Romania so far is awesome! It kinda smells funny, and you have to pay for ketchup if you want it with your fries, and there is no sweet tea or chicken sauce but other than that I am having a lot of new experiences!
Pink toilet paper
Purple paper towels
No flushing toilet paper
Blowing an outlet up, along with my hair straightener…
Nutella for breakfast, lunch and dinner
Traveling 65 hours with little sleep
My very first stamp in my passport
My very first jet-lag and swollen feet
Staying in a bunk bed that doesn’t have a ladder is a challenge every night and morning
Right now my group (team Rhema) and another group (team anchors of hope) are staying at a missionary hotel on the campus of Caminul Felix which is an awesome mission, based around children here in Oradea, Romania. It started back 20 years ago when Romania was first coming out of communism and there were hundreds of homeless and abused children in Oradea.
Just like in the states if a home is unstable for a child due to physical or sexual abuse, or malnutrition the state will pull the child from the house and place them in foster care. However, in America there is an option to get your child back, but there is not here. Once you lose your child they are in the hands of the state and they are lucky if they are chosen to live at Caminul Felix.
Caminul Felix started with just 3 cows and a small house, and is now a huge dairy farm with 300 cows and a lot of farming land and 2 small villages with around 10 houses that are run by ‘house parents’ and hold 10 children each from ages 0-18. These children are provided for by the money that the dairy farm produces and are well taken care of. When the children reach 18 they are provided with an apartment in the city to be closer to work/school/social life and new children are brought into the home to take their place.
Unlike in America where the foster system is corrupt and based around abuse, neglect, and greed, Caminul Felix is a Christian based establishment where the children feel so loved and protected here that most of the people who work here as adults were raised here as children themselves. I don’t know of anywhere else people are so quick to want to be married and move back to help out with the children faced with the same past as them.
Some of the work that we have been doing so far is cleaning up trash around thefarm and roads, and helping lay foundation for the new sub-division that is in progress. The new sub-division only has 6 (and a half) houses right now and when finished will have a total of 80. This housing will be specifically for the children who grew up here to move into once they are married, if they choose to give back the place where they were given a foundation.
The bottom line is, even though we are not doing much this month, and we have showers, washing machines, wifi, and a kitchen to use, I am so blessed to be at this establishment. Learning to live in community with my team and another team, all cramped together 24/7 was hard at first until we all realized that these kids, who have no choice, live in community every day. We all CHOSE this for ourselves (well the Lord chose it for us but you know what I mean) the least we can do is get along and give back joyfully and humbly. 
