A Rockin' Good Time

The North Jordan Branch really knows how to party. Whenever there's an activity everyone comes because they know that there will be plenty of food and we will do something really fun.  Yesterday was no exception.

At 8:00 a.m.  a bus started picking up people in Irbid and worked its way down to Al Husn.  When they arrived at the Church the bus was full, so we had to take our van.  There were 33 people total, and 16 were non-members.  We don't get too excited about the number of non-members, because the same ones have a tendency to only come for the activities and don't come to church.  They all have a good excuse.  We still love them and include them.

From Al Husn we traveled south to the Ajloun area to Tel Mar Elias.  Tel Mar Elias is a small hill that has long been identified as the birthplace of the Prophet Elijah.  The remains of an ancient church can be found here.

Note:  the Bible Dictionary gives an excellent comprehensive description of Elijah.  We suggest you go there and read about Elijah--one of the greatest men in the history of the world.

Stone steps going up to the top

The remains of a church built at the site about 600 years A.D.  

Beautiful mosiacs still exist and are out in the open for all to see.  The lack of security for ancient artifacts is amazing to us.

The people put the grapes in the slot by Morad's shoe, pressed them down with their bare feet and the juice poured through a slot into the larger pool.

We thought Morad was teaching about the prophet Elijah, but later we found out he was actually telling an old love story (in Arabic of course).  The meeting began with prayer, so it probably qualifies as a spiritual event.  

Sometimes we just have to laugh.  Most of the time we don't understand a thing that's happening.  We just smile and nod like we do.

"The Wishing Tree"--It's a local tradition to write a wish on a piece of paper or cloth and tie it to the branches of this tree.  If you do, your wish will come true.  We haven't a clue what this has to do with the Prophet Elijah, but it's kinda fun.

From here we thought we would be going to a really nice park for lunch and spend the afternoon.  What we didn't know was the park was on the other side of Amman, and took us about an hour and a half to get there.  We also didn't know that we were going to an amusement park.

We had a wonderful picnic with lots of good Jordanian food.  We brought our tuna fish sandwiches but left them in the cooler when Huda invited us to join their family for chicken and rolled grape leaf  "things."

Sister Tolley and the sisters danced to the Arabic music....

The young people went on the Kamakazi.....

The older ones sat in the shade.....

 And Brother Tolley rode a camel.  Yee, Haw!!
(He says he's in training for the 2016 Spanish Fork Fiesta Days Rodeo)