Today was the final day of the car rental and I was supposed to return it in the morning. Even though I parked the car without paying last night, it didn't have a ticket when I picked it up, which is good. We were planning to visit the famous Baha'i gardens after returning the car, so we all got in (me, Julia, her cousin and his wife) and drove to the rental place. There was some confusion with getting inside the place, since it was blocked with a barrier and didn't have any instructions for getting in. So I just left the car outside and went in to return it. The return process went smoothly, there was no new damage on the car. After that we went to a nearby bus station and found a bus to the gardens.
Near the gardens we met Julia's former classmate Igor, who I also met few years ago when he visited Toronto
. Then all together we joined a guided tour through the gardens, which is the only way to visit the gardens for outsiders. The tour was in Hebrew since we missed the Russian one, but the guide spoke all 3 languages and translated some parts. The gardens are as striking as I remember them from 9 years ago: everything is perfectly symmetrical, plants and grass are manicured, architecture is light and airy. The religion's brochure highlighted that all decorations on the garden and the golden dome were purely aesthetic and did not have any sacred meaning. The whole basis of Baha'i faith is equality for everyone: all genders, all races, all religions, and the symmetry of the gardens symbolizes exactly that.
After we exited the gardens, we walked down towards the sea to a main street called Ben Gurion. There we found a fancy Arab restaurant for a nice lunch. Then Igor took a bus to go back home and we walked to Julia's cousin's place.
After we got back and had some rest and a shower, it was time to go to Passover Seder (the celebration dinner on the first night of the holiday). Igor picked up Julia and I in his car, there we also met his wife Nina. Igor drove us to Nina's parents and we were introduced to the parents and also Nina's sister and her husband. So there were 8 people there in total. We had a lot of great homemade food, shared some stories from Canada, Israel and Russia and had a very good time overall.
Baha'i gardens and Passover Seder
Friday, April 22, 2016
Haifa, Israel
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2025-02-15
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Shawn
2016-04-25
Wowzers now that's a garden!