We are at the
church waiting now, sitting in the mini bus on this dusty gravel road
in the middle of Somewhere, Romania, with the two of our teams,
Goodness Gracious and Kingdom Unity. We drove all night to meet our
contact here, but they haven’t shown up yet. It’s 5:45 am.
I spent the night
in and out of sleep. Waking up for two or twenty minutes at a time
to witness the shadows of Romanian hills and trees and towns stagger
by dreamily. There were moments when I thought this might be the
most interesting, beautiful place in the world, as we drove in
between the tall, shadowed mountains with their big, leafy pine
trees. I would wake up, bright and alert at least for a moment, and
look at the country which will be my home for the next month. I
would look in awe and wonder at the fact that I was there, that I was
in a bus driving through the mountains of Romania. Romania of all
places!
And then I would
drift back off to sleep in some awkward, neck straining, butt numbing
position.
Our
contact walks toward us. Lit by the headlights of the bus, she is
wearing a brown coat with a fur hood. It is September 1st…
well 2nd
now, and it is cold outside. She speaks to the driver and then gets
into the bus with us.
“Hello,” she
says. “Good to have you here.” Her English is good, only
slightly accented. We drive to the house, the house we’ll be staying
at for the next three weeks or so. Our bones creak as we climb out
of the van and unload our backpacks from the trailer behind the bus,
carrying them into the Hungarian style house. It is white, with a
steep, brown roof and tan, intricately carved woodwork.
Too be continued…
