So I made it through week one of the World Race!! Woo hoo! And what a week it was!
After doing a lot of sitting in several lovely airports and planes I made it to Albania at 10pm on Tuesday. Our host picked us up and took us to our home for the next month, an old kindergarten. We also got some awesome sufllaqe, which is essentially Albanian fast food.
Since then it’s been a fairly busy week full of markets, ministry, team time, soccer, and lots of kiddos. I would say the biggest struggle for this week was definitely the language barrier. I’m going to be honest it was pretty overwhelming coming into a new country, so late at night, and not be able to read or understand the language that people were speaking. Oh and having them all stare at you as you walk through the airport. Simple things quickly became very difficult, like trying to order your delicious sufllaqe, asking how much something is and even trying to ask someone their name.
That being said, we’ve been slowly adjusting and learning how to stop and take time to figure out how to communicate with people in other ways. It’s actually pretty amazing how well we’ve been able to start communicating with people here. I mean often it’s like playing this really intense never-ending game of charades, but hey whatever works right?!
What’s awesome is that even though we are the outsiders the people here try just as hard to speak our language and help us understand. It’s so refreshing to see the kindness that comes out and the amount you get to know about people when you have to stop and take a little more time to communicate. Because of this we have already met so many people and made some awesome friendships! In fact pretty much all of the neighborhood kids now know where we live and come by every night to dance, play and laugh with us. It’s pretty much the best! My goal now is to make Albania my version of Cheers, the place where everyone knows my name. 🙂
We had the opportunity to play soccer with a bunch of the neighborhood boys, who again didn’t speak English, and it was by far the best time I’ve had since I’ve been here. It was full of jokes and laughter and I can’t express how much joy it brought to all of us. Now we get to see their beautiful smiles every day and experience the light that they bring to those around them, especially us.
I can’t wait to see what next week holds and what boundaries God will break down.
