Well…we are officially wrapping up our 11th and FINAL country of the race! Man, time has flown…I can NOT believe we will be back on U.S. soil in less then a day…11 countries, 11 months, & now less then 11 days till HOME-crazy! When we began I thought almost a year of my life…how will I ever be able to be gone from my home, family, & friends that long and here we are…finishing up…God…His grace…His mercy…He is enough…He gives exactly what we need…here I am approaching the end of my journey…well…this journey…there will always be others…. 😉
So…we arrived in Moldova 2 weeks ago after an 11 hour train ride from Macedonia to Bulgaria…a 10 hour bus ride to Romania…then another 12 hour train ride to Chisinau, the capital! World Race “style”…anything to save $! Our squad stayed together for one night in Chisinau before we split and went our separate ways all over Moldova. Most of us hadn’t seen each other since we arrived in Ukraine, so it was a sweet reunion! Our squad had a briefing with our Moldova contacts on our first day. Moldova is the poorest country in Europe.Then on Monday my team loaded a van and took off to Balti, a good size town about 2 hours away. Balti is known as “the northern capital.” It is an old soviet factory town and still appears the way you might imagine… It’s a bit grey, gloomy, and almost abandoned looking. The streets seem dark and unkempt but there are still people and motion in the city center…
This month we were working with a church in Balti & SportQuest . Check it out: http://www.sportquest.org/ In our first meeting, Uri, our main contact, proceeds to tell us about the game our team is playing in the tournament. My friend Emily quickly interrupts to say that she doesn’t even know the rules and positions of basketball…well…the only problem with that is it was “futball”… that’s when I knew this month was going to be “good”…hahah. No worries we did not let her moment go unnoticed…love you, Em!
Our boys played & Tanna reffed…and ash, em, & I did skits, pics, etc…and froze to death..cuz you know my mad soccer skills;).but back to the ministry…SportsQuest is a really awesome ministry! They have locations all over the world that bring in athletes to train and connect with communities. We were so blessed this first week, because the founder, Kent Susud, was in town visiting from the states. It was so interesting to hear more about his ministry and visions. He had some amazing stories from their first sports camps in rural Africa that made our time there seem sugarcoated! Kent is a mighty man of God and God used him to encourage us a lot the few days he was there…kind of sad that our team was split our last month…but …what else…oh so def. had a moment in Moldova when I thought this is my life…really…walked outside our home to see a dead body & continued on to work…great way to start the day…only good part of this was the inappropriate laughter moment I had when Ashley tried to tell me, “no, it’s just a garage sale.”hahahha…so weird…yeah…well…just a quick update on our LAST month!…I’m just sitting here…pulling an all-nighter- soaking in these last moments with some of my “family”… in a few hours we will head to the airport to end…no not end…but begin a new journey…crazy..talk about surreal…so bittersweet…well…got to go pack…get ready New York City…here we come!!!
