i'm just combining what i put on facebook.
man, its gonna be long.
Today. Monday.
i woke up completely DEAD, only thirty minutes before we had to be at the church for breakfast, which is at 9-ish.
we ate, and then went out to this big park that is just one street down from our apartment. Travis taught the kids about Creation. for crafts, each of them got this paper that had lines dividing it into seven parts, one for each of the days of creation. We handed out stickers and di-cuts to glue onto the respective days. There were these older kids, from the Center in town, i think, and they kept asking for more stickers, even though they already had them filling the page. each kid was supposed to get one of each, so we couldn't really give them more, but they somehow managed to get a BUNCH. i mean, they had to be...my age. or older, even. but apparently...they like stickers.
After that, we divided them into two groups-- kids younger than 11, and kids older, to do different games. We played games with bean bags, and had lots of fun. We finished for lunch, and told them all to come back at three for more activities.
there were probably around a hundred young kids, and around fifty that were 12 and older.
we ate lunch, which, by the way, is their biggest meal of the day. its ALWAYS a soup first, followed by some type of salad, then vegetables and the meat. and dessert. they have this weird sour cherry ice cream, which i think is what we had a Luci's house yesterday, but i didnt have any today...i dont like it all that much.
ANYways, we went back at three. there weren't as many kids, but there was a good enough number. they all listened to the bible story and to this puppet skit Sarah did with Scooter the raccoon. Then, the older kids came with Will, Kate, Petrica (sp? i have a story to tell about himm!) and I to do some games that we had picked out. We played four corners, this weird funny version of rock, paper, scissors, snake tag, and this group game. Will spontaneously gave this life lesson on one of the games, and they really liked it. Fuorte bine, Will. =]
These two girls, Anda and Juana, befriended Kate and I, and we exchanged email adresses. Juana was this TINY girl. and i mean TINY. she looked like she must have been Madison's age, probably, but she was 13, 14. she gave Kate this Catholic bracelate she was wearing.
when we were playing the games, the girls kept grabbing my hands, and putting their arms around me. it makes you feel very accepted. they seem to be pretty "touchy feely" people.
and so went the first day of "VBS". later on, we heard stories about some of the little kids dragging their mom to take them, running pushing strollers to get their on time. this one kid had been telling his mom all day yesterday "tomorrow at 10:00, tomorrow at 10:00". they are such sweet, beautiful kids.
us youth workers had the afternoon to ourselves. Cindy, Betty and Libby did a womens thing, while everyone else was in a meeting with the children's staff workers. So, Will, Kate, Petrica and I hung out, talked, took a [short] walk. it was nice.
we came back to the apartment, and most of us were here, gathered around in the living room. Everyone except Tom, Cindy and Betty. Now, Petrica is from Timisoara, the city that we flew into, and then drove from to here. He is Will's good friend, and he came over here to help us out. He speaks English very well
i dont think i've really missed anything. i'll have to add in other things, if i read over it later. again, it is like 12:30 here.
Love you guys and miss you!
muah <3
TUESDAY.
okay. tuesday.
i have to gather up all my thoughts.
it feels like lightyears ago since just this morning. and i'm tired. so i'm sorry if it doesn't make any sense.
we had breakfast here, at the apartment, so we got out to the park at ten. Travis did the story about Jesus' birth, and they colored these little nativity things. then, we split up, just like yesterday, and Kate and I and Petrica (Will was doing door to door ministries again, with Luci [Luci's son, remember?]) we took the kids to do a couple of new games, and some of the favorites from yesterday. while we were playing the snake tag game (y'know, when one person is it, and when they catch someone they hold hands, and have to run together to catch more people, until there is no one left, everyone is in the "snake") and i was holding this one kid's hand. He asked me "Your name is Courtney?" and he pronounced it pretty perfectly. I've been going by Nicole here (i can't remember if i've already said that), so i said "Yes, or Nicole." and he introduced himself as Chris, which i'm sure is spelled (spelt?) differently, but that's the English equivalent, i guess. I told him it was nice to meet him and he said "Me too." =]
we played some more games and then we [OMGOSH! interruption--- hahaha, kate just plugged the hair dryer in, which is from here!, and it kind of whirred then died and smoke came out.] started walking to the church for lunch. some of the kids from our group were following us, and talking to Petrica. Their names were Christi (this guy), Andrea, and Thomas and this other girl, i didn't catch her name. well, they lived at a home near the church, and so they walked with us there and Petrica told them to come back to the park at three.
we ate sarmale again. well, i didnt. i had soup and crepes =].
3:00. They told the story about Easter to all the kids. Then we made salvation bracelates and i helped pass out the string. And i saw Chris and he was like "Hi, Nicole!" Andrea and her friends (brothers? maybe) were there. She wouldn't really say much, but she kept hanging around. Will and Petrica both were gone, trying to set Will up with a bank account over here, so Kate and I were on our own (with translation help from Olivia and Naomi, of course), but that guy Chris proved to be a help, he spoke pretty good English. So, we are playing games, having fun. We played snake tag again (they really liked that one) and some other games. then we played the Romanian equivalent of Red Rover. They kept saying the, ya know, "Red Rover, Red Rover send... right over" or whatever, in Romanian. They did call my name once, and i broke through (Megan got this awesome picture of it) got to pick someone to take back to my group with me. I ran over and grabbed Andrea's hand. She seemed to appreciate it.
Then, the other team picked me to go with them AGAIN, and i kept going back and forth. Everyone wanted me =].
after then, everything was over. no more VBS. Jehlu (a guy from the church, he is in charge of the kids and youth ministries) told them that they would have the same activities and VBS in September, but that their friends from America would not be there. So we had to say goodbye. it was...sad.
well, then we went back to the church to eat supper. mashed potatoes and chicken.
RIGHT after dinner, we went to a different park to play volleyball with the youth from the church. i was so tired, i thought i would just collapse. well, we ended up teaching them how to play bippity bippity bop (hence the title), which, if you've never played it, is a REALLY fun game. Hilarious. Especially with these kids. we had fun =].
Kate played volleyball and i sat in the grass and talked with the girls. Alina was saying that she wished i could just stay. I was like, yeah, me too, but then she started seriously asking me if i could stay, like Will is going to stay. I didn't really know what to stay. She wanted me to stay. She said i could live in the apartment, sleep in one of the other bedrooms, and just leave later. That it was more expensive to buy a plane ticket for just a week, than for a long time. Then, i sorta pointed out that we had already bought the tickets. but i was really, very flattered...all the same...
we rode with Alin (sp? the music youth guy) back to the church for a team meeting. now, let me tell you. you have never been on a wild ride until you take a car in romania. its literally a miracle from God that people are not being run over and crunched every two seconds. our team meeting consisted mostly of laughing our heads off. i love them =]
now, i'm tired.
there is more i could say, but.. i'm tired.
and thats what i wrote.
i hope its okay.
man, its gonna be long.
Today. Monday.
i woke up completely DEAD, only thirty minutes before we had to be at the church for breakfast, which is at 9-ish.
we ate, and then went out to this big park that is just one street down from our apartment. Travis taught the kids about Creation. for crafts, each of them got this paper that had lines dividing it into seven parts, one for each of the days of creation. We handed out stickers and di-cuts to glue onto the respective days. There were these older kids, from the Center in town, i think, and they kept asking for more stickers, even though they already had them filling the page. each kid was supposed to get one of each, so we couldn't really give them more, but they somehow managed to get a BUNCH. i mean, they had to be...my age. or older, even. but apparently...they like stickers.
After that, we divided them into two groups-- kids younger than 11, and kids older, to do different games. We played games with bean bags, and had lots of fun. We finished for lunch, and told them all to come back at three for more activities.
there were probably around a hundred young kids, and around fifty that were 12 and older.
we ate lunch, which, by the way, is their biggest meal of the day. its ALWAYS a soup first, followed by some type of salad, then vegetables and the meat. and dessert. they have this weird sour cherry ice cream, which i think is what we had a Luci's house yesterday, but i didnt have any today...i dont like it all that much.
ANYways, we went back at three. there weren't as many kids, but there was a good enough number. they all listened to the bible story and to this puppet skit Sarah did with Scooter the raccoon. Then, the older kids came with Will, Kate, Petrica (sp? i have a story to tell about himm!) and I to do some games that we had picked out. We played four corners, this weird funny version of rock, paper, scissors, snake tag, and this group game. Will spontaneously gave this life lesson on one of the games, and they really liked it. Fuorte bine, Will. =]
These two girls, Anda and Juana, befriended Kate and I, and we exchanged email adresses. Juana was this TINY girl. and i mean TINY. she looked like she must have been Madison's age, probably, but she was 13, 14. she gave Kate this Catholic bracelate she was wearing.
when we were playing the games, the girls kept grabbing my hands, and putting their arms around me. it makes you feel very accepted. they seem to be pretty "touchy feely" people.
and so went the first day of "VBS". later on, we heard stories about some of the little kids dragging their mom to take them, running pushing strollers to get their on time. this one kid had been telling his mom all day yesterday "tomorrow at 10:00, tomorrow at 10:00". they are such sweet, beautiful kids.
us youth workers had the afternoon to ourselves. Cindy, Betty and Libby did a womens thing, while everyone else was in a meeting with the children's staff workers. So, Will, Kate, Petrica and I hung out, talked, took a [short] walk. it was nice.
we came back to the apartment, and most of us were here, gathered around in the living room. Everyone except Tom, Cindy and Betty. Now, Petrica is from Timisoara, the city that we flew into, and then drove from to here. He is Will's good friend, and he came over here to help us out. He speaks English very well
i dont think i've really missed anything. i'll have to add in other things, if i read over it later. again, it is like 12:30 here.
Love you guys and miss you!
muah <3
TUESDAY.
okay. tuesday.
i have to gather up all my thoughts.
it feels like lightyears ago since just this morning. and i'm tired. so i'm sorry if it doesn't make any sense.
we had breakfast here, at the apartment, so we got out to the park at ten. Travis did the story about Jesus' birth, and they colored these little nativity things. then, we split up, just like yesterday, and Kate and I and Petrica (Will was doing door to door ministries again, with Luci [Luci's son, remember?]) we took the kids to do a couple of new games, and some of the favorites from yesterday. while we were playing the snake tag game (y'know, when one person is it, and when they catch someone they hold hands, and have to run together to catch more people, until there is no one left, everyone is in the "snake") and i was holding this one kid's hand. He asked me "Your name is Courtney?" and he pronounced it pretty perfectly. I've been going by Nicole here (i can't remember if i've already said that), so i said "Yes, or Nicole." and he introduced himself as Chris, which i'm sure is spelled (spelt?) differently, but that's the English equivalent, i guess. I told him it was nice to meet him and he said "Me too." =]
we played some more games and then we [OMGOSH! interruption--- hahaha, kate just plugged the hair dryer in, which is from here!, and it kind of whirred then died and smoke came out.] started walking to the church for lunch. some of the kids from our group were following us, and talking to Petrica. Their names were Christi (this guy), Andrea, and Thomas and this other girl, i didn't catch her name. well, they lived at a home near the church, and so they walked with us there and Petrica told them to come back to the park at three.
we ate sarmale again. well, i didnt. i had soup and crepes =].
3:00. They told the story about Easter to all the kids. Then we made salvation bracelates and i helped pass out the string. And i saw Chris and he was like "Hi, Nicole!" Andrea and her friends (brothers? maybe) were there. She wouldn't really say much, but she kept hanging around. Will and Petrica both were gone, trying to set Will up with a bank account over here, so Kate and I were on our own (with translation help from Olivia and Naomi, of course), but that guy Chris proved to be a help, he spoke pretty good English. So, we are playing games, having fun. We played snake tag again (they really liked that one) and some other games. then we played the Romanian equivalent of Red Rover. They kept saying the, ya know, "Red Rover, Red Rover send... right over" or whatever, in Romanian. They did call my name once, and i broke through (Megan got this awesome picture of it) got to pick someone to take back to my group with me. I ran over and grabbed Andrea's hand. She seemed to appreciate it.
Then, the other team picked me to go with them AGAIN, and i kept going back and forth. Everyone wanted me =].
after then, everything was over. no more VBS. Jehlu (a guy from the church, he is in charge of the kids and youth ministries) told them that they would have the same activities and VBS in September, but that their friends from America would not be there. So we had to say goodbye. it was...sad.
well, then we went back to the church to eat supper. mashed potatoes and chicken.
RIGHT after dinner, we went to a different park to play volleyball with the youth from the church. i was so tired, i thought i would just collapse. well, we ended up teaching them how to play bippity bippity bop (hence the title), which, if you've never played it, is a REALLY fun game. Hilarious. Especially with these kids. we had fun =].
Kate played volleyball and i sat in the grass and talked with the girls. Alina was saying that she wished i could just stay. I was like, yeah, me too, but then she started seriously asking me if i could stay, like Will is going to stay. I didn't really know what to stay. She wanted me to stay. She said i could live in the apartment, sleep in one of the other bedrooms, and just leave later. That it was more expensive to buy a plane ticket for just a week, than for a long time. Then, i sorta pointed out that we had already bought the tickets. but i was really, very flattered...all the same...
we rode with Alin (sp? the music youth guy) back to the church for a team meeting. now, let me tell you. you have never been on a wild ride until you take a car in romania. its literally a miracle from God that people are not being run over and crunched every two seconds. our team meeting consisted mostly of laughing our heads off. i love them =]
now, i'm tired.
there is more i could say, but.. i'm tired.
and thats what i wrote.
i hope its okay.
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