Back in the 70′s I was an exchange student to the Australian Outback–near Walgett, NSW.  When I wanted to make something typically American for my host family I thought of chocolate chip cookies.  They had never heard of such an item.  My mother sent some, a big undertaking, and expensive, in those days.

To the best of my recollection, I saw none for sale and ate no foods in Panama, Mexico or Bolivia in the 70′s, 80′s or 90′s containing chocolate chips.

There were lots of chocolate bars in Mongolia, but no chips.

Ditto in Israel.

Back in the 90′s my friend Soon, from Korea, wanted to make Rice Crispy bars.  To her _they_ were the quintessential American food.

_________

The daughter of one of my friends from China plays the Guzheng.  I finally saw a photo of one yesterday and listened to a musician performing on one here today.

The Guzheng similar to a harp.  And a piano.

X brought a Sichuan dish of mung bean noodles with garlic, cilantro and herbs that we ate at room temperature.  We also had leftover venison chili on rice.  I made chai, which X and M had not had before.  That was a surprise to me.  We went over the various spices I used: cardamon, cinnamon, allspice, ginger, nutmeg, star anise.  Cardamon and nutmeg were not familiar to them.

We made chocolate chip cookies from the recipe on the yellow bag: a typical All-American cookie.  Chinese homes, they explained, do not have ovens and they had been at a loss to use the ones found in their apartments here.  X’s daughter and husband in particular wished her to learn how to use the oven to make cookies!  Chocolate chip cookies!  We made and decorated chocolate spritz Christmas tree cookies.

All that butter.  Another thing not used in Chinese cooking.

Then we went out and collected assorted greens, berries, and plant material for the arrangements.

M’s very lovely artistic result:

What I made for X:

That morning the Paperwhite narcissus Ellie gave me had come into full enough bloom that i cut them and added them to the arrangement already on our table.

We had such a lovely time.

Since they are at it again that makes me feel like maybe nothing scary is happening.  The trip to Israel and Jordan was a shock for my feet.  Shoes are usually worn on these tootsies only when leaving the house or walking.  On the trip I wore boots from the time I was up until I went to bed.

So now the top half of the bottoms are sloughing off in quite an impressive fashion. Flayed feet. Each night I peel off a bit more from the raggedy edges.  Separate peeling areas are now joining into (relatively) vast new areas of fresh rosy pink skin.

Can you imagine what it must be like to be a snake? The skin of your whole body gets dry and rough and separates; even your nictitating eyelids peel off…

And since one more is on the way, what a better time to knit something new-to-me:  Elizabeth Zimmerman’s Babies’ Garter-Stitch Surprise Jacket.  On my list to try for some time.  Mine is more a toddler sweater since I used Noro Kureyon. 

The knitting was started here in the Fingerlakes, proceeded across the Atlantic, was finished in Israel, crossed the Atlantic again; the final sewing, washing, tucking in of ends and sewing on of buttons was accomplished back in the Fingerlakes.  The sweater was then mailed to the midwest, where Uberimma picked it up when she was back for business and with her it once again crossed the Atlantic to its final home back in Israel. 

Whew!  What big trips for a small sweater!

Isaiah 9:1-2, Matthew 4:12

Let’s walk out and meet the morning.  It is an hour or more before dawn.  Wear lots of layers — it is cold outside. How dark it is!  We can distinguish the dark grey of the road, the black trees, the lumps of houses, and the midnight blue night sky — impenetrable save for the diamond stars.  Careful — stay on the road — without a light it is easy to stumble in the dark.  There are countless stars shining their feeble light like shiny bits of glass on dark velvet.  And up above us is the Milky Way.  The Incans thought it was the road to heaven. They did their best to find a path to God in the dark.

If we keep moving we will eventually warm up. You probably know that most ancient nations believed the sun was a god.  Many myths anticipate some aspect of Jesus’ coming.  The Aztecs thought only human blood sacrifice would keep the sun rising each day. The Incans chose special children to be messengers to the sun.  The Greeks have the story of Helios daily driving his chariot of the sun through the sky dragged by fiery horses.  Though his father tried to save him, Phaeton, Helios’ human son, wanted to be just like Dad and tried one day to drive the sun chariot.  The result was chaos and destruction for earth and death for Phaeton.  All peoples were walking in darkness, longing to know God.

Look– the eastern sky is becoming pale.  The dark and the stars fade.   Truth is stranger than any fiction.  From time’s beginning the Triune God planned the death of His only begotten son to bring mankind redemption through a new covenant.   Jesus stepped off His throne and came to us robed in flesh as a human baby.  The road to heaven is through Him–God’s messenger to mankind.  He came not as an equal to His Father, but as a servant, laying down his life. He fulfilled man’s longing.  The sky displays the majesty of a god coming: just above the horizon is a pale butterscotch; the clouds overlaying it are bright fuchsia and an incandescent orange.  All stories were swept away by the True Son’s coming just as the veil of night is swept away by the sun’s rising.  Jesus, the Great Light,  came to all who live in the land of the shadow of death.

Wow–Look at that sky!  Dark rose and pink now spread high up into the clouds in the eastern sky, and are reflected even in the west. A scarlet thread of light is seeping, bleeding across the dark horizon’s edge. Each dawn is a symbol of the mercy and forgiveness available to all through the blood of Christ. The sun shines on all people.  It gives light and heat even if hidden by stormy weather.  Just so, God’s redeeming love is available to all, regardless of circumstances.   Now we people of the Light prepare our hearts anew to celebrate the coming of our King of Light.  Let us shine His glory upon those around us who still walk in darkness and live in the shadow of death.  Dawn has come; God Himself came to be with us.  The sky is turning golden– here comes the great light once again.

they look human-like. Winged messengers from God.  But what if:

There are giant chicken angels over the one small nativity we have out so far this year.

One of the visiting chickens, a Red Comet, accidentally stayed outside Thursday night when there were high winds.  Jay found her Friday morning wandering by the side of the house and returned her to the coop. We think she spent the night in the giant rhododendron. Chickens are not meant to spend the night out-of-doors in the cold winds. There were small spots of blood on the snow where she walked.  Her back end was icy.

Yet she seemed OK until Saturday  late in the day when Jay noticed she was not eating and was hanging apart from the other hens.  She was very light.  He moved her into a pen in the basement, warmer, dry.  Jay coaxed her to start drinking; she was interested but kept falling asleep–or was very hypothermic.  Eventually she started drinking, then drinking with gusto, then eating again; wheat, corn meal, apple.  I put her out with the others this morning.

Two security screenings to enter the bus station: you walk through a metal detector, then your stuff goes through a detector.

Buy a bagel with dill cream cheese.  More cream cheese than bagel, and tomato slices to boot.

The armored, bullet-proof glass bus was full.   The hour long ride wound through rocky land with terraced fields, settlements both Jewish and Arab, and some lone houses.

The tunnels and high walls on parts of the highway were to protect Jewish drivers from rocks through the windshields and bullets.  At the three bus stops along the way were heavy cement guards so drivers could not swerve and kill those waiting for the bus.

Grapes, melons, olives, corn, kale, tomatoes growing.  Saw one herd of sheep and goats.

The Arab homes differed in style but were of similar, if not nicer, substance.  An interesting note:  Jewish homes have white solar water heaters on the roofs; Arab homes have metal or black solar water heaters on the roofs.

Kiryat Arba has a population of about 7500-8000.  We had a fun textile time, A teaching her friend to knit, and I spinning up the last of some pastel Easter Egg colored wool from Germany into a fingering weight yarn.

I saw an olive tree with olives up close and personal.  The olives have to be soaked in brine to be palatable. Mammoth roses and their small apple-sized rose hips.  A nut tree of some sort.  Pomegranate bushes with ripe and splitting fruit.  Gigantic morning glory vine in full bloom.  Lot of other plants in bloom and fruit which i have no name for.

And that wonderful large jaylike bird which has a large, lovely feathered crest more on the order of a parrot than a jay. But it would not sit still for a photo.

The sound of jets training in the desert near by.  A blimp.  Watchtowers. Returning to Jerusalem, the bus had to come through a security checkpoint to enter the city limits.  Lots of men with protective veswts and submachine guns.  Hanging out.

Because really, it is safer here than Chicago.  Robberies are essentially nonexistent because you never know which home has a gun with ammo in the bedroom.  And all security profiling is 100 percent racial profiling.  Which is pretty effective.

A left me in the bus station which also has a small shopping mall.  I made my way home alone via the #6 bus, walked under a large crane which was busy lifting cement for a new building.  The vast cauldron attached to the crane was sitting behind the cement mixer parked by the edge of the sidewalk, being washed out.  I had to scoot to avoid being sprayed.

Now we hope there is no general strike tomorrow, which would put s crimp in plans for the rest of the week.

The rest of the apples need to be picked, and the stems of wild rose hips for bouquets.  The lst hydrangeas picked before the snow:

The girl spent more of her birthday money on a new haircut:  a long shag.  Almost half her hair was cut off but it is hard to tell, she has so much!

And I am readying for a trip to visit friends in a far off land, my first visit to the Mediterranean and the Mid-east.  Pounce looked last night like he was waiting to be packed!

He has been joining Hawthorne and me on our morning walks.