Hi again, well another month as just flown past, and what a busy one it has been!
Since my last email I have been on a 2 week camp in Romania, then went
to Greece for a week with a few days to Albania, now I'm on my way to Istanbul before I fly to the Philippines on Wednesday!
I'm getting really tired of travelling and I think I have seen enough of Europe for now. My brother is in the Philipines so I am going to go visit him and travel around a little, then… Back to New Zealand!!! Can't wait!
So for the camp in Romania. I joined a group from Holland called 'Go Kids'. It's really cool… they bring children from Holland, aged between 6 to 14 years, to help run camps for the gypsies.
The first week we were in a town called Reghin and every day we went out to a small gypsy village were a Dutch girl has set up a 'youth centre' and we would run programs for the local kids. The morning would start with the older ones and we would have
a time of singing and some games, then after lunch the little ones, below 6 would come and we had some songs and workshops/sports etc… then again with the older ones doing workshops. The kids were really cool. They are extremely cuddly and would come up and hug you all the time. They are really open and friendly. The village though is extremely poor. Houses with unfinished roofs, or big gaps in the walls and everything is very dirty, including them. ; ) There is rubbish everywhere and a lot of the kids have wounds or a carrying fleas…Which lucky for me took a liking to my blood! I'm covered in bites!!
I really wonder how they keep warm here in the winter though, as it gets very cold. I can only imagine
there are a lot of sick families. I'm also told there is a lot of abuse and violence amongst the gypsies… but to me they also look happy and seem to get along pretty well. They are defiantly more of a relational culture than a task orientated culture.
I admire this girl Annemieke though for going in and starting this program. She has been really blessed and is just about to move into a house in the gypsy neighbourhood so she can minister more personally to the girls. I would love to bring back some teams to help her.
I also meet a couple that meet and were married within 1 1/2 months and now 5 months after being married are adopting a gypsy baby and they have the land and foundations laid for a small orphanage they want to start. She is also a nurse and is going to start a free clinic in the gypsy village… so again some more contacts to help out : )
The second week of camp we moved further south. We are staying near 4 small towns and everyday going out in small teams to pray for people… as God leads. Today I went with a group into a gypsy neighbourhood and we had some kids come up to us. We asked if we could pray for anything and one boy showed us this huge scar on his upper led. He said a tombstone had fallen on it and broken his leg. But since the operation he has not been able to run. So we had a boy in our group pray for him and after he was able to stretch his leg like he hadn't been able to before and he was able to run. Praise God!!!
Then we asked him to pray for the dutch boy that had prayed for him. He is a dwarf and has had a series of operations on his legs and is also unable to run and bend his legs properly etc…
So after the gypsy boy prayed, Roserio tried doing things he couldn't do before. He also was healed and was able to move his legs and stretch them like he couldn't before and he could also run!!!! Ha, it was so exciting, and really encouraging for the gypsy kids to see they too could pray : )
What a great God we have!
The whole thing was a lot of fun, but exhausting. It's been so long since I have routine like that!
Unfortunately I did receive some rather upsetting news during the camp though. The little HIV Baby that joined the children's village in Sudan just before I left, died. Isaiah lost his mother to Aids and him and his older sister came to live with us 3 weeks before I left Sudan.
He was an adorable kid and I really liked him. A while ago he stopped eating and Jennie had to patiently spend time with him at every meal to get him to eat… but I understand it was very difficult getting food into him. Then one night he just stopped breathing. : ( Very sad.
So after the camp I went to retreat in the mountains for a few days, in a beautiful city called Brasov. It was there I decided to go to Greece, after finding a really cheap flight and then head overland to Albania.
In Greece I stayed with this really nice girl whom I had great chats with about God and religion. East Europe is so… religious! It's so hard to explain to people that you have to separate religion and relationship. Everyone is caught up in religion, but no one is satisfied. There is a real need for some outreach here I think. It's time to wake up the church!!
Anyway if you would like to pray for her, her name is Alexia. She doesn't want religion, but I can see she is hungry for relationship, and I really want her to experience our great friend Jesus.
Anyway, she invited me to spend the weekend with her family in a real small village (40people) for a religious weekend to celebrate mother Mary. It was nice to get out into such a rural area. Here the houses are still white like you would picture in Greece but they have red roofs to blend in with the landscape, not blue ones like on the Islands.
Ok, after that I went to an amazing place called Kalambaka, where there are these incredible rock formations with very impressive monasteries built on top of the cliffs. It's really amazing to see. During WWII the monks would hide in caves on the cliff face, accessing them via rickety wooden ladders. They would keep working there way up the cliffs then eventually they started building the monasteries. A lot of the material would be hoisted up via baskets on ropes. A lot of work!!
Now they are multi million tourist attractions, so have lost a lot of their character, but still it was an impressive sight.
It was also cool to read through the new testament and identify the places Jesus apostles travelled spreading the gospel to the Greeks : )
After that I headed up to Albania. The first time seeing the sea in 8 months! It was so nice to go swimming and the water is so clear and the perfect temperature. Albania was a lot less developed than other Europen countries and the roads were pretty rough, but there is a lot of development going on around the coast, as it is one of the last sea front areas to sell.
As I had already got tired of travel before arriving in Albania I decided not to stay long and explore. Instead I found a ticket to the Philippines where I am going to go travel with my brother for a while. I'm really looking forward to having a travel partner! And seeing family! Yeah!!!!!!!!
So right now I am on a 21 hour train journey to Istanbul, Turkey, where I will spend my last two days in Europe, then on Wednesday I fly to Manila. I'll probably be there about a month, but really I have no idea, no plans… typical Amy style : )
So, one chapter coming to an end and another about to begin. I'm really amazed at God's provision to me on this trip. I never expected to be able to go this long on the little I had, but God has been providing in His way, and here I am, entering my forth month. What a good God we have!
Love you all
Amy
