Zsolt and Ilona

This is my friend Zsolt Csernus. He and his wife, Ilona, and sons Benjamin and Daniel are missionaries with Operation Mobilisation, Hungary. They serve Jesus Christ as a welder, sailors, teachers, parents and as a wonderful example of what Christian marriage should be. The wonderful news about Zsolt and Ilona is that they have been offered another opportunity (the second for their family) to sail aboard an Operation Mobilisation ship that will sail from port to port (more details will follow soon!) to share God's love through medical services and education and literature in the languages native to the area. Please pray for the Csernus family, and if you would like to learn more about OM international, please visit http://www.om.org/, and if you would like to support the Csernus family on their mission field, please contact OM Hungary and let them know of your desire to support Zsolt and Ilona Csernus.

Do something this year! Have a great 2009!

Workshops are fun!...and fattening?

Those who know me know I love food. That's why I was thrilled to see 3, count 'em THREE, workshops devoted to food this year. Workshops at English Camp (Angol Tabor, in Hungarian) are each about an hour long and represent an interest or expertise of one of the camp workers. They are approached with trepidation by the camp workers, because we rarely view our gifts as things to be shared, oddly; the challenge for workers at camp is to see themselves as vessels to be poured out, and workshops give us that opportunity.

Among the workshops this year are:

Soccer (a personal favorite, since it is taught by my daughter!)

Making Cowboy cookies

Making gingerbread waffles

Decorating cupcakes

Project Runway: World Cup

American Dating

Chess

Get Fit! (which you have to do after making waffles!)

Nail design (yes, we have our own licensed cosmetologist teaching this!)

Drum set

So, you can see that we are a group with a wide range of interests! The best part of all…I'm watching the Get Fit group right now, filled with kids of an average age of 10 or 11…is hearing the kids laugh and giggle their way through the exercises, working on their English and having a wonderful time. This process, the making of friends, is largely why Anne, the kids and I continue to come back year after year; we see our gift as making friends, and being able to use that friendship as a platform for bringing something of meaning here. God has richly blessed us in this experience, and we only hope that we are as much a blessing to the ones we hold dear, both here and at home…

Camp Time

The days have flown by here; I always think I have more time than I end up having to prepare. (Of course, the same can be said for my time at school, and with my family, and at church…maybe it's me?) Anyway, our days look like this:

10:30ish    We begin our day with devotions. With at least 3 seminary graduates on the camp staff, you'd think we'd have someone well qualified to lead our morning devotions. Alas, Boci (Uncle) Duane got the nod this year, so we're studying about God's passion for the lost…you can start in Luke 15 and follow along!

11:30    Staff lunch

12:30    Campers arrive

12:30    Opening…LOTS of singing and general merriment

1:00    English lesson (prepositions, numbers, days of the week…the good stuff!)

2:00    Staff led workshops (Hannah taught one on soccer today…she was a little disappointed at not being able to model much because of her knee, but she taught well!...and she thinks she wants to be a veterinarian??? HMMM….)

3:00    Go West time…today we're panning for gold (popcorn kernels buried in the grass; blessedly it's cloudy today and not 90+ and humid, like yesterday…)

5:00    The kids have dinner

6:00    Moms and dads and Anne and I have dinner

6:30    Kids are in evening game, song and testimony time; grown-ups are working with Anne and me…tonight we're talking about setting priorities in life and aligning them with God's priorities for your life.

Those are the days for camp. We have about 30-40 kid campers, and we had 9 adults show up for the first session last night. We're trying to accommodate everyone wanting to get home to watch the World Cup by 8:30-including the camp staff! It's the only thing we can watch language free and know what's going on!

 

Over all a great week. I'm spending a lot of time thinking about school this year, for some reason. I wish school could be more like camp, with less focus on the business of "schooling" and more on learning…learning is a blast, and the way we lose the joy of learning is awfully disappointing….but hey, a new year starts in just a few weeks!

Getting Oriented...again?

I am amazed at how much there is to remember as we prepare for English Camp.  The entire camp staff has arrived, and after a day in Budapest to stretch legs and get introduced to one another we've begun the  business of preparing to meet our campers and to enjoy working with one another in a purpose larger than ourselves.

One of the biggest reminders I owe myself (more often than during these summer engagements in Erd) is that faith drives virtually all that I do.  Belief in God and belief in others, whether students or teachers, my children or my wife, my friends or the strangers who will become my friends over the week ahead, is the central theme of my life.  Nothing I have accomplished has been accomplished on my own, and nothing that I want to see done in the future can be.  Among the great blessings I count each day is that God has sent  these fellow workers into every aspect of my life to join my journey.  While I don't always find success in the world's eyes, I certainly emerge from every day the richer for having traveled it in the company of my friends and companions.  Monday brings another group to work with...I serve a great God, and am amazed at the blessings in my life as I sit here in Erd, or in my office in Jackson, or on my deck in Locust Grove...and I am grateful.

A day in Eger

We got a chance to take our families (extended, too!) to Eger over the weekend. It's always wonderful to spend time with people who are intrigued by us. My greatest joy is finding myself in situations where the best I can do with a language amounts to an attempt at humor that native speakers laugh at. Saturday was my day in Eger! Eger is known for it hometown wine, Egri Bekaver, or Bull's Blood. Suffice it to say that the name hearkens to the first of two Turkish invasions over 700 years ago; I doubt Ernest and Julio Gallo can say the same thing?

The picture above is a shot from the center of the city toward the castle...

Anne and I have had our pictures taken on this bench during every trip to Eger...a pretty great tradition to have with my beautiful wife!

Figuring out what to do...

Anne and I have come here to Erd over the past six years to teach.  Ostensibly, we teach English...lots of interesting vocabulary, conversations and scenarios.  Each year we work with a theme that we try to make lend itself to our work, though we always work to present Christ and His plan for salvation.

One of the dynamics in our household, and the planning that goes into each summer camp, is that we both have lots of ideas that need to be melded together to create one whole experience.  Using a metallurgical metaphor, this melding requires, well, quite a bit of heat.  Over the years we have learned to contain the flames inside the furnace, and in focusing the heat of creation we are able to burn away most of the dross of the lesson before we give it.  Of course, building the heat is, well, the difficult part...

So we're working on our lessons now, trying to get a handle our English theme..Going West...while trying to figure out how to introduce Jesus throughout the course of the lessons.  We're packing the wagon, picking the right trail, and seeing Christ as our trail boss; that's the thing, isn't it, when we teach...to make things so odd, or interesting or out of the way that students can't help but remember what we teach.  And then think about...and then act on what we teach.

That's the thing.  Letting Christ speak through us in a way that works in our students' hearts, helping them to see and ultimately accept His love is all  that's important.  And if we need to wear chaps, spurs and cowboy hats, that's what we'll do....giddy up!

A daytrip to Bratislava...

We had to postpone our daytrip to Bratislava for a day because we ended up trying to catch the train at the wrong station.  We thought we had the right station, but as with many things in Eastern Europe, the trains sometimes have a mind of their own and we have to go with the flow.  So we did!

Friday, however, found us traveling to Bratislava (capital of Slovakia) in good order; indeed, the traveling to and from were, from the "good order" perspective, the best part of the day.  My companions were Aaron, my son, and Dustin, our companion from the camp crew.  Dustin is a self-proclaimed East Europa-phile, so the day was a hit with him!

Alas, it didn't work out quite the way we'd planned, though.  First, our maps were GALACTICALLY inadequate given the Bratislavan's don't really have an appreciation for street signs, directional signs or anything that might tell you where you are or where you could conceivably go in their city.  We got off of the train and began our explorations which included walking...and walking...and walking.  We wanted to get to the Danube and find the Bratislava Castle-noble pursuits to be sure!  So we walked...

We happened upon the Presidential Palace with its lovely public gardens where we at our peanut butter and jelly sandwiches (yes, we brown-bagged it...) and chocolate creme cookies.  This was, for me, the highlight of the afternoon.  The day was overcast which contributed to my already questionable ability to judge direction.  Of course, it didn't  really dawn on us to ask which way the river was...so we walked...and walked...and walked.

So we walked.  We saw several lovely parks which, blessedly, had benches.  We sat as often as we could...which ended up being not that often.  We helpful advice from one English speaking Bratislavan who assured us our desired destinations were "that way;" we walked that way...for a LONG time.  Indeed, apart from the 30 minutes we spend inside the Polus City Centre Mall, we walked all day, from 11:50am until 7:30pm.  

We found ourselves on the far side of nowhere when it struck me that with only 2 hours before our train was scheduled to leave we would be pressing to make up for 5 hours of getting lost.  So we began our retreat.  Of course, neither of the maps we had actually showed Hlavna Stanica, the train station, so we found ourselves at the mercy of several very kind, multilingual (though not English-speaking) Slovakians.  We were approached by a very kind 70-ish man who spoke a brand of pidgin Slovako-German who indicated that we were a long way from our destination.  We walked some more, and then spoke to a delightful couple who were out for their evening constitutional who also indicated that even though we'd been walking for some time now, were were still a LONG way away from the train station.

The train was scheduled to leave at 7:54pm, and it was now 7:15pm in a strange city, and we had no idea where we were and our legs/feet/knees/toes HURT.  And just when I was resigning myself to finding a room for the night, the tram that ran to Hlavna Stanica passed right by us!  You might be asking, "Why didn't you just get ON the tram!?"  The answer is, I had no idea where to buy tram tickets..you see, in Europe there is rarely the option to pay a bus or tram driver directly, and if you haven't purchased your pass at a shop or station, you don't get on...such was our dilemna.  But, we did follow the tram, like puppies smelling food in the kitchen.  And we walked...

Blessedly we started finding landmarks we recognized, and slowly we limped the final half mile or so into the station...with 15 minutes to spare!  Of course, I'd been praying for God to help us make the distance before our train left and in his provision He did help us...and then some!  Just as we walked into the station, the office posted that our train was 35 minutes late...a safety cushion that I, at least, greatly appreciated.

Lessons I learned:

1.  Always have a GOOD map;

2.  Always travel with friends (it made the day WAY better);

3.  Always appreciate the small kindnesses of others;

4.  Wear comfortable shoes;

5.  Be grateful for every opportunity God gives you to grow, to love and to explore...that's how He transforms you into the likeness of His son...

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We had planned to go to Bratislava, Slovakia with another of our camp-working friends today, but...I guess we'll go tomorrow...

For our friends worried that we should find time to smile, laugh and relax. We are...

Sun's up!

Jet lag can be a pain.  We watched the world cup game last night; South Africa happens to reside in the same time zone as Hungary-six hours ahead of home.  The game ended at 10:45ish local time, and we were off to bed...and from 3 o'clock on, I sat staring at the walls while my sweet bride and son and daughter slumbered.  What to do with my time but work on school work and blog!

It's 5:30am here now, and the sun is full up.  I forget in the months between visits just how far north Hungary is compared to us, and how much earlier the sun rises here.  It looks as if this may be our first day without rain, so I'll get out and walk around the neighborhood this morning, being what I am, an American out of place.  The people will know that immediately because I'll greet most of them with "Jo Reggelt!"-Hungarian for "Good Morning," and will be met mostly with blank stares.  Which is why I return here with my family so often-the innate optimism I have that is born of a hope that so many here don't have drives me to return.  Something about these people draws me here, to them, in the hope that I might be a blessing.  Three weeks of this trains me to try to be a blessing in my own world as well...and I need that training.

The morning train into Budapest just ran by.  Must be time for another cup of coffee.  Jo Reggelt!