America, meet:
Taylor, Bryson, Dan, Annie, Ryan, Jessica, Stephanie, Jillian, Rachel,Meredith, Holly, Mia, and Josie
Team Liberty's Fearless Leader, RyanTuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday:
These were mostly work days for the students. They were able to get a lot done at the Barnes house and the church; the tasks that they accomplished saved the Barnes about six months of work. What a huge blessing. At night, we continued with the English classes and we had a steady roster of the same four people all week. A young girl came to the Advanced class one night, but ended up translating for Lita in the Beginner class. During Big Group Time, Ron had a different student speak each night to bring an encouraging word to the students. Speaking to non-believers who don't even fully understand your language can prove to be quite a challenge, but the students did a great job coming up with simple messages that could encourage and inspire. We were able to take another visit to Ceske Krumlov, the beautiful little city that sits twenty minutes away on the river. We explored the local community by visiting local hot-spots such as Tesco, the afore mentioned grocery store, and Globus, a combination mall and Wal-Mart-type shopping center. And the students taught four more classes at the elementary school, which proved to be a huge success. In fact, the school was so excited about the participation from the students that they have asked us to come back on a regular basis to help the students with their English. That is huge for a Christian ministry to be invited into a public school in a dark country just because we showed the children some attention! This was a huge breakthrough and will hopefully lead to more open doors in the community.
Friday:America took over the town of Ceske Budejovice in full force today as we were released in teams of three for a Scavenger Hunt, Czech Style! My team, i.e. the winning team, was made up of myself, our wonderful leader Sophie Barnes, Josie, Rachel, Bryson, and Mia. We followed clues that took us all over the town square and beyond and had us doing everything from eating ice cream in freezing weather to putting our feet in an icy river. We had been told that there was no time limit but the most creative and funny pictures would win so we all put our heads together to get some awesome shots of "Team Czech Us Out" hitting the town of Ceske Budjovice. It was a great opportunity for not only the Liberty students to sightsee and practice the Czech language but also for myself since I hadn't really seen the city. The best part was that we had to get locals to take the pictures, since we had to be in them, so the looks we got from them were priceless. They watched as we hung Sophie over a rail, climbed a wall on a bridge, asked total strangers to be in pictures, acted like birds eating food, dunked me under a water fountain, and did handstands next to giant pencils. Although the game was deemed a tie, we all know who really won...
After the hunt, we shopped for a little while since the square was filled with merchants for Easter. A group of us decided to go up the historical Black Tower, however, and I was so glad I went with them. The concept was simple and familiar: walk up about 245 steps of a tall lighthouse type building and take pictures atop the city. Well, somehow climbing lighthouses in Savannah was a lot simpler. The Black Tower steps were skinny and narrow and the cold weather and heavy coats did not make for ideal climbing conditions. But once we got to the top, it was definitely worth the sweat and sore legs. The view was amazing! How beautiful it is to see a city from the way God sees it...up high and able to see everything in one view! After several dozen pictures were taken from every angle and with every participant, we made our descent back down, which was much quicker for some reason.
That night we had the Good Friday service at the church. This was a really cool idea and the turn out was great. We spent a few minutes in remembrance of the sacrifice that Christ made for us - coming to Earth only to be rejected and killed by the very ones He came to love. But then, as Ron encouraged us, we celebrated His resurrection. After all, that is what Easter is all about. He is alive and not dead and we celebrated that fact through songs in English and Czech, praising a God that gave the ultimate gift so that we could have the ultimate existence! It was a great service and a great time to fellowship with the church members.After that, it was time for us to have our own little celebration! Brenda prepared a whole table of goodies for ice cream sundaes and we all sat down together to view the pictures from the day. Not only were the pictures being judged but there poems written while in the square, using words from the square and I don't think there are any words that I could use to describe the poetic beauty that that came out of the minds of the three teams. All I can say is, Dr. Suess would be proud but Robert Frost would probably cringe. We were rolling on the floor though - it's amazing what college kids can come up with! Again, Ron declared it a tie between the teams, all led by a Barnes child. So as we sat and screamed for our respective leader the kids got to feel like rock stars for a little while which was actually pretty satisfying. But I still say there was a clear cut winner - after all, why play a game if you can't win? Then you are just a group of losers - super! Everyone did a great job though! (But Team Czech Us Out did the best)
Saturday:We had an amazing morning planned. We were off to Hluboka Castle, about thirty minutes away in the town of Hluboka. Everyone was so excited - the castles are one of the reasons people come to this area. We walked about a mile up the hill to get to the castle, which apparently is a theme around here, but once we reached it the walk again was totally worth it! Ron had told us that the parents of one of the local girls, Eva, had gotten married here in the castle. Judging by the outside alone, I would definitely be ok getting married in this castle. It was beautiful! We took a bunch of pictures of the outside and the inner courtyard and then we waited to see if we could tour the inside. Ron had been told that it would be closed due to the winter; it would cost too much to heat the entire building so they only offer tours during the warmer months. Yet, today they were taking groups through. So it was arranged for us to get an English speaking tour guide - we just had to wait about thirty minutes for them to be ready. Unfortunately, we were not able to take pictures inside the castle and we had to be extremely quiet and respectful. They are not above throwing people out in the middle of the tour.
The castle was beautiful! It was absolutely amazing! Every room was carved with deep wood in such an intricate manner. The ceilings were painted in gold, purple and red flowers. Chandeliers were huge crystal ornaments hanging from the ceilings. There were treasure boxes and paintings and deer heads in all the rooms. There were several rooms dedicated solely to armor and weapons that the family used for wartime. The formal dining room sat 72 people. I have been to the Biltmore Estate in North Carolina and I must say that the Biltmore paled in comparison of elegance and grandeur. Hluboka was incredible and the tour guide did such a great job explaining everything in English, though his accent was a bit hard to understand. He made us laugh with his humor about the castle and the people. He even let one of the college students, Holly, play the grand piano. That was pretty awesome to watch - if only we could have taken pictures! Everyone loaded up with postcards once we got outside and then we hiked back down the hill. Today happened to be an extremely cold day and since they were not able to heat the castle, it actually felt colder inside than it did outside.
For the afternoon, we were going to be staying at The Open Door Club. There we would be holding a game afternoon, but with indoor games due to the cold. We were not sure who would be showing up so we sat and waited and then started playing a big group game called the "Animal Game." I'm not really sure of the point of this besides you act like an animal and you have to remember who the other "animals" are. It was funny to watch though - after all, anything is better than Mafia. After being accused of the being Mafia in my first time playing and then being whacked the second time, I was pretty much done with that game. The college kids thought they were Tony Soprano apparently. After a while Yada and Olga, our landlords, showed up. We split up into smaller groups to play card games and I orchestrated a game of spoons with my group. Then came Rapture and Egyptian Rapture. It was a fun afternoon and I think Yada and Olga enjoyed just sitting around and talking to everyone. They even brought us food and their daughter Lita made us a chocolate lamb cake for Easter. It was just shaped like a lamb, not actually made of lamb - a few of the kids were worried. Once the games were done, we headed back to the Barnes house for dinner and somehow ended up watching High School Musical. I lost about two hours of my life that night that I will never get back. I know this will probably enrage a lot of people because this craze seems to have brainwashed America and now surrounding areas but I found this movie very hard to sit through with using any gag reflexes.
Sunday:
Easter morning in Czech was much different than Easter morning in America but it was Easter just the same! Today would be bittersweet however, since it was our last day with the Liberty students. We put on our best dress for the service and the students got all their things packed up. The service was really great. The students led us in English worship and we also sang in Czech for the church members. Vlada gave a great message about the Resurrection of Christ and luckily Peter translated for us. It was so nice to hear the message of Christ halfway around the world, in another language.
Immediately after church we had to change and get on the road. A quick stop at KFC (yes that is Kentucky Fried Chicken) we headed to Prague for the day. It was about a two hour drive and boy were we ready to get there. First though, we had to stop at the Baptist Seminary in Prague, which is where we were staying for the night. Then we parked the vans and we set out on foot to explore the beauty of Prague. The first stop was the castle district. It was crowded and we had to stick together to avoid getting lost or pick pocketed but it was so neat. There were all these beautiful buildings and massive cathedrals. Statues filled the inner courts and it was crazy to stand there in the middle and be surrounded by this huge beauty of work. We all tried to stay together and still stop and take pictures every few minutes. Ron lead us through the area and then would stop every once and a while to release us for fifteen minutes before we had to move on to the next stop. After the castle district we headed into downtown Prague, near the famous Charles Bridge. We walked down cobblestone streets (can't get over that) along skinny little roads with outdoor cafes and little shops along the way. I took pictures of everything and still couldn't believe I was walking through this major European town. We got to a stopping point just before the bridge and Ron stopped us to brief us. We had about an hour and a half to shop and sightsee and then we were moving to the next area. He pointed out the Starbucks and let us go. Of course, about half us went straight to the coffee shop to fill up on our American java. And yes, I was part of that group. I wanted a mocha! About thirty other people were also flocking in as well, so we were a little worried that we would waste about thirty minutes just trying to get our drinks. Now, I am not trying to be anti-American in the least but I have to give another point to the Czechs on this one. This Starbucks was more efficient with thirty customers than I've seen American Starbucks with two. We stepped up, gave our order, our name, they threw the cup down the counter, we paid, and we were out. Literally, in five minutes. I was impressed - this location should be a training headquarters!
Once we had our jump start, we were on our way. Unfortunately, once we reached the door we saw that it was pouring down rain. None the less, we headed out and shopped for a while ducking into little shops to get out of the weather. Normally, the shops are pretty set on their prices and will not barter with you; it is not the culture like it is Latin America. All I did was stop in one store where some of the rest of the group was and pick up an item and all of a sudden the worker is bartering with me. He must have spotted my keen business skills, because he started with just 10kr coming off the price. Well, I was not going to fall for that. I walked out of the store with the item, and I paid about 40kr less than what was on the sticker. Even the Barnes thought this was strange that he did this. But I was not complaining. Once my group reached the bridge, it was still raining but it was still so beautiful to see! We were wet and tired but to stand on the bridge and see so much of Prague, with a ferry boat playing music in the background, was so amazing! We walked along the bridge and looked at all the vendor's paintings of the scenery. This was really cool to see; they tend to be more expensive on the bridge but we didn't have a whole lot of time left and the group had money to spend. It had stopped raining and we started to enjoy the stroll along the water, looking at the paintings and trying to find ones that were nice but not too expensive.
We left the bridge and walked to another area of the town. This was the old town square, and it was filled with people and more merchants. A little fair was set up due to the Easter holiday so we shopped yet some more and explored the area. Fifteen minutes there and we walked to the next stop. Another thirty minutes of shopping in another area and we were finally worn out. The last stop was neat though because you could see the capitol building and these streets were lines with really nice clothing stores. Now I felt at home! Now it was time for a new experience - public transportation. We walked to the subway station and Ron got us all tickets. This inevitably produced another photo session as most of us had never ridden a subway before, myself included. So we took the subway, which wasn't much different than the tram at the Atlanta airport, over to another stop where we then took a public bus. Their bus system is completely electric though, and there are big bars that stick out of the top and run along the wires. It was all very exciting for a girl from a small town in GA. We got in the vans and drove to dinner, which was a really nice mediterranean restaurant called the Myln Restaurant. We checked our coats and they had two long tables set up for us, all decorated very nicely. The food was amazing, the service was super, and the company was even better. We got to drink from fancy little wine glasses (not wine, just used the glasses) and everything was so nice. They put your coat on for you when you left, which was another surprise for most of us. You just don't get service like that anymore...
It was a great last night together and a really nice way to just relax and hang out. We met up again in one room at the seminary to debrief about the trip and it was so encouraging to hear how impacted the students were after ten days. It was encouraging for me just to have them around. They definitely brought America to me and I built some amazing friendships through it. They completely made me feel like one of them and welcomed me as part of their group - I knew it was going to be tough to say good-bye to them. By the time we were done, we went to bed for about four hours. At 3:30am we were up again to take the students to the airport to catch a flight at 6:00am. The good-byes were sad and it was hard to see them off. I have made some amazing friends within them and seen a group of extremely dedicated, strong Christian students fulfill the Lord's purpose in Czech Republic. I couldn't have been more humbled and encouraged by their presence. They were such a blessing to know and I pray that God truly blesses them in their future.
No comments:
Post a Comment