The start to month four in Romania brought with it a few changes.
Some expected: a new continent, a totally new language that no one understands
Some not as expected: team change.
The emotions of this change have rocked my world over the past few days. I can’t even begin to describe how much I am going to miss being with Team Favoured. We have laughed (a lot) and cried together and just plain lived life for the last three months. It will be hard to get used to not hearing Michael’s unending movie quotes and laughter; Lauren randomly busting out in song with her amazing voice; the look on Kirsten’s face while she is playing with a child; laying with Heather on a single person sleeping pad watching my boys and listening to her giggle; borrowing Joey’s sunglasses because I lost mine month one (oh, wait…I still have those…oops!) and joking in a way that I think only we understand sometimes; waking up to Kylie’s bright smiling face (and bright red hair) and hearing “I’ve missed you!” and getting a hug after just being apart for a few hours. I miss you all so much already! Thanks for letting me steal some (or all) of your team times, for building me up in my walk with the Lord and for helping me experience the Lord in ways I never thought possible. I can’t help but also be excited to see how the Lord uses all of you this month. I know that He is doing great things through all of you! I love you all so very much!
As hard as leaving Team Favoured has been, I am thrilled to be with Team Veracity, a group of six other amazing women of God. I am eager to see how the Lord will use them to help me grow and heal from past wounds and how He will use me in each of their lives! I was blessed to work with them last month in Peru (round 2) and I can’t wait to get to know them more by being a member of their team! All of the Sarahs on our squad (there are 3 of us) are now on one team, and thus we have resorted to being called by our last names unless you are talking about all 3 of us at once. Check out the links to all of Team Veracity’s blogs and get to know them as I continue to this month.
This month, we are in Romania at a summer camp working to prepare it for when campers come this summer. We are not sure what kind of work we will be doing, but we arrived here today and I know I am going to love this place! There are hot (not just warm!) showers, washing machines, comfortable beds, delicious meals cooked by Angela, a fire place, wifi, a full court basketball court, a soccer field, a zip-line, swings and probably a lot more that will be discovered once we explore the entire grounds (it has been raining since we got here and a lack of sleep won over exploring earlier).
Here is what has happened in Romania thus far:
30 seconds spent in customs to get into the country (I swear it’s easier to come here than it is to get back into the US!).
A short bus ride from the airport to the train station.
A 10 hour train ride overnight to Arad consisting of lots of confusion finding our seats (I have no idea if anyone actually works on those trains!), a Romanian language lesson from the young man we met (ask me how much of it I remember from our lesson at 3 am), maybe one hour of sleep and about an hour of preparation (standing with our bags by the door of the train) to ensure that we got off at the right stop and that all of us made it off the train (we had timed a previous stop and found that they stop for less than one minute before starting up again).
A short taxi ride (in which I ended up being the only person in the car) which resulted in a full conversation in Spanish with the young Romanian driver (who knew the Spanish I picked up over the last 3 months would be more useful in Romania than my English!).
One steaming hot bowl of beef stroganoff (or something that tastes very similar).
A short conversation with our host about the camp (we were told that the third floor is forbidden—three-headed dog perhaps?!)
A 6 hour nap.
A delicious bowl of chicken noodle soup and stuffed hash brown type things (whatever they were, they were good!).
One long, hot shower!
So far, Romania is great! As the weeks go on, and we get started in our ministry, keep a look out for more blog posts!
