Children's program in Dranita

Our children during their final practice. It's a good thing we are finished, because they are! School is out for them and it's hot, very hot.

Back in Dranita

Steph rescued this little chick with Ron's help. This little baby was the LOUDEST chickie we have ever had to listen to. However, Steph found his brother and she and Viorica returned them to their mama (we think).

The Holy Sisters

Early Morning Prayer Meeting in our "jammies" the rest of the team were too chicken to join us holy ones in the picture!

These are our "Sad Faces"

Good bye Brandy, we will miss you. Brandy has just left for a vacation with her family in the states and we will certainly miss her!

Eastern Europe

Now, you need to know that living in Eastern Europe is a fascinating place. When we lived in Moldova, a truck came several times a week to pump out the septic tank, but we always had water! We didn't know how much of a blessing that was until Ukraine. Now, every now and then we don't have water and. . . you guessed it, a truck comes and fills the well!

The first well, is the neighbor's house, he is our landlord. The second well is ours for our apartment building. After the big truck comes (it does resemble the septic truck in Moldova) they fill our little well with a garden hose! No wonder they recommended that we not drink the water!

Happy Birthday Stephanie

Happy Birthday to you!

Happy Birthday to you!

Happy Birthday, dear Stephanie

Happy Birthday to you!

This is a picture from Steph's birthday party, which we had two days early. Stephanie will turn 25 on the 25th! Cool, huh?!

sorry, Stephanie's mom, we are teaching your daughter bad habits!

She said this is her first birthday party away from home and her first carrot cake for her birthday! It was yummy!

Blessings Steph! La Multi Ani!

Our Personal Superhero Family, The "Undesirables"

Okay, so you need to know the extent of our weird life! This is about our neighbors with the dark brown roof on their house, which was just painted smurf blue. Frightening. Anyway, we have named our neighbors for valid reasons. Okay, the lady is Spandex Mama. Picture this? Well, most of the time she wears a tight tank top and bright purple spandex shorts (with flames on the sides). She has a son. The other night this skinny, muscleless marvel was outside yelling at the neighbor dog (white dog) in his whitie tighties. Only in his white underwear, understand? We call him Underwear Boy. And now there is this young girl, in her late teens. She was hanging clothes out on the line to dry in a tee shirt (I like her tee shirt, it’s larger than her mother's and a bit longer) but it was all she had on. When she reached we got a view of her dark blue thong. Now, we call her Thong Girl. This girl sunbathes in her yard in a tee shirt and socks. And her mother sunbathes in a light colored bra and her dark blue underwear. You need to know the newest members of the superhero family – THE UNDESIRABLES: spandex mama, underwear boy, and thong girl.

We are smiling in the picture, but on this day. . .

Okay, so I want to vent! Yesterday it was a bit hot. Okay very hot, and everyone in the city was in a nasty frame of mind! A man stepped on my foot and had the audacity to yell at me! Hello – I’m not that small that he couldn’t see me! In the grocery store. . . everyone had a cart and they weren’t afraid to use them! They used them to run into others, to block aisles, and as weapons of mass destruction. It was just plain unpleasant! I say, if you are hot, take off your coat!
On the bus, people stood in the aisle even when there were seats; which makes it hard to see where the bus is! It was just an interesting day to be in the city. People were crabby (perhaps because of the heat) and it made me feel crabby! I hope that being in Eastern Europe where service and kindness are rare doesn't become a habit for me.

Krakow Castle

Ron is where?

Ron in the inevitable phone booth! Every country has phone booths in different colors and designs, have you ever noticed that? Well, in Poland they open at the corner and open both ways for a person to step out nicely.

At Church

So, while the team from Moldova was here, instead of our regular routine of going to the villages, we helped with a youth conference. A team from Romania came to provide this for the youth of the local, Romanian speaking churches. Teens from local villages, including the ones we are working in attended and we had some pretty important jobs. Ron preached to the teens about the need to pray, Mike preached on women (we don’t know why that was the topic), and Lilian (yes, even our visitors from Moldova participated) preached on the value prayer has had in his life. The young people sang quite a few songs, and the rather large church was packed! It was fun to participate in this and to see the desire some of the young people in Ukraine have to follow the Lord!

Welcome Moldova to Ukraine!

Several teammates from OM Moldova came for a visit. They came on Thursday afternoon and stayed until Sunday afternoon. Our apartment is the home of meals for our team and it was so crowded that we had breakfast outside on the patio. It was a beautiful morning, Brandy and Steph made the pancakes, Mike and Myra made the scrambled eggs, and Ron and I set the tables, set up the situation for eating, and allowed our space to be invaded!

Train Travel

On the train to Krakow, Poland! We are having fun!

Hanging out in Krakow

Hi from one of the many beautiful parks in Krakow. This was a great break from ministry and adjustment into a new culture! In Poland, we weren't expected to learn any language, to know how to get around, and we didn't have to try! We just enjoyed the city and the people there.

At one time the castle and main city were surrounded by a moat (the original drawbridge is still there) but that moat has been filled in and is now this lovely park that surrounds the old city.

The city has four historical parts, the old city with the castle and walls, as well as the tower where the famous trumpeter lived. The second part is the Jewish section. It seemed the Jews couldn't live in peace with the others so they moved into their own area which is virtually empty of Jews now. A third area is the ghetto where the Nazi's forced the jews to live, the original wall is still intact and you can see where the trams were forced through a single gate into the ghetto. The fourth area, we didn't see, but didn't think we needed to was the communist section. We assume it's what we live in in Moldova!

As you can see in one of the other blogs, we did a bike tour of the city and got a great overview of the history and Ron, Steph, and Brandy did a tour out into the countryside on the last evening we were there.

Auschwich

This was an incredible opportunity to walk back in time. It was amazing to see the extent of the evil man could think of for man - frightening. The banner over the entry says "Work Brings Freedom" and the only freedom truly offered was that of death. A heart breaking place. I hope that we all remember the horrible cost of this event and don't repeat it!

It was sunny when we visited and that seemed wrong and right. Wrong that the sun would ever shine on such a horrible place and right that the sun would shine and bring hope for the future.

Cruising Krakow!

This is Mike, our tour guide for two trips on bikes. What a great time - thanks Mike for all your work!

Poland

Hi from Poland! We are here for about four days. . .and today we saw Auswich. . .more on that and pictures later. Just know we are having a good time and it wasn't too far by train from where we are living in Ukraine!

Ukraine

We wanted to tell everyone what we are doing here in Ukraine. We are teaching English. A lot.

We teach:
Monday night – one young man who needs tutoring
Tuesday and Thursday night – a class in the new church plant (about seven students)
Friday and Saturday – a couple who are moving to Minnesota in the fall
Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, we help Steph with her classes of children

It should be easy, but we are teaching English to Romanian speakers in a country that doesn’t generally speak either language, so there are no resources available except the internet. We spend time searching the internet for tools and information and then Brandy, who is a great teacher, shares her expertise with us and we do it. I think we could do it better if we had some sort of resources available, but what might be here is in Russian. That won’t help us!

We are having a good time and working hard. In some cases the purpose of teaching English is to better prepare pastors who will be working with more and more English speaking pastors, in others the purpose is to draw non-believers to the churches. In the villages the purpose is to help grow the local church. And with our couple we work with, it's to help them be prepared to move to the United States.

Riotous Times

We don't know if you have kept up with the world news, but here in Ukraine is a bit of a fuss over the government issues. The president has fired the entire parliment and they are protesting, so we were encouraged to avoid the downtown part of Kiev. Ron, Brandy and Steph were exploring the city and stopped by to see the riot sights. It was relatively calm because of the coming holiday, but the tents were up and people had signs communicating something in Russian/Ukranian that was important to them!

As these three wandered the city, they traveled the Metro and, like moles, occassionally came to the surface to see where they were. In this way, they saw the upside and the downside of Kiev. They enjoyed the Metro system - Ron says, "it was a blast!" Not that they knew where they were, but they learned to use the Metro and found their way home without problem.

I stayed with Valari and the kids. We had a quiet day of visiting and playing with the kids! Easter was a good time in Kiev.

American Excess

We have to confess to our excess issues in Kiev. There are 23 McDonalds in Kiev, TGI Fridays and Baskin and Robins! Don't misunderstand we tried to visit all of them while we were there. It was good to see American food (especially with lettuce) and the confession continues. We did visit five McDonalds while we were in Kiev. There are none in Cernauti. But the ice cream was a major treat!

Kiev

Jonathan and Emma were sweet children and it was a joy to visit with Slavic and Valari and compare information about living in Eastern Europe. The top center picture is the view outside Valari's apartment window. After the ten hour bus ride to Kiev, we had a day of rest then we were off to the city to explore! The last five pictures were taken in the city near the WWII memorial. Note that we are sitting on these fancy soviet tanks, it sure seems strange to me! Kiev is a beautiful city and is growing and changing rapidly. It's amazing that when we were first in Kiev it was so different, now it looks like any major city in Europe.

This is a mini-tour of Brandy and Steph's trip to Dranita last weekend. They had a good time in our village. They wandered the old soviet part of the village and came back with "wonderous tales of intrigue" in Dranita! Including secret information left behind!

Silas working

This is our team leader here in Ukraine, Silas. He is leading by example, he is ironing his own shirt for church the next day because it is appropriate to look as if you ironed your clothing in Eastern Europe and no one volunteered to do it for him!

Good job Silas!

Visiting in Dranita

This is the family we are teaching English who is moving to Minnesota in the fall. On the couch is Anatol, our team leader, Silas, me, Anatol's oldest son, Mark and his wife, Vernica, with Eric in her lap!

Borders, borders, and borders

Interesting. In the United States we travel from state to state without thinking much about the border. If you are on vacation, you might take a picture of the sign that welcomes you to the new state, but that all there is to it. In Europe, the borders are different. Although the countries are smaller than many states they have firm, uncrossable borders. The border between Ukraine and Romania is electrified, barbed wired, and about ten feet high. And every several kilometers there is a little border station, where there is a little border guard with a big gun.

This is too fun!

Like all of Eastern Europe, if you get sick you go to the local pharmacy and buy the antibiotic the internet recommends for a specific illness, which you have diagnosed yourself. Well, Steph was sick with a very, very sore throat and was positive it was Strep, so we looked up the correct antibiotic and she went out to buy it. After two tries, she did get Penicillian, but the only available form is in the injection. I got to show her and Brandy how to give injections. This was the most fun you could imagine. I never knew that my opportunity to stab a needle into another person would come on the mission field. God is so good! This is us in our tiny kitchen experimenting on other human beings.

Dranita

Punk Rocker Chicken

Mashutkas and Buses

Things we see that make no sense to an American.

A train track. Fully operational. And a lady standing on it about a mile from the main road. She just walked down the train track. So I wondered, was she just waiting for the train to pick her up? Maybe she was hitchhiking!

Riding buses becomes common place, but last night I saw something new. A lady got on the bus quickly and saved a seat for her husband (he was smoking and later in line). He came and she got up so that he could sit next to the window. She sat down again, until the bus was full and moving forward – then she stood up next to her seat holding on to it for dear life but never giving it up for someone to sit in. I just don’t understand!

Something that has become familiar to us, but isn’t possible in America is the crowding of the buses and mashutkas. The seats fill quickly and then it’s standing room only and people don’t mind touching others so they pack-em in! The mashutkas all have the bars that are attached to the ceiling so that you can hold on to something (like a short person can reach them) and although these large vans have 13-17 seats, to put maybe 30-35 people on is not uncommon. We got used to them in Moldova and they are here also, but . . . most of the people speak Ukrainian on these buses. So what is it they are saying to me most of the time? I don’t want to know! Ignorance is bliss!

Buses are the subject many, if not most, of our conversations. But I have to say, every time I see Mike on a mashutka, I have to laugh, he is too tall to pass for a European! He doesn’t fit. Sorry Mike!

By the way, this marvelous picture is of a "real" bus, the one from Cernauti to Chisinau!

Tickets to Draniţă

And so, we have to tell you about buying tickets and taking the bus to Draniţă. Vitale was worried that would couldn’t figure out the difficult trip to Draniţă so, he devised a good plan to get us there by bus, but without trouble. He doesn’t undersstand that language is only a part of the life we lead! So, in his remarkable kindness, he gave Steph a note saying something about helping us get to Draniţă in Russian. The first trial of the note came at the bus station. I asked the woman working there if she spoke Romanian – BUT she didn’t. So, I said Bus and Chisinau. The route to Chisinau leads right by Draniţă, she gives me a paper with the numbers 33 rph (that’s the cost in Ukrainian money). I’m thinking this is expensive, but Steph holds up the cute little Russian sign Vitale made us. The lady smiled and held up a paper saying 11 rph. And we bought tickets. This was almost a wordless deal. It worked, now we had tickets and could find the bus, but that was the first try on the paper deal. We found the correct bus (praise the Lord, its sign was in Romanian and Russian. We walk up to the driver and he says something in Russian. We ask if he speaks Romainian. . . you guessed again, he didn’t. But Steph pulled out her little note! He smiles and motions us to wait. We waited in the cold rain for 20 minutes and then his helper man helped us find seats in the back of the almost full bus and motioned for us to stay there. Then he took our tickets. Okay, we are on a bus bound for Moldova, a country we are temporarily exiled from, and we are at the mercy of a little magic piece of paper. About an hour later the little helper man came to back of the bus and motioned for the magic note, looked at it and motioned that we could get our stuff, the bus stopped and we got off. . . in Draniţă! It was so exciting to have arrived with the help of a cute Russian sign. And we didn’t get stuck at the Moldovan border being kicked out once again! God is Good!

Where in the world are we!

Here we are!

Cernauti is Chernivtsi in Russian, sorta.

Okay, as Americans we draw the attention of others. We are on exhibit 24/7. That is very interesting, but what is hard is we know so little Russian! We can’t even buy a pizza without it being an adventure! So, last night, Mike went to buy pizzas for Ron’s Birthday party and planned on getting three, cheese, Canadian bacon with cheese, and Canadian bacon with pineapple. Brandy told him which one on the list she thought it might be and Mike bought them. However, he ended up with the cheese pizza, the Canadian bacon with cheese pizza, and a calzone stuffed with ham and mushrooms! It was to die for! It was so good! But not what he planned! However, keep in mind that for six Americans who can read NO Russian to buy pizzas and get pizza is impressive, since the staff speak only Ukrainian or Russian. No English here. No Romanian here! We are often in trouble! God has been so good to us. The pizza here is the best we’ve had in Europe.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY RON!

This is a picture of Mike and Myra's birthday card! It was so fun and yes, he is the reason this group is not lost ALL the time!

Last week Brandy and Steph planned the best party. It was a surprise party for Ron’s birthday. We had pizza, ice-cream cake, balloons and a super great time. The best part of the surprise was two-fold. Brandy didn’t let me forget! Matt, she was taking your job because she knew it was important to you that Dad’s birthday would be remembered and she also knew that left to me, I might just forget or not get around to planning it. However, the best part of the surprise was that it was a day early! Ron knew his birthday would be lost in the typical busyness of splitting up and getting to the villages so he had no plans or thoughts about it. But we had the party the night before! Birthdays are soooooo fun! Brandy’s mom and Steph’s mom . . . you have much to be proud of. I thank you for the gift of your daughters. Thank you for sending them for a “time such as this”.

fun

Village where we teach English

These are some of the children who are learning English in Dranita. They are the best behaved children we have ever worked with. We did have to break tradition and have the boys sit on the same side as the girls because it was too difficult to show pictures on two sides of the church. Steph is the main teacher and we help. There are about 30 children every weekend.

We have to post this picture – A FART CAR!

Our Cernauti team

Cute Girls

I just want to post a few pictures. . . This is Stephanie, Andrea and Brandy

Snow Angels

In Ukraine, we had a beautiful snow. All snow is beautiful the first time and before it melts and becomes nasty, but this was beautiful. So, Ron, Brandy, Mihaela, Andrea, Stephanie, and I went for a walk, but we got nowhere before the girls attacked with snowballs. I quickly grabbed the camera and Ron defended the male species. It was so funny! The girls did not win, let me say this first, most often they ran from him, and it was four against one! But Ron did have to work hard to keep up with them. It was more fun than with the boys, the boys would have wounded egos if their dad beat them this badly, but the girls just had a great time. When it was over, I reminded Brandy about what Dad said in my last email. Life is short, when it snows, make snow angels! So she did!

We went on a "walk about". Ron believes the only way to know where we are is to walk it as much as possible, so we walked to the city. This is before Mike and Myra came, because they are smarter then the others. They would have waited for the bus. On the road, we had many adventures, but the funnest is when the girls found these three trees and decided to pose! Shortly after I was taking a picture of a fabulous house when I got road sprayed by a passing dump truck. I was very angry at first, but realized that since I was terribly hot, it was nice and cool! It was however, very ugly on my black pants once the mud dried. We found a marvelous grocery store, bought food, and took a trolley and bus home. It was a great day!

So life is funny, huh?! Well, we got together at 7:00 to leave for the bus on Saturday. We made sure that most of our luggage for the next three months was ready to put in Silas’ and Mike’s car. Mike and Silas were going to drive so that we had cars available for use while we were out of the country. So, five of us take the mashutka to the bus station and the real adventure (for us) begins. We walk by several buses that look likely that do not say Chisinau/Cernauti. We keep looking and finally find an old, ugly bus that from a distance, Andrea, Brandy’s friends says, “with our luck we will be riding that one.” How prophetic. The seats were close together, and were narrow, but that was the good part, at least we were close to our seatmates . . . because it appeared that the bus had no heat. There was ice on the inside of the windows, but one would assume that once the bus got going it would warm up. Stephanie and Andrea went to look for something to eat and in a short time we were underway. The further we went, the colder the bus was. There was a heater by the driver and his assistant, but the driver was a smoker so the window had to be open also. I truly was thankful for the huge down-filled coat that I have (thanks mom!). We made several stops and learned that while the bus was idling at bus stops it would actually warm up (relatively, we mean that it was not so cold), so we began to pray for many stops! We arrived at the border at 4:00 and found ourselves questioned by the border patrol (yes, the Americans held up the rest of the bus) and once on the other side we were met by the man who was the Bishop of the Baptist union who was working with Silas for our time in Ukraine.

Well, although it was cold, the van was nice and we waited for Silas and Mike to arrive at the border. We saw them come, and then we saw them turn around and leave. That was not good. It would appear that their papers were not in order for their cars. So, the nice man from the Baptist union went over to the other side of the border and tried to help them. The best they could do was make arrangements for us to walk to the cars (they allowed them to come closer) and get our most important suitcases and walk them back to the van. In the process we learned that we weren’t very cold before. BECAUSE WE TRULY FROZE during this time!

So, Silas left Mihaela with us and left to go back to Chisinau with Mike to get passports for their cars! Now, all of this was very stressful, but I have to ask, did you read that last sentence? THEY NEED PASSPORTS FOR THEIR CARS. Inanimate objects need passports. Very funny. So ends that little story.

Next story, we can’t stay here in this place very long, we have to make a decision about what we will do tomorrow in the absence of Silas, our leader with the assistance of his fiancé who is Romanian but just continues with the conversation without checking to see if we are following. She is learning English.

As soon as I can upload the pictures from my camera, we will post the one of Stephanie, Andrea, and Brandy keeping warm on the bus. Brandy laid across the other two girls for most of the trip! They were actually warm much of the time, except their feet.

We are being cared for well, here in Cernauti but must make decisions soon. Thanks for reading this email and praying for this rag—tag team of Americans wandering around in Eastern Europe. And pray for us to begin to understand the basics of Russian!