There's a world out there that we should see.

LIVE. LIFE. OUT. LOUD.

Tuesday, April 29, 2014

POLAND - DAY 8 - ALL DAY AT TOMY CHURCH

April 4, 2014


Let me just tell you that today was ANOTHER day FULL OF LAUGHTER.

We started our morning with breakfast at 830am. Which mainly consists of us all sitting at the table with our food on our plates but on our phones the entire time. I was sitting beside Jeff at breakfast and I got up to put my plate away and as I walk back he says, “I thought you were going to take it (points at his plate)” and I reply with, “Jeff, I’m not much of a caretaker. Truth.
Jeff and I then go to the barn to see the donkeys and ponies. That was an adventure in itself. Let’s just say that the donkeys were NOT being appropriate.

As we get in the van, John says that we’re going to listen to ROCK BALLADS on the way to the castle. Before going to Tomy, we drove to the old church on the hill and then walked to a castle in the same area. Daniel was our tour guide and it’s NEVER a dull moment with him around so it was rather amusing.






At the old church, there’s a cemetery there and the graves have large monuments above ground (still buried below) and there isn’t much grass since they’re all very close by each other. Daniel informed us that if someone were to ever mow the lawn on top of the graves (like in the US), it’d be blasphemy to them in Poland.


We then enter the old church and climb upstairs and as Daniel rings the bell slightly, he informs us NOT to do that. When you ring the bell, it means that someone has passed.







VIVA LA VERVE!



BESTIES !


Jamie was looking at the ducks or something so I stand behind her so someone can take a pic of me pretending to push her in (without her knowing) and I didn't see Daniel behind and and just after they took this pic, he had pretended to push me so I scream because I wasn't expecting that. 
Good times.






As we were inside exploring, Daniel’s phone rang and I said, “Wow, you’re popular” and he said, “Jesus is calling me.”
AHAHHHA




We then walk to the castle. As I tell Margaret to take a picture with me she says, “Aww, it’s our first selfie” lol and then she kept closing her eyes in the pictures and says, “I was trying to force my eyes open (because of the sun)” and Jeff says, “I bet, you’ve been trying to do that all morning.” She was extra sleepy that day.


Jeff and I decided to do a mini photo shoot whilst touring this building...


always a good time.


We visited the future school, where they bought land.
We all walked around it and in it and prayed over it.




SO . . . as Jamie was walking around praying for the building, a bird pooped on her head.


And Taryn, like a good bestie, cleaned it out for her as I (another good bestie) took pictures AND recorded this priceless moment.




Margaret discovered how to fall asleep standing up and as a good friend, I made sure to capture the moment.



We then visited two other schools that have been established for a couple of years now. They are Christian schools. We learned that in Poland you have to learn two other languages than just Polish and it’s English and German. If people really excel, they can learn Spanish as another.



They’ve seen many teacher and parents come to Christ through just the kids being in the school. They start their day with prayer and solid bible teaching. Not all teachers and/or staff are Christians. And they are well aware of what’s practiced prior to accepting the position.

We helped the preschoolers do a small craft of making a cross out of Popsicle sticks. This little girl was sitting beside me and kisses me on the cheek then hugs me, unexpectedly. It was the cutest thing.


300 kids  year don’t have a pre-school to go to. Their school initially started with 28 kids and now they have 170.




Soup is the biggest thing in Poland and it's delicious.


This was strawberry sauce and noodles (or something) and she said that most Americans don't like it but I'm pretty sure that we all had 2 plates.



She was saying that a child’s faith is far greater than an adult’s and here’s the story that follows:
She was telling us the story of when they were in the US (her husband is from the US) and staying for a couple of months visiting family. Her son would pray at night that his friend David (their friend Daniel’s son) would come to the US so that they could play because he missed him. She didn’t want him to get his hopes up of something so unrealistic so she would say that it’s not that possible for that to happen. Some time passed and shegot a call from Daniel saying that his family in the US are helping pay for their tickets and want them to visit. So, in a month or so, her son and David were playing together in the US.

Another story of one of their staff members having cancer and the children and teachers would pray for her health every day. The teacher overcame the cancer and when the other teachers announced that she would be okay, the kids reaction was, “Well yea, we prayed.”
This just shows how sometimes we need to have faith just like children.
Believe in what seems to be impossible.



Playing some crazy NOT UNO way of playing UNO with the kids.
They made crazy rules that didn't make sense BUT we laughed A LOT.


Simon (not spelled or pronounced like that) was SUCH A GREAT HELP. He was with all of us pretty much most of the time. We had Piotr (Peter) who drove the van and Simon was always with telling us information and just hanging out.




BINGO!


These girls and I were besties whilst playing BINGO.
It got loud.


 Daniel is HILARIOUS


I don't remember what happened here but Margaret's face is priceless while Jeff is yet again....on his cell phone all up in church.
I suppose I'm not any better since I'm taking pictures with mine, haha

TECHNOLOGY WILL BE THE DEATH OF US ALL!


I don't know where I was trying to connect to wifi but when I saw CHEERS BAR, I got so happy!
Then thought of a friends episode (I know, it's pathetic) of when they are all in London (except for Phoebe since she was pregnant and couldn't fly) and Joey was feeling homesick and when he turned the TV on, Cheers TV show was on and he got sad again.
That's my story, thanks for listening.



Our last picture of the night before we went back to the camp to sleep and pack.
Love this church.
Reminds me of Verve and it's so incredibly amazing to see that people across the world are praising God just like we do but in a different language. That's pretty cool too.

Lesson learned --> LOVE IS UNIVERSAL.


We left Tomy a little late, maybe 8pm (and I only say that's late because by the time we drive back to the camp, it's late) and we went to Rafal's home for dinner. His wife prepared GREAT FOOD and they are such a sweet family.

We ate dinner at Rafal and his wife's home.
The girls: Maddie, Kristina (spelled like my name! I wasn't referring to myself in the third person), Jamie and Taryn.



 Our last day in Poland, before flying out the next morning, was another successful day.


Monday, April 28, 2014

POLAND - DAY 7 - AUSCHWITZ

April 3, 2014


We woke up at 530am since we had breakfast at 7am.
We had a 4 hour drive to Auschwitz and our tour started at 11am.

Today is Nathan’s birthday! Stephania and a couple of the ladies sang Happy Birthday at breakfast and they had two small plates of orange sherbert cookies. 


All you hear Jeff say (once he finds out that it’s orange sherbert) is, “Orange sherbert? Ohhh, maybe I’ll take one here in a little bit.”


This was Jeff messaging Lisa every morning.
PS - We ALL were on our cell phones when whenever we ate because we didn't get wifi in our cabins.


Then all you hear is the face time ring tone because a few people are face timing.
We head out of the castle to go to the van and I’m first then Taryn then Jeff. I kind of trip and say, “oh ohhh” and Taryn is behind me laughing. Just as she’s laughing, SHE FALLS FACE FIRST AND EATS THE CEMENT, and Jeff and I are both looking at her and laughing hysterically. 

As we’re driving to Krakow, Margaret told us how her straightener broke this morning. Nathan (her husband) decides to chime in and share that, that morning he was laying in bed and farted and coincidentally the straightener started burning around that same time so he thought that the straightener smell was his fart then got really worried that something was wrong.
FANTASTIC story. We applaud Nathan for sharing.
I then stated, “if this is what I have to look forward to getting married, I’m good.”

We arrived at Auschwitz at 11am and our tour began. We watched a 20 minute video to start the tour and then we had a tour guide that spoke for the next hour and a half and took us around the camps. There’s A LOT of history/information that I can’t even type but I’ll share a couple points. There were actually 50 camps total and 3 parts to Auschwitz. Part 1 and 3 were smaller and part 2 was the biggest and mainly where everyone went. 


BESTIES







600 prisoners were in each one of these buildings







Mainly Jewish people and Gypsies were taken because of their ethnicity and then the rest of the Europeans from all over were mainly because of their politics.










There really just never a good day to go to Auschwitz. Whether we went earlier in the trip or later, or just anytime . . . it’s just rough.
It was a day of reflection.












Jamie was a ridiculously good photographer. I was walking towards the entrance (since we were leaving) and as I turned back, she had taken the picture and I'm directly center. Crazy.


We then drove an hour to Krakow to see a Cathedral inside of the Castle. The cathedral is free to look at and we went there. I’m not much of a buildings/cathedral kind of gal. I’m more into the local area homes and castles, as far as buildings go.





This was me done walking for the day.












After that, we walked to Sphinx Restaurant and had dinner. I ate the Australian Steak with vegetables which I was very much looking forward to but it wasn’t as good as I’d expected. But still, steak is better than no steak. Amen to that.


 It was about 6:20pm when we finished eating so we walked around Krakow for another 30 minutes and left around 7pm . . . well, as I’m typing this, I’m noticing that it’s 8:50pm soooo I’m not quite sure what we did from 7pm to now because we’re just now getting on the road home to the village. We did have to walk some and then make a pit stop to the gas station in order to use the restrooms. We have about a 2 to 3 hour drive right now back to the village so we expect to get in around midnight at the latest.

We get to sleep in tomorrow a little since we don’t have breakfast until 830am. We leave at 9am and get to Tomy around 10:30am.

Today was a day of history and building relationships with each other. We’ve definitely grown on each other as a group and made friends with our Polish friends. We laughed A LOT in the van today. . . I hope so since most of our traveling time is done in the van!