“Hey Emily, do you wanna go find the village store with me?”
I was asked this question by my friend Seth sometime within the first couple of hours of our arrival to our home for the month: Sistarovat, Romania.
We had just finished taking a 10 hour long overnight train from the nation’s capital, Bucharest, to one of the nearest cities to our home, Arad. We were originally supposed to hop off of the train at an even closer city, Radna… butttttt, we missed our stop (oops). This travel-fail added an hour long taxi ride from Arad to Sistarovat to our travel day. So, needless to say, we were all exhausted by the time we arrived at our new home that afternoon.
Within the first hour or so on the property, everyone had passed out sleeping except for Seth and me. Which brought us to the opening question of this story: “Hey Emily, do you wanna go find the village store with me?”
“Sure, why not?” was my response, as I’m sure you had anticipated.
So, we grabbed our wallets, put on our shoes, and began to walk in what we thought was the right direction, with the dogs from our property following closely behind.
& Walk we did.
We found the local store within minutes, bought something to snack on, and decided to keep exploring the small village that would be our home for the month.
We then found a small park that looks like it came straight out of the 90’s. We stopped and hung out there for a little, but soon decided that there was more exploring to be had.
So we continued to walk past a few homes to the top of a hill that gave us an amazing view of the village. After admiring the land for a few minutes and having a quick conversation about the communism that once overtook Eastern Europe, we decided to keep going.
Next, we walked past a beekeeper. A FREAK-ING BEEKEEPER! How cool, I thought those guys only existed in the movies or on tv. As you can imagine, I got really excited and forced Seth to stop and watch this man at work for a few minutes (interesting fact: there are tons of bees in our village, so beekeeping is a pretty common thing here).
After a short time, we decided to keep on trekking, for we had just realized that we were getting pretty close to the other camp in the village that was run by Scottish missionaries. Finding the other camp quickly became a game for us, so we decided that we wouldn’t stop until we got there.
After walking another half-mile or so, we found ourselves stepping onto the land we had been searching for. We quickly found a few of the Scots working on the property and struck up conversation with them that ended up being the beginning of a really cool friendship we have developed with them over the past few weeks. They quickly invited us to their house for a Bible study they were having in a half hour, so we decided to swing by for a few minutes. I’m not sure if we knew just how beautiful of a situation we were about to walk into.
When we arrived at their home, we stepped inside and found a group of 20 or so missionaries from both Scotland and America hanging out, just simply being in community with one another. We quickly dove into conversation with many of them, hearing about the lives that they lead here in Romania to further God’s kingdom. It was one of the most amazing things that has happened to me on the Race thus far. Hearing stories from these long-term missionaries was so encouraging. Their work ranged from leading worship clinics, to running summer camps for orphans, to rescuing prostitutes from their bondage and giving them an education, to working with the mentally ill. They were so open and honest about the struggles and joys the mission field has held with them. They were so willing to hear our stories in return. They were so inviting and willing to accept us in as part of their family – to enter into a bond of friendship with us, even if it would only be for a month’s time.
The joys that resulted from this friendship with these missionaries are endless and continue to amaze me every day. So cool.
It’s amazing to see what you can find when you decide to leave the walls of your home and explore with an open mind and heart.
Word.
