Life on the Race is such a blessing, but sometimes it is just straight up funny and we never know what to expect.
My team headed from Thessaloniki, Greece to Bulgaria about week and half ago now. We were to take a bus to Sofia, Bulgaria (4 hours), and then a bus from there to Vidin (another 4ish hours) (again, these were our expectations that we were holding loosely too).
It ended up taking 6 hours on the first bus because we got stuck at the border for 2 hours. When we got to Sofia, the buses weren’t running anymore for the day so we got to take a train!! It was a God-moment though because our host son was headed home for a couple days and he over slept and missed his train and ended up leaving with us. So when we told the pastor we would be running late, his son was able to meet us. And I’m so glad he did! The train system can be confusing (in fact, even Bulgarians are confused) so he helped us find the right trains, find places to sit, etc. When the train would stop for periods of time (like 30 minutes to switch tracks) he would tell us what was going on since he spoke English. But then when we were about 40 minutes away from Vidin, the ticket lady told him and he translated for us that the train would be stopping to help with an emergency in a different village. I’m glad he was there so he could tell us what was going on. So our train stopped and then a bus that was as old as the Communist times picked us and the other stranded passengers up to take us to Vidin. Then we headed to our housing.
At this point it was quite late. We took three taxis to our home where our SQL already was. We immediately noticed it was small, BUT It’s a blessing in that it’s so CLEAN, we have A.C. (a huge blessing we aren’t always guaranteed), are able to cook our own food and we are cooking healthy food this month, have a washing machine (another HUGE blessing), and have hot water for showers. We also are living in community that is more like government housing so we have friendly neighbors we get to minister too.
But, I just have to share two things that are funny with our housing. I say this NOT to complain (because I love our housing!), but to share with you how different life on the Race can be from life back home.
One. Our home is TINY! We have 7 people on our team and then an SQL so we have 8 people in a small, two room house. One room is where four of us sleep and also where we cook and eat meals together. The other room is where the other 4 girls sleep and then the bathroom is separate. Let me show you.
Two. Also, living in this community is neat and the people are very friendly and kind. When our laundry falls off the rack, they knock on our door (or just come in) and tell us. They wave at us, the children want to talk to us, and they are just sweet.
One day we were doing some weeding out front and there were a group of men hanging out by our house (probably where there was shade) where they had set up a table to play cards. Well, while we were weeding, they just kept staring at the white, Americans weeding and it was very funny. However, the neighborhood kids were sweet because we didn’t have gloves so when we got to thistles, we weren’t able to pick them and they got them out for us.
Life on the Race is definitely not typical life, but there are some funny stories and sweet people we get to meet that come from it.
