Karachi Photo Blog

Tuesday, May 30, 2006



Shops in a row, Old Jerusalem



Haj felicitation graffiti



This one is for Tech Whirling Dervish (ifaqeer aka Sabahat Ashraf)



Facade detail, Dome of the rock

Saturday, May 27, 2006



The center of controversy, Dome of the Rock (Temple Mount)

Thursday, May 25, 2006



Waiting vendor


Souvenir shop in Jerusalem old city


last one


yet another, along wall of old city


Another view



Graves in Muslim cemetery

Tuesday, May 23, 2006



Seeing solar water heaters everywhere made me very happy



Sign outside Muslim graveyard



Pilgrims gather around their guide



For some reason I thought her glasses didn't go too well with her fatigue



Muslim graveyard inscription



Soldiers and barricades
They were preparing for Jum'a prayers.

Here is a Jerusalem video I uploaded on Google today:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1019797493772308763

Please take a look and comment.
Thanks

Monday, May 22, 2006



Tower of David sign



"To Al-Aqsa", sign reads



An alley leading to Al-Aqsa mosque



Post Office in East Jerusalem



Herod's Gate and city wall of Old Jerusalem



Herod's Gate of Old Jerusalem



Old Jerusalem, Easter poster



Old Jerusalem, cobblestone street



Old city alley with election posters

Sunday, May 21, 2006



Bab-al-dimashq
View from East Jerusalem. You go out of Damascus Gate to enter East Jerusalem (Arab part of Jerusalem outside Old City).


Sign in three languages


Old City as seen from Bab-al-Khalil (Jaffa Gate)


Bab-al-Khalil (Jaffa Gate)
If you go from West Jerusalem you enter the old city through Bab-al-Khalil (now popularly known as Jaffa Gate). This is a view of Bab-al-Khalil from inside.


Walking towards Balad-al-Qadeem we now saw the surrounding wall of the old city.


Zion Square, West Jerusalem


West Jerusalem
It was the last day of Passover.



Mediterranean, Tel Aviv




Tel Aviv beachfront
Both hotels that we stayed in, Hotel Nes Ziona and Hotel Eilat, were close to the beach. These were inexpensive hotels that mostly backpackers stay in. I had made reservation at Hotel Nes Ziona from Pakistan. Most probably it was the only call that day (or month) that was made from Karachi to Tel Aviv. Of course I was using Vonage so neither Karachi nor Tel Aviv knew.



A Tel Aviv street
Our stay in Tel Aviv was very short--we were there for just two days.

Friday, May 19, 2006



Graffiti on a Tel Aviv wall



A concert ad




A theater in Tel Aviv



Now that I am a bit settled
Let me post the pictures in the order they were taken.
We landed at Ben Gurion Airport on April 17. It was a nested tour, a separate ticket that would take us from London (our stopover in the original trip) to Tel Aviv and back.
If you have a Muslim name or you were born in a Muslim-majority country you are a suspect in Israel. The girl at immigration at Ben Gurion flipped through our passports a couple of times. I asked her not to stamp--an Israeli stamp in that little book would make you persona non grata in many Muslim-majority countries (see how carefully I am avoiding calling countries Islamic or Muslim!). She handed back our passports with a card that read "Gate Pass." Well, their Gate Pass is not the kind of ticket that would whisk you out of the airport. That 'Gate Pass' meant, 'Thoroughly check these people and find out what they are really up to.' Coming out of the immigration we were duly stopped and interrogated. What was the purpose of our visit? [Well, actually we are suicide bombers.] Where do we plan to stay? [We are heading off to Gaza to get explosives.] Do we know anyone in Israel? [Not quite, You know how careless Bin Laden is, he just asked us to go without giving us names of Al-Qaida to contact in Israel.]
Luckily there was an American of Palestinian origin ahead of us. Her interrogation was more heated, so they let us off easy.