We left Ukraine on Tuesday October 5th, knowing that we had a long journey ahead of us to get to Macedonia. Little did I know how long.
We started the journey with a 15 hour over night train back to Kiev, Ukraine. Unfortunately that night I got sick and started running fever. We finally get to the train station the next morning to be met by a sweet girl who was giving us a free place to stay that night before we caught the next train. We unloaded all of our stuff and started the 15 minute walk, which turned into 1 1/2 hours. We had to take the Metro (subway) to get to our destination. We all had all of our bags with us and trying to shove into the Metro was not an easy task. There was man who helped me because I had nothing to hold onto so he helped stay upright. Or so I thought, as I exited the Metro I realized that nice man stole my wallet. And I said thank you to him!!
We finally get where we were going and thank you God that it was nice and comfy and heated. I tried to rest so maybe I would start feeling better, got some sleep and got up the next morning to catch the next train at 11 am. This train would be taking us to Belgrade, Serbia, 35 hours.
The first day on the train we watched all 3 Lord of the Rings movies, extended version. Get to bed around 12:30 am then get woken up at 3 am for passport checks as we enter into Hungary. We were there for about 2 hours while customs checks the train. We spend the whole next day travelling and go through another customs and passport check which was of course when I tried to take a nap.
Made it to Belgrade at 9:30, the train from there left at 9:50 and we had not bought our tickets yet. So we run in get our tickets quickly, then run to catch our next train, 10 hours. As the train is leaving the station we go to find our sleeper car when the man demands that we pay him more money before he lets us through. So we basically had to pay the guy for the right to sleep where we had already payed to sleep. Which wasn’t really worth it because you can not sleep on trains.
We finally make it to Skopje where we had another 11/2 hour bus ride to get to Tetovo where we are working this month. Oh yeh, the number for our contact was in my wallet, which got stolen, remember? So off the bus and no where to go. We walk around the town to try and find internet which apparantley they do not have. Finally called my mom back home, at 4:30 am sorry mom, so she could get online and find the number for me. She finally pulled it up and was just about to tell me, literally, and my phone ran out of minutes. Then we went to find a place to buy more minutes and played charades with the lady to try and figure out how to get the minutes on the phone, everything is in Macedonian. Got them on there, called my mom back and got the number. Amen!!
After about 62 hours of travel and 4 days of train rides we finally made it to our ministry and I think this is going to be an amazing month!! After all that I know God has something great in store for Malachi this month.
This is also a reminder of one of my favorite words of which I also have a tattoo. A Greek word hupomone, persevere-hang in there.
James 1:2-3
Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance.
