Second weekend!

This particular weekend was the weekend of October 19th. My friend (classmate from UPS) from Oahu came to visit for the weekend. I flexed my Friday so I only see one kid and then we can do touristy things.
L.K. came in on Thursday night a few hours after my homeless roommate came from Peru. This was my second time at the airport that day.
After a Thai dinner we were off to the airport again. L.K. arrived safely.
The next day we were ready to see one kid and then do touristy things.
Our first stop: Ulupalakua Ranch where we bought some cool gifts. Some of you will have the opportunity to receive some. Lucky...
Next we went to the Maui's Winery in Ulupalakua. We tasted some wine and enjoyed looking at the other things they had in the store. L.K. got a little drunk (well maybe just a little) on the wine so we had to wait a little before moving on to our next location.
We were off to the lavender farm where we had some tea and scone. The flowers are beautiful there and the view amazing.
It was getting cold and windy and we were getting hungry so we went to Kula Lodge and some great pizza that they make in their outdoor oven.

The next day we went and drove around the back side of the West Maui Mountains. It's so beautiful there and such an exciting drive. We went to the olivine pools, the blow hole, stopped in Lahaina for lunch and then off to the Maui Ocean Center.
Here are more pictures.
So that was another one of my busy weekends. More to come later.
Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving...

One of my many busy weekends!

So my roommate got married on October 13th. so soon I'll be getting my old roommate back. Yay.. but also real sad LT is gone.
It was a beautiful wedding. LT was like an angel when she walked through the church doors. The food was great, mostly Hawaiian food. The same as our Luau dinner.
I'll post some pictures too so you guys can see my new dress for those who are interested.
The reception was interesing. There were so many people that my table and one other one were stuck by the pool away from everyone. It felt like we were at a different party. It was ok though cause I walked around most of the time.
The groom and his friends did the Superman song dance, it was so funny to watch.
Ok, so I don't know what else to say about it but here are some pictures.

I am still alive!

OK, so I know it's been a while, but I have been really busy with work. I am currently relaxing on the beautiful island of Lanai at an amazing resort. We love you auntie Yvette. It's much more peaceful then the resort on the beach. Less people, more quiet, lots of green, and relaxing things to do. We just took a walk in the gardens and had a cappuccino by the fireplace. I'll post some pictures later.

So I know it's been a long time since I got back from Romania, but it sure is still fresh in my head. I posted the pictures from that second week. We worked with boys from a state placement center who have some kind of mental, learning, or mild physical disability. It was a challenging week, but with the help of God we survived. It was nice to see some of the kids I've seen in 2003, but they sure have grown. The challenges of that week included stealing, fighting, and cursing. The week was also exhausting after we thought the first week was challenging, but after looking at the second week the first was nothing compared to this.
God gave us the patience and rest we needed, and we were able to survive and love on those kids even in time of disappointment.

So anyways, here are some pictures from the second week of camp.
Enjoy.

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First week of camp Pictures!

Well so I finally uploaded the pictures from the first week of camp! You've read the stories, now you get to see the pictures. Enjoy.
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First week of camp!

Well back to my stories. I can't believe it's taken me so long to update again.
So on Saturday we arrived late at night so we met the Romanian staff and had dinner together and just played around with the few kids that were there for the weekend. On Sunday I gave the team a tour of the camp and after a few hours of free time (trying to get adjusted to the time) we were off to work. We put together the care packages, which included the soup, shampoo, toothbrush, toothpaste, wash cloth, and comb. We also arranged all the crafts and made sure we had everything we needed for each craft. And we also started cleaning up camp and putting all cabins together (making the beds and cleaning up).
Monday morning we finished up what we had left to do and we were waiting patiently for the boys (from around villages) to arrive. The first group from Talmaciu arrived around 11am and we just played with them (mostly soccer) until the rest of the boys and Romanian staff arrived.
The vans were starting to pull up. Lots and lots of boys came out of the vans. I knew one boy out of all 55 of them. I knew some of the Romanian staff and the leader. Marcel is a great leader. He works with children in the villages around Brasov every week and he has an amazing heart to help those children and their families. With God's grace he and his wife had a little girl a couple of years ago and I was so happy to see her. She is a beautiful and smart little girl.
Back to the kids. The kids were between 9 to 19 years old. Some were there for the first time and some have been there before.
The first day we introduce ourselves to the boys and told them our name, where we were from, if this was our first time there, our favorite sport and the animal that we are most afraid of. Can anyone guess mine?
The rest of the day we got to know them by playing with them, eating together and having fellowship together. The boys had the opportunity to read about each one of us. We had our pictures with a little bit about ourselves on the wall in the fellowship hall so the kids can know us better. Here is a picture of that. During the week it was time to put the team to work. At the camp we had three interns who were in charge of the camp areas. We had to help them out with dishes every meal of the day, so a put up a list of each helper per meal, who had bathroom duty, and who was cleaning the hall after each meal. Some needed reminders some were always helping out. The team was great.
For the next few days we got to really know the boys. We did crafts (box cars, kites, albums, name tags), played games (tug of war, soccer, chess, volleyball, 4-way tug of war, and other indoor games), ate all meals together, went on a hike, walked down to the store for ice cream, and shared the love of Christ with them.
We didn't get to have the bon fire this week due to lots and lots of rain. We also had some power outages and no water for a few hours. My team got to learn how to be flexible. We talked about it at all meetings and still some of them were surprised off all the changes that were going on at camp. That's camp life, you never really know what's going on.
Here is a picture of all the boys from the first week of camp.

Before the first week of camp!

Ok. So let's see where we can start.
After I said Good-bye to my family in Cluj, I took the "air conditioned?" bus back to Sibiu. I got to sit behind the driver this time so the ride was not too bad, except for the fact that my driver and the driver (not driving - second shift) were watching TV on a little tv that was placed on the dashboard. I couldn't believe they were watching TV and driving a group of people on very dangerous roads (we only almost got hit once).
So I got to Sibiu about 9:30ish PM and I took a taxi to my cousin's house. The taxi driver was so talkative and I was so not in the mood, but listened nonetheless.
He was telling me how he was from Sibiu and he works a lot,and this morning when to Baia Mare (2 hours further south then I was this morning) and had come back and went right back to work. He was then telling me about a country town he stopped in to get vegetables and fruit and the lady was real nice and told him he can go pick his own from the garden. He was hesitant but he also gave her something he got real good vegetables.
Me to myself "that sounds familiar" to the taxi driver "What town were you in?"
Taxi Driver: I think it was Chisinau or something like that
Me: Oh, I have a grandmother who lives in one of those towns and I thought maybe it was the same one but it's not. Any ways
Taxi Driver: (going on and on about his stop) He also talked to the lady across the street because she saw his Sibiu license plate and she was also from Sibiu (Valia Aurie - where we were heading) and just moved there with her husband.
Me to myself "that sounds real familar"
Me: tell me the town again
Taxi Driver: Chisinau
Me: are you sure it was not Catcau?
Taxi Driver: could be, I just asked someone a few towns later but did not look myself what it was. Why?
Me: well I have a aunt from Valia Aurie where we are going right now and she recently moved there with her husband and it just sound it the same.
Taxi Driver: Do they have a little girl there?
Me: yes, my cousin's daughter and my grandmother is there also
Taxi Driver: wow, it's them. What a small world? It was meant to be that you take this taxi.
Me: yeah
taxi driver: where are you from ?
me: Cluj, just visiting Sibiu
taxi driver: can I ask how old you are? (brave of him)
me: (with a little hesitation) 30
taxi driver: I'm 31 and single ... blah... blah... are you married?
me: no
taxi driver: why not?
me: (wanted to ask him "why aren't' you?") because I'm just not
taxi driver: (getting real close to my cousins' house) well you should call me if you need a taxi while you are here. What are you doing tomorrow? my name is ...
me: getting ready to head to a camp in the mountains to work with kids
...: (remember we were speaking Romanian this whole time but had to translate for those of you who don't know Romanaian) so what are you doing after the camp?
me: going to America to visit my parents
...: I hand a feeling you were from there. Here is my phone number to call if you need a taxi or your family does.
me: thanks got to go. have a good night!

Almost had myself a husband. Oh, well he was short and talked way too much anyways.

So I got to my cousin's home and they were ready to go to a concert in the center, so I decided I didn't have anything so why not I don't have anything tomorrow.
I'll post a video so you can decide for yourselves what you think of the guy.

The Plaza was full of people. I've never seen so many people. I'll have to post the video I took later. For now just check out the one I have above just to see what kind of music he sings. Sometimes he just sits there with his drink (probably Vodka) and make hand signals and his band sings, but he is the famous one. It was an interesting night to say the least.

At the last minute at night my cousin and his wife decided that they will be going to visit my grandmother. So the next day they left early in the morning and I was home all alone. I slept a lot. Did some last minute things for the camp. Visited with friends in town and on the internet. I talked with one team member who arrived in country. It was a good relaxing day.

The next morning I was picked up by the same driver who picked me up from the airport and we headed down to Bucharest to pick up the rest of the team. It was another long trip to Bucharest but at least it was not as hot. Before reaching the airport we had a meal at McDonald's. I got a Happy Meal just for the toy.

We got to the airport and we quickly found R. She arrived early and had been waiting for about 30 minutes. F. should be arriving soon so we checked the board and it said his plane landed. The other three should be at the airport soon, since they have been in Bucharest since last night.We arrived at the airport about 1:00 pm. We wait and wait and we don't see F. come out and the other three have not arrived yet. About 2:15 pm F. arrived safe and sound. Then soon we saw C., he arrived by taxi but S. and J. were in the taxi stuck at the entrance. After figuring out where everyone was it was 3:00 pm and it was time to go. We still had to stop at a store to get some food. The grocery store was big almost like a mall. We got what we needed and off we went to camp. Still 6 hours to go.

More on arriving at camp and the first week of camp.

Pictures!

Hello Everyone. I'm in the process of writing more about my trip but I just haven't had the time yet, so I put up some more pictures of my time with my family in Cluj and Sibiu.
Click on http://picasaweb.google.com/jildav

I hope I get some time this weekend to write more about my time in Romania.