If you missed the Day #1 recap, you can read it here.
Day #2 of the 10-day Israel & Italy trip with Museum of the Bible dawned bright and early. I was grateful for a good night’s rest, good coffee, some time in God’s Word, bacon & eggs, and this amazing view from the rooftop restaurant in Rome at the hotel we were staying at.
I kept looking out feeling like it was a dream… to be eating breakfast with the breeze blowing, the birds singing, and this amazing view. Incredible!
Our group gathered early to walk to some local sites nearby to our hotel. Then, we saw the State Archives and got to see some old documents and hear more about their significance. {You can read more about our visit there in Jeff’s post here — he is a wordsmith and I loved his post on our time there.}
After that, we walked to the Great synagogue, met the head rabbi, learned more about Jewish history and traditions, and went to the Jewish Ghetto.
While I had a cursory knowledge of Jewish history, spending so much time with the Jewish people and getting to hear about their beliefs firsthand was so enlightening and helpful. Not only did it make me appreciate them more, but it also gave me a better understanding of what it’s been like to walk in their shoes.
After walking miles and miles, it was mid-afternoon and we still hadn’t really eaten much other than a quick pizza snack a local shop mid-morning, so while some people went back to the hotel, some people looked at more historical sites, and some people went shopping, a few of us decided we needed to have some Gelato.
The only problem was, I had no way to pay for my Gelato because I hadn’t been able to exchange any money yet for Euros. We couldn’t find a gelato shop that took US debit/credit cards, so we tried to get money out of the ATM, but we couldn’t get the ATM to work.
A friend on the trip offered to give us what she thought were Euros… but when we tried to use them we discovered they were actually Mexican PESOS (clearly, I might be a newbie at this!!).
We finally were able to borrow some Euros from Kristen and got some gelato. It was yummy — and worth the effort!
I loved getting to see the Pantheon — and especially thought that the open ceiling was cool! (Okay, the one downer was that the first time we went into the Pantheon, we tried to take our gelato in — there weren’t any signs saying you couldn’t bring food in! — and then Ruth and I got “kicked out” of the Pantheon by the security guard.)
We ended the day with yummy lasagna and tiramisu at a local restaurant, and then I finished the night out with heart-to-heart talks and prayer with a few new friends.
It was a GOOD day and I crashed into bed to try to get some sleep before another big day the next day!
…To be continued tomorrow
