Day 4 (July 22, 2012)

I had such a good sleep last night. I slept in later and woke up at 7:30 this time. After my shower I went downstairs and had some tea while I wrote my Day 3 blog (yes...these are all written the morning after the actual day). Then I had a granola bar for breakfast and Alegria and I headed outside to wait for Rebecca - she was picking us up at 9:00 to take us to her church. The service was completely in Hungarian. The service started with worship music - all of the songs were unfamiliar melodies and had Hungarian lyrics, but I was able to follow along a little (the words were projected on the wall). I was having trouble keeping my eyes open during the sermon (not because it was boring or because I didn’t understand...just because I was sitting, which always makes me nod off!!). Luckily, another guy that’s affiliated with OM came over to myself and Alegria and translated the whole sermon for us. That was awesome! It was also neat to the on the “other side”...to be the one needing the translator...a different perspective! The church was pretty small, but really neat looking. It had an interesting architectural design (as do many buildings in Hungary!), and the Baptismal pool took up most of the front of the church and was decorated like an outdoor pond with rocks and trees around it. After church one of the older men kept trying to say something to Alegria and myself, but neither of us could understand...and I’m not sure if he realized that we couldn’t understand him or not!

Rebecca's Church

Then we went out for Chinese food (haha...I KNOW!). I had rice because everything else had meat in it. I also had a Kinley (gingerale...but the BEST gingerale I’ve ever tasted!!! Totally not as sweet as our gingerale). After lunch we went to this bakery/ice-cream place and got ice cream cones (which are also WAY better and less sweet than ice-cream in Canada!). Alegria, Rebecca and I had some really nice conversation about our faith walks outside at a table while we ate.

Next we went back to Rebecca’s house, where we met the rest of the team (her daughter-in-law Meaghan, a student of hers named Ana, Attila, our other volunteer who just arrived this morning - Ty, and another lady who works with OM Hungary, but whose name I can’t remember at the moment!). We spent the afternoon planning the first day of camp. It’s going to be awesome! We are starting off with a name game, then I’m leading “Bananas”, then doing some other games like Zip Zap Boing, etc. for the first hour. Then for the next 2 hours we will split up and half will do art with Alegria and half will do music and drama with Rebecca, Meaghan and myself for the first hour, then they switch. The afternoon is basically more art and drama games in order to help us figure out where each camper’s strength lies. By the end of the day we want to be able to cast the show based on the movement, singing and speaking we have observed throughout the day. Tuesday morning will start right in with putting the play together and making sets. I am SO excited. I felt like it was Christmas Eve! It just goes to show how amazing God is! I took this summer off from doing the musical at church, only to find my gifts useful in another country to do the same!

We also discussed our goals of the camp, and beside teaching English and a bit about music, art and drama, the main goal is to be examples of Godly men and women for these teens. Hopefully we will have a lot of opportunities to share our stories and stories about Jesus with them, and we also hope He shines through what we do.

After the planning session Alegria, Rebecca and I went to a store...I forget what it’s called, but apparently it’s all over Europe and England and it’s like Walmart...starts with a T and ends with an O...that’s all I can remember! Ha! We picked up a bunch of supplies for the camp, as well as a few Hungarian chocolate bars, and snacks for us to try. I also grabbed a large bottle of that Kinley gingerale! ;)

The next thing is super funny, but needs some back story. Last night (Saturday), us girls were fed up with our puny fan that sounded like a train. When we were lying in bed Alma wondered out loud, “I wonder if the ‘Arts Guy’ room has any fans...” Alegria and I thought she was brilliant, and got out of bed to check. It turned out there was a tall, quiet fan in there, so we grabbed it and (giggling...) replaced it with our noisy one. It was then the joke of the evening. Ty arrived at about 8:30 this morning and went to sleep. When we saw him at our meeting in the afternoon, we let him in on the joke. Now to the funny part...Ty did not come with us to the store, so he was home for quite awhile before us. We got in to find him reading at a table in the great room. We decided to head upstairs and have our showers. When we entered our room we burst out laughing...because there were 7 fans blowing around in our room! I, of course, took a picture!

7 fans in our room (from Ty)

After our showers Ty, Alegria and I ate dinner together (more of the “whatever you can find in the kitchen” kind of dinner...mine was cheese, popcorn, and bread with hazelnut chocolate spread - the dinner of champions!). We sat for a few hours chatting about our experiences and lives. It was a really nice time together. It is just the three of us all week, as all of the others left for camp in a different part of Hungary this afternoon.

Now I’m just lying in bed typing this...Alegria is scratching her itchy legs. I have no mosquito bites, and she has about 17 of them all over her arms and legs. Plus one bite on her knee that keeps oozing. I told her she probably has leprosy.

Ok...I’d better get some sleep before we start with the kids tomorrow! SO EXCITED!!