Europe Met the Crazy Americans...Part 1

    

     Wow! How do words even begin to describe all that I saw and felt over those three weeks. It's been over two months and thoughts are still sinking in that I had actually been there. After speaking at several churches and a ladies meeting about the amazing experience that I had, I am finally sitting down writing about the time I spent in Romania.

  

    The adventure had started! I excitedly walked through security and wandered up to my gate to sit down and soak it all in. The thoughts that this country girl was seriously heading to Europe on a mission’s trip ran through my mind as I waited patiently to board. This was only the first part of my journey though, as I was to meet three other team mates in Georgia.
     Upon arrival in Atlanta I began to navigate through the airport; I decided to evade the underground tram to the luggage claim and instead fast, walk along side it on moving sidewalks, figuring that I would beat it to the destination. I accomplished my goal of beating the tram to the claim and I met up with Bethany there.  Warm, muggy air greeted me as I stepped outside of the airport doors and into the Georgia atmosphere. I greeted Rachel, fellow teammate and chauffeur, and we all clambered into her lovely car ready for the next leg of adventure.

      After spending a wonderful evening, night and morning at Rachel’s home amid her family’s southern hospitality, us four girls, Amanda had arrived later on in the evening, headed to Walmart to get snacks for the long overnight flight that we would be embarking on later that day. We were delighted to discover dark berry skittles, pretzel m&ms, cheez-its, and some other “healthy” snacks. We were prepared for that flight and for the adventure in Romania.



  On June 13^th the team boarded the flight out of Atlanta to head to Paris, France and then onto Budapest, Hungary. It was the start of our friendship, I mean seriously, being stuck on an eight hour flight with nothing to do but trying to convince yourself that you should sleep gives you plenty of time to connect.
   I got to see the sunrise and Paris, I truly wish that we all could have had a longer layover so that we could see the city, but alas, it was not to be.

       Upon the arrival in Budapest, my body was now cooperating and telling me that it was time to sleep, but I had to again tell it that NO it had to AWAKE! So the perfect key to staying awake after an overnight flight is to take a small nap and tour the amazing city of Budapest. I had heard of Budapest before but was not prepared for the great architect and beautifulness of it. Venders lined the streets with their colorful items, restaurants seemed to have poured out into the street with tables and umbrella’s set up for shade, and apartment homes were painted brightly and contained little window boxes with flowers. The sights are so hard to describe, the lost me in a sense of wonder and excitement at how busy this city was and yet how very cool.

     I got to complete a so-called bucket list item, I rode a subway! Yes, this country girl got to ride her first one and she did not realize it until after a second ride. My city friends got a kick out of that one. It was pretty amazing even though I had no idea what anything meant but I sure did enjoy the ride and the really high escalators. One thing I noticed right away with the food is that they like soup, and if you want “normal” water that Americans are used to you have to ask for “flat water” or they would bring you a carbonated kind. I have to say that I found it very interesting, not bad by any means just interesting. It was like drinking pop that had no flavor, it was clear like water but had bubbles like pop, and it had a slightly different taste to it. I know great explanation there huh?

First Subway Ride.





How we truly felt.....EXHAUSTED! =)

    
      While there I got to climb to the top of a church and view the whole city, saw a synagogue-even though we missed the tour, took a sunset silhouette picture, ate a shwarma- no American brand of shwarma will compare to the spectacularness of the ones I had in Romania- and got to know the team even better. But this was just the beginning! The team would be heading out soon to start working with local kids in the city of Deva. My heart grinned that the thought of getting to interact with these kids, I could not wait to see what God had in store for me and the rest of the team.

     ~Laura Arminta
p.s. I'm going to start working on part 2

The Parliment Building of Hungary

The Old Castle of the Royal Family....They downsized to a smaller one.