I spilled lard on my dress…

city, though that is certainly not the house we are living in. We are living in a college

dorm further in the city, about two miles inland from the water. (I googled the

picture above, so far we’ve only been to the beach when it’s cloudy.) We arrived

here after flying from La Paz, Bolivia to Santa Cruz, Bolivia, to Miami, Florida, to New York City, to Istanbul, Turkey, to Tirana, Albania, and taking a four hour van ride

here. It was quite the week.

My parents brought a bunch of us Chick Fil A and

pumpkin muffins in NYC, and we were absolutely giddy. Collectively as a squad I

think we may have made the Miami Airport Starbucks run out of pumpkin flavored

items. In NYC, we stayed in a hotel, and were completely baffled by things like

the hot showers and continental breakfast. We then all made a Target run for

warmer clothing for Europe, things we needed, and more pumpkin or fall things.

It. Was. So. Weird. A blessing, but really surreal.

Now we are back to going to the

bathroom in holes in the ground and knowing about 4 words of Albanian. In Turkey, we got Turkish Delight, took a picture with a Turkish man, and waited in way too many lines. Albania is beautiful. We haven’t been around much, besides the beach once (the Adiratic/Ionian/Mediterranean Sea… we’re still figuring that out), but we can tell it’s

a beautiful country. It smells like coffee and cigarettes.

Me sitting by the sea on a cloudy day.

Vlore is about 70 nautical miles from Italy, and Athens, Greece is about a 9 hour ride. The weather is exactly like autumn at home and it’s awesome. When we ordered

hot chocolate to celebrate, we got hot chocolate pudding in a cute little mug and I immediately fell in love with Albania. Fifteen years ago, Albania was closed to all visitors, especially Christians. The harvest is ripe 🙂

Really, really excited about country number 4 with palm trees. Made up for the clouds.

It’s so weird changing cultures and languages. In America, we accidentally spoke Spanish to everyone, and here, we try both before realizing our point is not getting across. This morning when ordering breakfast, we ordered eggs by bending our arms and flapping our “wings” like a chicken, and then making a little circle with our hands. (We wanted eggs, and we got out eggs.) Unfortunately, however, it seems to be Albanian custom to pour liquid lard on their eggs, and I got some on my dress. Such is life on the World Race.

Oh, lastly, there’s a giant SANTA that lives in our room. Currently, we’re all squished in a room, and I built a fort and sleep under it, while Santa watches over. He’s super creepy, and he definitely knows when we’re sleeping and when we’re awake. Soon, we will be more spread out (excuse the mess in this picture), but Santa will still be our roommate. So much for an all-girls team.

Anyway: the important stuff… we are living in a girl’s dorm at the college in Vlore, working with Campus Crusade for Christ (now CRU), and love it. We have good showers for once one the race, but we have to go to the bathroom in a hole. Always a good time. We start ministry tomorrow with CRU, and we’re pumped. Our goal is to make real friendships with the girls, invite them to events, tell them about the Lord, bring them out for coffee and follow up conversations, hook them up with church, etc. We also have a few American Culture nights planned, where we are going to show them dances like the YMCA, the Cupid Shuffle, and the Cha Cha Slide. A Halloween party is also in the mix. Pray for us, pray our translators are awesome, because currently I can only say hello, goodbye, thank you, i’m sorry, one, two, friend, and egg (and the last one is in sign language.) Ministry update soon 🙂 College life, without the Christians and the homework. Let’s do this thing.

Oh, and in case you don’t know what a squatty potty is, this is a pretty nice one.