Hanukkah

I am going to tell you about Hanukkah or you can also spell it as Chanukkah.

Hanukkah was a minor holiday but then it eventually gained population.
It is celebrated for eight days this year it will start on December 2 all the way to the 9th. As you lite the candles there is a ancient song you sing with it it is called Hanerot Hallalu. Hanukkah reminds the jewish people of strife and conflict that their ancestors had faced in the passed. It takes 44 candles all together to last the 8 days and noght.
When they cook their food either fried or baked they put olive oil in it in all their foods. They put the olive oil in all the food because it reminds them of the oil that burned for 8 days in the holy temple. They even put it in theit dairy foods. They also play games and one of the popular one is spin the dreidel this game is the most played game. They exchange gifts for the gelt because it falls by christmas but traditionly your not really suppose to recieve gifts.
Well thats it for this one.

Iranian Plateau

The Iranian Plateau is huge! It's like 2,00 kilometers big. The reason there is a plateau there is because that's where 4 tectonic plates meet and push together. I asked Alexis what she knew about the Iranian plateau and she said " Well I know that the highest point is the Damavand peak at 18,406 feet.", I thought about that then she said " The Plateau is divided into 5 sub divisions." then in reply I said " Oh, Yeah the Koh-i-baba also goes through part of it." Then we finished our hike and went back to the hotel.

Taurus Mountains

The Taurus is a Mountain range in southern Turkey I actually think this is a cool place because it reminds me of the Himalayas. The highest peak there is Mt. Demerkazik. It is, 12,320 ft. tall. something I didn't really know until Alexis told me was that there was a German, Turkish Railway in World War 1. We stayed in a resort 16 miles above any town. On one of the hikes we found out that limestone has eroded the insides of some of the mountains. Because of the erosion there is a bunch of underground caves, and waterfalls. My favorite thing about this place is that they found evidence of tin mining inside the caves. I would love to go back here.

Map URL.

This is the URL that Alexis, and I madehhttp://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&q=tigris%20and%20euphrates%20rivers&aql=&oq=Tigris&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&tab=wl

The Syrain desert

We are back at another desert . This place is amazing it is like 200,000 square miles big. But I couldn't believe that it only gets bout 5 in. of rain a year! That's nothing! I also found out it borders the Orontes Valley. Alexis found out something interesting that it has more than 2,000 species of plants! But i saved the best for last it's unusual because it's not a sand desert it's a rock, and gravel desert i think this is an awesome unique place to go.

The Tigris, and Euphrates Rivers

Im not sure what to say about what we say and learned at the two rivers, but I now know that the Rivers are so old that they were a part of an old land empire called Mesopotamia. It's also in present day Iraq. Jackson told me that the Tigris river is 1150 miles long. Then I Told him that the Euphrates River is 1700 miles long. We Figured out that together it is about 2850 miles long all together. I liked going to this feature.

The Dead Sea

So since we lefted the Jordan Sea we are going to the Dead Sea it is connected to eachother. The Dead Sea is spectacular natural and spirital landscape in the whole world. As we are here we are going to get salt for our food that need to be salted. This sea is the lowest body of water on earth and the lowest point. We got out the boat and we started to swim there is so much salt that you can float. This the worlds richest source of salt. AS we are swimming we notice that there are no fish or plants living in this lake because of all the salt it is so strong. This salt is so bitter and its not like the salt that we eat on our food and stuff. We was talking to this old man he said when they was younger that they use to call the Dead Sea the Stinky Sea.Well now we are going to head to the Tigris and THe Euphrates river.