Sixteen Years and Two Weeks

For a change, this will have very little to do with our life here in our new home, but a lot to do with the man who is my home.

Sixteen years and two weeks ago, on August 13th, 1994, I got to marry my best friend.  We were so young (24 and 21) and skinny and naive.  We had no idea where these last sixteen years would lead us...11 different mailing addresses,  8 full-time (and countless part-time) jobs between the two of us,  and 7 churches.  We've been to 7 different countries and 21 states together.  We've ridden just about every type of transportation know to man...except maybe a helicopter and a rickshaw.  We've seen hundreds of movies, and eaten enough guacamole and ice cream to kill us at an early age.  We've been blessed with three amazing children and more *"heart-friends" than anyone deserves in a lifetime.  When we got married Trey, of course, picked the music.  At the last minute he added a song that was sung while we lit the unity candle.  Here are the lyrics:

We lift our voices, we lift our hands.

We lift our lives; they are yours.  We are an offering.

Lord, use our voices, Lord, use our hands.

Lord, use our lives; they are yours.  We are an offering.

All that we have, all that we are, all that we hope to be...we give to you.

Lord, use our voices, Lord, use our hands.

Lord, use our lives...they are yours.  We are an offering.  We are an offering.

I've thought of that song a lot over the last few months.  It is still true.  Although we've both failed numerous times and in many ways our hearts' desire is still the same.  We are His.  He is the reason for all the blessings over the last sixteen years.  He deserves all the glory.  We would have completely ruined the whole thing.  I don't know why we have been so blessed, but I do know that we are humbled by it and want to be faithful with what has been entrusted to us.  We are an offering.

*This is a term I'm stealing from my friend Bonnie.  Your heart language is the language you talk about the things closest to your heart in.  It is almost always your mother tongue.  We are struggling through learning Serbian so we can talk to people here about "heart" matters.  Bonnie said some friends are like that...you just speak the same "language" and you can talk about the most important and intimate things with them.

Buses, Trains and Automobiles...our trip to Bulgaria

Our journey began about 5 o'clock one Friday afternoon in July.  We left our apartment in Novi Sad with 2 rather large suitcases, 5 backpacks 2 purses, a computer bag, and a few other random items...and...

• took a city bus to the bus station 
• took another bus to Belgrade 
• walked a few blocks 
• took the overnight train you see above to Sofia, Bulgaria 
• took a different train to Plovdiv, Bulgaria where we got to hang with the Grozevs!!! 
• took a bus to the Hissaria bus station 
• took a cab to the hotel 
• took a very large van with some great friends through Bulgaria and all the way back to Belgrade 
• !!!Connor and I took a bonus ride in a Bulgarian ambulance, but that is another story!!! 
• took a bus from Belgrade back to Novi Sad and... finally 
• took a cab from the station in Novi Sad back to our apartment 

And there you go...

• 11 vehicles 
• 10 days 
• 9 worship times
• 8 new t-shirts 
• 7 other youth for Connor to "hang" with 
• 6 days with co-laborers 
• 5 US fast food chains (Burger King, McDonald's Subway, KFC and Dunkin Donuts) 
• 4 (at least) babies for Brooke to hug on 
• 3 days at the beach 
• 2 foreign languages 
• 1 great trip 

 I couldn't get Kyle to keep his head in the train...He loved watching everything pass by.

Connor and Trey standing outside our sleeper car and enjoying the fact that the VERY HOT train had started moving...the view and the breeze were very nice.

Brooke and Kyle in the sleeper compartment on the overnight train...the lady that sold us the tickets was very sure that the three bed compartment would be plenty big for our family.  (She lied).  Connor slept on the top bed (where Brooke is in the picture), Trey and Connor slept in the middle bunk (where you see Kyle here) and Brooke and I slept on the bottom one.  She also said the three bed sleepers were much nicer than the 6 bed compartments...well... 

Brooke and I enjoying a peach tea about 17 hours into the journey on the train 

between Sofia and Plovdiv.

The boys on the train...we couldn't wait to hang with the Grozevs in Grozio's homeland.  They were already waiting for us a the train station.  We were late because our first train was late and we missed the early train to Plovdiv...they were looking for us all over the Bulgarian countryside, afraid we'd gotten off in the wrong city.  They were awesome hosts!

This one's for you Kyle Stevens...Oh, the posts that will never be...

This picture really has nothing to do with this post...other than the fact that Kyle Stevens allowed his children to bury him first and then Trey was obligated to do the same.  I guess too, that this is one of the things I "thought" a blog post about...notice the strategically placed shovel in front of the baby in the background...I could have done a whole post on the way people dress (or maybe I should say don't dress) on the beaches of Eastern Europe.

Okay, okay, I know I said I would post every Sunday and I've failed miserably...I could list some excuses, but I will spare you all my sad stories of my blogging short comings...I know you...all 17 of you who follow this post don't want to hear excuses you want to see posts!
My dear friend named in the title of this post has shamed me into getting back on the blogging bandwagon.  And in his honor I decided to make a post listing all the ideas I could have blogged about...many of which I even "thought" the post, but never got around to typing...so here we go:

• What it must have been like to take the train from Yugoslavia to Bulgaria in 1953...pretty much the  same as in 2010, only the border crossing at 5am would have taken a lot more than an hour and a half.
• How it messes with your mind when in Bulgaria a nod means "no" and a shake means "yes"...very confusing my friends...very confusing!
• How a bird can be flying overhead in the rain and miraculously poop through the very small slit in the canvas covering over our table to hit Trey in the head. 
• Burger King in the middle of no where...is it real or is it a mirage to these tired eyes? (Seriously, the middle of nowhere...on a road in the middle of sunflower fields, many kilometers from the nearest city...a brand new, clean and modern place to have it your way!)
• Never get into an ambulance with a man you don't know.  It could cost you 65 Euro.
• The "Ambassador Club" isn't just in Chicago.
• Care packages ROCK...all the love we've received in the last six weeks has been AMAZING!!!
• "No, I don't know the names of the people who just took my son out of the country for ten days to a place I really don't know the name of and no, I don't know exactly when they will return, but that doesn't really bother me like it would have a few months ago."
• How many people can you feed and get out the door by 8 am without water, and what will your house look like after the fact?
• The importance of carrying a driver's license with you when you are driving in Serbia...I really can't state this strongly enough...it is; as we have found VITALLY important.
• How a very powerful God can change the mind of a very angry police officer at the very last minute.
• The best way to strengthen your prayer life is to drive on the country roads of Eastern Europe...just WOW!
• There are a lot of things that just don't get done when your days are limited to 24 hours.
• How blessed we are to have people who still love us and lift us up even though I am doing a lousy job of updating them on our lives.  
• Sesame seeds are big in Serbia...just ask Jackie.
• I work with some amazing people who really love God and others!
• Klima is really a good thing.
• 42 reasons I miss dependable internet

And that is all I've got for today.  Thanks for bearing with this back-sliding blogger.

A Day at the Beach

    This is one of our favorite summer outings here in our new home.  On the banks of the Danube River is a small stretch of beach that we refer to, here in Novi Sad, as the Штранд (Shtrand).  For only 50 dinar (currently $0.58) we have access to the beach and all it has to offer.  There are several places to eat...both sit down and to-go type places, several playgrounds, lots of nice grass with benches and tables, showers, pretty decent public restrooms, lots of old men in speedos...I'll stop there.
     We live in the center of Нови Сад (Novi Sad) on this side of the river.  You can see one of our bridges in the background that leads to Фрушка Гора (Frushka Gora) the small range of mountains on the other side of the river.  (A storm was brewing, blocking the view of the mountains.)  
     This is the bridge we crossed on March 26th...three months ago as we entered our new home for the first time.  God is teaching us so much.  Probably the biggest thing we've learned is how little we know.  I was reading in I Corinthians one morning when we first arrived and ran across this verse, "We know that we all possess knowledge. Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up."   I began laughing to myself as I realized this must be my great "deflating".  
     As time has passed we've come a long way in knowledge of our new land, but we have sooooooo much more to learn.  Our prayer is that we will not be puffed up with our own knowledge, but that we will allow Him to build us up with His love.
    Here is some of the knowledge we've gained during our time at the beach...
*bathing suits are optional until about the age of 6 or 7
*bathing suits are small and tight until about the age of 106 or 107
*you can choose your topping on the pastry they sell at one of the stands...pizza ketchup or chocolate sauce.
*sometimes old men sprint down the beach (as a form of exercise as best as we could tell) in their speedos...not pretty
*big screen tv's come out of nowhere when the world cup is on
*families rent little garage type storage places to keep all their things in so they can just enjoy hanging out on the river with their peeps...Serbs have huge love for community
*we live in a beautiful city where we still have much to learn

Language, Language, Language

Wow, Sunday night seem to come quickly for a new blogger like myself.  I think this is going to be a short and sweet post...because guess what I still have to do?  You guessed it...Language Homework.  An old friend sent me this link and it made me laugh so hard this afternoon.  Just watch the short video and imagine us as some of these people...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LysS2s14YdY


Okay, I hope you've watched it.  I am definitely the "It's okay for you all...I have a very small vocabulary" girl mixed with the emPHAsis on the wrong syllABle guy.  Trey were grammar guy.

Our goal is one day to know enough language  and culture to be the mixed metaphor chickadee.  But, we don't want to count our chickens before the milk spills.

Seriously, this is probably our single greatest hurdle and pr-yer request right now.  We want to know the language, but it is so hard some days.  It is hard to find the time (and let's be honest here...the motivation) to study as much as we'd like.  It is hard to find the motivation to go out and butcher the language and make fools of ourselves in front of perfect strangers all the time.  It's hard because often the people most interested in talking to us want to practice their English with us...good for relationships, but not for our language development.  It's hard because their are about 25 ways to mess up a sentence that you have all the vocabulary to say.  Of course there are the different verb tenses, but aside from past present and future there are six or seven (I'm being real here...I really don't even know for sure) different ways to say every noun and it depends on how it is used in the sentence.

For example:

I live in Serbia. - Živim u Srbiji.
I am going to Serbia. - Idem u Srbiju.
Serbia is a nice country.  Srbija je lepa zemlja.

Did you notice how even the proper noun had three different forms here!  Joy Joy!

Okay, enough of the negative...we are thrilled to live in a place where we can find some people who speak enough English to help us do things like register the kids for school and get our visas...(which Trey picked up this week! PTL!)  We are blessed with a great group of instructors that are helpful in and out of the classroom.  The owner of our language school took great care of us this week by setting up a doctor's appointment for me so I could have someone look at my famous foot "condissue".  We are honored to have to opportunity to be supported by many of you out there so we can study full time for a while.  We can't wait to be able to listen and learn from the great people here and to share with them all that is most important to us.  We love this place and the chances we have to grow each day.

View of our city from our apartment balcony.

When stand on the balcony and look out over the city I can't wait to learn my new language so I can talk to all my new friends...someday I'm trusting brothers and sisters even.  

Okay, to end this post here are a few of our favorite language blunders from the first few weeks here:

I (Randi) got the words for come in and I'm sorry mixed up for a few weeks and often told people I was trying to communicate with, "Come in,  I'm learning Serbian"  I also, used it correctly on the bus one day, only I mixed up my verbs this time and told an old lady on the bus, "I'm sorry, I'm learning English"   She didn't look very impressed.  Trey tends to over use thank you.  He uses it as a greeting, as please and thank you and any other time he's at a loss for words "hvala" is just what comes out.  We both throw in a lot of Spanish.  I even used a little in my first official language evaluation.  But, I was thrilled last week when an American thought I was a Serb and complimented me on my English.  At least I look the part even if I don't speak it very well yet.  

Fifty Yards of Meat...

Well friends,
Here you go...this is what 50 yards of meat looks like...this is only the tubed meat section of the mega grocery store here in town.  That's right...Trey paced it off...50 yards of tubes of meat...We have not tried any of them yet.  I don't know if it's that the selection is overwhelming or the thought is appalling.  I'm not really even sure what it is.  I want you to know we didn't even take photos of the smoked meat counter, the fresh pork counter, the fresh beef counter, the fresh chicken counter, the fresh fish counter, the frozen fish section, the canned meat aisle or the meat pašteta tower.  These people love them some meat!
Connor is loving life in the land of meat.  He is in heaven.  A sweet friend from church has taken me to a mesara (butcher shop) near our štan (apartment) to show me all the meats and tell me what is good and how to tell the butcher what I want.
So far we have enjoyed:
*bacon--It is not the same...it has some sort of a rind still on it and I have to slice it myself, but it is still really good.  I chopped some up with eggs and salsa...thanks mom for the salsa...and we had some breakfast burritos the other morning.
*ham--in a hundred different forms...on pizza and sandwiches mainly
*kulen--this is Connor's favorite.  It is a pepperoni type sausage that this region of the country is famous for.
*sausages--not like breakfast sausage...more of a smoked sausage type thing.  We've had it on big meat platters you get at the restaurants and in a dish with white beans.
*ćivapi--this is Kyle's favorite...it looks like breakfast sausage links, only it is some mixture of ground meats that is then grilled.  I must admit it is quite tasty and easy to cook too.
*rostilj (grilled) bacon wrapped chicken kabob things--I'm not sure if there is a real name for them, but they are really tasty and it costs the same if the butcher cooks them for you, or if you bring them home and do it yourself...needless to say, Trey heads to the mesara around 5:30pm a couple of times a month.
*som (catfish)--it was quite good and pretty cheap since the Danube River running through town is full of them.
I could go on, but I'm starting to bore myself with all this meat talk.
Maybe next week we'll talk produce or something fun like that.

It's been a long time coming...

Well friends...here goes...my first ever post...
Trey did the first one a mere seven months ago.  It has been on my "To Do..." list for at least seven months.  I kept wanting it to be gorgeous and brilliant and so many things...but alas...it is just going to be.  My plan is to post every Sunday evening some the highlights (and possibly some of the lowlights) of our new life here in Serbia.
I've decided to just list some random observations that I've made during our first 10 weeks in the country.  Some are funny, some are sad, and some are kind of boring.  I hope at least one or two will be a little insightful.  I hope you enjoy...
*We serve with an awesome team of people who are fun and helpful and loving and forgiving.  I look forward to spending as many years as He allows on the journey with them.
*Sometimes you get offered whiskey really early in the morning from the principal of the school.
*Salsa, Dr. Pepper, and ziplock bags would make life here pretty near perfect.
*You really should wear tight jeans and big glasses to look like a native...I've embraced the big glasses, but am sparing the world the tight jeans.
*It is amazing and humbling and glorious to hear praises being sung to the God of the universe in new languages.  It doesn't matter that I don't understand the words yet, the message is one I know well.  Holy is the Lord who is worthy of our praise!
*It is fun to get your hair colored when you speak 42 words of Serbian and the hairstylist speaks 42 words of English.
*Sometimes it is nice not to understand what people are saying to you in a really angry voice.
*Tulips are beautiful everywhere.
*God is good, all the time.
*It is good to know the right chicken lady and egg lady and pasta lady and meat guy and banana person and cheese lady and plastic bin person and spinach guy and so on and so on...a wonderful woman named Lidija (Lydia) has taken me to the market and introduced me to many things and many people.  What a blessing to have someone teach me.
*Graffati gets less annoying after a while...I've learned to appreciate the stuff with cool lettering and no bad words.
*Organizing a cabinet and figuring out how to save 10% at the store still makes me very happy.
*Everyone needs to know Him.
*It takes longer to do everything.  I'm less productive, and so I'm learning to focus on what is important and not what is urgent.
*It sounds like the space shuttle is launching from our bathroom when the washing machine is on the spin cycle.
*Ice cream tastes better here.
*Lots of people say, oh...you are from Texas...John Wayne.
*Chad Marsh has a twin brother who drives a bus here.
*Nine year old girls have clothes drama in all countries of the world.
*Six year old boys still love star wars.
*Twelve year old boys still don't love to shower.
*An amazing forty year old boy still does super great things to keep his wife sane...(doing dishes, buying a cabinet for me to organize and figuring out how to call the special taxi to get it home, carrying the vacuum all over town because I asked if he could get Brooke on his way home, flowers for no reason...I could go on, but I don't want to embarrass him.)
*This thirty seven year old woman still has amazing friends and family and serves an amazing God who is teaching her so much on the journey.
*The sun comes up at 4:30 a.m.
*There is a hair salon, bakery and pharmacy every 15 feet.
*One kilo is a lot of cheese!
*We love it here.  When we are in the van coming to our new apartment 10 weeks ago Kyle said, "So, this is Serbia...I've been waiting my whole life to get here"  and that is how we all feel.  For such a time as this.