A day in the life.

Last Sunday I experienced what I like to call a day in the life of a Romanian. Well not so much in the morning but later in the day. In the morning we got to spend some time to ourselves. We got to sleep in and do breakfast whenever we woke up. Then we had a morning “night light” since our night before had been a late night. We had a super relaxing day. We got to spend some time just hanging out and watching movies. When 4 p.m. came around though, that is when things got really cool and very Romanian. We went to visit a lady from down the road. We met her on a walk and Shannon took her picture and ever since then she loves to see us and spend time with us. She invited us over for an afternoon visit. We didn’t have long to stay there, but we experienced real Romanian hospitality. She showed us into a room that I think was a bedroom, they brought us all chairs to sit even though we were perfectly fine sitting on the ground or on the bed. They had prepared a cake and a special type of bread for our visit. The bread takes like half a day to make. They kept asking us if we wanted anything to drink, and finally they brought us in some pears from the pear tree. It is a fond memory of mine, sitting in that room with this old Romanian lady who just started telling us some of her life. She talked a little about life during communism and how hard her life has been since her husband died. She has lived in the same house forever which I thought was amazing. It is so interesting to see the life of a Romanian, and the difference between the life of a Romanian in the city and the life of a Romanian in the country. We were able to meet some of her family as well. Her daughters were there as well as her granddaughter. We were only able to stay for probably about 30 minutes or so and we had to leave to go to church. We took her granddaughter with us to church. We arrived at church and some of the boys we had been working with that week, as well as some of the girls we worked with previously in the summer showed up so they could see us. Romanian churches (especially the ones in the small towns) are so different from American churches, but I love it so much. There is much more singing, there is a time or two during the service where we stand to pray and people in the congregation can pray. The intensity of the prayer during those times, from those people is enough to challenge me in how I pray. Then if there are visitors, the visitors should have prepared some special music (we had three songs) as well as someone to share a testimony, or if it is a man to share some scripture or a word from God. Also the men and the women sit on opposite sides of the church. After our church service we hung out with the kids for a bit and went back to the Heart to Heart apartment in Rosiori while we were waiting for the best shaorma I have had the whole time I have been here. We spent some time just hanging out with each other, enjoying our little time to relax. Then we went home and went to sleep. It was a fabulous day. If you have questions, ask me about it.