more pictures and memories (already!)

well, friends, it is 23:15 here on Monday night. It's a beautiful night here in Monoszló, Magyarország (Hungary). It's beautiful for many reasons: the stars are out, it's cool and crisp and... it's our last night!!! in a little over 24 hours, i will be moving into my new apartment in Budapest!

A lot has happened since I last updated, so sorry about that, but they've kept us busy!
We finished language school and apparently I'm supposed to now know enough Hungarian to survive a year. HAHAHAHAHA! it's a funny joke, really... thank goodness we have continued lessons once a week at the ÖDÉ office!
The other volunteers (the ones that speak Hungarian) joined us from Hungary, Ukraine, Switzerland, Romania and Italy. It was great to finally meet everyone. We have been well orientated and it was great to finally figure out some of the nitty-gritty details that have been giant question marks this last year.
I met my roommates. i'll be living with three other girls in Budapest: Silke from Germany, Andrea from Romania and Silvia from Italy. Luckily, Andrea speaks Hungarian AND English. I'll be sharing a room with Silke for the next 11 months. it should be exciting and trying at times (can't remember the last time i shared a room with someone... 6 years ago?! wow...), but it should be a lot of fun as well.

pray for everything to go well with travel and settling in. I'm excited to finally have a HOME (with an address!) and unpack into a space that is actually mine (even if it's shared).
pray for everything to go smoothly with visas, bank accounts, bus passes, phones, etc.
pray for Vorosmarty School - I start there on Thursday, I think.
Praise God for renewed health! I'm not 100% yet, but almost! I can sleep again and my coughs are few and far between :) yay!

...

on to some pictures! When we were in Sarszentlorinc, we made some crafts with some of the towns people. This is me helping to make a reed mat :) it's a style of weaving and was very interesting...


we also got to see a couple choirs on the last day we were there - turns out it was the 125th anniversary of the choir in Sarszentlorinc (i think?) - any reason for a party, right?


one of them even did some traditional gypsy music and dancing :)


finally, this is a picture of us 5 American/Canadian volunteers - Kristy, Matt, Emilie, Jeff and I --- and our new friends in Sarszentlorinc on our last day :)