Back in Timisoara

Hey all,

Real quick update as we get ready for dinner with the Romanian leaders here in Timisoara.

Camp was amazing, and there was an abundance of snow all week, which made for a great week of teaching the students how to ski & snowboard.

Our flight issues from the first day have caused changes in our return back to Atlanta, so if your friend or family member is on our team and you were planning on picking them up from the airport, our new arrival time is:

MONDAY 2/23/09 at 8:15pm. We will still need to clear customs & claim our bags, so it may be closer to 9:30pm before we get to baggage claim.

We will try and see if we can get someone in the states to give a call in case some of you don't see this before then.

We're on our way out to dinner, but look forward to updating you more when we arrive back in the states.

1th day in ROMANIA

After a long trip and a few hours of sleep(DJ - none) everybody it's in the bus ready to go to the camp. A full big bus with people, baggage, skies and snowboards leaved Timisoara monday morning at 8:30 am. They get to the camp place around 1:00 pm.

I just spoke with DJ a few hours ago and it seems that everybody it's ok, tired but OK.

Please pray for everybody from the camp, there are a lot of new students in the camp who are the first time with us. It's the biggest ski camp that we had in the last 7 years of doing this camp.

Also, please pray for safety of every person who's in the camp. One of the girls it's not coming to the camp because she brokes her arm saturday before the camp.

I will keep you in touch with news about the camp!

Sami

Finally Here in Romania!

Well, after a little difficulty getting out of Atlanta and the states, we have finally all made it to Romania safely and with all our baggage, and we all just wanted to thank you for your prayers. For those of you who got e-mails or calls from our team members as we sat in Atlanta for 5 hours trying to get our flight issue resolved, you already know some of what we experienced. For those of you who don't, I will try and summarize it for you as best I can.

Originally, we had our flights going through Frankfurt to Timisoara, but one of those flights got cancelled and we ended up with a trip through Munich to Timisoara instead. We knew this would cause us to need to have our paper tickets reissued in Atlanta when we got to the airport, and was part of the reason we got there several hours before our flight. Unfortunately, there was some mix up as to who should have done what between Delta & the travel agent (most of which I still don't understand, but that's not important), and we ended up not being able to get on our original flight and were scrambling to see how we could all get out of Atlanta and still make it to Romania in time for the camp.

Long story short, Donny ended up taking 6 others with him through Madrid & Vienna and got in about 2 hours after we were originally supposed to be here, and I took 3 others through Paris & Bucharest and arrived at our normal times. This could have been a major area where we could have allowed the enemy to get us all into bad spirits from the start, but we all saw it for what it was, and as the team prayed that this would get resolved, God sent us a Delta agent who went above and beyond her duty to rush all 11 of us through all these different connections and made sure all of our oversized bags ended up making it here without any issues.

In the end, everyone seemed to make it through the experience tired but unshaken and ready to get to camp, and as I stood waiting for the last members of our team to arrive at the airport in Timisoara, I could see laughter & smiles as they finally made it here after several months of preparation and prayer. The couple of us that went through Paris were able to make a quick side trip to the Cathedral at Notre Dame, and made the delays on our end seem like a distant memory and something that we will surely enjoy telling you all about when we return.

Finally, it is about 4:30am here, and I have yet to get some rest since the 3 hours I got back home on Saturday morning before heading down to the airport before all this began, and the 1 or 2 hours of quick naps I took along the way yesterday. The rest of the team is upstairs sleeping and getting ready for the start of the camp, but I did want to take a few moments to update you all and to let you know that God is answering your prayers for this team and this camp, and we are confident he has amazing things in store for each and every student who attends.

Big Day FINALLY Here!

OK, so I've been a little slack in keeping updates on this blog, but with a short amount of time to prepare for our departure and so much to do, I just haven't had the time. So, I figured I would give you all a quick update on the day we head down to the airport & fly out for Romania.

Our team has raised all of our financial support, and from hearing some of what has been going on, I can also tell that we have a lot of people praying for our trip & the camp. Last year, we took 2 instructors over to Romania with the intention of helping get the snowboarding portion of this camp off and running, and they did just that and had an amazing group of students. This year, we were hoping that this would continue to grow as we had more instructors sign up for the camp, and we did! There are enough students coming for this portion of the camp that we now need 2 different groups, which also meant more equipment.

We had originally thought we would need to get 6 snowboards ready to go for the camp and would probably have to buy a couple of them. However, Katie, one of the snowboard instructors sent e-mails out and called some of her friends in the snowboarding community, and when they found out about the camp, donations of equipment came rolling in. So much so that we were able to get 10 snowboards completely ready for the student ministry to use at the camp! On top of that, since this saved us over $3,000 in budgeted equipment expense, we were also able to purchase a much needed laptop for the ministry as well. We can already see God's hand at work in this group, and I can't wait to see what he has in store for them at the camp!

On top of an amazing amount of snowboarders coming to the camp, there are also a large number of students coming for the ski portion as well. So much so, that this appears to be one of the larger camps in some time. We have filled up 2 hotels with approximately 80 of us (about 70 students), and we are excited for what God has in store for this year's camp.

As I said before, we have been busy these past 2 months (but more so these last couple of weeks), and we are all excited to be getting ready to head down to the airport this afternoon. I don't know how much updating we will be able to do while at the camp, but we will do our best to keep you all up to date on what is going on this week, so please check back.

Thank you all for your prayers and support - I know each member of our team is excited to be a part of what God is doing in Romania, and we can't wait to share with you all when we return!

Taste of Romania!

This past Thursday evening, we ventured up to Suwanee, GA to Astoria Euro Restaurant (http://www.astoriaeurorestaurant.com/) where we met Razvan, a Romanian friend of mine who lives near the restaurant, for dinner. I have to say, the place was a little empty, but sounds like it is packed on weekends and for lunches. That was fine, because we could relax and take our time just getting to know each other a little better without too many distractions. Romanian TV was on in the background showing some news and "rural"-type Romanian music that seemed to embarrass Razvan. The menu had several different options, but we focused on the types of food that we could not get at other restaurants - since that was what we had driven up there for. Most people tried the Sarmale (or stuffed cabbage) & Mamaliga (or polenta), while Lauren & Razvan went for the tripe (or cow stomach) soup. I had been thinking about getting Sarmale & Mamaliga all day, but since no one had ordered the Mici (ground beef & pork shaped into sausage links and grilled), I decided to go with that so everyone could try a taste if they wanted. Everyone seemed to enjoy what they had (at least they said they did), and the evening was brought to a close with some delicious desserts Razvan ordered for us to sample.

End of the Year Update

OK, so it has been a while since my last post, and a lot has gone on since then, so I thought I would do a quick update while I had a minute.

We have gotten our team together for the ski camp, and had our fist meeting back on 12/7, where we got a chance to meet everyone and talked a little about our upcoming trip. Since then, we have been working to get our flights booked (got those finalized today) as well as taking care of some organizational things so that we will be ready to kick it into high gear after a little break for Christmas. We have also found a Romanian restaurant near Atlanta that we will try out early in January.

Well, sorry to keep this short, but I did want to just drop a quick note to let you all know how things are progressing.

Hope you all have a great Christmas!

Getting Started

OK - so I'm not sure if anyone has even gotten this link yet or have even started looking on here, but I figured I would get things started with a little info before we even have our first meeting.

Last year, we were privileged to be able to take a team of 7 from Buckhead Church to Vatra Dornei, Romania to be a part of an amazing Ski Camp with OSCET, the college student ministry in Timisoara, Romania. The weather was cold and the van ride was long, but the camp was amazing, and God provided snow for us when we needed it and gave us a break with warmer weather later in the week so we could hang out and relax. All in all, it was truly an amazing time and one of my favorite visits to Romania.

I am thrilled to be able to go back again this coming February, and I am looking forward to meeting new friends and reconnecting with old ones. I know God has amazing things planned for this camp, and I can't wait to see what part He allows us to play in His glorious plan for Romania!

At this point, a lot of things still have to be decided, but hopefully, we will have our team from Buckhead Church finalized within the next couple of days, and we will begin booking flights and preparing for the camp shortly thereafter. In the meantime, if you do happen to stumble across this blog and want to get involved as early as possible, please begin praying for our team as we seek God's direction in everything we do. Also, please lift up OSCET and their leaders in prayer as they meet weekly on Thursday evenings praising God and sharing their faith with their peers.

Finally, I am including a link at the bottom of the page where you can give financially to help support the team too if you feel lead to do so.

Thanks for being a part of what God is doing in Romania, and I look forward to sharing more with you as we get under way.