Our Romanan Saturday

We have introduced before to our property manager, Emil. Last week he asked us to give him a ride to Deae, to take a few bags of seed (alfalfa I think) to his father's farm, since he does not have a car. We said sure, we would love to. We have learned here, though the language barrier and various other reasons, that when you committ to something such as this, you never really know what it will entail. Melanie had the boys for the day so me, Karen, and Emil were off to Deae. Before we left Emil asked if we could take a few other things, keep in mind our car is not very big. I had some old tires that he asked if his father could have for his caruta, I said sure, so we threw them in the car with the two large sacks of seed. Then we went to Emil's house and he asked if we could take their dog from their house to live permanently out on the farm, so we loaded it in the car. Then Emil asked if we could take the dog house also, we said sure. We also added a shovel and some various other tools. In the end it was good that the boys were not with us, because the car was totally loaded. Then we were off for the 40 minute car ride.

Deae is a small village in the middle of no where, accessible only by a very seasonable dirt road. When we arrived we meet Emil's father, who lives alone, is in his mid-sixties, and runs the farm with the help of his neighbor. They were in the process of plowing the potatoe field with a horse drawn plow. Karen immediately asked if she could try, they said sure without hesitation. I have no idea what they must have thought about this crazy American woman. We then got the tour of the barn and various animals. We saw the cows, chickens, sheep, turkeys, pigs, and rabbits. Karen especially loved holding a new little lamb, until Emil informed her that this lamb was the one we would be eating together for Easter, when Orthodox celebrate Easter next month. She thought he was joking with her at first, but he was not. Were then invited into the small farm house for some food. They sat me and Karen down at the only two spots available at the small table and found us some dinnerware. They put a bowl of liver and onions in front of us and insisted that we eat all of it without them. They also pulled out the biggest slab of slanina, raw pig fat, that I had ever seen. We also had bread, and they brought a honey comb, literally straight out of the bee box. We looked at it a little unsure, so they took the knife and scraped the honeycomb back and exposed beautiful honey in the middle for our bread. It was a great day, one that I will remember for a long time. It was a snapshot of how people in the heart of Romania live their daily lives on a small farm in small farming village. It is one of the many moments that I have had here when I can not believe that I would ever in my life being there. It is very surreal in a great way. Here are some pictures. In my next entry I will tell about the next day, Sunday. Maurice

What's Going On?

You may wonder where we have been and what we have been up to for the last month. I have heard from several faithful blog readers to say "What's Going On?". I promised my sister-in-law Amy that I would definitely write a blog this week so here you are Amy. Since our last blog on February 11th much has happened and we have been pretty busy.

Liam turned 5 years old on February 12th. It is really hard to believe that he is already 5. He is getting tall and losing his baby fat. He has quite an active imagination and often contributes anything he does wrong to the little guys who live inside of him. Conveniently- when I want to talk to those little guys- they have locked the door inside Liam and won't let him in. Melanie made him a really cute birthday cake and he got to open a few presents.

On February 15th a group came from Pearce Memorial Church. There were five adults and 15 teenagers. While they were here we worked on a house in forest in real need of some insulating and protection from rats, worked in the Baragan apartment where we hold a lot of our clubs, fixed and painted the main room in Magda B's apartment which had water damage, as well as tear off the walls in the Sighisoara church. Pretty ambitious- but everyone did a great job. The teens were fantastic workers. In addition to all the work we also had a great time of devotions every day with a different teen leading them. It was great for us to see this as these teens have grown up and spiritually matured while we have been away. It also got us excited to go back and work with the teens again. The first Saturday the teens were here we had a soccer game at the Baragan school. We had so many kids we had to have teams rotate out every fifteen minutes but everyone had a great time. At the end we played 6 on 6- America vs Romania. If you can't guess who won- let's put it this way- the America got spanked. Our American teens though were really impressed how great the Romanian kid's footwork was.


Another highlight was our trip to Mama and Tata's house in the village of Saes (shaiesh). The morning before I took four of the guys down to Mama's house to make Salata de Boef and prajitura. Mama made me a chef hat to wear. She said now I had my own kitchen staff. The guys had a great time and Tata really got a chuckle when he came in the kitchen and saw Alex wearing a flowery apron and cutting up potatoes. The next day we took everyone out to Saes and cooked mici (meech) on the grill and ate the Salata de Boef. We had a wonderful time but a couple of the boys got to experience the anger of a romanian mama. Two of the guys came back from the soccer field with questionable foot attire. Sid had no shoes on and Stephen had only shoes- no socks- because it was so muddy. Mama was "superat". When I was leaving to take the first group home she had both boys in the back room with their shoes off soaking their feet in steaming hot water. Quite a sight. Mama said "I told you so" to me a couple of days later when I told her Sid was sick the next day with a cold. It was definitely a real Romanian experience for Sid and Stephen.

The greatest thing about the team being here was the relationships with our friends from America. We got much needed encouragement and realized how much we miss our church family. It also got us so excited to come home and work with the teens again.

To read more about the teen trip from their perspective go to http://www.sighisoara08.blogspot.com/ or look at my attached photo album.

On February 29th Maurice, the boys, and myself took the train to Arad to spend the weekend with our Free Methodist missionary friends in Arad (the Dunn's). The boys had really been wanting to ride on a train but that got old quickly during the5 hour train ride. The boys had a great time while we were there as the Dunn's have a great dog named Madison. Stephen (their son) also has a car video game the boys loved and the Wii. While we were there we went out to dinner a couple of times and drink some really good hot chocolate at Paula's favorite coffee shop in town. We had a wonderful time just being able to talk, share, and relax together.

March brought a lot of new things. Mel is living out on her own now in a little apartment above Mama and Tata's. This means Liam and Nolan now have their own room (Mel's old room). It works out great because we don't have to retreat to our bedroom as soon as we put the boys to bed. It also means that Liam quits getting me up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night. He is now right across from it. Starting March 1st the boys are no longer going to school here. We had been talking about taking them out for financial reasons as well as making sure Nolan is where he needs to be for school in September. The week before we took them out of school pretty much solidified the decision. I have never really liked the way they discipline the boys (black dot on the had when they are bad, red when good). For Liam who rarely had a red dot it was difficult. Every day he would get the message reinforced that he was a bad kid. Then they were coming home saying they had to wear these Christmas tree shaped hats when they were bad (dunce caps). Then they said that their teacher pulls their ears so hard when they are bad that Nolan can hear the inside of his ear crack. Needless to say- it's just not what I am used to although that is pretty mild for here. Home schooling seems to be going well now that I am getting some kind of routine. I try to take the boys one day a week to elderly club so they can sit and color with them or play Rummicube. Mel comes on Wednesday afternoons and does geography or history as well as music class with the boys. They seem to love all the silly songs they learn.

Since the group left Maurice has pretty much doing construction everyday in the Baragan apartment or church. Last Saturday there was a whole church construction day at the church and the whole thing got painted as well as the outside getting washed. It was great to see so many people work together. This Saturday will be another work day for the church but this time the plan is finish the apartment.

We have picked a tentative coming home date - June 10th. This will allow us time to get reacclimated to America before I hopefully go back to work June 30th. We still have much we want to accomplish here but we are not sure what God wants to accomplish through us. Please be in prayer for meetings we have coming up concerning small business in Tsigmandru. We will be working with Magda and Nelutu to develop a small business plan for the sewing workshop in conjunction with a Peace Corps volunteer that is here. Soon after we hope to have similar meetings in Sighisoara with the church here.

February had it's really great moments for us but was also filled with some real discouragements. I want to especially thank the Pearce team, the Dunn's, and Tracy for keeping us looking towards God even in the difficult times. God really blessed us though you. Thank you for all your love, support, and prayers. -Karen