The name ‘Holy Land’ means different things to different people. I knew very little about the many competing narratives around this place until my time with Holy Land Trust. What started out as a crazy idea after I stumbled upon the Summer Encounter program online, it gradually turned into one that I toyed with frequently in my mind.

Last night over dinner I asked my son’s new girlfriend what was her favourite food? Falafel she replied. I blurted out my first thought. Brilliant, you can come to Palestine with us. The look on her face conveyed a hundred emotions.

When I was in the airport on my way here, I was so nervous that I wrote a Facebook post in an attempt to work through it. I wrote, “And I’m off to Israel/Palestine for a month!

If I were to say that going to the Holy Land changed my life, that would be an understatement... Seven years ago as a 22-year-old living in my tiny American bubble, I heard about a trip going to the Holy land. Intrigued about the pilgrimage of where Jesus walked, I went to that meeting and heard stories of amazing adventures from the Middle East.

Descend the narrow street in the south-west corner of Bethlehem’s Manger Square and, tucked along another alley, make your way up to some stairs.  ‘Welcome’ is the sense you get as you enter the headquarters of Holy Land Trust.