Happy New Year!!
I hope everyone had a safe and enjoyable new year, wherever you may have been. I think it's funny that I got to celebrate the new year 6 hours before you guys did, at least most of the people who would read this. I guess that means I win.
So the past couple days have been pretty sweet. We went skiing at Plejsy, which is the same place we had summer camp. It was neat to ski down the same slope that I had to hike up like a billion times this summer. We also got to see Jaro, the guy who was in charge of the camp. Mike broke a ski, and it was pretty funny even though I felt kind of bad. It happened like 5 minutes after we got off the lift the FIRST time. The lift goes up pretty far, and the first hill is pretty steep, Mike fell and heard a crack, thinking maybe it was his leg, but looked down and the back of his ski was flopping around, so he had to walk down the rest of the slope which took him about an hour, so he just called it quits for the day and hung out in the hotel at the bottom of the hill. This time there were 5 of us instead of four: Ondrej, Rina, Jano (from the Jano and Stano show), Mike, and myself, though Mike got knocked out early so it was four of us skiing. We had lot o' fun though. So after that we went and played soccer again in a gym, which was pretty sweet. That night we got to hang out at the cafe again, and I played games with some folks and just had a good ole' time.
Yesterday, we had the first part of the day to just relax and do whatever. Then we went and visited a local village that is going to be doing a KECY camp this coming summer. Mirushka (for those who know her) is the leader of the youth group, and she's an awesome woman of God and it's cool to see what the Lord is doing in such a small village outside of Presov. We did some other random errands during the afternoon like buy our train tickets for Prague, get groceries, etc., then I got to talk to Melissa on AIM which was pretty sweet. Also, I got to talk to my folks the other night on this program called Skype, it's like talking on the phone, but it's over the internet and it's free and pretty cool. You should check it out if you're ever out of the country.
Last night we had the KECY 2004-2005 New Year's Party (it's called Sylvester here, I can't remember why). There were a ton of folks there, maybe like 60 or so, which is more than I expected at least. Many of them were KECY Alumni from the summer that were really cool to see. We played a bunch of games, I gave my testimony, which went alright I think, then there was a skit that was a slovak fairy tale, and I played a part and had to speak Slovak, except it was like Old Slovak or something, but everyone laughed when I said my lines, so either I said them right and they thought it was cool, or I just totally butchered them and they were laughing at me. After that, there were more games, then we did this thing called KECY Superstar, which was basically American Idol. they have something called Slovakia Superstar, which is the same as american idol, and they copied that. So for my "audition," instead of singing I did a dramatic reading of Britney Spears' "Hit me Baby one more time," which i think everyone thought was funny. After my performance, judges critiqued me, but it was all in SLovak, so after the first three judges I just said "I don't understand" in Slovak, or "Cough on it" in Slovak which is something like Don't worry about it in English. Then the last judge said in Slovak "I'm not going to say anything because he won't understand me anyway." That was pretty funny, but I guess you had to be there. After that, we learned the Greek National Dance, then hung out until Midnight and went outside with sparklers and had fireworks, it was fun. A great night overall.
It was interesting last night to realize what it's like to really be in another culture. It was different this summer because there were other Americans to rely on when you had an awkward moment in conversation with a Slovak or just wanted to speak English with someone. Although Mike was there, we weren't just going to hang out the whole time, so I just had to talk to people, and try to communitcate as best as possible. Man it was difficult sometimes, but really cool to learn things about myself and how I relate to other people.
Today we're going to go eat lunch, then some folks are coming over here to hang out, then me and Mike are going to visit Jaro and Luba, a couple that helped at the second camp this summer, and then get on a train late tonight for Prague. It's an overnight train in a sleeper car, so we'll see how that goes. Mike snores i think, I might have to take desperate measure if that happens tonight.
It was cool to find out recently that Melissa and I had been reading the same verses, so I will recommend it to you guys to read too. I read Luke 6:27-36, she read Matthew 5:38-42, which are essentially the same words but in different books. I think they are great challenges to us as Christians, and I know that for myself, I had to look at my own life to see if this is true of my behavior.
Anyway, I love you all, and my next entry will be from the Czech republic! Please pray for the time that I will get to spend with Miro the next few days, I'm really excited about it, and I hope that we get to talk about cool stuff.
With Love,
Jonas
So the past couple days have been pretty sweet. We went skiing at Plejsy, which is the same place we had summer camp. It was neat to ski down the same slope that I had to hike up like a billion times this summer. We also got to see Jaro, the guy who was in charge of the camp. Mike broke a ski, and it was pretty funny even though I felt kind of bad. It happened like 5 minutes after we got off the lift the FIRST time. The lift goes up pretty far, and the first hill is pretty steep, Mike fell and heard a crack, thinking maybe it was his leg, but looked down and the back of his ski was flopping around, so he had to walk down the rest of the slope which took him about an hour, so he just called it quits for the day and hung out in the hotel at the bottom of the hill. This time there were 5 of us instead of four: Ondrej, Rina, Jano (from the Jano and Stano show), Mike, and myself, though Mike got knocked out early so it was four of us skiing. We had lot o' fun though. So after that we went and played soccer again in a gym, which was pretty sweet. That night we got to hang out at the cafe again, and I played games with some folks and just had a good ole' time.
Yesterday, we had the first part of the day to just relax and do whatever. Then we went and visited a local village that is going to be doing a KECY camp this coming summer. Mirushka (for those who know her) is the leader of the youth group, and she's an awesome woman of God and it's cool to see what the Lord is doing in such a small village outside of Presov. We did some other random errands during the afternoon like buy our train tickets for Prague, get groceries, etc., then I got to talk to Melissa on AIM which was pretty sweet. Also, I got to talk to my folks the other night on this program called Skype, it's like talking on the phone, but it's over the internet and it's free and pretty cool. You should check it out if you're ever out of the country.
Last night we had the KECY 2004-2005 New Year's Party (it's called Sylvester here, I can't remember why). There were a ton of folks there, maybe like 60 or so, which is more than I expected at least. Many of them were KECY Alumni from the summer that were really cool to see. We played a bunch of games, I gave my testimony, which went alright I think, then there was a skit that was a slovak fairy tale, and I played a part and had to speak Slovak, except it was like Old Slovak or something, but everyone laughed when I said my lines, so either I said them right and they thought it was cool, or I just totally butchered them and they were laughing at me. After that, there were more games, then we did this thing called KECY Superstar, which was basically American Idol. they have something called Slovakia Superstar, which is the same as american idol, and they copied that. So for my "audition," instead of singing I did a dramatic reading of Britney Spears' "Hit me Baby one more time," which i think everyone thought was funny. After my performance, judges critiqued me, but it was all in SLovak, so after the first three judges I just said "I don't understand" in Slovak, or "Cough on it" in Slovak which is something like Don't worry about it in English. Then the last judge said in Slovak "I'm not going to say anything because he won't understand me anyway." That was pretty funny, but I guess you had to be there. After that, we learned the Greek National Dance, then hung out until Midnight and went outside with sparklers and had fireworks, it was fun. A great night overall.
It was interesting last night to realize what it's like to really be in another culture. It was different this summer because there were other Americans to rely on when you had an awkward moment in conversation with a Slovak or just wanted to speak English with someone. Although Mike was there, we weren't just going to hang out the whole time, so I just had to talk to people, and try to communitcate as best as possible. Man it was difficult sometimes, but really cool to learn things about myself and how I relate to other people.
Today we're going to go eat lunch, then some folks are coming over here to hang out, then me and Mike are going to visit Jaro and Luba, a couple that helped at the second camp this summer, and then get on a train late tonight for Prague. It's an overnight train in a sleeper car, so we'll see how that goes. Mike snores i think, I might have to take desperate measure if that happens tonight.
It was cool to find out recently that Melissa and I had been reading the same verses, so I will recommend it to you guys to read too. I read Luke 6:27-36, she read Matthew 5:38-42, which are essentially the same words but in different books. I think they are great challenges to us as Christians, and I know that for myself, I had to look at my own life to see if this is true of my behavior.
Anyway, I love you all, and my next entry will be from the Czech republic! Please pray for the time that I will get to spend with Miro the next few days, I'm really excited about it, and I hope that we get to talk about cool stuff.
With Love,
Jonas