The road to the Holy site in Capernaum was closed by a big security gate with a sign saying This is a Holy Site, Be Respectful, No Picnics, No Weapons. This is the site of the feeding of the five thousand you understand. So I walked back up to the main road in the pitch dark in the hope of finding a bus back to Tiberius. I hadn't seen a bus on this road in the time that I'd been walking and I couldn't see anything that looked like a bus stop. So I decided to keep walking until I found a bus stop, and hoped that I didn't meet a bus speeding past me in the meantime. I came to one after I'd walked a mile or so and crossed the road to the bus shelter. The sign inside with the bus times was not in a language I could understand, so I opted to hitch while I waited for my make believe bus. About thirty minutes later, what looked like a 4X4 slowed down and pulled to the side of the road about a hundred feet from me, dazzling me in the headlights so I could see nothing. It just sat there, engine running, full headlights on. Nobody shouted, nobody got out and I wasn't for walking towards it uninvited. Eventually the car pulled away and I was left wondering what might have been. And still no bus. I was getting concerned that there might not be a bus and a was wasting my time with the thumb. So I did what we do when we've run out of options and I asked God to send me a bus or a nice person who would give me a lift. I knew that I could stay the night in the bus shelter and it might do me good, but I would prefer to get back to Sami's house and my bed in Nazareth, even if only because he might wonder where I was. No I don't have my phone. I carry on thumbing and wonder what's in store. After about another twenty minutes I glance round and see a car reversing up the road to me. Get in ! That's what I thought not what the driver said, not initially anyway. I did of course get in after we'd chatted through the window and he found he could help me. Here's who came to pick me up. Miki introduced himself by saying 'I work for peace, I want to help make peace'. We chatted as he drove : )
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AuthorCommunity Priest at St Barnabas Church on the Moss Rose Estate, in Macclesfield Archives
September 2015
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