The last time I wrote was last Sunday. I tried all week to get the blogger program to take pictures So today I had to switch to Google Chrome to make things happen. I am including some from this week. We are involved in the daily routine. The only issue is the weather was anything but ordinary Things started getting very cold for Israel. Our apartments have no insulation or things like weather stripping. The power to our buildings is not enough to have more then one or two electrical heating appliances on at once. So we have to turn off the water heater tank that sits on the roof. It supports the solar panel heat we should be getting. To use the kettle for coffee, the hot water system gets shut down. We have 3 electric heaters that have the oil inside. When we do put them on, all other major systems have to be shut down. We now have the cold penetrating the walls and floors so it is never warm enough inside.
You have likely heard that Israel had more rain this week then probably happened in any week in the last 50 years. In with the rain came the wind. I was soaked with every group I took out to guide. Umbrellas would have been nice but they would all be wrecked. We went for a walk on the one morning and there were dozens of them lying on the streets. It blows inside out- why carry it any further. Just drop it right there. I am sure in an hours walk I would have found over a hundred. Imagine around the country
Many of the shops right around this part of the city are outside with a plastic or umbrella type covering. Lots of outside cafes. Junk from them was everywhere. As you can see below,this is half a block from our place Every night the street sweepers come out and try to pick up all the trash on the streets. It took a few days this time. Wednesday night we had supper at the Directors apartment. They were to be on a day off on Thursday so he asked me to look after the morning cleanup crew as there was a possiblilty of some snow. When I got up and out after 6 there was already 4 inches of very wet snow. Some of the trees were already under the strain of the weight. I called the Director and he and his wife came out. All of the volunteers went to work. We were shaking snow off the long palm branches as they were touching the ground. We have several tent structures that we had to get down and some that we had to clean snow off before collapse. Every few minutes we would hear branches break. Since the entire city traffic was shut down, the staff that live in the area could not come to work. I thought we would not get open but we tried anyway. We could only sweep off half the paths due to time and the fact that some areas were not safe due to the trees. We have four very large pine trees. They are different then our pines. The branches spreed in a very large area at the tops.
Snow was still coming as you can see by the picture to the left. We warned all the staff that one tree at the top of the stairs that go to the tomb was really dangerous. We had a new guide come that day from Singapore named Ben. He was in his room so did not know. He had only seen snow once before so he came out after we all headed in for a late breakfast. He was standing under the tree when he heard the cracking sound. God was so gracious as he had just seconds to run. The tree limb was a foot thick and it of course was thick with branches covered with snow. It would have been well over a
ton. It is not easy to see but the green branches in the bottom left are the parts that came down.
Forgot to tell you. We don't have shovels, axes or chainsaws. No stores open with the snow
The Director decided we should use a small pruning saw and loppers to tackle the mess. His wife sort of suggested it was not realistic but Richard said the way to eat an elephant was one bite at a time. So I can hardly believe it happened but by 1 pm all that was left was a trunk like branch over 20 feet long. Of course a couple of us had to guide between shoveling and cutting branches. Two men from the volunteers used wheel barrows. They hauled all the branches out to the street and put them into the city dumpsters. These are huge containers that are spaced a block apart through most of the city. They filled two of them. Good thing the stores were closed as they used all the space
We had a most cold but blessed day. Glad it is over. The rest of the week was recovery and lots of groups. This morning I had the privilege of speaking at the West Jerusalem church we attend. Would you believe the three phase power was down to one. That meant no regular heaters. Second Sunday in the cold.
I have not figured out how to print properly between the pictures. Sorry about that. At the bottom you will see us coming back from one of our grocery shopping trips in the cold. Also a couple of pictures of the huge covered market. Trust you are all well. We are doing well. Donna even was having to help someone else in the shop to solve their problems. She is doing great. Blessings. Gord and Donna
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