A few pics from Romania

I thought you guys may appreciate a few pics from Romania, so here they are:

The first few are of Laszlo, who was "my" kid.





The next couple are from Black Forest, in the foothills of the mountains that house Count Dracula.




The last couple are from Apple Hill, just outside of Marghita, overlooking the surrounding area and the town.

How long did that guy teach?

So, I started cleaning out my room at Sullivan HS today, and got permission to throw away any books and whatnot that were irrelevant or outdated or whatnot. Now, keep in mind, the former resident of my room also taught computers. So, there are all kinds of computer manuals and PC World magazines...from the 90s. And the 80s. No kidding. So, I managed to bring home a couple of textbooks on how to program in Basic and QBasic (I mean, why not?), although the Bum didn't take my offer to bring him some, for whatever reason. I could have also gotten some books on how to work in Windows 3.1. All in all, I filled up a huge vat on wheels full of trash, and have only worked with 60% of the cabinets. I still have both closets to work with, but right now they seem to have trouble letting themselves get unlocked.... *sigh*

The ultimate kicker, though, are a couple of pamphlets that I brought home...about how to teach kids to use a slide rule, and how to use a slide rule to compute trigonometry functions. I no longer feel so old...

Cars are weird

I backed out of my parking spot at ECC this past morning, and it was very obvious I hadn't driven in two weeks. Not that I ran into anything, it just felt a little weird...

The trip was long...26 hours of travel time. We woke up at 5am Romania time on Wednesday morning (10pm Tuesday night here), and I got back to my place at 1am Thursday morning (8am Thursday morning Romania time). So, of course, I pretty much went straight to bed....and woke up at 6:30 this morning. My body still thinks it's 1:30 in the afternoon, and I should be up by now. :(

The trip was fairly uneventful, although when we landed in Munich, we had 45 minutes before our connection was leaving. Oh yeah, and taking a mass transit thingy to get to the right terminal, 8 of us had to stand in line and wait to get our boarding passes because the people at Budapest had computer issues...can we say "running to the gate"?

All in all, it's good to be home. Now what's this I hear about Descent?

God bless Nalgene

It's 90+ degrees, feels somewhat humid, it's very sunny, there's no sign of AC anywhere, and we have to walk everywhere we go. 'Nuff said.

Funny site today: saw a Romanian man....wrinkly...pretty old...wearing a FUBU hat.

Worship in a foreign language

How cool is it to worship in Romania? I had such a great time at the worship service in Oradea. There was jumping, yelling, dancing, and lots of loud singing. Not a lot different from my home church in Yorktown, in a lot of ways, but still the reminder that I can let go and be even more free in worship than I already am.

It's really intense to praise God with believers who you don't know, but love the Lord. To unite with their spirits in worship, knowing that God hears all of you singing, in all your languages, be in Hungarian, Romanian, English, or some crazy prayer language, is pretty amazing. And to be free enough to worship with them, even though it was a completely strange feeling, was good--God is working in me.

It was funny, too--some of our team members commented on the length of the service (2.5 or so, and still going when we had to leave), and I didn't even feel restless as all. I was ready to keep going.

Ultimately, though, it's good to step outside your box and se just a little bit about how big God really is, and how big His church is. Praise God!

What are the odds?

What are the odds that anyone is actually checking this, now that I'm in Romania? I guess will find out.

It's been a fun few days, although a little worry and a little hectic. The food has been decent, and sleep hasn't, and we've only seen the kids briefly so far. We've done a lot of planning, though, and today we are going to take a few of the kids to the "pool," although any semblance to what we think of as a pool may be questionable.

I'm starting to bond with some of the group members as well, which is nice. Apparently during VBS I get to play the role of a shephard, and the role of Jesus. I get lead another of us who'll be a lost sheep, but she's pretty small, so I think I want to just pick her up and carry her on my back, like the pictures you often see. We'll see if that results in bodily harm to Shawn.

Anyway, not much else to say...I'm up to 4000 lei right now, so I better get off. Of course, 4000 lei is like a quarter, so clearly I'm breaking the bank. It's fun to hold a million lei bill in your wallet, even if that's like $40 or so. It's just way to fun to say you're a millinaire...

Hi he, hi ho, it's off to...

...Romania I go. T-minus 1 hour twenty minutes until we meet at ECC and counting. And, ever so surprisingly, I am nervous. Lunch didn't sit that well. Go figure. Must be the curse of being over 6 feet tall and traveling for the next 12 hours of my life...

Alright God, time to strut your stuff. Show us what you're going to do in us and through us in the next two weeks.

Any ideas?

Does anyone know of a BPM counter for Windows XP that will automatically fill in the bpm column on iTunes? There are such programs for Mac, but none for Windows that I've found...

I'll take stupid baseball facts for 1000, Alex.

Italy won the World Cup today (btw, which nation was the only nation to get a point (or more) from the Italians? that's the USA, baby...and yet, we still can't play soccer). They have done that three previous times: in 1934, 1938, and 1982.

The Cubs are 4-0 on days Italy wins the World Cup.

What? You only have one mortgage?!?

So, I have officially made an offer on a place on the south side of Terre Haute, and actually got a counteroffer already. So, now I get to mull over that. The thought of a teacher having two mortgages I find very humorous, though. :) Of course, someone is looking at my house as we speak (I'm not there), so hopefully I won't have two mortgages for long.

Anyway, I got some more good news in regards to my next occupation. No, my room hasn't been cleaned yet (why should it be? there's a whole month before school starts...). Rather, I got my class schedule, which looks promising. First of all, my prep is 3rd hour, which means I don't have prep and lunch back-to-back like student teaching, which was brutal. More exciting, however, was that I am not teaching Algebra I as expected, but rather two sections of advanced Algebra II. How much cooler is that?!?

Somewhat surreal

Have you ever started packing up your house, putting things in boxes and whatnot, without actually have a place to take them? I don't know where I'm moving to after I get back from Romania (I see the realtor over there tomorrow morning again, and may make an offer), but since I'm going to be gone for two weeks and my house is currently on the market, I am starting the process of packing up my things. And it's a little freaky getting ready to leave with no actual destination at this point...

Speaking of which, anyone want to help? :)

Sleep, glorious sleep

It's so nice to be back in my bed. After spending five nights or so at the lake, on a mattress I never seem to sleep well on, next to a brother who snores like a drowning hyena speaking into a megaphone, it's really nice to come home and sleep in a room by myself in a bed I'm used to. It's amazing how different beds can be...

Now, we start the Romania process. And the house process. Hopefully, today I'll be heading over to Terre Haute to look at a couple more houses, and maybe make an offer. After that, I need to get a realtor for my place. And after that, it's all about Romania.

Oh yeah, and thanks to my last post, according to Yahoo I am now hit #1 for "Chickens singing In the Mood." I am officially completely and 100% uncool. :)