career student record

I'm back

2009-08-25T09:30:00.000-07:00

Well I'm back home again. I know some of y'all have been wondering if I would ever post anything again. I will. I'm still adjusting to being home and sorting through all the stuff that comes with that. I'm glad to be home and especially glad to be able to spend time with my family. But I am missing Plzen and my friends there a whole lot too. It's been much harder than I thought it would be. I wasn't really ready to come home really. I will write more when I can get some perspective on everything and figure out exactly what I feelings and thought are about it all.

But in the mean time Wade and I got to go camping and hiking for a week in Switzerland and it was so totally awesome! Here are some pictures.

Reflection

2009-04-14T12:40:00.000-07:00

Ok so I know I dropped of the planet there for a while. I apologize for that. I've been having some personal stuff I guess you'd say. I know some of you have wondered if there is a girl involved. Well, there is. I messed around and got my heart broken. We are really close friends still now and I think we always will be. I don't regret anything that happened. She's a great girl.

It's funny how in the training this exact subject came up. We did a skit about a girl falling for a local boy wanting to stay on. I must admit I did the same thing. The training is very good at warning us what to look out for. I knew about it but life has a funny way of happening to you when you least expect it. I've learned a lot from my experience here. I've realized I had kind of given up on the idea of having a family. It was painful but God showed me I really do want this.

Another thing to be on the lookout for is loneliness. It will happen. It's just part of being in a strange country on your own. But I am so blessed to be here and I thank God everyday for giving me this chance to learn about Him and myself.

We all have a part to play. I know most of the missions volunteers go to places without all the comforts I have here. I'll be honest, sometimes I feel a little guilty about that. I have a nice thing going here. I really enjoy teaching English at Maranatha. I hope that I have done a good job. I do know that I've made some great friends in the classes and had some really good conversations about God and His plan for us.

I guess if I had any advice for folks training to go on a mission it would be to listen to the leaders and really take it to heart. Even knowing what to look for won't stop you from having setbacks. Pretty much every situation we covered in my training has come up with me at some point during my time here and knowing that I'm not the first one to go through it helps. There may be times you feel like you're not helping anyone or making a difference. But trust in the Lord that you are where He wants you to be. We can never really know all the people we touch or what they will take away from knowing us. You just have to be open and show people who you really are. I know God uses us more than we can ever actually realize.

I get impatient like anybody else and I want to know where I'm going. However, I also know God is not on my timetable. I've been reading Donald Miller's latest book To Own A Dragon. I always take something from his books that changes my whole way of thinking. This one is about how God is our Father. He is THE perfect Father I know is always taking care of me. From my daily bread to learning to grow up and be a man myself He is with me guiding me. I don't always get what I want. He gives me what I need. I take much comfort in that.

One of the other things I've learned is to be able to ask for prayer. Before I came here I was always a little uncomfortable and embarrassed about asking people to pray for me. The Good Lord took that away from me right quick and I can't thank Him enough. Knowing that my Church family back home is praying for me gets me through the tough times and helps me enjoy the good times even more. So on that note, pray for me to find my way in this world and find my way to the family I hope to start one day soon. Thank you all so very much.

Here's a picture I took on a long walk where I figured out a lot of the stuff I've talked about here. It's from a hill top on the edge of town looking back to the Pilsen city center. For some reason, "He's got the whole world in His hands" comes to my mind. Peace to everyone.

I've had a few thoughts since I posted this. I highly recommend maintaining a blog if you have access to the internet in your mission. It really helps to write your thoughts out. If you don't have internet definitely keep a journal. Hopefully you'll be lucky and will have people you can talk to nearby. But writing down what you are going through helps to clear your head and reflect on your experience in a way you can learn from them. No matter how much you are helping people where you are you will feel like you are the one being helped. It is such a blessing to be able to come and be a part of what our brothers and sisters in Christ are doing.

Easter

2009-04-14T11:26:00.001-07:00

Happy Easter Everyone! One of the great things about Czech Republic is that Easter is a very big holiday for everyone, even people that don't go to Church. It's also the beginning of spring so there's lots of nice stuff going on. Like this market in the town square. They have booths with sausages and all kinds of crafts. I saw a whole pig being roasted on a spit. I almost felt like I was back home at a pig pull.
One thing I have not really talked about in the blog is beer. Now I've avoided it because I don't know how all people might react but I'm going to get into it. Beer is a big part of the culture in Czech Republic and especially in Pilsen. It is the birth place of Pilsner Urquell which is one of the oldest working breweries in the world. In fact the Brewery Museum is the oldest one in the world. The company employs many people and is very important to the economy as well as a source of cultural pride. I would say that I resisted drinking beer and only took it up to be sensitive to my hosts but that'd be a big fat fib. I liked beer before I came here. There, I said it. But I know moderation is most important. Having said that, it really would hurt a Czech's feelings if you refused to try their favorite local beer.

Anyway, Pilsner Urquell sponsors these festivals so there is a lot of advertising for them around. You can see the big blow up arch there? Pilsner Urquell. So you get the idea.

So as I was saying there a lots of interesting traditions around Easter here. I must be honest, I do not understand a lot of what I was told and I really can't remember everything. So if any of my Czech friends read this feel free to point out in the comments the important things I missed.

So here's the worst one probably. It's funny but I can see how it might be problematic. We'd never get away with this in USA. It's called Pomlazka. Basically a pomlazka is a whip made from willow twigs braided together. Boys in the village take the pomlazky and hit the girls with them in the legs and behind. In return the girls give them a decorated egg. I know, it's nutso. Needless to say many of my female friends are not fans of this tradition. Fortunately nobody really beats up on the girls so much anymore.

Another thing here they do that I love is this spot just off the square. Basically anyone can come up and read the Bible for everyone to hear. The nice lady off to the right goes to Maranatha actually. But from what I can tell anyone is welcome to come and read. There's a little sign up sheet in that walkway. For a country that is so secular they still have a lot of affection for tradition and the Christianity is a big part of that. At least I hope so. Now if they'd just start going to Church again. I hope I'm helping in my small way on that front.

If you really want to know all about the Easter traditions I found a link here at My Czech Republic.

The Monday after Easter is a national holiday. So a group of us from Maranatha went out to some lakes on the edge of town to picnic and have a nice day out. It has all of a sudden become the most beautiful weather here. It's in the 70s and sunny most everyday. So nice.

I apologize for my terrible photography. But over that lake behind those trees is where we went. We of course cooked sausages on the fire all that good stuff. We also played lots of games with the kids. This was so much fun. One of the funniest parts of the day was the big gift hunt. It's sort of like an Easter Egg Hunt but it's really just one big one. They all took off running through forest to be the first one to find it. But finding it was just the beginning of the battle.

That's right! It was up in the top of a skinny little pine tree. They weren't discouraged though. They went after it.

But eventually that had to face facts and enlist the help of Honza, the tallest guy out there.

That's right! I snapped the picture while the present was still falling. I'm very proud of that. So all the kids got their candy and all was right with the world. It really was a lovely day and it's amazing how you can travel such a small distance and be in such great natural beauty.

Happy Easter again Everyone!! Thanks so much to everyone for keeping me in their prayers. I need them and appreciate it more than I can say.

šťastný Velikonoce!

(I just know I got that wrong.)

Ireland

2009-04-14T05:15:00.001-07:00

Hello! I recently got to go to Ireland again. This time Deidre came so it was better. We saw lot's of great stuff. This is Bunratty Castle in sort of central-western Ireland. I forgot which county we were in. In the course of the day we were in 3 of the 4 provinces. Here's a little mill near the castle.

I didn't get a whole lot of photos because my camera is old and I never got a proper memory card for it. Sorry. But here's what I've got.

So you can't really tell much but this is from somewhere in the middle of Ireland. We took a train across from Dublin to Galway. Deidre found this great tour. We took a train to Limerick where Frank McCourt is from and learned about how he came to write Angela's Ashes. Then on to Castle up top. Then out to the Cliffs of Moher. Unfortunately I don't have any photos of that. My camera is not good for landscapes. One of these days if I'm nice Deidre will let me have some of the pictures she took with her much better camera. It was well worth the trip just to see the cliffs.

I did get a picture in Galway bay though.

It was an unusually sunny day so you could see the Islands off in the distance. We stayed at a bed & breakfast in Galway that night. Galway is a nice town. It's right on the ocean and is a big university town. I love college towns usually anyway but Galway is up there with the top ones. It's surprisingly modern possibly due to the focus of many of the universities. Ireland was way out in front when it came to computers and engineering and science in general. The universities put out many top notch IT and engineering professionals apparently.

Anyway it was a great trip but by the end we were pretty worn out. Here's my evidence.

We had a long day of travel that last day. We took the train back to Dublin from Galway, then straight to the airport to fly back to Prague. Luckily for me Mila came to pick us up and was exceedingly generous enough to drive me back to Plzen. I can't thank him enough for that.

So stay tuned folks. I've got some Easter pictures and stuff to tell y'all about the crazy customs they have here like the pomlázky.

Update: Here's a few of the pics that Deidre took.

This is at Trinity College in Dublin
And here's a few at the Cliffs of Moher.

Cleve's Christening

2009-04-09T14:51:00.001-07:00

Baker Cleveland Bowen has now been Christened. Have you seen a cuter kid? I know your kids are always the cutest but I'm so proud of this little guy and his Dad and Mom.

Back row left to right: Dad, Bo, Courtney, Lane, Mom

Front row. Dylan, Connor, Cleve.

I've got a couple more posts coming soon.

Where The Wild Things Are!!! Plzen

2009-03-25T11:03:00.000-07:00

OK so I know I've been a big slacker with the blog and this isn't really that much of an update but I just had to put this up. I don't know of any kid who didn't love this book. And this movie, at least from the trailer looks exactly like the book come to life in our world.

Well I supposed I should tell you guys a little something about what's going on here. I'm having a great time in Plzen. I love Czech Republic and have made some really great friends here. I'm thinking of maybe staying longer if I can find a job. I figure the way things are back home it might be easier to find one here. But I'm working on it so we'll see.

Also tomorrow I'm going back to Dublin! Yay! This time Deidre is coming too. I think she may even let me take her picture now.

So it's still cold here. That's maybe the only real bummer. It's been snowing the last couple days. But I'm used to it now so no big deal. Anyway I'll see if I have some good pictures of stuff since I've come back.

I've started doing some climbing now. This is Honza showing me how to tie the rope so you don't fall.

And off I go! Pavlinka is holding the rope for me.

Look folks he's a natural.

And here's from a night we went out for a hike to an old mine. It was closed off unfortunately so we just went and goofed around.

Ondrej's go his back turned to the camera, then me then Honza.

And Madla taking the picture of us. Oh she also got my awesome creation.

I tried to do it all secretly but she caught me in the act.

OK so that's all for now. I've got some more pictures to show you guys. Plus I'll have lot's of new stuff when I get back from Dublin. Thanks everybody for keeping me in your prayers.

Nazdar!!!!

Christmas pictures

2009-01-06T02:11:00.000-08:00

Hey everybody. I know I've been really lazy about updating. My internet is out in my flat so I won't really write a whole bunch right now. I got to go home for Christmas which was super awesome. Clud and I totally fooled Mom and she had no idea I was coming. Here's a bunch of pictures from the trip home. I'll comment more later when I get internet at home again and can spend the editing time I need to have a coherent post.

It's not that often that Mom gets all her boys in the same room.

Clevetok!!! The Miiiiiind Taker!!!!!

Little Brother's (not so) Little One!

2008-12-10T14:41:00.000-08:00

I have a new nephew! Baker Cleveland Bowen. He's my younger brother Lane's and his wife Courtney's first child. He's a few hours old here. A blessed day in the Bowen clan! Here's all I know so far from Clud (my Step-Dad). Looks like he emailed me from his phone.

"Pete you have a new nephew arrived 2:17pm weighed 2lbs 2oz. Was 21 inches long. Are well baby has full head black hair"

Look at all that hair! Apparently Bowen boys (there are no Bowen girls, long story) tend to come out like that. I didn't 'cause I'm the oddball and had blond hair.

While his weight sounds low to me I'm sure everything is fine as Cleve's arrival has been closely monitored. Wooohooo! [*UPDATE* That 2lb is a typo. Cleve actually weighs 8lbs. Much bigger than anyone expected so the news is even better. WooooooHoooooo!]

Maybe I'll have some photos to show soon. Oh I should also say Happy Birthday to my Mom. Happy Birthday Mom! She's certainly gotten the best birthday present ever with her newest Grand-baby.

Like said before it's a blessed day for Team Bowen/Kelly.

Mikulas!

2008-12-08T08:23:00.000-08:00

I apologize for being slack in writing stuff. It's strange how even living in a country where you're illiterate and can't understand anyone can become routine. I've adjusted a bit I guess. I don't really have time to get into all that right now. I've got a lesson in a bit. But I've definitely been doing some reflecting on my time here so far. With Christmas and Thanksgiving plus my 90 day visa adventure it seems like a time to look back a little. I've realized some things about myself and all that but that's a whole different post.

This one is about Mikulas! It's pronounced "Meekoolahsh" but I can't get my keyboard to do all the funky accent marks and stuff. The "s" has a little v over it that means it's pronounced "sh" instead of "s." So anyway Mikulas I think is like St. Nicholas. In Czech Republic every 5 December they celebrate with Mikulas and his helpers. Here's my friend Marek as the saint.

Sorry it's a bit blurry. I've been messing around with my camera trying to figure out how to zoom in and I think I've been taking very short videos instead. So Mikulas goes around town with his Angel helpers and gives out presents to children. This is in Maranatha so one character got left out.

For some reason I don't understand Mikulas also has a devil for a helper (not pictured). They've got some wacky folk tale characters that I just quit trying to figure out. Remember this guy? Apparently he's a Vodnik or water sprite that hangs around rivers and drowns people in order to keep their soul in a little ceramic pot. So the devils go around with Mikulas and the Angels in order to hand out the lumps of coal or some equivalent. I think. Again it's hard to follow sometimes.

But so Marek was Mikulas at Maranatha. It's a really nice tradition actually. All the parents bring their kids so they all get to have Mikulas give them a present in front of the whole Church. There is catch though. Mikulas won't just give you a present. Check this out.
The kiddies have to sing a song or say a rhyme first. Some of them are shy and some are not but it's all adorable and the parents get to have some nice pictures. Oh yeah that big guy in the back is the head Angel. I don't know the characters name. But anyway it was a really nice little get together. Here's some more photos of everybody.

This is in the main sanctuary at Maranatha.

Na slchedanou "good bye"

Guess Where I Went!

2008-11-25T12:07:00.000-08:00

Yeh I know. You can't tell much by this picture. Here's the thing. I don't like taking pictures where people can see me doing it and looking like a big dumb tourist. I had gotten over it a bit but I haven't taken pictures in a while so I backslid a bit. Also my camera is not very good at wide shots. Unless you're right up on something you can't really tell anything.

So anyway I went to Dublin. It's very cool town. I had to get out of the Schengen area to get a new 90 days on my passport. It's a long story and I've told it a million times so I really don't feel like going into detail. Basically all of the EU on the Continent of Europe is like one big country as far as visas go. In the old days you could just pop over to Germany for the afternoon and get a new 90 days. Now you have to go a lot further. Hence my trip to Dublin. I really don't mind. You know it's tough but sometimes you just gotta do what you gotta do and go to one of the coolest cities in the world for the weekend.

That photo is of the street where I stayed my last night. (Another long story) They've already decorated for Christmas. I think those lights say "Happy Christmas" in Irish. One cool thing. Who knew? They still speak Irish in Ireland. It's not like you hear it on the street much or anything. But all the signs are in Irish and English. I was very bad about taking pictures I'll fess up right now. I kind of felt like this was a reconnoissance trip for future times when I can get someone to go with me or meet me there. By the way, flights on Aer Lingus are very cheap to Dublin if anyone out there would care to make a trip around, say, March 25? Nudge nudge wink wink.

I did take some photos of graffiti that I thought was awesome.

I can't be totally for sure but I think this is a Banksy. He's a famous (in Graffiti circles anyway) artist. I don't know if that's his tag next to the cowboy. Anyway this looks like Bansky's work and he's British so it could very well be his. I just like this sort of stuff. The city doesn't seem to mind either. He is kinda famous. I got a couple of other ones that looked like his work. Check it out.

I don't think he did the "Vote No" part. That's about the Lisbon Treaty. Ireland voted against it even though all their politicians were for it. Czech Republic has yet to decide on it. I don't know how it will shake out. Lisbon basically would create a United States of Europe. I don't have the brainpower for that one right now. I just dig the picture of Arnold Drummond. Oh and the ribcage. I can't get enough bones for some reason.

This last one is my favorite though.

Maybe it's not your cup o' tea. That's cool. No accounting for taste as they say.

Insomniackin'

2008-11-13T18:58:00.000-08:00

So I'm having trouble sleeping and I'm trying to prepare for my class tomorrow (Friday). I'll probably look a bit like this guy by then.

This class is much less talkative than my other classes so I've got to have a really big bag of tricks. I downloaded a couple podcasts with funny stories that I can play for them and pause for questions and vocabulary. I have no idea if it will work but it was great fun listening to them.

First up was This American Life it's an NPR show and therefor a bit lefty but it's still a quality show. The latest episode has a bunch of verbal histories recorded by Studs Terkel about The Great Depression. It's fascinating to hear the old cadences and speech patterns of folks from that time.

This got me surfing around for podcasts on iTunes. I'd rather not be a shill for Apple but there's so much cool stuff on there! I found a podcast of Hardcore History that talks about how different the world would be if things went differently in 1066 among other cool speculative stuff.
That lead me to an Ancient & Medieval History podcast with Beowulf and other super cool stuff that I can nerd out on for hours and hours. If I'm lucky I may get some use out of these for my classes but if not it's still worth it.

Elections and whatnot

2008-11-06T18:04:00.000-08:00

OK so I'm going to indulge myself at your expense once again. It may take me a while to get to my point but please bear with me. I really do have a point to make and I'm not venting hostility or anything.

Is it? I really hope so.

Obviously the elections are the big news. Here in CR they only really heard about Obama. McCain was pretty much ignored. Well it's over now so it doesn't really matter I don't guess. I might as well have full disclosure. I did not want Obama to win. I have serious doubts about what he really believes. But he's going to be the President now so I might as well get used to it. As I've been thinking more and more on this I have found some hope in the result.

For a long time now American politics have been nasty. I went to Washington in 1998 just in time for Clinton to get impeached. I voted for him but felt that he should resign for embarrassing himself and our country the way he did. I saw the way Democrats seemed to forget principals they argued strongly for simply to keep their guy in power. I was working for a Republican Congressman for whom I had and still have very high respect and admiration. I saw that these politicians were good people but any time people with differing points of view try to do anything there will be conflict. They are still people with flaws like anybody else and sometimes they screw up. This did not keep me from being as extreme and vehement in my dislike of Clinton as any of some of the worst folks though.

Then in 2000 things just got worse. With the whole recount business the tables turned. All the impotent rage we conservatives had for Clinton and the Dems was taken up by many people against Bush. I was working for a lobbying firm by that time and we could not figure out why the other side could not just acknowledge that Bush won fair and square. There was no attempt to come together from either side it seems to me now.

The term conservatives have is Bush Derangement Syndrome. In fairness those of us on the right had some Clinton Derangement Syndrome in our time as well.

But when 9/11 happened everything changed. This is obvious of course but it seemed that there were much more serious things to worry about than scoring political points. My friends in New York were forced out of their homes and were stuck with the fear that something else might happen. I remember talking on the phone with my buddy when in the middle of the call he said, "Someone said there's a bomb, gotta go" click. It was a false alarm but in the days right after that happened frequently.

I was at work in DC in our office on Pennsylvania Ave when it happened. It was so surreal that I wasn't scared or anything. It seemed like a movie or something. These things just don't happen. The office manager came around and pointed out that since we were a block from the FBI building and about 3 blocks from the Whitehouse that we would close down and go home rather than take any chances. I was more worried that our house guests hadn't left yet and that I'd get to see them before they took off. Pretty silly when I think about it now. I took the subway home. It didn't occur to me that it might not be safe. They were shut down not long after I got home.

Our house guests were a rock band from London who were supposed to play a concert in New York on Wednesday, September 12. Needless to say they did not leave. We just all sat and watched TV and tried to call our parents. No luck on that front. No cell phones could get through and even the landlines were overloaded. Watching the towers fall on TV did not seem real. It just would not sink in. Then the news reported that one of the attorneys from our office was on the plane that hit the Pentagon. I just could not believe it. I didn't know her well but I did see her everyday. It's terrible but it never seemed to make an impression on me. She just wasn't at work anymore. That changed when we all went to her memorial service. That someone like her could be murdered like that made all those arguments we had with the "lefties," as we called them, seem petty and stupid. It looked like maybe we would come to reality and see that we were really on the same side.

Of course it didn't last. Many people now like to say they knew Iraq was a mistake from the start, that there were no WMDs etc. I'm not going to belabor that argument. But thanks to that war and the way it was prosecuted Bush Derangement Syndrome came back with a vengeance. I feel like it's unfair to Bush but what can you do? He didn't really help himself all that much either. But we seemed to be stuck with the negativity and meanness that politics had become.

So while I did not support Obama I am hopeful that we might be able to get past that. I think that since he won decisively it is clear that the country wants to move past the bitterness we've had in politics. Republicans are showing a willingness to call a truce. It's clear the country did not want what they represented. Hopefully they have gotten that message and will reform accordingly. Obama's acceptance speech is a good start. He seems to want to be magnanimous and is not looking to settle scores or punish his rivals.

If I'm going to be totally honest I do not think we would have this opportunity had McCain won. I just don't see Congressional Democrats the Moveon.org types being good losers. But we don't have to worry about how they'd have taken an Obama loss. Websites like 52 to 48 With Love are a good sign that since their guy won people on the left are willing to be friends again. I think everybody wants politics to be more civil.

While I disagree that the USA was bad or had anything to apologize for, Obama's election is a signal to people that disliked America that we really are good people. So I may rankle a bit at the implication that we need to rehabilitate our image it's worth it if Obama is the leader he says that he is. He has the good will of everybody right now. I pray that God gives him the wisdom to say yes to his opponents in Congress when he can, to say no to his supporters when he should and that both sides will give him a fair chance to lead. And I pray both sides will come together and put away the animosity of the last 10 years.

With the exception of the Russian President, the whole world appears to be feeling a lot better about America. Let's pray Obama can live up to those expectations. I'm cautiously optimistic that he can. Or at least I want to be.

Dessert

2008-10-26T06:47:00.000-07:00

Lest anyone think I'm having a hard life over here I just wanted to show you my dessert I'm having today.

Yep, it tastes as good as it looks. They really like their sweets here in CR. Every supermarket as about 2 isles devoted to candy bars and chocolate. This one is some kind of mixed berry something or other. It's not really a tart or a cake. It's sort of like a pie with no crust. The little sign it was behind in the case said "Ovocny Rez" I have no idea what that means and when I said it to the waitress she made me point out what I wanted so maybe it means "Dessert" or something general. Oh the joys of monolingualism!

First Week Ever

2008-10-26T05:43:00.000-07:00

So I've gotten through the first week. What have I learned so far?

1. I speak to fast.

2. I speak too much.

3. When someone looks you in the eye and nods, they may or not understand a word you said.

4. People here like to talk about politics.

5. People want to speak English but are not good with open ended questions.

6. I really need to find some things about which I can ask specific questions.

7. I've got a long way to go.

There's plenty more but #7 sort of catches all that.

I went through the whole week asking each class if they had anything they wanted to talk about that day or at any time in the future. You could hear a pin drop. Then on Friday I got through a whole class in the same manner when Petr Konopik came to my rescue. He's one of the first people I met here. He helped put in the swings and leads the music from time to time. He stopped me and said, "I have a question about something that is not on the topic we are speaking on." Then went on to suggest a few things he would like to work on in future lessons. This opened the floodgate and we got tons of great suggestions. I was like, "Yes finally, thank you Petr!"

So now I've got a lot more to go on. I'm pretty optimistic about how things are going. I've got about three classes with about 10 people and a few with one or two. So I've got a good mix of things to do so it won't (hopefully) get into a rut.

On a little side note. My wifi signal mysteriously went to nothing yesterday so I don't know how much I can post for a little while. Not that I was burning up the bandwidth as it is. I'm in a cafe around the corner from my apartment. Hi!

Oh this week is their 4th of July in a way. The current Republic was founded on 28 October 1918. It's not as big a deal here as 4th of July I don't think. Nobody seems to be all that workd up. But they do get the day off and so I might also. Although I only had one girl on Tuesday last week and she might be switching to a different day anyway. I may have every Tuesday off for all I know.

Na Shledanou!

I'm Popeye the sailor man, I live in a garbage can. . .

2008-10-23T10:58:00.000-07:00

That's not commentary on my living conditions. My apartment is quite nice. But that's how the little song we sang when I was a kid goes. I can't remember all the permutations of it. The only one I can remember is

I'm Popeye the sailor man
I live in a garbage can
I eat all the worms and spit out the germs
I'm Popeye the sailor man. Woo Wooo!

So why am I reminiscing about silly playground songs from my childhood? I ate big ol' plate of spinach today, that's why! For those of you that don't know me this is a big deal. So big that I would actually waste your time in my blog with it. I'm not big on green stuff unless it's a pepper of some sort. And leafy green stuff is an even bigger challenge. Then when you take said leafy green stuff and cook it for hours, I'm even less likely to eat it. Eeeww!

Well today I had an English class at Maranatha from 9:00-11:00 in the morning. Every Thursday they have a Communion then everyone eats lunch together. It's a really cool thing they do here. So I stuck around for that stuff after my class.

When I sat down to eat though I got an unpleasant surprise. The gave me a plate that looked a lot like this. So of course the first thing I thought was, "Uh-oh, that looks a lot like spinach. Oh that's not good. " But when someone is nice enough to offer you food you eat it. You don't turn your nose up like some spoiled brat. So I made up my mind that I'd just suck it up and power through the meal and hope that the dumplings, knedliky in Czech, would make the rest of it eatable. Then I started eating it and I was like, "Oh. . . this is good! It must be something else. Maybe it's a bunch of chopped parsley and herbs. Alright! I can eat this, I can do it!" So after I'd eaten about half of it I asked Slavo what it was. He said, "Spinach, duh!" Actually didn't say "Duh." I don't think they know that word here. But it seemed obvious to him that it was spinach and of course it was.

By the way, Czechs eat really fast. At these Thursday lunches I'm always the last one to finish. I don't know how they do it. Even the little old ladies eat faster than I do. And lunch is the main meal of the day here so the portions are quite large. They are an amazing people. They must think I'm a sissy.

Anyway, the English classes are going well. It's looking like most people don't want to work with text books and do drills all class long. I'm psyched because that means we will get to talk about general stuff they like to talk about and I can learn what's going on here. Assuming of course that I can trick them into telling me what they like to talk about. But it's coming along and I'm getting much more comfortable with it everyday.

More to come

I'm a teacher now, or that's what I tell people anyway.

2008-10-22T13:21:00.001-07:00

The classes are going pretty well. I had two today (Wednesday). It's really hard to get Czech people to talk. You can ask them questions and they just look at you with a totally blank expression on their face. It's pretty funny. Anyway I got through a whole class using these text books after I had asked if they wanted to use them or not. Then at the end they all said they didn't want to use the books. It worked out fine. They all just want to work on conversation and pick up a few new words that way. Which is great but the trick is getting them to talk. It's much easier when it's just one or two people. You can usually find something they like to talk about. But they won't tell you what they want to talk about. It's a challenge for sure but it is mostly funny to me right now. In bigger groups there's usually one or two people that will speak up but the rest just look at the table. I hope they all come back but I've been told to expect some people to only show up once. Which is a bummer. But even after just three days and four classes I'm already much more comfortable with the whole deal.

Sorry no photos this time either. When I know my students are going to stick around I will try to get them to let me take their photos for the blog. Hopefully they'll be more cooperative than some people (wink wink) I know.

The Big Day

2008-10-20T08:21:00.000-07:00

Well here it is. I've got my first English class in about an hour. Slavo and I have been getting it all organized and now it's finally going to happen.

Fortunately I've got books to follow so I won't have to wing it. This class is made up of adults that want a more structured, grammar oriented lesson. That's cool we can do that. No problem. I hope.

What will be tricky are the ones without the books. So far we don't have any but if teenagers start to come they will not want to do grammar 'cause they get so much at school and the teachers here apparently are not very nice. Evidently it's a bit scary to speak up in class because they get on your case if you're wrong. I have heard that many of English teachers were Russian or German teachers before and don't like teaching English. I hope that's not true. But hopefully I can make it fun for everybody. I certainly won't be giving anyone a hard time for being wrong.

I'll let y'all know how it goes.

I love Muppets

2008-10-16T15:14:00.000-07:00

OK so this is totally out of nowhere I know. But I came across some Muppet Show stuff on youtube. I always loved the Muppets. Never got into Fraggle Rock though. I'm that old that it was after my time. Ooof! That hurts.

Anyway it may seem dumb now but the Muppet Show was so great.

They had Dizzy Gillespie on singing Swing Low (Sweet Cadillac). So we little dudes and dudettes got some culture. Check it out! Just click here to see the video. Then come back so we can discuss. Make sure you come back though. It will be tempting to watch a bunch of Muppet Show and Dizzie Gillespie videos. It's cool I know but come back. You can play with that stuff later.

So that was so totally awesome! Wasn't it?

So maybe, just maybe Sesame Street and The Muppet Show contributed to me having a short attention span and the erroneous idea that learning should always be fun. It's totally worth it! I don't know if there's a DVD of the old show but there absolutely should be. One day I would like to have kids so I can show them stuff like this. That's not the only reason of course, no no. I'm not a complete weirdo.

Hey! I'm not! Really! I know what y'all are thinking.

Bye Bye

Karlovy Vary

2008-10-10T07:06:00.001-07:00

So this is the lovely town of Karlovy Vary in western Bohemia. It's about 30 minutes from the border with Germany. This means it has a very different feel from Plzen for many reasons that I will get into. The town is famous in this part of the world for the hot springs and the spas that grew up around them. King Charles discovered the hot spring hundreds of years ago. Karlovy Vary was a favorite vacation destination for Peter The Great of Russia. As a result Russians love to come here.

In fact the Russians have a huge impact here. For one thing, well I might as well go back to the beginning of what I know. For as long as anyone could remember Germans and Czechs lived in Karlovy Vary and got along fine. But when Hitler rose to power he saw it as something he could use. The infamous Munich Agreement, you know "Peace in our time" and all that gave this part of the Republic, the famous Sudetenland, to Germany and the nazis.

As one might expect there were lots of hard feelings at the end of WWII and all the Germans were kicked out. They were literally driven from their homes. So as the Communists took over the Russians again began to impose on the Czechs here. Apparently they filled the vacated German homes with people from Bulgaria and Serbia and wherever they felt like shipping people in from. I hope I'm not boring anyone with the history lesson but it really explains the way things are now for me.

One of the things the commies did in every town was to build a huge "cultural center" building in town. It was mostly a way for them to say that "We have all the power and will do what we want." They built a big ol' building right on top of the hot springs. Here I am in my embarrassing tourist pose.

The whole building is mostly glass except for that wall behind me to the right. What you can't tell from the picture is that on the other side of the wall just across the street is the Russian Orthodox Church. They very obviously blocked the Church on purpose just to show disrespect. There's no functional reason to put a brick wall up where they did. It's just there to say, "We are in control here."

So anyway now the Russians are back. But now they're just gangster businessmen. During the communist era many of the buildings were allowed to run down. They're 100s of years old remember. Now Russians are bringing tons of money into the town and things are being fixed up which is great. But the Russians kind of own the town now which understandably rubs the Czechs the wrong way.

Even with all that it is a very nice little town and one of the most beautiful I've ever been in. You really feel like your big "E" Europe here. I mean just look at it.

A couple other notable things are that movies are filmed here from time to time because it's so pretty. Casino Royale, the James Bond movie was filmed here. This building below is the actual "Casino Royale" where he was playing poker or whatever.

One of the most famous buildings which I did not take a picture of was the Grand Hotel Pupp (pronounced Poop, hee hee hee) Apparently Last Holiday starring Queen Latifa was filmed there. Deidre says it's a good movie but beyond the Czech landmark I'm not sure it's my kind of thing ;) Oh and James Bond (Daniel Craig) ran down the street in front of the Hotel Pupp in his movie. Just to be sure you know, this picture is not the Pupp.

As you could see fall is in full swing here in the CR. I'm glad I made it to Karlovy Vary when I did. The trees are really pretty.

I'm very much looking forward to coming back again when the snow comes it should be just as gorgeous. Speaking of gorgeous check out the UMC Church in Karlovy Vary.

Deidre can correct me if I'm wrong but I think her classroom where she does her English lessons in the Church. How awesome would it be to go to work here everyday? Unfortunately they don't have Church services here on Sundays. They've got a really big challenge in Karlovy Vary. Mila and Deidre are doing really well getting teenagers to come in for lessons and camps and whatnot. It's just a really tough place to get people interested in Church. Mila is a pretty amazing guy and does so much good here in KV. I don't know if I explained, Mila is the main representative of the UMC here in Karlovy Vary and "looks after" Deidre. Not that she needs looking after, she can handle herself fine. But I know it's got to be great to have him a minute away.

So that's pretty much it. Deidre still won't let me take her picture. For some reason she thinks I've been telling everyone that she's late all the time. I must have imagined it or something. She's never late. That whole story about us being late that day in Prague was all my fault. It turns out that nobody ever noticed Deidre being late to anything. So she is not a late person, I fully retract and regret any implication that I may have given to this effect. And I apologize wholeheartedly. Somehow I think I may have just dug myself a lot deeper.

Greetings from Prague

2008-10-07T04:37:00.000-07:00

Hey everybody. Guess what? I'm in Prague!
Don't worry about that dude behind me. He's just some random KFC patron. Yeh, the KFC here has wifi so I thought I'd take the opportunity to check in.

I've come up to Prague to meet with the guy who teaches English for the HQ UMC Church. It's been really helpful so see how he does things. I'm feeling a little better about getting going.

Slavo and I have been working on a schedule and price scheme for the classes. All we need now are students and a curriculum. I'm hoping to iron that out this week.

Shoot, now that I've got the chance I can't really think of much to write about. Prague is a really cool town. The buildings are all pretty amazing. Even the Borg-like commie "Culture Center" building was impressive in an evil Star Trek cyborg army kind of way.

I did manage to get a better photo of the creepy skull post on the Charles Bridge. Check it out, I have this as my wallpaper on my phone.

I'm hoping I can get this better image onto it somehow. I feel like I need to hurry up and get out of here. But really in CR they don't care if you linger after a meal. You have to pretty much chase your server down and ask for the bill or they'll let you sit there all night. Nevertheless, I feel a bit exposed writing on a laptop in KFC.

Well, I'll try to get some photos of the the Church compound here in Prague. It's pretty wild. You could walk past it on the street and not even see it. I've walk past it several times on accident already. (Update: I got some photos after all) But when you get inside the doors there's a whole big courtyard and tons of apartments that belong to the Church. I'm actually staying in a small apartment at the Church while I'm here. It's 200Kc (about $12) a night. Not bad. Especially since Maranatha is paying for it. The only thing is I apparently do not have hot water. Now I took cold showers in Nicaragua and didn't mind a bit. But when it's 50 degrees outside and your water is about -20 you don't really want to get too much of it on you. Therefor I might be pretty funky by the time I get home.
This is the actual Church.

And these below are some of the apartments owned by Church. They were burned in a fire a few weeks ago and they've been working to get them restored ever since. My apartment was not up there but over by the Church.

I may be even funkier because I'm thinking about swinging over to Karlovy Vary to visit Deidre before I head back to Plzen. She has started her classes so I kind of want to see how they're doing things over there. She thinks we'll be doing vastly different kinds of lessons. I'm sure she's right but I still can use all the input I can get my hands on to figure out how to teach the Plzners.

All right. I think that's going to be it for now.

Ciao

Progress and Practice

2008-09-28T10:15:00.000-07:00

It's been an uneventful week for the most part. But I have made some significant progress. I got a PlzenskaKarta. Which is a pass for the trams. I put that to good use today. I took the picture on the way over to the office to get the card which was an all morning adventure to find. I had as bad a case of bedhead as it's possible for me to have. I admit it may be hard to tell.

But the best news is that I've actually started doing what I came here to do, officially anyway. I have one English student. She doesn't really even need my help. She speaks quite good English already. But I've been helping her get used to hearing English again. She's going to Texas this week with a couple other women from Maranatha to meet and spend time with their sister Church there. She is putting a Power Point presentation together for the 4 services the Texas Church does every weekend. I think she said it's one on Saturday evening and three on Sunday. Whew!

I guess she won't mind me telling y'all her name. She's Linda Cechova. Actually she is Vitek's wife. I've mentioned him before. He's a great guy and their children Stepan and Kristina are lot's of fun too. We all went to lunch after Church today. Vitek is well known around Maranatha for being the guy to go to if you want to know the best places to eat. We ended up going back to U Mansfelda again 'cause his favorite Italian place was inexplicably closed. That place is so good. I had wild boar last time. This time I had a wild boar steak. It's different, seriously. This dish has a sauce with cranberries and congac and almonds. Whoowie that's some good pig. Oh and I had bacon knedliky (dumplings) as a side dish. So good.

Also one really cool fact. Mila is Vitek's brother. Mila is looking after the other American, Deidre in Karlovy Vary, a town about an hour from Plzen. Their father is a well known artist here in Plzen. He painted this huge mural.

In this painting are all famous Plzners. On the right is a guy that created a famous marionette, the guy climbing up on the ladder invented electric street lights and there's all kinds of significant people. I don't know if y'all have noticed but if you click on the pictures you can see a much bigger version in which you can pick out a lot more detail. I highly recommend it here. This mural is so cool. There's actually a guide to show you who all the famous dudes are.

I took a picture of the text but it's in Czech so it won't do any good anyway. There is so much public art and a lot of it is 100s of years old. So it's especially awesome that Vitek's Dad has such respect that they want him to do something this huge and this significant. All Czechs are fiercely proud of their cultural heroes and each town is very proud of their local historical figures.

It's funny now that I've been here for a little while I'm starting to get used to stuff. But every once in a while I walk by something like this and I'm like, "Whoah! Holy cow! That's right I'm in Europe!" This kind of stuff is all over the place.

There are also a few reminders that I'm in Eastern Europe in particular. There is a "Culture Center" that was built during the communist time and it is about as soul crushingly ugly as would only fit with communist architecture.

People can laugh now about how ugly the commie buildings are which is nice. But they haven't forgotten how bad it really was either.

This is an exhibit in the main square of town. It is a representation of a concentration camp that was operated by the Czech Communists. Not the Nazis. The photos are the file photos of actual victims. Their names and portions of their stories are in the exhibit.

As you can see the exhibit covers the years after WWII up until the Velvet Revolution in 1989. There were students as well as people old enough to be their grandparents that were taken. Also many, many Priests and clergy were put in the camps. Basically anyone that may at all be suspected of being against the regime could be taken. This is what the UMC faced in Czech Republic. Vitek was saying that Maranatha consisted of 3 old ladies during these years.

But at least this ended. After the Velvet Revolution people swarmed back to the Churches. I've covered a lot of this before I know. But apparently many people started drifting off after a while. Unfortunately many of the people that became Pastors right after the revolution have since left the Church. We don't really know why.

So enough of the gloom and doom portion of the show. Things are going well. I used my new tram card to do some aimless wandering. There are 4 tram lines so I hopped on #1 and just rode it to the last stop. Guess what? It's awesome! There's a big park right where you get out. It's not that far but check it out! It's like you out in the wilderness! . . . sorta

It was nice to be able to get out in some trees though. I start to get a little twitchy if I'm cut off from them for too long. Here's some proof. I can't ever tell when my camera is actually taking a picture. I was too busy looking around to make sure nobody saw me taking my own picture like a big loser.

I guess I might as well go all the way with it. My Mom likes it when I put pictures of myself in here so bear with me.

Hi Mom!

So I had a fun day. I also got some good news about the whole teaching thing too. Slavo, who will be my new neighbor starting in October, has taught English before and is totally fluent and all that. He's Czech. Anyway Pastor Petr told me today that Slavo said he'll put together some lesson plans for me that I can use to teach English to Maranatha folks. The upshot of all this is that I should finally start to have a regular schedule of classes to teach. Having Linda Cechova as my only student is really nice but it will be good to really get down to business.

Here we go! Hopefully.

Egghead Time

2008-09-22T10:56:00.000-07:00

OK so I'm going to be all tedious and philosophical this time. I don't have any pictures or funny observations (that I know of) so please bear with me.

I went to an English Movie night that's put on by my neighbor Becky as part of her work with Y.Y.M. Maybe some of y'all know what that is but I admit I can't remember what it stands for. I do know that "Youth" and "Mission(s)" are in the name so that gives a bit of an idea what the organization is like.

Well the movie we watched was Unbreakable starring Bruce Willis. It's directed by the guy that did The Sixth Sense, M. Night Shyamalan. Unbreakable is about a normal guy that discovers that he may in fact have extraordinary abilities. In short that he's a super hero. I happen to think that this is one of the most woefully underrated movies of past 10 years but what do I know?

Throughout the film nobody can bring themselves to believe it's possible for a guy to have these kinds of abilities. It's a big theme of the movie. The main character goes through a tough process of discovering his abilities and believing that it's actually true. This leads him to a decision of whether or not to use these abilities.

As we discussed the movie and the things we liked about it this quote (which I can't remember exactly so I'll paraphrase it) came up. "People can easily believe something that is impossible but cannot at all believe something that is only improbable." This got me to thinking.

Whenever a believer (a character that thinks Bruce Willis has superpowers) in the film tries to convince someone that he really has these abilities they are resistant. People do not want to believe that someone may be extraordinary. Why is this? There are people (some of my friends among them) that do not want to believe in God, any God, much less Jesus. Why? I have not always been a Christian but I've always wanted to be. I've doubted, I still struggle with it from time to time. But my desire for God to be real and for Jesus to have really died for my sins has been constant. A world without God is pointless, hopeless, cold and empty to me. Why do so many people seem to be comforted by the idea of a Godless world? How could this be preferable to an eternal life full of love?

What is so threatening about the idea of God? C.S. Lewis was a notorious Atheist in his earlier life. But even he wanted to believe. He felt that the Christian story was a beautiful myth. A way of explaining things that were unexplainable to people of the time. The story goes that J.R.R.Tolkien (my hero) and another of The Inklings (I think it was Charles Williams but I'm not sure) locked themselves in a room with Lewis one night and refused to leave until they convinced him that God was real and he could in good conscience believe in Christianity. It worked obviously. I like to flatter myself that I could be Tolkien to some of my friends' C.S. Lewis. The big difference is that my friends do not want to believe it. How do you get past that?

I feel like if I could crack the mystery of the desire to disbelieve I could get past it. Really I can only just be the best friend to them I can and always treat them with respect and love. But what is so threatening about Belief? I don't have an answer. So far all I can come up with is that once we believe in Jesus we have a responsibility to live accordingly. It's not a set of rules, "Do this, this and this. Don't do that, that or that." But you can't just pass the buck and say, "Not my problem" anymore. You can't help but feel your connection to people and want to help. The easy thing to do is just be out for yourself and the suffering of others does not affect you. You answer only to yourself. But at the end of the day you're alone. Is being your own master really so attractive that it is better to die than to serve a higher purpose and have an eternal life?

I don't mean to make this about being scared of death. But obviously if you do not believe in God then you believe that once you die that's it. You're worm food. I know that being Christian makes life worth living and gives us a much richer experience that we could ever have on our own in a random world of accidents and moral relativity. But there are many very smart people (smarter than me for sure) that prefer that very existence. Being agnostic I can understand. It does not take any amount of faith to say you don't know the answers. But atheists are just as sure (and in many cases much more certain) that they have the answer. They have figured out the true nature of the universe. Really, believing in God is also accepting the mystery of creation and acknowledging that we humans do not have all the answers.

I'm sure there are Christians out there that think they've got it all down. The whole "The Bible says it, I believe it, that settles it" thing. Probably many atheists think that this is what it means to be a Christian. That's one area I know I can change things with my friends. Some people have never known an actual Christian for whom they had any respect. I like to believe that's just 'cause they haven't known many genuine Christians. So when we let our light shine they can see the source, hopefully. But how do you crack that barrier of just not wanting to believe?

So I'm not any closer to an answer now am I? I guess not. One of those myriad people smarter than me is this guy Michael Novak. He's written a book called No One Sees God that seems to cover this exact topic I've been rambling on about. I haven't read it but he has an article on National Review Online about it. I think it's definitely worth checking out. His article is mostly about the argument for Belief. I've basically just said many of the same things. So much for my big original insights. But it doesn't really attack the answer to the question "Why do atheists not want to believe in God?"

Since I don't have the answers obviously I invite anyone and everyone to put their two cents in the comments. I'm all ears!

Big Weekend cont'd

2008-09-18T07:22:00.000-07:00

OK so now I'm really going to talk about Sunday. I hope.

Sunday we all went to Church in the morning of course. David talked about the Team's week and all the close connections they made. Very nice. Then we all went down to Vitek's jewelry shop so the Team could get some stuff. Vitek makes his own jewelry at his shop. It's really cool to see him work, he's a true artist. He also has some antique jewelry too btw. I left the guys there though because I had to go get ready for The Picnic.

We had a family day out at a park in town. I finally got to play fotbol! Yeehaw! It was fun but it really showed how bad out of shape I am. I managed to hold up alright though. Somehow at the end of our game it was 6 on 3. Three Petrs (including myself) against Vitek and a horde of kids and adults both. I think we won though. I can't remember for sure but we played much harder then. Tons of fun.

Then we retired to the playground and fire for lunch etc.

This is the fireplace where we roasted, you guessed it, sausages. I can't say how I am glad at how much Czechs love sausage. Sausage has always been one of my favorite things to eat. I never get tired of it. So I've come to the right place.

Sausage wasn't the only thing on the menu that day though. Periodically this loud blaring music would ring out like a demonic ice cream truck and shock everyone into silence. At which point some unknown purveyor would sing "Laaan-goshe!" Then then everybody would laugh. I couldn't figure out what was going on. Then Vitek came up to the table with this stuff that kind of looked like a pizza, if pizzas were made by Lunchables sized for adults. It was a piece of fried bread (yum) with ketchup (eeew!) with some unmelted cheese on top of that. Believe it or not it's pretty tasty. Nobody believed me though when I kept saying I liked it.

All in all it was quite a pleasant little picnic. We were intruded upon by a beggar though. Just look at this shameless miscreant!

Just look at him! Food all in his beard! Giving us those "sad puppy dog" eyes! Shameless I tells ya! He did get some sausage before he was through though. Weiner dogs are popular here for some reason. Go figure. This guy was pretty funny.

I planned on getting a picture of the kids in their natural habitat playing on playground but they spotted me.

These are the Prochazka kids, Petr, Barbara, and Karla. They lined up like good little kids when they saw me. I tried to get them to just go play but they don't speak much English so I just went ahead and took the picture. They crack me up. Whenever I run into them they do a bit of a double-take while they remember how to say "Hello" or "Good Morning" in English. They think it's hilarious to say "My name is. . . " in English. Petr has the makings of a legendary "preacher's son" by the way. On the way to the park, Ivana, their Mom was teaching one of the kids words with that rolling R sound sort of like some Spanish words. I was like, "This is great! I need practice with this!" It was comforting to learn that some of their weird 6 consonant in a row words give them trouble too. Even if it's just the little kids.

But the picnic wound down and it was time to get home and get ready for the farewell dinner for the Team.
The dinner was at U Mansfelda, an old (I'm guessing it's old, everything else here is too) restaurant that serves traditional Czech food. That's Karl in the white shirt. And of course I got the back Petr Balous. That's Mirek on the right. I had wild boar with the Czech dumpling assortment. Boy was it good. Oh so you think I should have gotten veggies? This is Czech Republic! Actually the boar came with a little salad on the plate which I promptly ignored. I could have been worse though. One guy had fried cheese as his main dish with french fries on the side and he was Czech. John sat next to me and got Trout. Believe it or not it tastes a lot like American trout according to him. John was on a quest to get carp at some point during his trip.

In CR it is a long standing tradition to have Christmas Carp. Every year people go a buy a live carp. You know those things are huge. Anyway, they keep it in the bath tub for a week or so to let it's (aherm) system (ahem) clear out. The kids play with it and all that fun stuff. Then they eat it on Christmas day. I'm so looking forward to that! Uh, not really. Well because of this John was curious to see how they prepare the notoriously gross-tasting fish. Alas it was not on any menu the whole time he was here. Which to me just proves that nobody actually likes to eat those nasty things they just do it for tradition.

Well dinner was finished and dessert gotten through and the party broke up. I rode back with team to drop them off at Hotel Plzen.
Here's the gang again once more. Kellie, Serena, Karl, David and John. I only really got to hang out with them for a weekend but felt like I'd known them for a long time. I'm glad to say they're keeping in touch. They all got home OK (with a few adventures in customs). I really appreciate their openness and how they took Deidre and me in. We're all on the same Big Team. Thanks guys.

pax

2008-09-18T06:26:00.000-07:00

So I had more to say about last weekend. "Not possible!" you say? Oh yes I do. That big long post was just Saturday in Prague. Not even the whole day. It was a big day.

Well, we all got back to Plzen fairly early in the evening. We were pretty wiped out but it was about time for supper anyway so we ate together because that's what we do. We decided to just eat at Hotel Plzen where the team was staying. Good food there. There was a couple who I'm just going to say were from Germany, they just seemed like Germans to me. One old lady seemed a little alarmed at us being kind of loud. Well you know what? We were a bit loud. That's one stereotype I don't mind perpetuating. What's wrong with people laughing and enjoying each other's company? Nothing that's what.

So maybe we weren't the most high minded bunch that night. We somehow seemed to get onto the topic of certain Czech phrases and words that could be misconstrued by an English speaker as having scatalogical meanings bear a striking resemblance a certain word of old Saxon origins that has taken on impolite connotations in recent years. OK so what I'm getting at is sometimes Czechs sound like they're cussing in English when in fact they are really saying perfectly respectful things in Czech. We found this to be very funny. Mostly because it is very funny!

Anyway it's nice to be able to just relax with folks. I very much appreciate this about the Team. They are very easy to just relax and be yourself with. We didn't only talk about funny words though. We did talk about what we are doing here. I must say I'm pretty psyched about what's going on in Churches these days. I've been running around the world in a way this past year and have been blessed to meet people from all over. We ran into some girls from Kansas when I was in Nicaragua, I got to be good friends almost instantaneously with the TN Team this week, and Deidre is a strong member of the Texas contingent. So many in America are looking outward and humbly (that's essential) trying to spread the Good Word and just really, truly, and sincerely going out of their way to love their brothers and sisters.

I know I said no more mushy stuff but I feel like this is kind of important. Pretty much any Christian I've talked to in the last year shares a sincere and humble wish to serve and really live Jesus' commandment to love our neighbors as ourselves. There are all kinds of different challenges around the world. There's so much poverty in so many places. And there are Christians in all of those places trying to help. But there is also the challenge of relatively wealthy peoples that just have forgotten (willfully in some cases) the Good News. That's what I've been drawn to do something about. Living in New York really made this impression on me.

In a lot of ways I feel like someone who did not grow up in the Church. This won't make my Mom happy but it is the truth. I've always gone to Church. But until I was in College it never really made much of an impression on me. Mostly because I am willful and like to do what I want to do and not so much what I ought to do. I've always believed, or wanted to, but I didn't really have the foundation to back it up. That's not my Mom's fault. It is to her credit that I went to Church at all.

I apologize for rambling so much. I've been trying to sort this all out in my own head for a while now. I have yet to really explain it to anyone with any success although I have tried.

Most of my friends are not Christians. For the most part they just were never exposed to it. Some are even very hostile to the idea of any kind of God. But just by being open about my faith, not pushing it on them, just living it openly has changed some of their attitudes. I've even had friends ask me, "So what's this Jesus thing really all about?" I know, what a question right?

That's a big one to answer on a 2 minute subway ride home.

Here's what I'm getting at. These are my people. These are the people I want to reach. I relate to these guys, they are my friends. This is the challenge in a place like Czech Republic I think. This is why I wanted to come here. I've had a running "discussion" with Mom for years. So much feels like preaching to choir to me. I certainly support and have benefited hugely from the fellowship within the Church family. I mean look where I am! That's because of my Church family. But I also feel like I'm one of those people outside the Church. Or maybe that I'm straddling the line between those two. I want to pull my friends, my "people" in that are on the outside. But one thing we have got right is humble, loving spirit with which "Church Folks" are reaching out to those on the outside.

This is why I put Mathew 5:14-16 up at the top of the blog. That's my goal. The trick is not hiding the light under a basket. "Hide it under a bushel, NO! I'm gonna let it shine!" Your supposed to sing that last bit by the way.

OK so this is not at all what I meant to write about. I hope it made sense and is not too much of a self important bore of a rant. I feel like such a windbag!

pax

Adventures of a Monolingual Doofus

2008-09-18T06:12:00.000-07:00

OK so I've been slacking a bit. My internet went down a few days ago so I was unable to finish writing about the weekend. Of course now it's almost the weekend again but hey, such is life. Turns out I had internet all along I just couldn't figure out how to fix it because all the instructions and information are in Czech. I've learned a valuable lesson, Learn Czech!

I actually went down to pay for my internet (you can't just pay online here, you have to go down to the bank and fill out a form etc.) and of course I paid with the wrong ID number. Yep, I'm that guy. The thing is, I didn't know I needed a number when I went down to the bank. Fortunately I always use the same 4 digit number when asked so I used it.

But when I got home I found out that Pilsfree (that's the internet service) gives you a number. So I texted that number to the Jan, guy who installed my stuff. Then I got into my profile by accident and discovered that my correction was in fact not my ID but Petr Prochazka's. So I texted Jan again with my actual ID. I think I spent 15 Krowns in texts that day. OK so it's not that bad, that equals a little less than a dollar.

I just hope they get around to attributing that payment to my account. By the way I've still got a month before it's due but I somehow managed to forget that in my panic to get internet again. Duh!

Big Weekend

2008-09-15T04:33:00.000-07:00

So I've been on the move for the past few days. It's a challenge to get my thoughts together in a coherent way. I'll start with the fact that I've gotten to know a lot more people and it's been a great time.

The TN Team.

Kellie, Serena, Karl, David and John. They represent 3 different Churches in the Johnson City/Tri-Cities area over in East Tennessee. I think I mentioned it earlier but they worked out at Holy Hill last week doing lots of digging and getting dirty. But of course they were there to be with the guys and just be loving friends. Which for these guys comes pretty naturally. Deidre, the "other" missionary here in Czech Republic said she felt like she's known them forever. I think this illustrates how open and fun they are.

Deidre is in Karlovy Vary and has been here a bit longer than me but we've got a lot of the same challenges (and some different ones). Well she spent big chunk of the week with the Team out at Holy Hill. She then rescued me from sitting around the apartment all day. Wow there's some much stuff that I can't possibly really do any justice to how much fun we've all had.

Friday Deidre and I walked around town and did a few errands etc. Then we went to U Salzmannu, a traditional Czech food restaurant. I had some gnocchi but it was Czech style. Which means it comes with sliced pork and a healthy portion of "cabbage." To a Czech person there isn't really sour kraut there's just cabbage. At least that's what I have gathered so far. Anyone who knows me will know that I am not a fan of cabbage in general and especially sour kraut in particular. But you know what? I don't mind it. I kind of just made up my mind that I might as well pretend I like it until I do because there's no getting away from it. That's cool though. I am actually starting to like it. They've got some kind of red pickled cabbage that's really good actually. So Mom I'm proud to say that I do eat veggies and cabbage is a big part of that. But in the interest of full disclosure I eat a lot of meat with dumplings most of time.

So anyway, as I was saying before that tangent we went around. We happened to be near the Team's hotel friday afternoon. Then Deidre got a bright idea. "You know what? The Team is going to Prague tomorrow. I bet we can we can go with them." I thought, "That would be super cool!" so we headed up that way and lo and behold there they were walking up the street.

So we asked David, who was the team leader, if he thought it'd be OK if we tagged along. Of course he and the Team all agreed it was great idea. The trick was we would need a ride but that was easily taken care of because Petr Balous was driving his car too and we could go with him. We kind of forgot to ask him about it though. But not to worry, David got a call from Petr while we were eating (oh yeah, the Team was on their way to dinner and invited us along. Nice folks them). So it was settled over dinner and quite a few laughs and cigarette smoke from the Germans next to us. We'd all go to Prague and be proper tourists. It was a great time.

Unfortunately, most of my pictures from Prague will make no sense. I did a particularly bad job of photography on the trip. My execution isn't so bad. It's my choice of subject that is the problem. For example

Nice picture right? Do you know what it is? Neither do I! It's up by the Prague Castle. That's about all I can tell ya. But if you are ever in Prague you must go there it is truly a beautiful place.

Here's the Cathedral from a bit of a distance right when you get onto the grounds. I think I caught the back of Deidre's head here on the right in the foreground. Actually I think that might be Serena in profile there in the middle. See how observant I was? Oh don't worry I've got plenty more where that came from.

Here's where I thought I'd be funny and get a picture of everyone taking pictures of the Cathedral. This was going to be my big "look at all the fun we had" picture where you could see everyone in a candid moment. That's John getting a picture on the left. That guy's got some serious energy when it comes to taking photos. He must have taken 300 pictures. His catch phrase for the day was "I'll catch up with y'all." Then he'd run off and take some more pictures.

You might be able to see a little bit of Petr's hat poking out between Deidre and Kelly. That's his arm pointing at the Cathedral. I think that's what he's pointing at. Anyway, as you can see (or not see actually) if I hadn't cornered the Team last night a gotten that picture at the top none of y'all would know what they actually look like. I must apologize especially to Deidre though because I did not successfully get a picture of her face. But you folks out there will see plenty of her in the coming year. Assuming she'll let me take her picture that is.

There was a huge mob of people trying to get into the Cathedral. The let you take pictures in there and everything. It's pretty amazing Church. There's so much to see. But my camera only holds like 6 pictures at a time so I had to ration them out.

But as you can see it's a huge building. I took a bunch of pictures inside with my camera too but they didn't come out so well.

By the time we went through the Cathedral we walked all over the grounds and saw the changing of the guard and all that cool stuff. Nope, I didn't take any more pictures up at the castle. You see the next thing to do in Prague is to walk the Charles Bridge. Which has a great view of the Castle. Check it out.

That's the castle way up there on the hill. The bridge is really cool too though. There are these statues along the way. I set one as the wallpaper on my phone 'cause it's got a creepy skull and cool gothic (in the real architectural sense not pasty teenagers with their hair dyed black) stuff around it. Too bad you wont' see it though. Not unless you or I go to Prague again. OK so I may take a proper picture one day. You'll just have to stay tuned. Assuming you like skulls and creepy stuff. Doesn't everybody?

By the way, we ate at McDonald's just before we got to the bridge. And before you roll your eyes and groan, we had good reason. Everything up there on that hill there you see? All of that stuff costs about double what it would anywhere else. Look at all these people. All of them are tourists. It doesn't make it any less fun or anything. It was weird though, it got to where I was surprised to hear someone speak Czech. I've gotten so used to hearing it all the time it's just normal now so it was a bit surreal. So anyway all these foreigners means "We must double our prices." to all the merchants and restauranteurs. Plus we didn't want to spend the whole afternoon in a restaurant. We had things to do and stuff to see.

Like now I have proof that I have done a bit of traveling in my day. Woohooo!

Apparently there is this amazing clock in the old square where Apostles come out and tell you what time it is or something. I don't mean to be disrespectful. Anyway, after we all convened at the end of the bridge we needed to hustle over so that we could see the clock at the top of the hour. Here it is in all its glory.

So my camera doesn't really do it justice but we were kind of thinking the same thing you are right now. Really? OK, that's cool. . . I guess. I did like the little skeleton that rings the bell. But when you consider how old (100s of years) it is and all the workmanship that went into it it is pretty impressive. Oh and it keeps accurate time by the way. Also, look at all these people! 5 of them are Czechs.

I was a bit worn out by that point so I was glad to get away from the big crowds. We saw a lot of huge and impressive and beautiful things over the day. But I think this might be my favorite.It's a statue in memorial to Mozart's mother I believe. I was all cocky and thinking I'd remember what that little plaque says. But Noooo! I can't. Should have known. This is outside a Mozart Opera House? Something to do with Mozart where they perform his stuff.

At the end of the Prague portion of the day we kind of went off to do whatever around the big Wensil Square. This was where the Velvet Revolution got started. There's so much to be said about that I just don't have the space here to get into it. We decided to split up and do our own things for a little while before we got on the subway back to the cars.

Deidre and I went to this big book store so she could get a travel book for her impending trip to Turkey. She didn't get a Visa either and her first 90 days are about to be up so she's going to Istanbul.

So now that I've told you her business (sorry :) ) Deidre kept getting called out for holding up the group whenever we were supposed to meet up. I didn't actually notice that she was late all the time. Well my point is that we were 10 minutes late in meeting up with the group. I feel it my duty to point out that this last case was entirely my fault.

I had decided I wanted some coffee. There's a cafe in the bookstore but they didn't seem to do take out. So Deidre graciously agreed to sit with me while I drank a latte. (She doesn't like coffee) There was a really nice little balcony outside, we saw some folks sitting out there so we decided to sit out there too. But as I was trying to close the glass door I discovered that there is no handle on the outside. So there I was trying to swing it closed and jerk my hand out before the door came to. Finally one of the patrons inside helped me out and closed the door. Now a more thoughtful person would have considered that this might be a bit of an obstacle in the way of getting back in. Not me my friends! Did not even occur to me.

So I had my latte and we had a nice little break from the walking around. Then Deidre noticed that we were late to get back. Woops! That's about the time I noticed that there was no door handle. What's a guy to do? Fortunately I didn't have to poke the glasslike a caveman noticing his reflection in the water but once or twice. Those same nice guys from before let us in. Then we hustled back to the group. All My Fault.

So that was the big day. I had a great time. Petr Balous was very gracious and patient with us. He's done that trip a million times and the crowds don't get any easier to be around. But we all got to know each other pretty well over the course of the day. I have more to talk about so I'll just put in another post. This must have tried your patience I'm sure. I don't plan on making a habit of writing novellas every time I post.

Comments are welcome

2008-09-12T00:24:00.000-07:00

It's come to my attention that a couple people may have had a hard time trying to contact me through the blog. My email is pcbowen@gmail.com It should be in my profile somewhere. I'm not really sure what it looks like to y'all out there that are not logged into the editor function of the blog.

Anyhoo, if you click on the comments link at the bottom of each post next to that little envelope thingie you can leave your own comment as well as see those from the rest of the peanut gallery. I would love to hear anything you guys have to say. I count on y'all to keep me straight.

So please comment away or email me if that strikes your fancy! Thanks to all two of you that actually read my wandering musings. Just kidding I'm sure there's a least 4 of ya.

PeterCleveland

ps What has two thumbs and loves comments?

This guy!

UMC History in Czech Rep

2008-09-10T12:53:00.000-07:00

OK so I don't have any pictures for this post. Sorry. But I learned some pretty interesting stuff today.

Right now there's a team from East Tennessee here helping with a project out at Holy Hill, a retreat in the countryside near Plzen where the Church helps young men with drug/alcohol type problems. It's a great thing. It's not conditional on becoming a Christian. It's just a loving place where guys can get help with whatever they may be seeking help for.

Anyway, the good folks from TN gave little presentations on their home Churches. They're really nice folks and the Maranatha people really appreciate the connections between our Churches. Kelly from the TN Team said she felt like we Americans have a lot to learn from our Czech brothers and sisters. I couldn't agree with her more. The Church here has some big challenges and they are very much like a family. The fact that it's even still here is pretty miraculous.

The Methodist Church was established in Czechoslavakia during the 1920s by Americans that had emigrated from Czechoslavakia. The Church grew well up until the 30s when the Nazis came around. The Methodist Church was seen an American so when the Nazis took over they pretty much wiped it out.

Then after the war the Soviet influence made it almost impossible for the Church to recover. The UMC had a lot of property but it was nationalized by the communists. The communists in Czechoslavakia had a habit of barring people that did not tow the commie line from certain jobs. Being a member of UMC put you on the wrong side of the government. Teachers, for example, were not allowed to be members of a Church. So the only people that could openly join the Church without reprisals were laborers. As a result Pastors pretty much had to do all the jobs around the Church because there was nobody else to fix leaks and mow the grass. Pastors were on their own without any lay help really. It was too risky for most people

Before the communists there were something like 10,000 Methodists. Today there are maybe 2,000 in the whole country. And that's after almost 20 years of rebuilding. Fortunately UMC was able to get a lot of their property back. Maranatha is once again a Church. It housed a University during the communist era. They didn't get all of their property back though. That's an ongoing challenge apparently.

It really makes you appreciate how blessed we are in America where the worst thing that could possibly happen to you for joining the Church is that someone might make fun of you. It also makes me glad that American Churches seem to be really looking outward for ways they can help and share fellowship around the world. I remember how we ran into so many people from mission teams in Nicaragua. And the folks here this week have ongoing relationships with Churches in Mexico as well as here. I don't feel like I'm doing anything all that special. To be honest I almost feel guilty because it's a big adventure for me. I just hope that I can give them back at least a small portion of what they are giving me. That includes you folks at home too.

shalom

New Stuff (literally) WoooHoo!

2008-09-10T03:42:00.000-07:00

Well after a week of timidity I've finally just gone and done some stuff. I had been reluctant to go off on my own to get a telephone 'cause I was thinking it was all complicated and the whole language thing would mess me up. But I girded myself with all the bravado I could muster and trucked on down to the Vodafone store to get me a cell phone. I did it! Woo hoo! I was very fortunate that the girl at the shop speaks English so it was actually easier than I was afraid it was going to be.

However, as you can see the instructions are all in Czech. So I still haven't figured out what my phone number is. It took It took me a good 20 minutes to get the menus etc on the phone switched to English. I was starting to worry that I'd be stuck with the Czech. I'd learn it eventually of course. (Wink!) But I do have my groovy new EuroPhone so now I should be able to coordinate with people a bit easier.

But in order to not be a bad stereotype I've started trying to learn Czech. I got this program that uses flash card type thingies and a dude over-enunciating the Czech words so that you get to hear the words and see how they correspond with the spelling. I'm working on numbers right now. This card is for Twenty One. I's really not as hard as it looks.

I've also gotten some teaching materials at the English Library. I still don't really know what level the students have reached so I got these intermediate level deals.
I showed them to Petr and he may have been a little dubious. But hey! You gotta start somewhere right? The good thing is that this stuff didn't cost me anything and if it's not quite right for us I can just take it back and get something else. But I need to sit down with the students before I'll really know what will work best for us.

Ahoj "Ahoy" for now. Oh yeah this is hello and goodbye or more like Hi and See ya later. It's kinda cool. Their word for Attention is Avast. So you get to feel all nautical and piratey. Loads of fun.

New Header Photo

2008-09-03T09:17:00.000-07:00

Just a quick note on the new header. I was not really comfortable with my mug at the top of the page. Y'all know what I look like now and that's not that interesting.

Anyway the pic is a street sign at a bridge. I love the street signs here. As you can see they are more expressive than the stick figures we have on our signs. I feel like the signs here are telling a nice fairy tale and if you follow the right route around town and avoid these guys you get to see the happy ending with Grand-PaPah and little Marlenka safe back at home in good old Sweetsie-Land.

Week One

2008-09-03T08:53:00.000-07:00

Well it's officially been a week and I'm still here. I've sort of gotten to know my way around now and I've got my library card for the English language library. It's in a really old building. Of course all the buildings are really old around here. But it's right in the big square in the town center where the main Catholic Cathedral is. That is one seriously huge Church and it's 800 years old. Very impressive.

Fortunately also at the English library are many, many books and resources for teaching English to Czechs. It's a good thing too since I didn't bring anything from the States with me. There are a few ladies from Maranatha that are going to Dallas in October and I'm going to help them get ready for that trip linguistically. Hopefully I'll get an idea of how to do this stuff and we can add more folks and get a more formal structure in place. But for now we're kind of just playing it by ear.

Revolution Church New York

2008-09-03T08:30:00.000-07:00

I've asked for (and been given) permission to put a link up on the blog for Revolution NYC. This is the Church I attended in New York. Wade still goes there too. It meets at a bar called Pete's Candy store in Brooklyn. Jay Bakker is the pastor. Some of y'all may have heard of him. His parents are kinda famous. Wink Wink. Anyway, Revolution is a big inspiration for me. I came back to living my faith everyday thanks in large part to what I got out of going to Revolution. It's also a big reason I decided to come here to Plzen in the first place.

New York is not an easy town in which to be a Christian. Jay has said telling a New Yorker that you're a Christian is like telling them you believe in the Easter Bunny. Revolution is a missionary Church in many ways because they reach out to New Yorkers that may have a bad impression of the Church and Christians. Plus it provides fellowship that is so crucial to those of us that might feel alone in our faith there in NYC. I may not agree with every stance Revolution takes but they don't hold that against me just like I don't hold it against them. Every thing they do is in the spirit of love and compassion with the goal of spreading the Good News of God's free gift of Grace through Jesus. That's what matters most.

So I would like to encourage everyone to go and check out there site and support them. Just click on the links here in the post or up in the links section on the right. They have a paypal link you can use to donate. It's an uphill battle for them in New York so they need all the help we can give. They also podcast all the sermon. You can listen to them on the site or subscribe to it on iTunes like I do. I've been listening to old sermons pretty much everyday. It really helps me to stay connected.

Pax

First Sunday

2008-08-31T04:09:00.001-07:00

Well today was my first Sunday in Czech Republic. This is Maranatha, the church I work for now. It awesome to say I work for something. Those of you that know me know that I haven't really "worked" in quite a while. Sure I've worked here and there for various people. Ms. Prince was very good to me and more generous than I deserved. But I am so proud to be a part of a Church and this Church in particular. It's a pretty young building. It's only been around since 1929 or so.

Today Ivana, Petr's wife gave the sermon. She was the pastor at another Methodist Church in Plzen before and now preaches from time to time at Maranatha. I was prepared to just not know what was going on but Petr introduced me to Teresa (I am sure I'm misspelling everyone's name that isn't named Petr so I'm just going to have to ask forgiveness until I get Czech spelling down) and she translated for me. It was a big help and she was very nice. Teresa speaks remarkably good English. She doesn't really have an accent.

So Petr introduced me to the Church at the end of the service and I embarrassingly had nothing to say. But they of course were very nice. The service was a lot like what I'm used to in many ways. They sing praise songs just like Northside. Well, not just like Northside. They sing in Czech. They don't have an organ. But there were two girls and I assume their mother that played flute, violin and acoustic guitar. Yeah you're right is was very pretty. The songs were similar in structure to most of the praise songs that Americans are used to but they use minor keys a whole bunch more and I totally dug that about it.

After the service a bunch of people went down to the little cafe in the Church downstairs. This is a very cool idea by the way. Another Petr invited me down and gave me a nice strong coffee. The cafe filled up with Dads and their kids and Moms too. The kids didn't drink coffee though. They have Coke here too thankfully.

Anyway I had a nice conversation with this Petr. It turns out he went to University for Missionary studies. How cool is that! Plus it turns out he plays football (soccer to you Americans ;)) and he has a band. So I'm pretty much set. I had only a few modest goals for my time here. 1. Most importantly to do a good job teaching English. That is why I'm here after all. But I was hoping I could find people to play soccer with and musicians to play with. And Bang! One dude does all that stuff. Well he doesn't teach English. You got me.

After hanging out at the Church cafe Petr Prochazka (the Pastor at Maranatha) and I went and had lunch at this cafe. This is the view from my bathroom window. It was my first meal outside of my apartment or Petr's or Becky's and Linda's apartment (Becky is American, Linda is South African and live downstairs from me. They've been lifesavers for my big dumb American butt.)

Petr ordered for us one of the specials of the day. It was pork (you know I luvs me some pork) with green peppercorns and fries and cabbagey cole-slaw type salad. Yes Mom I did eat the cabbage. I'm not only eating sausage. (mmmm sausage) Boy was it good. Anyone coming to a new country for the first time is always going to be afraid they'll hate the food. I'm no different. But I gotta tell ya I have yet to have anything that wasn't really tasty. My stomach doesn't always like me very much but he'll just have to get over it.

Here's some random photos I snuck on the street today. I'll just leave it at that for now.

Shalom

Thank you Northside UMC

2008-08-30T11:53:00.000-07:00

I want to thank everybody back home for keeping me in their prayers. I just happened to be reading Acts in my study Bible (NASB) really I'm not making that up ;) when I came to 6:6 and was reminded of Northside last Sunday. I know it meant a lot to my Mom. It was as if Pastor Don read her mind. It meant a lot to me too.

Acts 6:6 "And these they brought before the apostles; and after praying they laid their hands on them."

The notes in my Bible explain that this refers back to Gen 48:13-20 and conferring blessing on a person and commissioning a person for new responsibilities (Num 27:23) in the OT. And in the NT there is blessing (Mark 10:16) commissioning (Act 13:3; 1 Tim 5:22) and imparting spiritual gifts (Acts 8:17; 19:6; 1 Tim 4:14; 2 Tim 1:6).

Sorry for getting all Bible nerdy on y'all but it so exciting to see this stuff and know that it is real and applies to me. I have my Mom especially but also my family at Northside to thank for this. So I thank you all very much.

Ok, no more mushy stuff!

Believe it or not I made it!

2008-08-30T10:46:00.000-07:00

Well I finally got here. Actually I've been in Plzen since Wednesday. But I've been in a jet-lag fog pretty much the whole time. Add to that the fact that I got the wrong kind of adapter plug for my computer and I've been less than productive on the blog. Also I have yet to master the art of taking pictures on the street without looking too touristy.

But I did take a few pictures today. This is the swing set we put in today at Maranatha. This is the back yard behind the church. The crew in this photo from left to right is Petr, Petr, Petr, Witek and Petr. Apparently everybody in Czech Republic (including me) is named Petr. Except Witek of course

In this photo the crew is Petr, Peter, Petr, Vitek and Petr. That time I messed it up with my weird American spelling.

All in all it was a fun time. None of the guys really speaks much English except Petr Prochazka so I was doing my best to soak in what few Czech words I did know. Fortunately "dobry"(good) was said quite a bit and at the end I'm pretty sure someone said "Super" so I think it turned out well.

It is definitely very exciting to be here finally. So far I haven't ventured out on my own too much. I did go to the Tesco by myself yesterday and got some groceries. Apparently Tesco is Great Britain's answer to Walmart. It's fine with me 'cause I can just pick out what I want and I don't have to bother anyone with my non-Czech speaking shenanigans.

One thing that becomes immediately obvious in the supermarket here is that Czechs love them some sausage. I would like to go on the record as being 100% on board with this, down with and all other superlatives I can't think of. So far I've only sampled a couple. One I don't know the name of and Khlobasa which I bought and grilled with my neighbors. I've got so many to try that it's good I have a year to get around to them. There was one intriguing black sausage that I'm pretty sure is made with just blood, mmmmm blood sausage. Hey don't knock it! It might be awesome.

Gearing Up

2008-08-19T22:46:00.001-07:00

It's officially less than a week before I leave for Plzen. I'm still trying to get all the last million or so little things done. Of course, I'm figuring out that I should have done lots of stuff a long time ago.

I would really like to set up a link so that those of y'all out there that feel generous can donate to the cause. However I see that I need to set up a special account with the Church specifically earmarked in order for donations to be tax deductible. I will pursue this. Hopefully it will work out.

I feel like a big jerk asking for money. I have most of the money I need. It may actually be enough. However, when I started this whole process I was thinking the money I had would be plenty. Most places to which missionaries go have a much, much cheaper cost of living. While Czech Republic is cheaper that the US it's not as cheap as I would have hoped. So there ya go. Once I get to Plzen I'll have a better idea of what the expenses I'll need help with are.

I'm going to teach English among other things. But Maranatha does not have a curriculum in place. According to folks who live in Czech Republic and Slovakia it is best to purchase a curriculum locally in order to get one crafted more specifically to the folks who will be using it. Anyway, I'll get together with the Pastor and we will get the best program we can find. Hopefully I will be able to afford. But I may need help. Hence, me being a jerk asking for money. Hey, maybe I'll get lucky and it won't cost too much.

Day One

2008-08-04T14:17:00.000-07:00

Well, I'm scheduled to leave for Plzen on 25 August. I'm still trying to sort out the visa issues which may get in the way. I'm making a leap of faith and hoping it will all work out.

I'm very excited! This time next month I'll be in Plzen helping the pastor at Maranatha United Methodist Church. I don't really know what I'm doing and I'm not an expert in much other than taking it easy but I'm confident the Lord will use me as he sees fit and we'll get to do great things in serving Him and bringing His Love to everyone we can.

More to come. . .