We continued our adventures on Friday, heading to Nazareth and then on to the Sea of Galilee. I’d downloaded the New Testament audiobook and we listened to it on the way as a refresher.
Nazareth was an adventure. The streets were tiny, which made maneuvering difficult in the unpredictable Fiat. The gearing worked differently than a normal automatic, making the clutch prone to overheating in first, and causing problems when reversing on a hill.
On one of these adventures down a side street we reached a dead end. We were getting pretty frustrated trying to turn the car around when the call to prayer started from all the minarets in the city (though most famous as the childhood town of Jesus, most inhabitants of Nazareth are Muslim). I’d never heard the call to prayer in person before, and it was beautiful. We took a moment to appreciate it, and realize the absurdity of getting frustrated about having your Fiat get stuck on a back street in Nazareth. We moved on, and found a spacious parking lot opposite a mosque a mile away.
From the parking lot we walked to the Church of the Annunciation, famous for being the spot where (in the Roman Catholic tradition), Mary was told she would give birth to Jesus.
The Church was beautiful, and had both modern and traditional art inside. We walked around the church and the surrounding area before wandering through the streets of Nazareth.
On the way back to the car we stopped in a yard to watch some puppies playing. Two men were there working on a car, and one of them offered us water and some raw nuts in their casings (cashews?) to eat. We sat and chatted with him for a while. He was born in Nazareth, but had lived in San Jose for twenty years and made frequent trips back to the states where he had family. We talked about the differences and similarities between the US and Israel, and a little about each of our lives. As the sun got lower we said goodbye so we could make it to the Sea of Galilee before sundown.
Almost all Jewish-operated businesses are closed for the Sabbath from Friday evening through Saturday evening. When we arrived at the Sea of Galilee, there were only a few tourists milling about. We arrived right as the sun was going down and the full moon was coming up. We took it all in. It was a beautiful warm night with the full moon rising over the Sea of Galilee. There was a bar right on the edge of the water, and we had beers there, right on the banks of the Sea. A pretty special moment, we both agreed.
