{"id":2752,"date":"2007-12-19T14:51:37","date_gmt":"2007-12-19T19:51:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/karmalised.com\/?p=2752"},"modified":"2007-12-19T14:51:37","modified_gmt":"2007-12-19T19:51:37","slug":"memories-of-bethlehem","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/karmalised.com\/?p=2752","title":{"rendered":"Memories of Bethlehem"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/video.mercurynews.com\/mms\/rt\/1\/site\/medianewsgroup-bang-mercurynews-pub01-live\/current\/launch.html?maven_playerId=foodandwine&#038;maven_referralPlaylistId=33fb5bff7023cf9828f0c00be9b1a5f787b2eff4&#038;maven_referralObject=46a4ccb3-fe63-4473-8648-93d38f0fa93f\">Audio slide show &#8211; Bethlehem-inspired Feast<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>SMELLS, TASTES OF TRADITIONAL HOLIDAY MEAL TRANSPORT FAMILY BACK TO HOMELAND <\/p>\n<p>By Carolyn Jung, Mercury News, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.mercurynews.com\/lifestyle\/ci_7758033?nclick_check=1 \">19 December 2007<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>As mother and daughter close their eyes and inhale deeply, their faces glow with wistful smiles.<\/p>\n<p>Vera Araj, 55, and Blanche Araj, 35, may live in the Bay Area, but at this time of year, the comforting aromas of roasted chestnuts, warm breads sprinkled with pungent za&#8217;atar spices, and spinach-feta pies fragrant with fruity, puckery sumac always take them back to their ancestral homeland.<\/p>\n<p>To cherished memories of Christmas in Bethlehem.<\/p>\n<p>The tiny town venerated in classic holiday carols is where Vera Araj lived the first 18 years of her life, until she married, and where her three children, including Blanche, happily spent childhood summers.<\/p>\n<p>Cradle of Christianity<\/p>\n<p>The West Bank city is considered the cradle of Christianity and the birthplace of Jesus. With the city under Palestinian rule and with a Muslim majority, many Christians have scattered across the globe, including at least 600 families now in California, according to the Bethlehem Association.<\/p>\n<p>For those with close ties to Bethlehem like the Araj family, Christmas is not so much a jolly Santa, a reindeer with a glowing red nose and chaotic shopping malls with half-off sales. Rather, it is about faith, tradition, togetherness, and of course, exquisite food.<\/p>\n<p><strong>[<a href=\"http:\/\/www.mercurynews.com\/lifestyle\/ci_7758033?nclick_check=1 \">Read the article<\/a>]<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Audio slide show &#8211; Bethlehem-inspired Feast SMELLS, TASTES OF TRADITIONAL HOLIDAY MEAL TRANSPORT FAMILY BACK TO HOMELAND By Carolyn Jung, Mercury News, 19 December 2007 As mother and daughter close their eyes and inhale deeply, their faces glow with wistful &hellip; <a href=\"http:\/\/karmalised.com\/?p=2752\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2752","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pdXTf-Io","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/karmalised.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2752","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/karmalised.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/karmalised.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/karmalised.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/karmalised.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2752"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/karmalised.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2752\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/karmalised.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2752"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/karmalised.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2752"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/karmalised.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2752"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}