The first trip home.

The sun's not up yet, but I am... so rather than lay in bed tossing for two hours, until the normal hour when the rest of humanity will wake up, I think I'll write what's on my mind.

We're in Iowa!  It's cold and snowy, and my body is clearly not yet adjusted to the 8-hour time difference from Romania, but it is Good to be here.  We arrived in Chicago on Thursday afternoon and drove home to Decorah with my mom and sister, finally completing our journey at 10:30 PM (Iowa time) after leaving our apartment in Lupeni on Tuesday morning at 10:30 AM (Romania time).  It doesn't usually take quite that long to make the journey, but ours was augmented by a 19-hour layover in Zurich, Switzerland (which we made the most of by eating cheese fondue and delicious chocolates, though very few of the latter because they cost an astonishing $130 per kilogram!).  It was nice to break up the trip, and Zurich was like a dream straight out of a Disney movie, particularly after the noise and chaos we had just left in București.  The part of the city we saw was all cobblestone streets, adorable upscale shops, delicious smells, and bikers with cute dinging bells.  No blaring horns, no trash, no whiffs of sewage and rot and cows as we walked down the sidewalk.  It was lovely -- though even after a few hours there, I started to wonder if I would get bored living in such a wealthy, clean, orderly place.  (Okay, I'm sure there are social issues and poverty in Zurich... the point is just that the city is so gosh-darn cute!)

Anyway.  Eventually we got back to the airport (one more moment of gushing: the trains from the Zurich airport to the city are so fast and so silent -- it was like floating!  Anyway...).  Then another 10-hour flight, then a 6-hour drive, and then we were home.

Zurich was great fun, but Iowa is better.  :)

So far the transition back has been pretty smooth.  I'm currently most astonished by toilets, which flush in America with one quick little push of a lever -- whoosh! -- and a powerful burst of water cleans everything out.  In Romania, at least in our apartment, you hold the button down for as long as you want water to run -- and the flush isn't nearly as powerful, and sometimes takes multiple pushes to even get started.  Perhaps this is too much information, but it's true -- so here, a couple times a day, I just laugh as I realize I'm standing there like a fool, holding down the flusher when I don't need to be.  So that's nice.

It's also just quiet here.  Decorah has always been a quiet place -- it's a small town with lots of trees, little traffic, and no major motorways close enough to send much noise pollution.  But compared to life in Lupeni, it is blissfully silent here.  Lupeni is a small city, but between the frequent honking of Romanian drivers, the coal trains whose horns echo through the valley several times a day, and the street dogs who have choir practice together every night, it's loud.  Sitting in my parents' house right now, the only sounds I hear are the clicking of my fingers on the keyboard and the gentle hum of the heater in the background.

Oh yeah -- heat.  That's also been nice.  :)

Mostly, though, I am just glad to be back for a few weeks.  I am excited to catch up with people, particularly my family in these first few weeks we have in Decorah.  I'm excited to have time and space to think and process, to repent and adjust, to think over all the things I've learned and experienced in the last year, to make commitments to the future.  I'm excited for weddings and dinners and game nights and church services and parties.  I'm excited for hamburgers and Christmas cookies and cheddar cheese and pizza with lots of sauce.  I'm sure in January I will be ready and excited to go back, too, but for now it is just Good to be back, in this one of the many places I now call home.

A few thousand words.

We've been neglecting the blog lately -- probably because we come home so soon to visit that it feels silly to be typing the stories we'll soon tell in person.  (!!!)  Plus, life is FULL here right now.  The weeks before a long trip always feel that way -- packed to the brim with "one last dinner together," "one last hike before it snows," "one last weekend" -- and thus we're too busy spending time with people, saying temporary goodbyes, to write.  I think that's probably healthy, in the grand scheme of things -- though it does leave our blog woefully empty.

But I have been taking pictures.  And because the old adage says a picture's worth a thousand words, well... hopefully this will make up for our lack of verbiage in the last few weeks.

This man.  Have I mentioned lately how incredibly thankful I am for his friendship and his love and his faithfulness 

and the millions of ways he makes me laugh?  Oh, what a gift God gave me in my husband.  I am so grateful.  

(Also... check out the beautiful fall foliage!)

 Halloween... we dressed as Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox.  And then we sang karaoke with the study abroad students... to Katy Perry.  We're awesome missionaries.  heehee.

November has proven surprisingly warm and beautiful, after a miserably cold start to autumn... so we've done a lot of playing outside, enjoying the sun before it sets each day... at 4:45 PM, I might add.

Jack's birthday party, surrounded by loving and wonderful Romanian friends.  

I AM SO THANKFUL FOR THESE PEOPLE. 

 We went to the opera in Cluj as a surprise for Jack's birthday.  We rarely dress up, so it was fun, even though we've decided that attending the opera is not our favorite pastime.

A lot of weekends this fall have been spent on Straja, leading groups through the ropes course. 

This weekend was with IMPACT leaders from around the Jiu Valley.  

Okay, I guess I only took pictures of the fun things.  :)  In reality, much of our time is spent the same way it has always been -- working, cooking, sleeping, cleaning, slowly getting to know other people over the course of conversations at the grocery store and earnest, eager dinners together.  But it's good, and steady, and beautiful, and we are doing well.  And I promise to tell you more about it when we see each other... in person! 

Day of the dead.

I can't believe it's November.  We're coming to the States this month!  That's crazy.  Anyway...

November's beginning is marked in Romania by Ziua Morțiilor, or Day of the Dead.  Unlike the spooky death themes of Halloween (which Romanians don't really celebrate), Ziua Morțiilor strikes me as a beautiful way to honor and celebrate life and acknowledge death as part of what it means to be human on this planet.  In Romania, Ziua Morțiilor is festive, at least in Lupeni.  Everyone comes to the cemetery carrying armfuls of flowers, clutching candles in their fists.  There's an abundance of cakes (heaping platters full!) and bottles of țuica (a strong, homemade Romanian plum brandy).  Extended families gather in clumps around the graves of deceased loved ones, passing the treats, decorating the tombstone, remembering and mourning and laughing and celebrating.  It's beautiful, and fragrant, and fascinating.

I'm sure it's not all light-hearted.  Just like in the States, the debate rages here too about what it means to celebrate death -- death seen as so antithetical to life, to the holiness of God, to the way things ought to be.  We have some conservative Pentecostal friends here who don't observe Ziua Morțiilor because they believe its treatment of death is un-Christian, who are afraid that it makes room for the devil, who are concerned that it dismisses the seriousness of eternal consequences for your life on earth by simply treating death lightly.  But I can't say I agree.  Of course, death is horrible.  Of course, it's not the way things are supposed to be.  Of course, the promise of the new heavens and new earth and the promise of no more death is a far better promise to look forward to than the reality of our mortality.  But what I like about Ziua Morțiilor is the way it doesn't let death have the final say.  On this day, grief is turned into joy as people remember the love and friendship of those who have gone before.  On this day, the cemetery is not a somber place of grief, but a place of community and remembrance.  And on this day, we can remember and celebrate the goodness of life, and look forward to the day when death will be no more, when tears will be wiped away, and when -- I hope -- we'll join in singing and laughing and passing the cake, celebrating with our God who has overcome the grave -- and even somehow made it beautiful.