This past Monday, all the students, interns and a few of the staff of the Arava Institute departed for our first semester trip - about 50 people total. We're all required to take the class "Water Management in the Middle East," and this was the three-day class field trip. The class is about water scarcity in the region and how the resources of the Jordan River basin can be shared amongst Israel, Palestine, and Jordan. Very relevant and pretty eye-opening, at least for me. The trip took us through the Dead Sea, a village near Jericho, Jesus' supposed baptism site, East Jerusalem, and the sprawl south of Tel Aviv. While I enjoyed visiting each one of these places, the great irony of the trip was the perpetual rain (water scarcity, what water scarcity??). Here's a limerick in honor of my friend Lexi, which basically sums up what happened:
From many a rain cloud we fled
But we never could get ahead
Of the constant drizzle
Our spirits did fizzle
And the mosquitoes ate us in bed
The rain meant that we didn't go on either of the planned hikes during the trip, which left me in a sour mood since we were confined to the bus all the time. And the first night my face got eaten up by mosquitoes :P
On the plus side, we witnessed some rare waterfalls next to the Dead Sea!
I love the poem! Did you bring your rain boots?
ReplyDeleteNope, my boots are at Olin. I didn't even bring an umbrella (this was the first time I'd actually seen rain here). I will try to write more poems in the future!
ReplyDeleteI've definitely been there too, although the waterfall wasn't nearly as impressive at the time. Your class sounds interesting. Water management makes enough trouble in the Southwest, and Colorado and Arizona don't really have any other reason to get at each others' throats.
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