Our group easily met up in Bangkok airport, and it is great to now have the extra five people joining us for the Holy Land section.  We are now complete. This photo is us taking a photo of the huge screen taking a photo of us, which then places it to the side, and takes another photo of us taking a photo of the photo. What a fun way for the 15 of us to have our first photo together!

We were not looking forward to the flight to Amman. Boarding at midnight, we knew we should sleep and we wondering whether we would. It was a very full flight and we were all cramped in, but a few hours sleep for most of us did actually happen.

It was very exciting to land in Amman a little after 5am local time [but a 9 hour flight]. We were met in arrivals so our walk through the visa section was a breeze, and we also just breezed through customs. We were then met by our Jordan tour guide, Rabi, who is a great 35 yr old Jordanian Christian, who shared with us that he gave his life to the Lord 2½ years ago, and has only been married for 3 months. He excitedly shared with us that we are all brothers and sisters in the Lord and are family sharing together. Apparently over the last year the tourist economy here has wavered between low and dead, so they are VERY pleased to have us here.

We checked in to our beautiful hotel and rested for the rest of the morning and afternoon, and gathered back together for a great group time at 3.30pm. We joined the ex-pat congregation at The Church of the Redeemer for their 5pm service and met up with

Mal & Charissa Forrest and their children, CMS missionaries here at the church in Amman. They were very pleased to have their vegemite supply replenished! Great to meet with them.

Rabi then showed us a little of the city before we went to a local Jordanian restaurant and had a wonderful time trying some genuine local dishes. In the foyer of the restaurant there was an old Jordanian lady making the bread for the patrons that night. She must have been very busy as it’s a huge restaurant. We thoroughly enjoyed the meal in the upstairs section, complemented by a beautiful desert

breeze keeping the temperature very balmy.