Jerusalem, Israel

The Story:

Leathers worked with the Jerusalem Foundation to build two playgrounds in Jerusalem in 1990 and 1993. The first was funded by the Boston and New York Leadership Groups of the Jerusalem Foundation and the second by Friends of the Jerusalem Foundation in the United Kingdom.

These playgrounds are unique in that the people of Jerusalem have little to no experience working with wood. Everything is normally built of stone. The playgrounds are built into solid rock—every hole had to be jackhammered. The lumber was shipped in containers from the United States.

Culturally, we had to adapt to their typical work days. We worked from 7 to 10 a.m., stopped working for the afternoon, resumed working in the early evening and worked late into the night. In fact, one night we worked until 2 a.m. The site shut down from sunset Friday to sunset Saturday.

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