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I rarely post unprocessed images, but I have to wrap up my trip coverage quickly so I can move on with life back home! I came home with such a new mindset and focus! Things I used to think were necessary are seeming so frivolous, and little things that seemed cumbersome are looking quite a bit more important and worth while. Right now I want to spend time with my kids, and that's more important than perfect looking pictures, so you'll have to forgive the lack of zing in these shots!
Here's some Romanian countryside, and a few of the sunflowers we saw in fields and bunches everywhere.
 If it says ANYTHING about how huge it was, James couldn't finish it! Matt and Sarah in their fedoras.
 Rich got tired of walking so he called upon his two slave boys for assistance.
 This street performer looked like an interesting picture until he asked me for money when I was done. I was a little befuddled...I don't often have to pay my subjects to take their pictures. lol
 James being...James.
 We walked down the banks of the Danube looking for our tour boat. We were hoping this wasn't it!
 Thankfully, THIS was our tour boat station and the boat was quite nice.
 The view was incredible. The bridge and the buildings were all lit up.
 This is the Citadel, way up on the hill
 The water reflected the lights from all the huge, century-old buildings. Amazing.
 This is the royal palace.
 Several beautiful bridges spanned the Danube.
 This is the Parliament. The building itself is as old, if not older, than our country.
 On our walk home we saw this gorgeous church.
 I wish I'd had a tripod on me for this shot. It's not bad for a 1 second hand held exposure, but I had visions of it being a lot better.
 A little of the diversity in the city.
 This is what James and I had for breakfast. It was SO yummy.
 Had to take a picture of the money before we changed it and left.
I can't wrap this up without adding some personal thoughts about our trip. My mind is still reeling with all that we saw and experienced. Coming home feels so strange. We had no idea how blessed we were to live in such a free country, where freedom has been our motto for such a long time! We don't realize how quickly and easily it can be snatched away from us. Other countries of the world have a much better understanding of it's fragility.
Materialistically, we are gluttons. It makes me want to come home and open the doors of my house and allow my house to just VOMIT STUFF. Sorry to be so graphic, but that's exactly how I feel. We spend so much of our lives rearranging stuff, managing stuff, earning stuff, buying stuff, selling stuff, organizing stuff, rotating our stocks of stuff, displaying stuff...it's all just so overwhelming. I want to live more freely, less addicted to my stuff. And I want to put my entire focus where it should be...on a personal relationship with Jesus because that's the only thing that matters.
I hope that each and every one of you has the chance to someday expand your world view and experience what I did. It will truly change your life.
First of all, good answer Julie! :) I love it. I'll pass that along to Jonathan as soon as he gets home from the morning service. We were all given the option to stay home this morning and most of us took advantage of that, but he was up at 7am so he could go. He really does love it here. That's the part we're not joking about. And Pastor Tim has encouraged him that he needs some young help. Not THAT young, but young. He should probably finish school first. lol
Pastor Pete is concerned that some may get the impression that there's a lot of flirting going on. Let me clarify the humor in all of this. The gypsies are very flirtatious with us Americans. I've had to pull women away from my husband a number of times. We flash our rings and indicate WE'RE MARRIED. Everyone is being responsible in their behaviour, trying to remain friendly while being firmly understood. There's just a lot of teasing because certain gypsy individuals have gravitated to certain team members. In some cases, there's not too much argument, but we're all making a group effort not to ENCOURAGE this behaviour. In the slideshows we're doing today, we're specifically excluding pictures of gypsy girls with our guys, and visa versa, so they don't get any wrong ideas.
We had a beautiful day yesterday for the baptism. Martzihaz is a brand new church so they still meet in someone's home. This is the family's back yard. They set up a swimming pool and filled it with water by repeatedly carrying LARGE jars of water back and forth from the pump. Our guys helped with that and were QUITE worn out.
 The ones in white are the people who got baptized.
 Pastor Tim preached and Pastor Pete gave a few words of encouragement as well.
 This little kid was PICTURE PERFECT sitting off to the side watching the service. The lighting was awesome, everything was just perfect, I couldn't have posed it better if I had tried.
 Each person gave their testimony. Several of them cried, one wailed. It was very emotional for them.
 Pastor Pete and Pastor Tim dunked them. The first time down, Pastor Pete hit his teeth on Pastor Tim's head. :) We're going to check Tim's head for teeth marks later. lol
 I won't take the time to post each of the baptisms, but here's a couple more shots, chosen at random.
  Afterwards, they greeted each other with kisses, hugs, and tears.
 Each person was given a Bible and prayed for.
 Tomorrow we leave here and head to Budapest for a day of tourism, including a boat ride down the Danube, I believe. We're all a little sad to leave. Tonight we'll be saying goodbye at the church services and for some of us, that will be the last time we see these people until heaven. I believe others will meet again, and maybe soon. :) I may not be able to blog tomorrow...don't know if our hotel room in Budapest will have an internet connection. This may be the last post of the trip. If so, lots of love to everyone. We'll see you soon! I can't wait to hug my boys! I miss you SO much!
OH SO TIRED! This morning we did pretty much nothing, which felt really good. Tonight we had the baptism at Martzihaz which we JUST got back from (it's 11:30pm). It was a wonderful experience, but there's not much of a point in explaining it without the pictures, so I will blog that tomorrow. Wanted to just say hello to everyone and thanks so much for all your encouraging comments. Jonathan would still like to hear from his Mommy. lol. Hope everyone knows we're just (half) joking about all that. Ciao.
We're all gathered around the blog this morning, reading comments and looking at the pictures together before we move on to the activities of the day. We have a quick question for Julie...can Jonathan stay here and be a missionary intern? He feels like he has finally found his calling in life, caring for the gypsy children and finding a future "esposa" who is using her talents to serve the Lord. She's 14 and is one of the most responsible individuals (including adults) that lives in this village. He has Chrissy's blessing (and encouragement, and maybe forceful implementation). We just need you to say yes, to agree to all this, and we'll be leaving him here. Chrissy is going to take on his full support, so you don't need to worry about that. Really. We're serious. Ciao. Big bro James is excited about this. He thinks he needs extra room at home for friends to come over more often. LOL.
This morning was rainy, but once again we were blessed with dry weather once we arrived at VBS. The team occupied the kids outside while others set stuff up inside. Each person has a different method of entertaining children...
Jonathan spins them.
 Cody throws them... 
(normally I wouldn't save a picture that's so out of focus, but this one makes me LAUGH OUT LOUD!)
...Martha hugs them...
...Sam and James make them run till they can't run anymore (by CAN'T I mean Sam and James).
 Kara, Lena, and Martha did face painting this morning, which was a huge hit.
 Pastor Pete helping out one of the smaller kids who couldn't figure it out...
 Then we did the Limbo...
 Meanwhile, behind us these little teeny tiny kids were pushing a cart up and down the street. It was positively adorable. I won't post my FAVORITE shot because I don't want to offend anyone, but the little guy with the saggy drawers was losing them at one point...it was SO funny. He had to keep stopping to hike them up. Those are actually bright green tights!
 Cody has become particularly attached to a little guy named David (Da-VEED!). They are just inseperable. Today David couldn't be at VBS for some reason, but afterwards, he saw Cody and just RAN up to him yelling and screaming. I think a few tears will be shed over this one when we have to leave. We're all calling our bets.
 This little scene made me think of the Little Rascals. The little girl's pants needed to be held up, but she was so serious while she was talking to her friends. It made me laugh.
 It's always crowded when it's time to leave...
 And here we are at Cheriu for the 2nd half of our day...
 James is holding this sweet little blind girl.
 It's laundry day at this house!
 At Cheriu we did relay races with the big balls.
 We have had a couple people sick, but nothing serious. Kari and Chrissy stayed home today, Kara and Martha were feeling a little under the weather, but carried on. I'm noticing a sore throat coming on...but I don't think it will slow me down much. A few personal comments: Corban and Jadon we LOOOOVE you and miss you SOOOO much! Can't wait to hear all about your week. Mom and Dad, thanks for spoiling them this week. Isaac...I love you. Hope you're not too lonely. No, you may NOT. Don't even think about it. Katie...I'm seeing a lot of horses, but no cows on hills. It's just not the same. Marka: I'm still waiting for my shipment! Would you put a rush on that please? Parents of all our teens: Do you have dowry's? That info would be handy...email me with figures. lol
It's incredible. I keep saying I'm going to post FEWER pictures tomorrow, and yet it always ends up that I post MORE. This is crazy long. Lest you think I'm just insane, I am trying to post pictures of as many team members as possible, in addition to artistic pictures and pictures that explain what we're doing. Temporarily, this is a multi-purpose blog. I already wrote a little about yesterday, so I'm just going to quickly caption each of these pictures. I have to make a disclaimer...I process pictures on my own computer and I post them on the Fink's, so now that I'm here on theirs I'm noticing some of the pictures look a little dark. I am in a huge hurry so I'm not going to go back and fix them. Too much work. Right now it's quantity over quality. Children watching us through the window as we get set up for VBS.
 The view of the village of Oserhei from the church (the gypsy camp is outside the village)
 This little girl was soundly beaten by her mother for disobeying. In this picture she's happy, but later on I found her looking a little swollen in the face and very sad. Laurie told me that she had brought her baby brother or sister back to Mom so she could color during craft time, but Mom told her to keep the baby with her. She walked away so Mom came over, pulled her out of the church and hit her in the head a few times, so hard that her headband went flying. I was so sad for her.
 A few of the kids are barefoot and on these cold mornings, it just breaks my heart. We are all bundled up in sweatshirts and sweaters but being barefoot doesn't phase them.
 Also of interest...these are the feet of a little boy.
 This kid has earned the nickname "cowboy" because that was his English word that he kept repeating when we first arrived. We think he really likes cowboys and was calling our guys American cowboys, or something. But it stuck, and he's a favorite. He's the son of the church deacon.
 A face I will not soon forget.
 Tug of war.
 I asked Lena if she made them cry or if she just attracted screaming kids. :) 2nd day in a row that poor Lena gets a naughty one. But look at her handling it with grace and dignity. :)
 Chrissy has a Little House on the Prairie moment.  Matt (the MAP'er staying with the Finks right now) found his gypsy double.
 Some interesting variation of Red Rover.
 Red Rover, Red Rover, send ALL the gypsy kids back over!
 Pastor Pete watches from a safe distance. :)
 Here's one for the National Geographic collection.
 Cody led games. He who has the whistle rules the world here.
 Some beautiful faces...
 Sam hands out crayons...
 Darrin puts his talents to good use and designs church pews that the guys will hopefully have a chance to build before they leave. They found out that lumber for the project was EXHORBITANTLY priced (like $15/board!!!) so we may just make enough for the new church in Martihaz.
 Rich doing what Rich does best.
 The school teacher in Chrissy definitely comes in handy.
 Cody shares his Dad's gift for loving children.
 A cute Lena/Bethany moment.
 The kids have figured out that I can turn the camera around now, so I may appear a little more frequently.
 Chrissy teaching a little girl to fold her hands during prayer. Me teaching her that it's cute to have her eyes open for a picture. WOOPS!
 Several of the kids have learned our names, but Sam is one that we hear a lot. They like Sam.
 A few other team member portraits
 We went to Cowboy's house today. They have a TV and their house seems to be one of the nicer ones in the village.
 The man looking at the camera is Joseif, Cowboy's dad, the deacon. I really like him...he seems so kind and faithful.
 The house from the outside.
 Cowboy says that Josh is Superman and that he is the Hulk.
 Classic cuteness.
 Things we would never get used to seeing no matter how long we were here...
 This is a closeup of the previous picture so you can see the little girl playing in this courtyard all by herself.
 The "playdoh."
 The kids never want us to leave. I can't remember the word for "Be CAREFUL" but we scream it out the windows as we pull away every day.
 Driving over to Cheriu, I saw this gypsy woman walking past a Romanian man. It's such a mix of worlds, all in such close proximity.
 I love this picture. It just looks so quaint.
 The response when I told this girl to say "Funk-ay!"
 Darrin the architect still working hard on the bench designs.
 Chrissy's voice was gone from laryngitis, so Martha told the lesson and Chrissy did the flannelgraf and sideshow theatrics.
 They come to him like the pied piper...
 Just to prove, our feet get just as dirty as the gypsies!
 Not all the work is exciting, but somebody's got to do it.
 Bethany gives a little girl a cracker.
 I don't believe this needs any explanation...
 Ok, THIS one does...if you click on this picture to enlarge it, you'll see the kid way off in the distance. He's walking down the road with a blanket over his head. I couldn't get out there fast enough to get a direct shot, but I really love it this way anyways...one of my favorites.
 Another fav...
 Lena stealing Rich's job...
 EWWWWWWWW.
 Staying in line...or trying anyways...
 Guys against girls tug of war.
 The human wall...if they didn't do this, the kids would root for their team by running to the end of the rope, grabbing on and joining in.
 Cody and Jonathan against all the girls...the boys won.
 ...and the girls went sprawling all over.
 Pastor Tim, however, was not so lucky. He lost his footing right away and the girls totally won.
 Pastor Tim's hat for the day.
 Jail time.
 Jump rope didn't go over so well. Surprisingly, none of them knew how to do it.
 So Rich tried to show them how it was done. He doesn't know how either.
 Sour grapes, sweet faces.
 This man is crippled and gets around very slowly. We found him in the church playing the keyboard after VBS and went in to hear for awhile.
 He asked Kara to play, so she shared a song with him for a few minutes.
 Mihiala is one of the girls who helps us out with crowd control and translation. She's enjoys trying out her english with us.
 A gypsy wagon
 The Fink's neighborhood is under major road construction so every day when we wake up, we have no idea if we'll be able to get through or not. We often experience major delays, but so far we've been able to get through. Thankfully the gypsy's really have no sense of time, so if we're late, OH WELL. This is one element in yesterday's obstacle course...a huge pile of dirt in the middle of the road. That's Pastor Pete's van navigating in front of us.
 The evening service musical team. The guy on the accordian is the gypsy pastor.
 The middle of the street...yep, that's where we all were.
 During the service, a wagon came through, and just drove right through our service. Kinda funny.
 Pastor Tim is a dynamic preacher and I couldn't help thinking it's just PERFECT for the gypsies. He really speaks to them and relates to them.
 Darrin soooo wants to bring this one home. We're going to check his luggage before we leave for stray children.
Well, this is going to be brief. It's 10:30 and I'm in a hurry! We had an evening service tonight, that was amazing, but our day was one thing to the next, to the next until this very moment. In fact, we came home and the rest of the team is packing candy bags for all the kids, so I'm skipping out of the "next thing" to give you this brief update. Pastor Tim needs the internet tonight for important business, so I want to make sure I'm off the computer early enough that he's not up later than necessary. I will post pictures tomorrow for both days. Tomorrow night some are going to the service but others are staying home...I'm planning to stay home and work on my projects. I'm having a hard time keeping up! I've already taken almost 3000 pictures, about 2000 of which are "good." It takes several hours a day to load them, go through them, tweak them, save them, shrink them, and blog them! And I'm at about 5 hours of video footage as well. I'm going to join the gypsy circus with my juggling act! Hightlights: No rain today! YAY! VBS in Oserhei went well. Chrissy and Martha gave the lesson, Cody did games, Rich handled babies and behaviour issues...as usual. Today the kids at Oserhei were a little more wild than normal. Usually they're the more well behaved village. They weren't bad, just tired us out a little more than usual and we were tired to start with! As much as I love taking pictures of them, I am getting a little tired of taking the SAME children's pictures for the zillionth time. I usually delete what I don't want as I go so I don't use up memory space that I don't need. My camera has become part of the activity time...I have a herd of children around me at all times yelling "Poser, Poser!" which means "Picture, Picture!" I have to eventually yell "GATTA! GATTA!" which means "Enough! Enough!" They're quick learners, though, and they'll go grab a team member and say, "Poser, Poser" and of course, how can I turn down a picture of THAT? lol. They bring me their baby brothers and sisters in an attempt to get me to take more pictures. As we are all packed in the van, they are still up against the windows, some still asking for posers. I got tired of hearing "poser" after awhile and started telling them to say "Schnazzy" or "Funky" instead. We're quite amused because now they think those words have something to do with pictures. The next Americans to visit will wonder why these kids are running around yelling, "Schnazzy, schnazzy! Funky, Funky!" lol While we're on the topic of language, it's funny when the kids pull out some English from time to time. One boy told us he was Michael Jackson. Another child said, "I love you, baby." One little girl sweetly told Martha, "I love you, in the Lord." Occasionally they'll say "hi" or "bye bye" or "Thank you." And they're so proud of themselves. It's adorable. But I think my favorite will still be schnazzy and funky. You'll have to see the video footage to appreciate it...they sound like little birds chirping out the words...hilarious. Cheriu VBS was once again out of hand for game time. We had to send a number of kids "CASA" (home) because they would not listen. Cody and James had to hold a couple children captive so they wouldn't interfere with the games. We were attempting tug of war and jump rope. And there was a loose form of Red Rover at one point too...which basically consisted of lining up the men with their arms linked and sending the kids running down the hill to see if they could break through in masses. It was amusing. And wore them out for a few minutes. After VBS today, the children in Oserhei decided it was playdoh day! And yes, you can just imagine what their playdoh is made of. Very thick mud, which is not always just dirt! Mmmmm. They take it and make little bowl shaped objects out of it and then throw it down on the road so that the air pocket makes a loud popping noise. I love the creativity of it and that they amuse themselves, but I still had a difficult time stomaching the concept in general. We were invited into another home tonight, I have pictures I will share tomorrow. The service tonight was really cool. We were back at Cheriu and Pastor Tim's good friend, a gypsy pastor, visted and his team gave a musical presentation (he invited our girls to give an impromptu musical number, which they did quite nicely). The church members brought out their church pews and set them in the street. Others stood outside their front gates and watched. A few horse drawn wagons came during the service, one went right through the middle, the other was polite and went around. I loved hearing the authentic gypsy music...so beautiful and moving. As promised, Leevu was not around today, but we DID see him in town, driving his horse drawn wagon on his way home from wherever he was. He waived. We tease Sarah mercilessly. But she would like everyone to know that the moment she found out that he may have misconstrued her friendliness (and that in their culture, things are taken much more seriously), she made it quite clear that she is not interested. That's her story and she's stickin' to it. lol Well, time for me to go to bed. I was falling asleep standing up. Time to get one good night's rest before our last day of VBS tomorrow. Thanks for all your prayers and your comments...the team enjoyed hearing. It was a topic of discussion at lunch...Who left comments? What did they say? Did so and so comment on this picture? :) GATTA! GATTA!
First of all, I'd like to REALLY thank everyone who's leaving comments! We
love to read them and know that people are praying for us! If any of you
parents are reading, feel free to leave a note...I'll pass it along to the
kids! Every night at and after dinner, they all want to see the pictures I
took and find out (and vote on) which ones I'll be blogging. They'd love
to hear what you think of what they're doing.
Our day this morning started out COLD and RAINY. This was a direct answer
to prayer. I smile as I type this. We prayed that it would not rain today
because the rain makes EVERYTHING ten times harder (read: muddier),
especially for our VBS in Cheriu because the church building is SOOOO
small (imagine your master bedroom with 65 dirty little children in it).
And yet, the rain today WAS an answer to prayer because, as Pastor Tim
pointed out, sometimes God says yes, sometimes he says no, and sometimes
he says wait. Today, we were relieved to find out that he didn't say no,
he said wait. By the time we arrived at our first VBS, the rain had slowed
to a drizzle and by the time we got to Cheriu in the afternoon, the sun
was out. We may face more rain in the next couple of days, but if we do,
we know God has a purpose for it and our job is to do the best with what
we're given. But today we were grateful!
So even though we packed for sunshine and 80 degrees, we pulled out and
shared what long sleeved shirts, hoodies, and jackets we had between the
team and the missionaries and bundled up for rainy and 65...here's Kara
braving the elements with a grin...
Here's Sam, carrying on in his steady, happy way.
Rich picked up right where he left off at home...holding anyone's baby that
a Mama would hand over. We're all quite used to seeing Rich with a baby in
his arms, but it was still cute, photo- worthy, and above all, INTERESTING.
Because Rich = INTERESTING.
(this child was trying to run off with a whole cup full of crayons and was
throwing a temper tantrum. Poor Lena couldn't contain him, so finally one
of the men had to come along and help her out. We were laughing at her
because sweet Lena WOULD be the one to get the ONLY out of control child).
During prayer time (and story time, and craft time, and game time, for
that matter) the kids are usually really chatty and distracted. But I
caught this little boy intently praying today and my heart just melted. I
can't even tell which boy it is from this picture, and I don't remember,
but tonight before I go to bed, I'm going to pray that God keeps his heart
focused and tender.
Ok, HERE'S a story for you. Remember Leevu? Well, yesterday Sarah told Leevu
that she could have beat him in that race if she didn't have a skirt (she
quickly rephrased that before the translator threw that out
there...LOL!). Seeing as THAT was not an option, she decided to even things
up by bringing HIM a skirt today. Chrissy delivered the challenge and Leevu
decided making a complete idiot of himself was worth it for the attention of
the lovely Sarah.
He even colored her a picture during craft time. Of
course, he doesn't write english, so the writing is all compliments of
Chrissy. That does not, however, make it any less true.
I have to say that the skirt didn't affect the outcome
of the race, even after several attempts. No pictures, just video footage.
Sarah, if you'd like to watch Leevu LEAVE YOU in his dust, catch me later.
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This is a picture I took of Chila before we left. She's SUCH a sweetie. I will miss her.
Chrissy gets a little more TLC from Maria before we take off.
Our group
In Budapest we saw some impressive and historical sites.
Sam, Sarah, Kari, Jonathan, and Matt (the Missionary Apprentice)
This is the Baptist guest house we stayed in for one night.
It was set up much like a dorm, with sitting areas and rooms with multiple single beds.
It had beautiful courtyards, but we were wishing it had an ELEVATOR! lol
We climbed these stairs a few more times than we cared to. Some of us were on the top floor, which I think was 5 or 6 stories up. Not sure.
Homeless guy sleeping in his car...
For dinner we ate at a fabulous restaurant called Rustico. They had a gourmet Italian and Hungarian menu. Jonathan really got into his goose leg.
This was Bethany's food...green Ravioli. It was AWESOME (I got to sneak a bite)
James (my James) goose leg dinner.
My own meal: duck in walnut raisin sauce. YUMMY.
Beautiful food...love the colors!
Cody polished off his HUGE personal pizza.
This street performer looked like an interesting picture until he asked me for money when I was done. I was a little befuddled...I don't often have to pay my subjects to take their pictures. lol
Thankfully, THIS was our tour boat station and the boat was quite nice.
The view was incredible. The bridge and the buildings were all lit up.
This is the Citadel, way up on the hill
Several beautiful bridges spanned the Danube.
These children's eyes are amaaaazing. I love them.
