Well folks, our time in Eastern Europe has come to a close. After spending 5 months in Asia it feels like we shouldn’t be leaving Eastern Europe so soon, but here we are. Here are some things I’ll miss from Eastern Europe:
-Beautiful mountains
-Cobblestone streets
-Cheese (so many varieties!)
-Pizza, pasta, pastries
-Tiny elevators
-Wild horses
-Nutella
-Cafes (everywhere!)
-Wedding parties (either seeing it or just hearing the music)
-Great friends!
Some ways I grew in Eastern Europe:
-I became more confident in sharing my story and who Jesus is with people
-I grew in challenging people to see/think from a different perspective (my teammates and others)
-I learned that my time is not my own
-I practiced setting boundaries by being kind, consistent, and firm
There were so many similarities between the 3 countries we went to (Albania, Macedonia, and Bulgaria) and yet there were unique qualities to each (but they were harder to find). All of the countries were a part of the Ottoman Empire, which I had no idea what that was until 3 months ago, and were Communist countries until about 20ish years ago. They all have the classic European cafes everywhere, but most of them only serve drinks and not food. Christian Orthodox is the main religion in all of them, so that made it easy in one sense to talk about the Lord but also hard. People would either already consider themselves Christians because they go to church, or they thought we were a part of some cult.
The main differences that I can remember are in the languages, architecture, and certain foods that were more popular in each country.
We just had a debrief at the end of Bulgaria, and at that debrief we had team changes. I am on the last team that I will have on the Race! We are a team of 6 gals and our name is Fearless (and yes Taylor Swift’s song is our anthem). Their names are Sylvia, Maggie, Emily, Sara, and Leah. I’ll introduce them more later on. Right now we are in the Johannesburg airport waiting until 6pm to take an overnight bus up to Zimbabwe. So next time you hear from me it will be from Zimbabwe!
Keep the faith,
Malia
