yay. On the way to Jaffa we stopped at a small museum which honestly i still dont know what it was about but it was a nice stop. Once in Jaffa we mostly just looked around and went up and down streets. We went to a flea market which kind of stunk really bad and it was just people selling things that they didnt want anymore. And we also went to a few shops. Apparently you are supposed to barter here but none of us are really good at it so we just ended up spending the asked price! We saw a shop that sold Hookas (spelling?) and so we took our picture there! We had lunch at a little place where the waiter didnt know ANY english so other patrons translated for us. Mom and grandma ate weird food and I ate pita bread and drank sprite! After lunch we felt as if we had seen all of Jaffa so we just found a place to sit and hang out while we waited for the boys to get out of school. We met up with the boys at around 2:30 and were going to just ride with them in their cab home but had trouble because taxi drivers cant take more than 4 people. it is a serious crime and their licenses could be taken on the spot. So mom, grandma, Ibrahim and myself rode in the taxi home and i think that Yusef just walked home. But we got back to Alias and mom and grandma crashed. Ibrahim fixed some tea and we did homework and then i crashed. I woke up at 5:30 and just kind of relaxed some more. It is now 7pm and mom and grandma are still asleep, while i am writing this. I assume we will have dinner in a little while, Chicken Curry i am told. OOH almost forgot... they have orange trees right outside their house here and they are very good but leave my lips burning after i eat them!
So I suppose that is it until next time, hopefully tomorrow. The game plan is Old and New Jerusalem tomorrow!
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