Ramadan and Shabbat

This last Friday, some friends of ours offered to watch the kids so we could take advantage of having a car and do some grocery shopping.  They told us to take our time so we decided to run down near the Old City to run an errand.  BAD idea.  What we failed to think about was that it is currently the Muslim holiday, Ramadan.  This is a huge holiday for them.  It's a chance to purify themselves through self-restraint.  They fast every day from dawn until sunset.  They're amazing!

Fridays are also their prayer day.  They gather at noon to pray and to hear a sermon.  Tom and I stupidly headed out to run our errands at 20 minutes to noon.  When you combine Ramadan and Friday at noon, you have one incredibly busy city.  The closer we got to the Old City, the more crowded it got.  We saw hundreds, if not thousands of Muslims walking towards the Old City for Friday prayers during Ramadan.  There were also road blocks everywhere because they weren't allowing any cars near the Old City.  So, what was supposed to be a 20 minute errand turned into more like 2 hours, and we never even got to where we wanted to go.

But we did run into this fun sight...

(Once you get over how adorable this Muslim man and his donkey are, notice the kid riding the camel in the background)

  

We had to drive all over some Arab neighborhoods that we had never been in just to get back to our neighborhood.  We had another donkey sighting....

  

Crowds of people heading up to Lions Gate, the gate closest to the Dome of the Rock...

  

 

After about 20 U-turns and a lot of driving, we finally made it back to our neighborhood grocery store.  Because it was Friday and close to the beginning of the Jewish Sabbath, we got two free loaves of traditional Jewish bread, or Challah.  We gave one loaf to our friends who watched the kids, and kept the other one.....

  

And turned it into this marvelous creation of garlic bread....

 

Although we were initially quite frustrated at the inconvenience of the crowds and road blocks, we realized what a great experience it was for us to see such a sight. I hope this isn't my last Ramadan that I ever spend in Jerusalem.

I also love that because as Christian Americans we are somewhat neutral to some of the differences in beliefs here, we get to experience Ramadan one minute, then on to Jewish Sabbath bread the next.

Ramadan Kareem!

And Shabbot Shalom everybody!  Have a "peaceful Sabbath" back in the states!