January trip around Central Europe

As my good friend, Janice, is now living in Vienna, I decided it would be a good place to go to spend New Year's, before heading out to see some YWAM people around the Central European region. My first adventure was being kicked off the bus from Zagreb to Vienna as it was overbooked and put on the bus 3 hours later. I did get vouchers for my trouble, but as it was my first journey with Flixbus, I was not impressed to say the least!

But I eventually made it to Vienna, and seeing Janice again made the trip all worthwhile. Janice used to live in Sarajevo, and Ljilja and I last saw her 4 years ago in Israel, so it was time for a nice catch up! After celebrating New Year's I spent a week with her and we also managed to fit in some sightseeing in between the catching up! The highlights were Schönbrunn Palace:the summer palace of the Hapsburgs, so much history!

And a #bucketlist item: the Spanish Riding School and the lipizzaners. We went to the practice session, and I managed to sneak a couple of photos (which aren't allowed...so hopefully I won't get into trouble putting them on this blog). It was just so amazing to sit there and watch them do their dressage steps, but also realise that this place has been in existence for almost 300 years.

I managed to have my camera focused on the right spot at the right time to get this shot of an "airs above the ground" move. This is not done every day at the practices, and it was the ONLY one of the day, so it was a lucky shot indeed!!

I also managed to meet up with fellow Capetonian and friend, Richard at a traditional Viennese coffee house: He is living in Vienna now, so it was nice to have a good catch up!

Then it was time to do some "work". I travelled  by bus and train to YWAM Hurlach near Munich in Germany. It was my first time at the castle bought for the 1972 Olympics and one of YWAM's heritage sites. It was great to spend time here at the base and see old friends. I spent time in YWAM Hurlach staff meetings, but mostly spent time with our Member Care people for Central Europe, Hannes and Doris, but unfortunately I didn't a get a pic of them, so you will have to do with a pic of the castle instead:

Then Hannes and I drove together to the Czech Republic to meet with our YWAM team in Cheb. We had a great time with them and I think they enjoyed our visit as well: 

I then travelled by train to the lovely city of Budapest, but unfortunately all the other travel caught up with me, and I got sick. So I didn't actually spend time with almost anyone (after setting up many appointments, which had to get cancelled :( ). My last day I went to the doctor and got some antibiotics for my throat and asked her if I should cancel the next leg of my trip to Bucharest (by plane) and she said that with the antibiotics I would get better and there was no reason not to go... so onwards I went: 

It was a whistle-stop visit to Romania for some meetings and of course I didn't get any photos of that either, but on the way back I got to enjoy the stunning sunrise in Bucharest airport: 

After 3 weeks of travelling, by car, bus, train and plane it was really great to get back home to Banja Luka!! 

MCFC in Romania

The first European Member Care Foundations Course was held in Prod, Romania and as I am working more and more with people across the Central European Region, it felt right for me to come and learn some more skills to help with leading the wonderful people of YWAM in this region. It was also useful that they had shortened the school to two weeks, which is more manageable for me, and with pre- and post-courses it will still be all of the wonderful content of the 3 week course.

There were 17 students and 4 staff, and we had a wonderful two weeks together:

We were in deep rural Romania, and the terrible internet was sometimes annoying, but at the same time also meant we had some peace from the outside world. It is as if time stood still:

 We did work hard, we only had one day off in two weeks and spent most of the time together in the classroom working around tables during lectures, or in pairs:

We did sometimes take time for more fun activities:

Outside the classroom, there was a little time at lunch to go for a walk: This is me with some of the walkers: Rod from Australia, Bodil from Norway and Jessi from the US:

That day we walked to the horse farm across the village and I go to treat the horses to some clover. The rest of the time when we went past the horses they weren't interested, but it was fun that one day!

Most evenings a new friend, another Jessi (also from the US) and I went walking together. I didn't get a pic of us walking in the dark (with her torch!) but we went to Sighisoara on our one day off and so here the two of us are in the old city:

Besides making new friends, I also had one fun evening with some old ones: Anni from Romania, Helga from Germany working in Romania, Bodil from Norway working in Bulgaria and Misha from Bulgaria working in Hungary. It was a lovely time together with others who work in our region! 

On our last day we had a lovely festive lunch together. The food all week was cooked for us by two lovely Romanian ladies (standing in the back with Rod) and the food was beyond delicious! I walked twice each day to be able to eat it all and not come back with more kgs! (and managed to come back at the same weight as when I left - 15kgs down since May!)

I felt I learnt so many useful skills and have a lot of good tools to be able to use to help people to help themselves. These are things that will not only be useful in my leadership role with YWAM in Central Europe, but also in whatever I do. I am so grateful that I decided to do this course and for all the wonderful friends that I made while doing it!