In God’s Land : City of David, Hezekiah’s Tunnel

2 09 2019

Day 1: Arriving Jerusalem

The flight from Abuja to Addis Ababa was uneventful except for the one and half year old baby girl, who was my co-passenger. She was seated right beside me, looking at me with big round eyes filled with mischief. She was comfortably strapped in seat belt as we were about to take off. I was worried she would become frightened by the roaring of the aircraft as we took off, but she didn’t seem to be bothered at all and was busy making faces at me as the plane took off. She would put the index fingers of both hands in her mouth and show me her teeth and I would do the same and be rewarded with giggles and rolling over to her mother. Her mother, a young woman of about 35 was seated by the window was trying to catch some sleep, grateful that that someone was managing baby.

We had a brief stopover over at Aminu Kano Airport where some passengers disembarked and even more passengers came on board. I hadn’t been to Kano for more than twenty years and I looked out the plane windows, I had a faint hint of nostalgia

I grew up in Kano and left after the riots and religious killings of the 90’s. I was pleasantly surprised that among the disembarking passengers where Chinese and some southerners, men and women.

I couldn’t believe many southerners and even expatriates risked living in this place after all that happened. Perhaps things were not as bad as imagine.

We took the air shortly after and soon the cabin crew mostly young Ethiopian girls where bringing out things for lunch. It was standard flight meals: rice and chicken, even for baby diamond. They had no baby food. In any case the mother was there to help if the baby couldn’t finish.

Midway into the flight, the Diamond’s mom felt ill, complaining of headache. Lucky, I had some medicine which I gave her and told her that perhaps all she needed was to get some sleep. I continued distracting baby so that her mom could sleep, but I don’t think I succeeded.
Situation soon deteriorated as mom soon said she felt nausea. Frightened at the prospect of her going all over me, I volunteered to call on of the hostess and see if a doctor was on board.
The hostess soon returned with a sizzling bottle juice and a glass she poured out some and handed it to mother who sipped it and after a while I asked her how it was. She said she was feeling much better.

They say that time flies when you are having fun, and it flew like a jet

Time flew like a jet propelled rocket and we were soon at Addis Ababa
We started disembarking, mother asked me to help with baby since I had just a small hand luggage. I picked baby and was surprised that she wasn’t very light.

Mother and child where continuing to Thailand and there interconnecting flights their terminal was C5. We hurried to find it, and as we searched, baby was getting heavier and my arms were aching. I began to respect for mothers.

I considered myself fit, swim daily fir 2hr and yet a 1yr old baby was giving me a tough time. We finally found their terminal and sweating profusely, I handed her to mom who thanked me profusely.

I wished them a safe trip and proceeded to look for my terminal for my connection to Tel Aviv. I was standing scrutinizing the airline monitor when someone called my name. Spinning 360, I saw Pius, and the Nigerian contingent. We shook hands and I was grateful that I have found my team. Thanks to carrying that baby, I was exactly at the right place to be found, talk of children’s guardian Angels. In another 4 hours we landed at Tel Aviv airport, Israel. We then drove to the great Land of God: Jerusalem. A land where God lived .

Saxum Center

After about 5 hr wait at the airport, a bus came to take us to Saxum Conference center. It is located in Jerusalem at Abu Ghosh The Saxum Visitor Center helps pilgrims to deepen their knowledge of the Holy Land through different multimedia resources in order to enrich each person’s Holy Land experience.

Day 2 City of David and Hezekiah’s tunnel
After Mass and breakfast, the group went on a tour of the city of Jerusalem by bus.

Here we enter the great city built by King David

Hezekiah Tunnel

Next, we experience a bit of the old Testament by climbing down the tunnel of Hezekiah. This tunnel was built in search of water for the old Testament Jews by their king, Hezekiah. Below is a the old Testament scriptural verse that talks about this tunnel

“As for the other events of Hezekiah’s reign, all his achievements and how he made the pool and the tunnel by which he brought water into the city, are they not written in the book of the annals of the kings of Judah?” (2 Kings 20:20)