Thursday night - The New City (or so it is called)

I took my first steps out into the new city as it is called here which is almost everything that is not inside the city walls of old Jerusalem. It was interesting to see the differences between the old and the new. Everything is still being built out of local limestone just as the old city, but there is definitely a modern style to many of the buildings. It is much like any other modern city around the world with public squares, taller buildings, cars everywhere, many streets lined with restraints, bars, and even Blockbuster and KFC. It reminded me a lot of NYC with many smaller storefronts, probably family owned, with only a few major name brand stores. Just as in the old city the diversity of the population is extreme and I could not distinguish between all the different languages that were being spoken walking down the streets.

There seems to be some kind of celebration being prepared for as they are putting up lights and banners that read '40'. Trying to figure out what it is for has been difficult, but we think it is for the 40th anniversary of the 6-day war for reunification of Jerusalem, but we have not been able to find out for sure yet. There is a lot of new construction going on in the city and you can see no signs of past violence or destruction. The only signs I have seen at all are on the Zion gate, the southwest gate out of the Old City, which is where the Israeli Army broke through to retake the City from Jordan in 1967 during the 6-day war. There are many bullet holes and pockmarks all over the gate as Israel sieged the city before breaking down the gate and finally retaking it.

The weather has begun to get cooler as they slip out of the summer heat and move towards the rainy season. It is staying in the 80's during the hotter parts of the day and falling into the upper 60's in the evenings and at night. There has begun to be a strong western wind coming out of the Med in the evenings which actually brings with it some moisture in the air, which I was told are the first signs of the coming rains.