All spring I’ve been looking forward to our family’s trip to the US this summer. It marks two years of living and doing ministry here in Budapest. Since I’ve been back a few times since we lived here, I have mixed emotions about going home. It is going to be a very busy summer, but it will be great to see our family and friends. Our summer in Budapest last year was wonderfully relaxing and nothing can top our trip to the beach in Croatia so at times I’ve wished I could spend summer in both places.

I had mixed emotions until . . . the HEAT came. For the last week, the temperature here in Budapest has been almost exactly the same as Orlando. In fact, we were hotter than Orlando for a couple of days. The big problem with this is . . . NO AIR CONDITIONING. Our house doesn’t have it, our church doesn’t have it, my car doesn’t have it . . . I’m typing this in my office which does have it and I’m considering moving in for the week.

Yesterday morning at church, it was hard to concentrate on the service because it was so hot. Then, we came home to a house that was equally as hot. We have fans, but circulating hot air just creates a convection oven effect. Then, to top it all off, I woke up this morning at 4:30am. It is already daylight at that time, but usually I can go back to sleep. This morning it was just too hot. I tossed and turned until 5 and then went downstairs where it is a little cooler. It is going to be a long day and I’m already dreading bedtime tonight.

Yes, it is hot in Texas and Orlando (where we will be this summer), but there you go from the AC in the house, to the AC in the car, to the AC in the stores, to the pool!!! 7 more days and AC here we come!!!

Top-Chretien.com staff
Originally uploaded by squarejer.

While seeing our friends, the Spears, is a pretty good excuse to go to Paris, it wasn’t the real reason.

We went to meet with Eric Celerier and his team that runs a very successful internet ministry called Top Chretien (Top Christian). They are a part of Campus Crusade in France (they call it Agape France). We had a wonderful day talking about how we can work together to create evangelistic sites here in Eastern Europe.

I have a feeling that we will look back on our day of meetings one day as the start of something very significant.

The Spears
Originally uploaded by squarejer.

Jerry & I went to Paris this week to meet with Eric who does web ministry (more on that later). We stayed with our friends from Orlando, Harvey & Carol Spears. In Orlando, Harvey, Jerry & I worked in the same department and our families lived within a half mile of each other. Now we are all in Europe. Three years ago, none of us would have believed it.

It was fun to spend time with them and their kids. Here I am at the dinner table with the family.

It was a great visit.

Gdansk Campus Team
Originally uploaded by squarejer.

Last week, Jerry & I had the opportunity to visit the Polish city of Gdansk. It is in the far north of Poland on the Baltic Sea. We went there to do some planning with the people that are involved in internet ministry. Check out the websites at http://www.podprad.pl (student site) and http://www.agape.pl (online Bible school).

It was a great trip and we were able to get a lot done. We also had the treat of meeting with the Gdansk Campus Ministry team (shown in the photo with Jerry & I). It was a great chance to get to know some of our Polish staff. We played a “get to know you” game with the team and it is amazing how much we have in common even though we were brought up in very different environments (to say the least).

Gdansk was also a beautiful city. We visited the old town and enjoyed seeing the beautiful buildings and the main church.

Jerry & I are sitting in the Warsaw airport and isn’t it cool that they have a free wireless network.

After I found out, I decided it was the perfect chance to blog.

We are going to Gdansk, which is a city on the north edge of Poland. We will be staying very near to the Baltic Sea. It is also the place where Lech Welesa started the solidarity movement in revolt against the Soviets.

We are meeting with our Internet Ministry team to make plans for the coming year.

Currently, our flight is delayed and we won’t get an update until 11pm. It is going to be a late night

I’m a little late in blogging about it, but Valerie & I had a great time on our pilgrimage to Poland to buy pottery. We had beautiful weather and enjoyed the time driving across the Czech Republic. I’m not sure we enjoyed the pottery shopping as much as we expected, but we do enjoy having the pottery at our house. Valerie hosted a “Book Club” last night and was able to use her new stuff for the party. She loved it!!

It was not a leisurely shopping experience at all. Our friends in Prague that we stayed with the night before gave us a briefing on how to plan our day buying pottery. The fact that we needed a plan was my first clue that this wasn’t going to be easy.
Here’s a timeline of our day:

0530 REVILLE SOUNDS and we awake and prepare for the mission

0600 TRANSPORT TO BATTLEGROUNDS – Make the 3 hour drive from Prague to Boleslawiec, Poland (It was a beautiful drive through rolling hills and winding roads. It is amazing to notice the contrasts between Hungary, Czech & Poland. The houses and villages look very different)

0900 – RECONAISSANCE – After arriving, we had a plan of the key targets in the town. It was important to visit each of them to gather intelligence about what types of treasures that the held. There were 20 or so small to medium size shops in about 3 or 4 locations throughout the town. Each shop has some of the same patterns and collections and some different. We needed to find the patterns that we needed, in the right quantity and for the cheapest price. This was not a casual window shopping experience. In each store, Valerie’s job was to look for the patterns that we need for us while I looked for the patterns that our friends and family asked us to pick up. We would blaze through the store and then I would write down what we found as far as patterns, quantity and prices. It was a grueling 3 ½ hours.

1230 – LUNCH and BATTLE PLANNING – We went to local restaurant where we ate traditional Polish soup and Polish perogis (potatoes & meat stuffed in a pasta type of shell). During the meal, we reviewed our notes and planned which shops had what we needed for the best prices. We then had a strategy for the afternoon

1330 – ATTACK!!! – We were off to make the purchases. We first had to revisit a few of the stores that we visited first thing in the morning because we had learned some things along the way and we wanted to make sure that we didn’t miss something. Thankfully, one of the stores had much cheaper prices than all the others and a pretty good selection. We went there next and bought as much as we could. After that, we went to a few other places and filled in the gaps. The funny thing is that we went back to the cheapest place 4 times during the afternoon to get things that we forgot or that we decided to buy later. I was seeing spots (most of the pottery is a collection of circles) by mid-afternoon and we weren’t sure we were going to make it.

1630 – TARGET ACQUIRED – MISSION ACCOMPLISHED – After 3 hours of attacking, we finally had made most of the purchases and reached the end of our budget. We were exhausted and yet Valerie was very happy with what we were able to get.

1700 – TRANSPORT BACK TO BASE – we drove back to Prague (assisted by much caffeine) and debriefed about our day. Valerie said, “I’m never going back there again!” While she is glad to have the pottery, she didn’t enjoy the experience because it was so intense and stressful.

2000 – ARRIVAL BACK AT BASE

2100 – LIGHTS OUT – We were exhausted and couldn’t get to sleep fast enough!!!

Overall, it was a great weekend. We enjoyed spending time together more than shopping for pottery, though!!!