Off to Greece....May 12 at 6:45 AM

It is indeed our last blog from Bucharest--we have been busy trying to repack our suitcases, and get organized to begin that last part of our journey.  What a full day Sunday was as Dennis spoke in a Baptist church here--he shared a welcome from our church to theirs and it was then translated into Romanian.  Many in the congregation knew English and so understood what he was saying (and could laugh at his comments ahead of others).  It was about a 1 1/2 hour service (all in Romanian) and I used much of the time for my own Bible reading since I couldn't understand what was being said.  From there we dashed over to the AlphaOmega church and arrived in time for a great sermon which the H2H team translated over our shoulders as it was being said.  They have a wonderful praise group--full band and so spirit filled.  This is a young church that is full of youth and we loved worshipping with them also.  Many there  also understand Eng. as well.  We also shared in communion.  

From there we headed for lunch (it is now about 3:30 PM) at a new mall that has opened.  Dennis and I ate Quiznos sandwiches, others ate McDonalds!  Followed by Happy Mothers Day Romanian ice cream (wonderful!).  

We had one last time at the Team House with Kristin DePorter and then it was a final meeting before we began our packing.  We are excited to go to Greece and begin the relaxing portion of this amazing time.  We will try and update the blog if we have time/desire/computer.  Know that we love you and miss you and look forward to sharing about this "EXTREME ADVENTURE FOR JESUS!".   We will be home on May 20 in the afternoon and are anxious to head down to meet our new grandbaby, Leah! as well as see our family.

  La revedere (Goodbye) from Bucharest!!

Final blog (maybe) from Bucharest-May 11

How hard it is to believe that this is our final full day in Bucharest--our time here has flown by and although we will be sad to leave the new friends that we have made here and that have enriched our time here, we are ready to go to Greece--to have some  "down" time and to rest.  

Yesterday we spent many hours with Costel, the Romanian Heart to Heart "head" person and his wife, Mirella.  

10:00 AM First, Costel took us to the glass district to go shopping.  I had thought we would see glass being made, but instead it was a filled with stores selling glass made from all over Romania--many beautiful things.  It was also an area filled with stores where you could buy wedding dresses--and we saw an area being all set up for a commercial for chicken (crews with large cameras, people in costume--interesting!)  Getting to the glass district from where we were parked was interesting--it was all wooden walkways since the 500 year old roads are being redone!  It appeared that this work was all being done by hand--

Guess that will have to be on the agenda for our next time that we are here!

Noon: We visited the Heroes Cemetery--this is where many were buried that died in the revolution in 1989--it was beautifully kept up and interesting to see. 

1:30 PM  Then, it was on to Costel's apartment for a traditional Romanian meal.  He lives in a block house (what we would view as a high rise apartment).  He and his wife live on the 8th floor (out of 9) and we got into this small elevator (barely big enough for the 3 of us! and an act of faith, for me, to get in) and traveled slowly there.  Their apartment is small but the hospitality was so large and they shared what they had so generously!  

Our meal consisted of chicken noodle soup with hot chili peppers available to eat along with the soup (strange--Dennis tried but I was not that brave!), then chicken drumsticks, a wonderful rice dish and cucumber salad with a dill dressing.  This was followed by very strong coffee and 3 pastries (we were each given a plate with 2 small pieces of each of the 3 traditional desserts).  It was a time of concentration for us since Costel doesn't have the best English and his wife understands Eng. but doesn't really talk much in it--so poor Costel didn't have much time to eat since we were talking most of the meal!

In the middle of eating--it began pouring rain and hailing for about 30 minutes--thankfully we had beautiful weather for our glass district time!

In the midst of our conversation, it came out that Dennis was a pastor and had been in our church in Clarksburg for 20 years and that we were going to Greece to celebrate 25 years in the ministry since Dennis was first ordained--and now Dennis will be giving a 5-10 minute "welcome" to Costel's Baptist church!  From there we will head to AlphaOmega church--we will be doubly blessed today.

3:30 PM After lunch, Corny (a Romanian on staff with H2H--and a wonderful girl--former graduate of the Girls Transition House) came to get us and take us to the Baby Hospital for one last visit.  When we arrived at the hospital, we only found 1 of "our" 3 kids there.  The other 2 were healthy enough (at least by Romanian standards) to return to their orphanages.  It was sad for us to not see all 3 of the kids that we had held and spent time with.  What a bond we had formed in such a short time!  There was also a woman in the room (which was about a million degrees and so stuffy!) with her 10 month old daughter--the little girl had a horrible cough and looked so sickly.  We so badly wanted to get her upright and help out--since most of the kids we have seen in the hospital are just laid on their mother's lap and rocked that way (laying down and not upright).  From what we could understand from Corny,  the little girl was born with a lung problem.  It was interesting to see the mother dressed in pajamas--she will stay at the hospital to hold and care for her daughter.  She can occasionally leave to shower and to eat.

5:30 PM From there, it was on to the Metro train to travel a bit to meet the H2H staff for a birthday dinner for a Romanian woman on the staff.  We ate at an Italian/Romania restaurant--we were the only people there but it was terrific.  Dennis managed to find room for trout that had a picante sauce with it that he could pour on it--and I only had room for a salad with Avocado, eggs and purple onions with only Lemon juice for dressing (it was actually quite good).  What fun it was to sit around the table with conversations in both Romanian and English--sharing was rich, laughter was often and again, we were blessed! The only bad part was that although we were on the 2nd floor eating, the people on the first floor (I think they were the workers and their friends) were smoking and all the smoke was drifting upstairs.  Our clothes smell smoky from that time!  Again, an amazing part of the culture here!  I don't think that teams coming over here would normally be included in such a gathering, but we feel as if we have truly become part of the H2H family here in our time--and so we were included.  God is so good!

9:15 PM  Returned back to the team house and then were able to talk with both Emily and with Tim using an international calling card that we were able to buy here.  It was terrific to hear their voices and to talk as if they were in the same room practically--but at the same time, hard to realize that we would not see them (and baby Leah!!) for another week or so.  We hope to talk with Anna and Carolyn today--we will see though since with the 10 hour time difference it is hard to figure out with our schedule when a good time to call is!  

10:00 PM (no, I am not on my way to bed!)  We sat in the living room and visited with Jenn and Angela for over an hour--sharing how we had come to Christ, how we had met and then hearing their stories.  These 2 women are the staff at the team house, and do a multitude of things--and it was great to hear their testimonies.  God indeed uses each of us and our gifts to his glory!

11:15 PM (yes, now I can go to sleep) It was off to bed--and try to unwind after a very full day.

We will try to blog tomorrow morning before we head to the airport--but if not, this is good-bye from Bucharest and our EXTREME ADVENTURE FOR JESUS!  

What a blessing and a privilege to have been here and to have been a part of this fabulous ministry!  (I am already planning on what we can send in the next package to be mailed to Romania!!--and am actually thinking of how soon I can come back to this country and people that have now a place in my heart!)  We love you and miss you!  Margie and Dennis

May 10, Saturday

HI,

Yesterday we traveled north from Bucharest to the mountain town of Sinaia and visited the Castle Peles--the home and entertainment "place" for King Carol.  It was amazing--sort of felt like we had traveled back in time there.  This area is known for great skiing in the winter (although it is hard to imagine navigating the roads in the winter since just getting to the castle involved quite a few hairpin turns!) and it had an Alpine feel to it.  The air was crisp and we had sunshine for most of the time--meanwhile back in Bucharest it was raining and hailing!  God has been so good!  We drove by fields of Safflower (sort of looked like wild mustard to us) which were a pretty yellow color and also by the oil refineries.  This is such a country of contrasts!  Of course, the driving was an adventure to get to and from Sinaia.  More stories....

Today we are supposed to go to the glass district that Bucharest is known for and then to lunch with the Romanian head of Heart to Heart and his wife.  We are looking forward to hearing the story of how they came to know the Lord in a country with not that many Christians.  After our lunch we will head back to the Baby Hospital where we will again see and hold the 3 children with cerebral palsy--it is amazing how quickly all of these children have entered into our hearts!  It has indeed been Heart to Heart!  We love you and miss you and look forward to sharing more adventures with you--

Friday, May 9 7:45 AM

Wow!  It is hard to believe that we have been here over a week and now it feels like we are practically running to do things and to see the sights of Romania before it is time to get on the airplane on Monday morning. Yesterday, we drove to Roisuri (pronounced like :ro-sure) which was about 3 hours from Bucharest.  It is hard to explain that getting out of Bucharest is an adventure with crazy drivers (sometimes a 1 lane area becomes 3 lanes with everyone honking at each other...it's nuts! esp. for a "country bumpkin" like me), roads full of potholes, with traffic circles with many roads going off of it and to top it off: policemen that stand in the way and just make the traffic worse.  It is indeed an adventure.  Back to the trip:

we arrived in Roisuri in time for lunch at one of the H2H missionaries apartments, toured this small city briefly on foot and then it was back to Alexandria to one of the toughest orphanages in the  country we are told.  It is also filled with "special needs" kids--from what looked like autistic rocking, to children that could not speak at all, to kids that were happy but also infantile in their behavior.  What a tough ministry this would be long-term--but what a blessing to these kids.  In the midst of these kids, are kids that were misdiagnosed when they were babies and are actually "normal"--and not special needs.  And there was a new boy yesterday who looked to be about 10 who was just dropped off by his parents---how hard would that be? I can't even imagine leaving a child there, let alone after caring/loving them for 10 years!  Many Romanians are struggling to survive and they see the  orphanage as a place where their children will get enough food and a place to sleep--forgetting about the lack of love and care from a family.  Many will return at some point to either visit them and then leave, or to take them back after they have worked and earned more money.  It has been hard to see but also to realize what a blessing this Heart to Heart ministry is here.

Back to the blog:  at the orphanage a group of 2nd-4th grades came in for singing and a story and we played a game with them.  It was a special time for these kids (and us) to get some special time. This group was about 10 kids.  After they left, another group of older kids came for a similar time.  These kids are only reached by Heart to Heart once a week since the needs are great elsewhere.  I have not taken as many pictures as I had planned simply because each time I pull out the camera, I am swarmed by kids wanting pictures--I will need to continue Baking for Bucharest just to mail pictures to everyone that I have promised!  In this orphanage, many girls have very short hair and are tough--acting like boys and looking like boys.  This is how they survive.  It is sometimes hard to see the kids and not be sure if they are girls or boys!

We also drove through a gypsy town (it was featured in National Geographic sometime ago) that had these amazing houses--we were told that the outside is very fancy and large and the inside is empty.  The houses were so large that we couldn't even take pictures of them--and each house tries to outdo the one built before them.  These people are the ones that drive the horse drawn carts collecting "stuff"--amazing!

After leaving the orphanage, we went to the  Boys Transition House--a beautiful place in the country that used to be an old cheese factory.  There are only 3 boys there right now since 2 of the boys dropped out of the program.  They have rules to follow, jobs to do and training to receive while there--and they did not stick with it.  Not sure what happened to them.  

We were out in the country and had a beautiful Romanian meal--typical to start with soup, then go on to meat with rice/potatoes, a salad, always bread and then we had a special dessert since it was one of the boys birthday.  We sang Happy Birthday in Eng. and Romanian--what fun!  It was fun to sit around the table laughing and talking--much in Romanian but it was translated for us.  It is hard to sit and wait for the translation--how eye-opening to experience what our Hispanic kids deal with daily!  God is indeed growing my compassion!  

I think I forgot to mention that we were in the country--there were many horse drawn carts and it was amazing to see farm equipment driving in the fields that were larger and at the same time to see horse drawn plows in the smaller plots of ground.  Most houses here also have a small garden most with a grape vine or two--and the houses are so very interesting!  Right next to a tiny falling down house will be a very large (esp. by American standards) house--and the colors are great: bright red houses, orange, yellow, green....and the colors are not subtle.  What fun to have the color of these new houses next to the dreariness of the cement block houses (huge apt. buildings).

Today we will visit the northern area of Romania and tour a castle--we are excited about this.  Although we have loved our time here in the city--we are missing the country.  It is very beautiful here--but it is the city!

We have had more rain and more is expected today and tomorrow--but that isn't stopping us! We are getting excited about going to Greece and having some warmer weather with sunshine! We are spoiled with our CA weather!  We got an updated picture of Leah and Emily from my sister that we enjoyed showing everyone here--we are also excited to hold her and to be back amongst our kids (and granddaughter!) and our church family.  We have many stories to tell of our adventures here!   Off we go.....

May 7, 2008~~Thursday

We have returned from 2 nights staying in Snagov (a resort town) where the H2H Girls Transition House is.  On Monday before we left we tried again to visit the People's Palace in Bucharest (the building that was to be the office for the then ruler....it is the 2nd largest building in the world!)  But, we were unable to go on a tour for about 3 hours, so we left and thought we would do other touring--but because it was the first day back from a week off for most people, the parking was bad and we couldn't find anywhere to park.  So--we gave up after several hours of driving around and came back for lunch and to prepare to leave.  Back into the car for a 45 min. or so trip to Peris (the orphanage we first went to) where we did Easter egg hunts for about 100 children.  It was great fun (and exhausting!).  The H2H Romanian teacher (Lunesta) asked the kids what they did for Easter--and then told them that Easter is not about eggs, not about bunnies---but it is about Jesus dying for our sins.  It was very powerful--and gave me ideas on how we could better present Easter for our children (slightly harder in USA since candy, bunnies....is so many people's idea about Easter).  Back to Monday....after the afternoon in Peris, we went to dinner at Kristin's apartment and then headed over to the Girls House about 8 PM.  We stayed right there with the 5 girls and at night a "seminary" girl--that means she attends a Christian school (she was 22 ). The girls were so excited to see us--it was hard to get them to settle down so that all could go to bed.  Finally, about 9:30 we disappeared into our room and things quieted enough for us to sleep. We spent the day on a field trip back into Bucharest  (feels like we have driven a lot) seeing "Aladdin" done in live theater.  None of the children had ever seen live theater--they were the best behaved kids there.  (only 9 kids had qualified for this reward trip).  The kids returned to the orphanage and Kristin and Deborah (a former H2H worker that came for vacation for 2 weeks) took us to lunch--we had a picnic with Swarma (chicken sandwiches that I have written about before) in a lovely park.  Then we had Starbucks!!!  It is so funny because the music was Frank Sinatra singing and the menu has English names but Romanian subtitles under the Eng. name.  Then it was back to the girls house--they were so excited to see us again.   Dennis mowed their large lawn for them while I began writing postcards--hope to get them all written before we leave here!

Today after a breakfast of pancakes with jelly on them, we were off with another reward trip of kids to the same museum we had been to last week--it was fun to see the animals with a group of kids that was so excited to be there.  The kids saw a helicopter landing and were just amazed.  This trip has opened my eyes to things that before I guess I had taken for granted.  At any rate, after the field trip, Dennis and I joined a Romanian girl, Corny, (a graduate from the H2H transition program)who took us on the metro back to the team house.  We had a 30 min. walk along busy roads to get here--but it was fun to see the sights in a different way.  We then walked to the post office to mail the postcards--we were given receipts for the postcards--interesting!  The woman was most helpful--just like Carla in Clarksburg! 

Tomorrow's plans are for a trip south to see the boys and girls orphanages in Roshure as well as the Boys Transition Home.  It will be fun to see what the southern part of the area looks like.  It is about 2 hours away--we will just do a day trip.

We are hoping that there will be time to get into the mountains--I am not much of a "city girl" and so am tiring of traffic and not as much green as we are used to.  It is hard to believe that we have been here over a week--we have so many stories to tell!  Over and out..... 

Monday morning, May 5

It is hard to believe we have been traveling/away from home for a week!  The house we are staying in (the Team House--since this is where missionary teams stay for H2H) is so wonderful--it has 7 bedrooms and is difficult to explain all the special parts it has for the ministry here.  Needless to say, I feel as if we are on a retreat here since we are being so lovingly taken care of!

Just to feel like home, we even had popcorn for dinner! (For those of you who don't know that little detail of our life in Clarksburg....we often have popcorn for dinner on Sunday since we usually eat lunch so late after church and don't want a big meal)

Yesterday was interesting to worship in a Romanian Christian church--filled mostly with youth ages I am guessing 10-30 (but we have discovered that people we think are much younger due to their height and looks are really much older).  They had a wonderful praise band which we were told was small.  It was fun to sing praise songs in Romanian--words on an overhead fancy projector/screen--great songs but all unfamiliar to us.  The minister preached in Romanian (he was actually a substitute since the minister was at a conference) but is actually from PA living here in Romania.  After worship we had lunch at a mall (it had McDonalds, KFC...and then Romanian fast food as well as other foods).  Dennis was brave and got a typical meal for here: sausage, potatoes (country--sort of like potatoes that you have with pot roast), a cornmeal mush kind of like cream of wheat, and about 15 pickles (!).  I had a baked potato that has cheese and sour cream--(but the cheese was melted on it and it was swiss cheese--odd but okay).  

After lunch, we went on the "Revolution Tour" with Jim--the co-founder of H2H that spends about half the year here while is wife is at home managing the American part of the mission.  We saw the area where the "revolution" took place in 1989.  The buildings are beautiful here--saw the Opera house, the home (huge!) of the first king and queen (King Carol) and the building that the final speech of Ceausecu was given on--we saw bullet holes where the guards shot and killed over 1000 people.  We stood in the square where there is a new monument built in memory of those that died on that day.  Fascinating history.

From there we drove to see the People's Palace--the office that Ceausecu was building for himself--it is the 2nd largest building in the world ! We will tour it today (Monday).  We also went into an Orthodox Church which is quite old and beautiful.  There was a mass going on while we were there.

Today through Wednesday we will be gone and staying at the Girls Transition house.  This is mostly to save on travel to and from the Team House but also to be able to be there for the special outings that will be done as a reward for the children that have earned them.  Pray for us in a house of the 5 young girls.....I am sure we will have lots of fun and get to play games and the piano.  We will write on paper our adventures and will transfer them when we get time. 

It has been fun getting emails from you--pictures of Leah have been wonderful to get but using "Webmail" we are not able to have anything too large.  Thank you for your prayers--

We are sending hugs and pieces of our hearts to you!

Saturday in Romania (May 3)

HI,

A rainy hello--the rainy weather has finally caught up with us here.  We even had hail for a time but it has not stopped us from doing things.  Today we went to spend the afternoon at the Girls Transition House (this is where the girls go after leaving the orphanage and before being on their own). Heart to Heart has chosen 5 girls for this special program--they are 21 and 22 years old and very lively with great personalities.  One knows  quite a bit of English so she was able to communicate well with us.  We spent the afternoon playing ping pong, playing Amazing Grace on the piano about 1000 times , and also Rummikub (or something like that)....the girls are about 14-15 years old mentally and we so full of giggles and loud voices.  Wow!  We did have fun with them and I even got to bake oatmeal cookies with them.  They live in a great house about 30 minutes from the Team House where we are staying.  There are 2 women that work for Heart to Heart (1 American and 1 Romanian) that stay with then during the week and then the different staff rotates on the weekend.  

Tomorrow (Sunday) will be worship at AlphaOmega Church on Bucharest followed by a tour given by Jim Sorrels (one of the founders of Heart to Heart)--called the "Revolution Tour". We are keeping up a busy pace but after making the time adjustment (10 hours) we are sleeping well and doing just fine.  My prayers have been answered for great sleeping (and not up during the night--praise God for that!).  

We loved getting pictures of Baby Leah--what a beautiful granddaughter we have.  We are excited to hold her!  love to you all!

Friday, May 2 8:30 PM

Hello to all,

In case you haven't heard from the Clarksburg "grapevine" we are grandparents as of yesterday, May 1 at 3:25 PM.  Leah Irene Hobby couldn't wait for us to return from Romania/Greece--and so made her appearance.  We haven't send a picture yet, but assume she will be beautiful like her mother (and grandmothers, aunts, great-aunts.....)!  It was so very hard to be so very far away during this amazing event!  In fact, I had a hard time falling asleep last night because I was getting a little teary about being so far away.  But we are soaking in so much here and feeling the blessings of this ministry so it has made this all much easier.  

Today we toured a downtown market, finding many interesting sights and having a wonderful lunch called "shoarma" (pronounced shwarma) which is like a chicken tortilla...with french fries, pickles and a garlic mayonnaise....it was quite good (Romanian fast food).  From there we went to the Baby Hospital and held and fed 3 children with Cerebral Palsy--a boy, David, about 2; a girl, Aileena, about 13; and a girl, Maria about 6.  They are all there because of being so sick.   The girls were pretty rigid and twisted--just laying in their beds (covered with hot, wool blankets....and of course, they cannot move to take them off) and David had been moved from ICU after getting better from pneumonia (he was still bad as far as we were concerned).  The nurse came in to give us bottles to give them--that was hard because they all struggle to swallow...the Heart to Heart worker, Cornie (sounds like that--not sure what it is in Romanian) was terrific with them.  She is 29 years old--a graduate from the Transition program here.  Angela, who lives at the Team House, where we are staying was the one touring with us today.

It was an amazing experience--and difficult as well.  Hard to imagine children being left alone like this.  Will write more tomorrow after our day.  love to you.

Thursday, May 1 at 6:30 PM

Another busy day here--the weather was warm with sunshine most of the day which was great since we were touring Bucharest.  We met up with a team of HS developmentally disabled boys (and 2 teachers from their school and 2 H2H staff from Rosario--about 1 1/2 hours from here) and toured the Museum of Natural History (fast speed!).  Great animals with lots of info. written in Romanian....  We met the "lone male" of the missionaries, Mark, and it was fun to visit with him as well.  We are well known as "the Ladies", even Dennis, so all are happy to meet us.

We also toured a living history museum (I think that is what it was) that had houses and churches from all over Romania--many over 200 years old.  They had been taken apart and reassembled here.  We also went on a boat ride around a big lake.  Today is May 1, which is a holiday here and everywhere was packed.

We keep forgetting to tell you about the crazy drivers here--that are on the road, along with carts being pulled by horses.  Lots of honking....I am getting grayer but am thankful that I am not driving!  The roads are in very rough shape with lots of potholes.  It is an experience that I cannot bring to life in writing--you will have to come visit!

We both slept very well last night--exhausted from the kids, but having a wonderful time.  Not sure what tomorrow will bring.  All for now--