Weekend Overview

My heart overflows with encouragement and love from the kind people here whom I'm thankful to call friends.  I should probably be organizing my suitcase and prepping for tomorrow's journey to Timisoara, but there's so much to say. I'll try to be brief, but brevity has never been my strong point!

Yesterday I spent time with Ana, the pastor's wife, for much of the morning.  We worked on some projects at the church, and also went to the market that happens on Saturdays.  It's sweet to see how easily Ana makes and maintains relationships with the people in her town, and we were able to pray with a woman named Mari, who is hoping she sells a lot of her eggs and produce to help pay for her daughter's upcoming wedding.

Tavi and Dave picked me up from the church around noon to head to Tavi and Nico's house.  I'd connected with Tavi and his wife Nicoleta last year, and they'd invited me for lunch this year, and they are also hosting Dave, a visiting missionary from Canada.  We all ate lunch together at their house, then headed to Maruntei to do a kids club.  I was able to use a lesson we used in our small group at church to teach the kids about things that only Jesus can do.

The next part of the plan for me (it's been kind of fun that everyone is mostly making plans on my behalf!) was for me to head to another village, Stoenesti, to see the ministry that pastor George and his wife Dana have there and to spend the night in the missions house above the church there, connected to their home.  There was some confusion about how I would get to Stoenesti, and eventually they sent a man named Ilie to come pick me up. Ilie is an older Romanian evangelist who comes for one week each month from the wealthier north of Romania.  He told me that he tried to escape Romania in the 80s, just before communism fell, but that he couldn't get out, and he knows this was God's will because he was meant to serve southern Romania.  Turns out he plays the accordion quite well, but I didn't learn that until this morning!

I arrived in Stoenesti and got to spend the evening with George, Dana, their two kids, and a few of the teens from the town.  Every Saturday night, they host these teens for dinner and a sort of "slumber party" in the missions house. The dinner table was filled with delicious food, lots of laughter, and stories of God's faithfulness that a few of us shared.  I slept in a cozy room upstairs, and it was such fun to just have to walk downstairs to breakfast...and to church!  I shared my testimony in the church, and was able to understand most of the service, and was so encouraged by this family's involvement in their community.

After a lovely afternoon nap, we all piled in the van, picked up some others from the village, and headed back to Draganesti for evening church.  It's kind of surreal how many relationships I already have there - it almost felt like showing up to my church at home!  George preached on the humility of Christ and how we ought to live in light of it (I turned down several offers for translation and really feel like I understood most of it!), and the whole church prayed for me after I got up and said a few words.  I said many goodbyes and took some pictures with these sweet friends (on my camera though, not my phone, so can't share here), and then headed out to dinner with Dorothy.  I was able to spend time doing ministry with Dorothy earlier this week, but when she found out I was staying longer, she went out of her way to find a time to take me out for a meal.  What a joy! We went to a nice restaurant in a nearby town and enjoyed pizza and great conversation.  Then she brought me "home" back to Raul and Ana's house in Draganesti. 

Tomorrow I catch the train, and I'm not ready.  These people here are now so dear to me, and it will be hard to leave.  I hope that I can somehow express, when I'm back at home, just how sweet the ministries here are, just how encouraging the friendships are, just how hospitable the people are.  But what I can't express is known by the Lord, and I know that if I find joy in these things, He finds infinitely more joy.  These things please me...but I'm not the one they are aiming to please! Truly this is a special place.

Much to Learn

The students left this morning!  Last year when the team left, I ate dinner alone and slept alone in a big empty house.  I was getting to know the people here, but didn't know them well, and felt shy about spending time with them.  This year is so different!  I'm currently relaxing in bed in an apartment filled with people I know and love after an evening filled with delicious homemade food and sweet fellowship.  But I get ahead of myself.  First...yesterday.

my ministry group on Thursday 

Even though we missed Women's Day this
year, we still managed to receive flowers from a stranger!
I love Romania!

Raluca with the friendliest cat
in the world

Yesterday was the last day of ministry with the students, and it was lovely.  I went with 3 of the students to a nearby town called Coteana, with two of the missionaries working in the area, Danut and Mark. Mark is British, and his two boys David and Ruben were with us also, and I was instantly jealous of their bilingualism.  When we arrived in Coteana, the men went with one of the students into a nearby town to buy a stove, while we girls stayed back with Raluca, a missionary living in Coteana with her husband Beni.  We got to see their house, which was a pretty amazing place.  They moved there in November but it isn't yet renovated, so they have no running water, no bathroom, and only a very limited kitchen.  The church also meets in the same building, in the room next to their bedroom.  So the reason that I say it's amazing is because of how hospitable they are able to be with so few resources, and the big hopes they have for this property.  This weekend another team of missionaries is coming, and 11 people will sleep there!  This is why they need a stove...

Anyway, after a quick tour, Raluca, the students, and I went to do house visits.  We brought along David and Ruben, and we walked through the village to visit women who have attended the church.  The first was a woman filled with sorrow because her children never come to visit and left one of their grandchildren with her 11 years ago and never came back.  The girls and I each shared our testimonies about God's work in our lives, and we prayed with her.  At the next house, we spoke with a woman and her adult daughter.  These women were tremendously hospitable and so generous with their limited means - they gave us duck eggs and sausages and coffee and candy.  We talked with them for a long time before heading back to the house to meet the men. 

Jared and the much-too-big cupboard

Back at the house, they weren't able to get a cupboard out of the kitchen - this project took a long time until they finally chopped it into pieces.  While we waited, Raluca cooked up the eggs and sausage and we had a mini feast in their bedroom before heading back to the church to eat a second dinner with the team.  I was blown away once again by the sweet hospitality that seems to be so central to the Romanian culture - I have much to learn from them in this regard!


enjoying our feast in Raluca's bedroom

 This morning, the students on our team surprised us chaperones by informing us that they'd divided into teams to get the cleaning done at the missions house while we went out for coffee. They'd even collected money so we wouldn't have to pay!  Instead of the typical vending machine coffee we often get here, we splurged and went to the "Art Café," where we sat and enjoyed coffee and conversation, then grabbed some treats from the bakery next door before heading to our final debrief with the students and Pastor Raul.

Sorry, this entry is so long!  When the students left this morning for Bucharest,
the men from the church helped me to bring my suitcase to the pastor's apartment, where I am staying now with he and his wife and 3 kids.  I spent much of the afternoon at the church, doing some administrative work for Raul and talking with people passing through. 

the view from my room at the Costea apartment

Friday nights are small group nights at Hope Church.  There are 4 small groups in this town, and Raul arranged for me to go to 2 of them!  At the first, one part of the group worked on an assignment, while the leader, George, worked through a lesson with the rest of us.  I was encouraged that I understood what he was saying and could follow along and take notes, and even more encouraged by the fervor and passion that he has for the gospel.

When this group was over, I walked down the street to the next group, which had just started. It was in a building I'd never been to, and I was nervous to enter, but it was a very special moment when they opened the door for me.  There were many familiar faces, many excited exclamations that I'd arrived, and a sweet little girl I'd spent time with on Sunday, who ran up and immediately gave me a hug. They offered homemade donuts (gogosi) and soda, and then we worked on a test for discerning your spiritual gifts.  There were 105 questions, and I was able to answer most of them without translation!  It was such fun to spend the evening with this group.  Another of the men from the church, Marcel, came to pick me up afterwards, and he drove me back to Raul and Ana's house, where I ate dinner with him and Raul and Ana's kids and a couple of other guys from the church.

Sometimes I just pause and remember the 9 years between trips to Romania, and how much I longed to come back, and how excited I would get at any reference to the country or its people or its language.  And tonight I got to sit at a dinner table, immersed in the language and the food and enjoying the people and the culture and the community here so much. And I remember also how I asked for prayers that relationships would be central to this trip to Romania, and they certainly are.  Thank you for praying.  I'm thankful to be here.

 

Zile Frumoase

These last two days have been beautiful, in more ways than one.  Today, the sun finally came out!  It was the first we'd seen of it since before we arrived on Friday. It peeked out on a foggy morning as we walked to the church to start our day, and during our drive to the nearby city of Craiova, blue skies took over the grey, jackets came off, and it was such a joy to enjoy beautiful sunshine and see the colors in the area come alive.

While today was beautiful in terms of weather, both days have been beautiful in terms of ministry.  I wish I'd had a chance to blog last night, because I feel like already I'm forgetting details, but here is a quick summary:

With one of the widows

Yesterday, I was able to go out with Dorothy again to see the widows.  Well, that was our plan A...and eventually we got to it.  But first we took some extra time at the grocery store, and then just before we were ready to head out I got a text from Derek saying that one of the students needed to go to the doctor.  He's had a sore throat since Sunday and it was only getting worse.  So...I got to have a new experience in Romania - taking someone to the doctor!

Romanian meds

 Thankfully Dorothy, who is fluent in both English and Romanian, was our driver and such a sweet support to the student.  The rest of us (myself and 2 other students) just tagged along.  We visited a missionary doctor in a nearby village,  got a script for some antibiotics, went to the pharmacy...and then we continued on our original plan.
We visited two widows, and then we went to the home of the woman who cares for her 3 siblings who have disabilities - Flori, Marian, and Lili.  This visit was so sweet: not only was it fun to interact with that fun combination of two populations I love - Romanians and persons with disabilities - but I really felt like I was able to connect with the woman and her husband.  I spoke directly to them more often than I used a translator, I read Scripture to them in Romanian, and they served us coffee and hosted us in their cozy front room.  We got so caught up in this visit that we realized we were very late for dinner back at the church...but thankfully, there was plenty of supa de fasole (bean soup) left.  This is my favorite Romanian dish, which I discovered last year, and I ended up skipping the main dish altogether and having two bowls of soup and then dessert- both so good!

Flori and Marian

Today we traveled to Craiova.  We took several vans, and my van was extremely quiet early on - there were two students, myself, and 4 Romanians, and none of us were entirely comfortable with each other's languages, so we just had occasional conversations. It was a nice drive, though, and fun to watch one of the students' reaction as she got to see this Romanian city for the first time.

the 2 students on my
 New Testament team

Sunny arrival in the gypsy neighborhood

Once in Craiova, we split into teams.  We passed out New Testaments in a relatively affluent neighborhood there, then most of us traveled to a gypsy neighborhood.  Some of the group put on a kids' program there, while 6 of us - 2 Romanian missionaries, 3 students, and myself - went on a home visit.  We visited the home of a man who has diabetes and a heart condition, and a terrible sore on the bottom of his foot.  It was probably about the diameter of a baseball and extremely deep, and because of his diabetes it won't heal. It has been this way for 4 years, and the medicine he needs for it is too expensive, so one of the missionaries is looking at how to get some cheaper medicine from abroad.  I talked about how we have to battle similar sores where I work, and then the students and I and the Romanians alternately prayed for and encouraged them.  It was a hard situation to see, but sweet to be able to speak truths from my own life about situations that are hard and that seem like they will never change...but then they do!  And to remind them that God has power to heal, and knows pain Himself as He sent His Son. 

I didn't take any pictures inside our home visit...but this was their home

After ministry we went to the mall, where I enjoyed a Tiramisu latte and conversation with the other chaperones, and then dinner in the food court.  The ride home was filled with much conversation - very different from earlier in the day - and I enjoyed getting to know some of the Romanians in the van better. Truly, a lovely day!

Arriving at the mall with the 2 students
and our driver and translator, Marcel

Tiramisu lattes with co-chaperone Lauren

Homes Away from Home

I'm trying to think of a clever way to start this blog entry, but the cheerful conversations of the teens in my room are a bit distracting.  Thankful, though, for sweet teens and cheerful conversations...but not feeling like the best of writers at the moment.

Students on my team today

I loved today.  The morning was very laidback - breakfast and devotions with the team, a time of prayer for the ministries here, and then most of the group headed to the city of Craiova while 3 of the students stayed behind with me.  We got to eat a relaxed lunch, talk with some of the people from the church, and then meet with one of the missionaries, Dorothy.  Dorothy works primarily in children's ministry here, but has also taken on a second area of ministry, with the neediest of people in the nearby communities.  Once a month, she brings groceries to them, and we got to be a part of that today.  We helped Dorothy pick up food at the market, then we drove from village to village and saw 4 different women.

the first woman we visited

The first was mostly blind and mostly deaf, and living alone.  It was cold and wet outside, but warm and cozy in her tiny home.  She talked to us, and we tried to talk to her, and we prayed for her, and it was sweet.

The home of the second woman

The second woman was very eager for conversation.  She also lives alone, though her youngest son was home briefly from working in Spain.  They had no electricity until recently, and now they have a single lightbulb, which works only at night.  I served as translator for the students as best I could, so that Dorothy (who is pretty perfectly bilingual) could focus more on the conversations themselves. Her son spoke too fast for me, but I could understand her and Dorothy, and it was fun.  It was also so encouraging to see the sweet relationships Dorothy has built with so many in these towns, and how easily she speaks with them about their lives, their families, their neighbors, and the gospel that she faithfully brings to them.  And once she got to the gospel part of the conversation, my work as translator got so much easier - these are the Romanian words that I've most rehearsed!

our team with the 3rd woman

The third house was the most emotionally charged of all.  This dear woman lives alone.  Cancer has affected her lips and nose, which have been replaced with skin grafted from her arms and legs, and this affects her voice and makes her sound almost like a toy.  Cancer also recently took two of her adult children, and we arrived on one of their birthdays.  She cried as she told us that our being there was a reminder of her girls and that she was glad to have us there. We all cried together, and when I hugged her I didn't want to let go!

I was especially looking forward to the last house - where an elderly woman lives with her son, who has a developmental disability.  I love when all my passions land in one place - praying, in Romania, with a person with a disability.  If we'd started making music my life would have been complete :-) Her son reminded me so much of one of our clients at TCH (JN, for any TCH people reading), and it was such a cool collision of my worlds. 

We all kept reflecting today on the passage in James that says that pure religion includes visiting widows in their affliction.  Dorothy's sweet service and cheerful friendship with these women, and the way that she seeks to meet both their physical and spiritual needs as best she can, were so refreshing to witness and to be a small part of.  And to top it all off, she took us out for snacks and coffee afterward.  I almost managed to not spend any Romanian money (I haven't spent a single leu yet!)...but then I saw in the shop the car air fresheners that are Romanian flags...and that streak was quickly broken :)

We got back and joined our team at the church in the evening.  Dinner, as usual, was delicious, and it was fun to speak with my team, and to speak with Romanian friends who are helping me with some nuances of language.  I'm glad we moved from them only complimenting what I do know, to helping me learn what I don't.  So thankful for these friendships.

I'm sure I have much more to say, but bed is calling once again!  We are hoping for less rain tomorrow so that we can see widows whose homes are too small to invite us in.  Another of these widows has 3 siblings with developmental disabilities, whom she cares for alone, so I am already looking forward to loving this sweet family...and to whatever else tomorrow holds!

Beginnings

It's day 4 of this trip, and I just made an important and disappointing discovery: I forgot to bring the cord that lets me upload pictures from my camera. So the pictures in this first entry will be mostly from my phone, or other people's photos...and I'll have to do better at using my phone to take pictures from here on out.

Anyway, enough about that. The trip has been great so far. If you were watching on facebook, you surely saw that our flight situation got a little bit crazy. The flight that took us to London was 4 hours late, so we had to move our flight FROM London to the next day. This resulted in a surprise stay at a London hotel Thursday night, which ended up being a lot of fun and a great place to get adjusted to the bulk of our jet lag. Students and chaperones alike were in good spirits, and we chaperones wrapped up that evening at a fun little London pub that made me feel like I got a small taste – literally – of the UK, before heading back to the airport early the next morning to fly to Bucharest. 

It was wonderful to arrive in Romania to familiar faces – the pastor here and others from the church – and to arrive in the daylight! We split up into a few vehicles and took a long and traffic-filled drive from Bucharest to Draganesti. Everyone in my van besides the driver and myself slept for almost the whole way. The highlight of the drive was when we stopped at a roadside bakery for some delicious bread.

We ate a delicious meal prepared by the ladies of the church when we arrived, then settled in at the missions house. Everything here feels so familiar, and I'm not the only one feeling like there's no way it's already been a year since we were last here.

Yesterday was orientation at the church, then we split up into smaller groups for different ministry activities. I got to return to the town of Maruntei, where I'd so enjoyed ministry last year, with one of the students. Nicoleta, a missionary there, picked us up, and we joined her while she did a kids' program in the village. 14 kids from the town showed up, and all 17 of us crowded into a small, cozy room to learn about the wisdom that only comes from God and to work on memorizing James 1:5a.

The student with me, who speaks no Romanian, easily caught on the end of the reference, since all the kids shouted it: “Cinci, AH!!” It was sweet to see how Nico and her husband Tavi's persistence in this town has paid off, and the sweet relationships that exist with the kids there. After the lesson, the kids enjoyed some snacks of oranges and cookies and we went to the park with them to play Rata Rata Gasca (Duck duck goose), and enjoy the almost-pleasant weather.

We got back to the church earlier than we'd expected, and were asked to help in the kitchen while the women prepared dinner for our group and for a group of pastors who were in a meeting at the church. I am not exactly at ease in the kitchen, especially not in someone else's, but it was a lot of fun to be a part of what the ladies were doing and to remember all the behind-the-scenes tasks that are tirelessly done day in and day out to make a ministry run. Our first full day was, I think, a great success.

Today, we split up into several groups again and visited 3 churches in the area. I went with Derek (our fearless leader) and 6 of the students, to the town of Comani. A very small congregation meets here, and we did a portion of the service ourselves – 3 students shared testimonies, Derek preached, and 3 of us sang songs. Tonight we joined the larger church here in Draganesti for their evening service, and it was so sweet. 

 

Truly, I can't believe it's only been a year. It seems like just yesterday we were walking these streets, eating these foods, and interacting with these people. There is much to be thankful for! I still don't know whether long-term ministry here is in my future, but there are answered prayers already as I get to spend time with the people here and build relationships. 

Currently, we're at that time of the night where teenage girls get this strange burst of energy while their sleepy chaperone gets really excited for bedtime. :-)  Off to bed with me!  Thanks for reading :-)

Returning to Romania...again!

On March 25th, 2016, I sat in a Starbucks in Bucharest and wrote in my journal.  Among other things, I wrote:

I sure will miss this place. I thought about adjusting to life at home once I get back, but I didn't give much thought to the actual leaving, the pain of it....And I love this place, not in the naïve way that I think I loved it before, but in the way you love someone you've actually gotten to know...And I will go home, and will love the people and the place God has given me there, and maybe I will come back again.

And today, after a year of loving the people and place God has given me here in Arizona, I am getting ready to go back again indeed.  Last year, I was able to blog quite a bit on my trip, and had such fun doing it.  This year's trip will be a bit different, and I'm not sure yet if daily blogging will be a part of it, but I figured that at least I could use this blog today to fill people in on what my plans are.  I know there are many who just see little facebook snippets and realize I'm going back but know little more.  So here's the plan:

Just like last year, I'm starting my trip) (this Wednesday) by chaperoning a group of high school students on a mission trip for a week. Their teacher, Derek, is a friend of mine from church, and I'm still blown away by the kindness of God in providing this very easy and natural way to return (again!) to the country that I love.  We'll be partnering with the same local church that we partnered with last year, Biserica Speranta (Hope Church) in Draganesti-Olt.  We'll do whatever they're doing, which I think will include things like ministry to the Roma (gypsy) population there, home visits in the community, and passing out New Testaments in different neighborhoods. 

This year, when the students leave, I'm planning to stay on with the church for an extra weekend.  This will allow me a little more time to connect with the missionaries there and to partner with what they are doing in a different context than I'm able to do with the students.

After the weekend, I'll travel to Timisoara.  I visited (and adored) this city last year, and was able to meet up with an American missionary who has lived there for many years and works with children with disabilities.  What was a quick dinner out last year will, this year, be a chance to stay with this sweet woman for a few days and work alongside her in her ministry.  I may even buy a guitar when I get there and do some music therapy with the kids!

The simple (and more expensive) plan after that would be to fly directly out of Timisoara to get home, but I decided to add a little extra  adventure to the end of my trip.  So I will hop onto a northwest-bound train that will cross into Hungary, and will stay in an Airbnb in Budapest for my last 2 nights before flying to London and onward toward home on the 25th.  I've been to Budapest en route to and from Romania before, but this will be my first time spending more than 1 night there and my first time exploring on my own.  Today, I met my goal of learning 10 Hungarian words...and firmly established that it is not an easy language to learn.  In Romania, I can read pretty fluently, speak enough to make basic requests and polite (if brief) conversation, and understand people decently if they speak slowly.  In Hungary, I haven't even learned their alphabet...so will have to rely more on the kindness and multilingualism of others in order to get around.  This will be humbling!

I would appreciate prayers during my trip for safety (my own and for the team), for a calm heart, and for the building of sweet relationships while I'm away.  Last year became sort of a whirlwind tour of Romania. I loved it, but was a little lonely and a little exhausted by the end of it.  I'm hoping this year will be a little less of a whirlwind and a little more of being a part of people's lives during my brief visit. 

Thanks for reading this far and for caring about my adventures! My next post will probably be written from across the Atlantic!

One last day...one week later

Today, I am sitting in a coffee shop...in Tempe, Arizona. I've been home for a week now, but I hate the idea of not documenting in the blog world my last amazing day in Romania. So even though this is one week removed, I'm going to do my best. :)

I got up early that Friday morning and cleaned and packed, then headed downtown one last time. My plan was to go read at my favorite Bucharest coffee shop (ok, the only one I tried). It was still cold and a little bit rainy, but I loved how confident I felt about getting downtown, and I was getting pretty used to the weather. I stopped at a little pretzel stand I'd been to once before, and got my favorite apple-filled pretzel for 1 leu (about 25 cents, a totally cheap and delicious breakfast). Then I walked to Origo...only to find no empty tables. So sad. So I went for a walk around the block, hoping a table would open up by the time I got back...but no such luck. I got my latte to-go (they still did beautiful latte art that I hated to cover up with a lid), and made my way back to the subway, only to realize I'd lost my subway pass and had to buy a new one to get back to the apartment. All in all, not the most successful morning, but I was still pretty cheerful.

I had prayed that the rain would let up by noonish. I had to check out of my apartment by noon, and was going to go from there to my friend Adoriana's apartment, which was a 30-minute walk or 10-minute drive away. Taxi drivers really don't like short drives, so I was going to probably have to pay someone extra to do it (plus taxi drivers are notoriously dishonest in this city) so I'd prayed the rain would stop...and it did! I had a mostly-pleasant walk (after being yelled at by a shop owner for throwing my trash in their trash bin), and arrived safely at Adoriana's flat. I got to meet her husband Bogdan and their son Paul, and she fed me a delicious lunch (complete with Romanian soup! I miss it so much!). While her husband worked (he owns a photography business) and her son napped, I walked down the street to the mall. I'd avoided American chains the entire trip, but I was actually pretty happy to sit in their really nice Starbucks in their really nice mall on a still-chilly day and read to my heart's content. Adoriana met me a couple hours later with Paul, and we walked back together after watching Paul explore a fun little play area for awhile.

with Paul and Adoriana

My evening in their home was truly one of the highlights of my trip. After two weeks of traveling alone, I was in a home again, with sweet believers, enjoying fellowship and a home-cooked meal. Belonging to the body of Christ is truly amazing – how sweet and easy it was to have conversations with these friends, and what a joy to see God's kindness toward me in their hospitality and friendship. I was filled with so many emotions – it is hard to love people and know that in just a few hours you'll be separated by thousands of miles – and so thankful that my original plan of hanging out at the airport for the evening was not God's plan for my night. I felt safe and loved and overwhelmingly grateful.

After purposely dumping a bowl
of popcorn on the carpet, Paul got
to help Bogdan vacuum :)

Bogdan helped call me a cab in advance, to come pick me up at 2:45 Saturday morning. He and Ado both got up with me at 2:30 to say goodbye, and Bogdan walked me out to the curb and made sure the cab driver was doing what he was supposed to do :) I cried a bit on that cab ride – not the first or last time I've cried about leaving Romania behind.

The rest is pretty much history – a flight to Amsterdam, then to Seattle, then to Phoenix. I'm horrible at sleeping on planes, so I think maybe I got about 2 hours of sleep in 24 hours of traveling, but everything went smoothly and for that I am thankful. My sweet parents met me at the airport, and since then my full-time job has been adjusting to “normal” life back home (oh yeah, and working at my full-time job, and my part-time job :) )

My heart wasn't happy at the
airport, but my finally-free
feet sure were!  Flip-flops!

I have so much more to say. I feel like much of this blog has just been a chronological outline of my trip's events and not much about the many things going on in my heart. Here is one thing I wrote – wasn't sure if I'd publish it here but looks like I will. I wrote this while sitting in the Starbucks that final afternoon. I'd prayed earlier that week that I would see blue sky before leaving Bucharest. It felt like a silly thing to pray, but I just wanted to see with my own eyes that the city wasn't always gloomy, and I had seen God answer prayer after prayer all month and felt confident that He would do so again, just because He is kind. And answer it he did! When I saw blue sky out of the Starbucks window, I wrote this:

(side note, I use the word “pocaitii” toward the end. This is the Romanian word for “repenters” and is a label for evangelical believers there  that is meant to be derogatory but that they've adopted as their own. I could write an entire additional entry about this word alone...maybe another day)

“Keep tearing up a bit, I sure will miss this place. I thought about adjusting to life at home once I get back, but I didn't give much thought to the actual leaving, the pain of it. And there's a beautiful patch of blue sky out this Starbucks window that reminds me of a God who answers prayers, even seemingly silly ones, and the really big ones, and who plants hopes and dreams in our hearts and has us wait and then sometimes fulfills them. And sweet Ado and Bogdan are at home in their humble flat and hardly know me but are welcoming me so very kindly, and this too is evidence of a kind God who dwells within them. It is strange to feel simultaneously sad and weary and peaceful and joyful and excited and nervous. And I love this place, not in the naïve way that I think I loved it before, but in the way you love someone you've actually gotten to know. This is not an easy place, and I don't understand it still, not completely. But there are so many dear ones here, and they are dearer to my Lord than they are to me, and He has watched this country suffer and fight and lose and win and grown and change, and I only see in snapshots, both literally and figuratively. And I will go home, and will love the people and the place God has given me there, and maybe I will come back again. And there will be a day when God brings all His ransomed ones, pocaitii all of us, home for good. And there will be none of the strangeness left, and all of the joys.”