Straja Recap, Etc.

It's been quite a week since my last post. We got back from the weekend in Straja really late on Sunday night, but it was a great time. We took about 25 people to Straja, a mountain resort place about four hours from Lugoj. We stayed at the "Sissi", a cabin about 2 km from the mountain. We got stuck big time getting up to Sissi because of the snow and slush, but after an hour we finally got there. We had long, exhausting snowball fights, Bible studies led by Ovidiu, intense games of Rummy, and mici (Romanian meat). We went sledding on the mountain on Saturday afternoon, which was amazing. Unlike Colorado or New Mexico, all of the hotels and rentals were on the top of the mountain, so it was like a big Romanian party up there. There were skiers, but we preferred to sled on plastic sacks and cheap sled rentals. It was great to get to hang out with some Romanian students, who taught me some new hilarious phrases such as, "Shut up, I'm the boss." We also played charades in Romanian, which was great for everyone except the American in the room. All in all, great trip, great people, loads of snow, and beautiful scenery.

The rest of the week looks pretty exciting. Ovidiu came to our apartment today and showed us the blueprints from House of Joy, which looks really impressive. It's going to be a great building and they definitely have big plans for the future. We'll be going to Timisoara tomorrow to do "business", and early next week I'll be going to Gavojdia to the orphanage for the first time, which I'm really looking forward to. This orphanage is one of the sites that Pioneer will be working at when they come over in early June. Everyone is incredibly excited about having the group come over in June and about having me here for the next five months, so that's a good thing.

I want to put a funny story on every post, so here it is. Danny and I were walking through the city center in Lugoj this afternoon, which is basically a big row of shops and stores, and saw a massive pile of snow fall on this high school guy from the roof of the building. It almost felt like a scene from Home Alone 2: Lost in New York, except no Macaulay Culkin. I almost felt bad for the guy, but I felt worse because I didn't have a video camera. Adios and have a great week.