szambat van (it's Saturday)

so, i called off sick to language school this morning. i didn't get hardly any sleep last night and woke up just coughing. I am sure there was one point where I asked Kristy (my Canadian roommate for the next week) to bring me a knife so i can cut out my throat... i just want to get better.
I have a Danish angel here at the school. Her name is Heidi. She has given me these miracle lozenges that supposedly kill bacteria. I don't care what they do, they make me feel better. She also gave me some cough drops. I wish there were more ways that I could thank her besides a simple "Thank you." Praise God for Heidi!

...

So, funny story. On our second full day in Hungary, we took a day trip to Lake Balaton for a Lutheran conference for Hungarians and Swedes. It was very interesting. The topic of the day was "What are we doing to help the Roma?", so there were also some members of the Roma community in Sarszentlorinz present. One of those members was our friend Gábor. He is pictured with the group and is the one on the far left. Well, I was silly and didn't bring a bathing suit, so while the rest enjoyed a swim, I read a little and attempted a conversation with Gábor. My poor Hungarian skills (read: none) and his poor English skills made this very interesting. We were sitting on a dock with our feet in the water, when all of a sudden a watersnake came close to us. I, of course, screamed like a girl and he said "Csiklo" (chi-klo). I repeat many times and of all the words he gave me, this is the one I remembered best. Turns out, we were sitting around at language school and someone said something about snakes and I said "Csiklo", which made the Hungarians raise their eyebrows and laugh. Apparently "csiklo" is a female body part... and zsiklo (she-klo) is a water snake. whoops! Thinking back, I told a LOT of people that I saw a female body part in the water! hahahahaha



There are a few pictures of Lake Balaton - it's considered to be Europe's inland sea, but it's a really shallow lake that's just pretty big.





Also, there was a beautiful church that we visited that day on our way home. So beautiful (yet also ridiculous because there are way better ways to spend God's money, but let's not get started on that...) that I needed to take a few pictures. The idea of wings is one of my favorite pictures from the Bible (from places like Isaiah 6 and Psalm 91), so to walk through doors that are covered with wings is something simply breathtaking.