Virtual Travel - I Miss The Challenges

It was another ordinary schoolday as I sat at my desk during the Religious Education class during the mid-sixties. The male teacher specialising in this subject might be considered eccentric, a bit of a crackpot or even weird, but at least he wasn't the threatening type who would boom his voice across the classroom. Nor was he the one who would have taken out his cane from his desk drawer to whack the palm of the hand of anyone who dares doodle throughout the lesson. In other words, eccentric he might have been, he was nevertheless likeable.

He had his own way of transferring knowledge from his graduate-level mind to a bunch of fully-abled thickos in what was considered the slowest learning class in the entire secondary educational stratum. Whether I was thick or simply lacking interest, or finding the subject in conflict with the evolution of the Dinosaurs before their sudden extinction supposedly 65 million years ago, that's left to a matter of opinion. But I have always felt that he would find his job of teaching considerably easier if he had taught at a grammar school where brighter pupils would have been more attentive. 

The school where I had RE lessons is now facing demolition.

But I do recall what he was trying to teach. Beginning with the call of Abraham, one city which began to be prominent throughout his lessons was Jerusalem. Back then I had no idea where it was located, but one of his main lessons centred on "the Temple on top of the mountain," and one particular afternoon, he told the whole class for each of us to draw an image of the area.

Having seen images of high, snow-capped mountains, the only reality of what was considered high ground was at Box Hill in the leafy county of Surrey. Part of the North Downs, from its summit on a clear day one can see the South Downs at a distance, across a valley known as the Weald, through where the border of Surrey and Sussex runs. And to Box Hill made an afternoon out with my parents and baby brother in their car from our London home a few years earlier.

But Box Hill was exactly that - a hill, not a mountain. During boyhood, I was already able to distinguish the difference between a hill and a mountain. So such terms such as Temple Mount or the Temple atop a mountain taxed my imagination. Since nobody at school, church or at home had shown me a photo of Jerusalem, it was down to me to concoct how the area appeared.

So I drew a mountain, in shape not unlike that of Mont Blanc of the Alps or even Mt Everest of the Himalayas. And at the summit, I stuck a very small square with the belief that in reality the size and ruggedness of the mountain would both dwarf and conceal any man-made structure built on it.

It was about the same time when a new deputy-head arrived to take his place in the school. By contrast with the religious master, this cane-happy newcomer quickly became a source of terror to the entire school, but particularly to us boys. There were a couple of other male members of staff who scared us, but this one takes the biscuit.

One morning, during assembly, this deputy headmaster shared with the whole school his experience when serving as a British Mandate peacekeeper in the Middle-East territory of Palestine before the birth of Israel as a sovereign nation in 1948. He described his post in Bethlehem, and how he became familiar with a star marking the exact site of the birth of Jesus Christ. After describing the star in detail, his testimony stuck, which would influence me for life. 

By the end of 1972, less than five years after leaving school during Spring of 1968, the city of Jerusalem became more of an interest to me after conversion from an atheist to a Christian, and the regular reading of the Bible which followed. My desire to visit Jerusalem came to a head in 1976, when I took my first backpacking trip outside Europe, to arrive into the Holy Land as a naive 23-year-old. Oh, such glorious days before the Internet when I entered through the door of a hotel in West Jerusalem and simply asked for a room without any of this modern electronic pre-booking! And I was offered one straightaway.

Later that evening, whilst lying on the bed, a loud gunshot echoed across the land. With the ongoing conflict between Israel and Palestine, I was suddenly reminded that this was no exotic beach lined with palm trees and sloping into a calm turquoise sea, lapping gently on the sand. Rather, this was a war zone, and visiting alone was not only challenging but afterwards became the talk of the town within the entire company where I was employed.

The next morning, I walked along Jaffa Road, arriving at Jaffa Gate, one of several gates into the Old City. Through narrow roofed streets, I walked and arriving at the Western Wall and also entered the Haram esh-Sharif and even had access into the Dome of the Rock itself, wherein its interior is the summit of the hill where Abraham was about to sacrifice his son Isaac. From the view at the Mount of Olives, Temple Mount, or Mount Ophel as its also known, was nothing like that drawing I submitted to the religious education master years earlier.

But while I was in Jerusalem, I quickly had to learn to keep my wits about me, learning how to say No firmly without being rude. A tourist will always stand out like a sore thumb when gazing with fascination at a particular site, whether it'll be a mosque, a church, an ancient ruin, or any other places of special interest, and I was an easy target for those Arab "guides" who, one by one, approached to persuade me to listen to him and learn of its history and purpose - for a fee. This included entry into the Church of the Holy Sepulchre where Jesus Christ was crucified and buried. Back in 1976, no one can just enter and walk around. Instead, a Muslim would stand at the door and any visitor arriving would pair up with him and be escorted around, again for a fee. As such, it was one way Palestinians earned their living.

And so, Islamic minarets would sound the call to prayer which echoed through the streets of the Old City and down the Kidron Valley between Ophel and Olivet. At other times, traditional Arabic music played on the radio, making such a contrast to our western music. And at a Muslim wedding, I was a guest of one, or rather at the reception held in the yard of a private home. A live sheep was brought in, and in front of us all, its throat was cut and its blood flowed as a rivulet to the drain. It was then skinned whilst still thrashing its legs. I realised the reality of Biblical animal sacrifices from that moment, and we all partook of the meal.

I managed to find a way to Bethlehem by bus, and after entering the rather prominent Church of the Nativity, I made my way to the underground crypt where the star is located, with the manger close by. As I spent considerable time there, I remember our terrifying deputy headmaster and wondering what he would have thought had he seen me there as a result of his testimony years earlier, perhaps the only pupil of the whole school who had made an effort to visit.

Star of Bethlehem. Visited 1976, 1993, 1994.

And my return to Israel in 1993, after seventeen years. It was then when I discovered a suitable venue of accommodation for backpacker's, the New Swedish Hostel, a former hotel, in the heart of the Old City of Jerusalem. Again, with "off the street" inquiry at its reception, I was offered a bed in the large dormitory which I saw accommodates people of both genders, unlike that of any HI YHA hostel. It was this visit when I learned the habits and the culture of the Jews more than at the first 1976 visit. This included the initiation of the Sabbath, with a large gathering of Orthodox Jews at the Western Wall, singing, dancing and praying with no fixed liturgy as in Christian churches. 

It was at one of these occasions when a group of English youths appeared near the Western Wall shouting ENGLAND! ENGLAND! in the same way as football fans do. Personally, not only did I find this incident disgusting behaviour as guests in a foreign country, but also rather puzzling. As far as I'm aware, Israel does have a national football team but, the game being somewhat alien to the Jews, Israel had never qualified for the World Cup and therefore never played against England. Nor was 1993 World Cup year. Therefore, who were these English youths? Where did they stay? What were they doing at a land such as Israel, and Jerusalem in particular? Certainly not on a Christian pilgrimage! Furthermore, has any group of Jews ever chanted ISRAEL! ISRAEL! at London's Trafalgar Square? Indeed, it looks as though the English are trying hard to make a bad international reputation for themselves. Why? That is a mystery, but I'm beginning to wonder whether, as a Brit myself, I will be tarred with the same brush.

And border security, Israel has one of the toughest in the world. At the end of the 1993 visit, and before checking in for the flight back to London, I had to tell the female officer at Lod International Airport, that I'm British and where I was staying whilst in Israel. When I told her about a small backpacker's hostel in the Old City of Jerusalem, she then escorted me into a small room where I was to strip down and undergo a thorough search, along with the emptying of the rucksack. Eventually, I was cleared to check-in and to wait as normal at the departures lounge. I felt humiliated by these highly trained officers, but it took me a long time before realising that as a Brit staying in a Palestinian hostel does not bode well with Israeli authorities! And that I had to learn the hard way.

All these ups and downs with travel, especially as an independent tourist, cannot ever be captured on virtual travel. And websites such as You-Tube, Alex and I have watched plenty of videos of walking tours and filming of the places I had already visited, especially those of Israel. Indeed, these were to revive memories rather than "virtual explore" a location I had not visited, but these too I tend to include during these days of Coronavirus lockdown.

And now with stricter laws on lockdown burdening our land, indeed, this is no time for travelling. In fact, I'm not too optimistic over the future either. At present, I know three Christian young men whose wives are pregnant, with each ready to give birth around the start of next year. These three, and all the rest of the unborn, I feel sorry for. What kind of a world will these children grow up in? Will buying an air ticket be so thoroughly difficult and bound so tightly with bureaucratic chains, that any idea of international travel will be confined in one's dreams or at best, virtual travel on the Internet, and that done by professional presenters under the terms of the company they work for?

This danger of catching a virus whilst overseas and with inadequate insurance cover may start a new phobia among many a Brit, the post-Brexit bureaucracy between the UK and the EU, if not downright hostility, may deter one from buying even a passport, let alone an air ticket, and then this issue of quarantine, whether abroad or back in the UK could well still be an issue here.

I look around. What has happened to the reputed stoic Englishman, the bulldog spirit which sent many a past foreigner trembling? It takes just one man in a suit and a tie to declare the need to wear facemasks, and the whole nation turns into one of panicking fear, populated with faceless zombies of horror film writers. And that despite the irritation developing in my throat whenever I wear one, an indication that wearing a facemask can be harmful rather than beneficial, breathing back in the carbon dioxide and other waste breath particles expelled by the lungs. And I don't even have the pathogen, and even when I thought I might a couple of months ago, I was still refused a test when I asked for one, due to "insignificant symptoms."

Wading through Hezekiah's Tunnel with one other person, 1976.

The reason why I have chosen Israel as the yardstick of the highs and lows of independent travel is that the Holy land and everything in it testifies of the truthfulness of the Bible. It was in the Jerusalem area where Abraham almost offered up his son Isaac (but stopped by God himself at the last moment.) It was at Jerusalem where David established it as the capital of Israel, it was there when the Babylonians razed it to the ground and later rebuilt by Ezra and Nehemiah. It was in Jerusalem (or nearby at the time but within its walls now) when Jesus was crucified, he was buried there and it was where he rose from the dead on the third day. And when he returns, he will sit on his father David's throne in Jerusalem.

Thus Jerusalem, Israel and the Jews, alive with us to this day, testifies of the existence of the glory of God and the entire land is a rebuke to all atheists and unbelievers.

This pandemic is a very sore point in human history, but God is right here with us, waiting for all to call upon him.