Easter In Banska

I had an amazing idea for a post a week or so ago. I thought, "I'll put that up for Easter. People would enjoy it." Now for the life of me I can't remember what it was. So instead I'm just going to put my random thoughts on Easter this year up on the internet for all to see.

This is my first Easter not being at home. It is strange to think about actually.  Last year I missed Christmas but very deliberately was home for Easter. This year I miss both.  Hopefully I don't regret it, but at the very least it is going to be a different experience.

Being in Slovakia itself makes Easter seem different.  Two weeks ago a big tree was put up in the middle of the square and decorated with paper Easter eggs. Then all these booths selling different folk arts were set up on the square and a kind of spring festival appeared.  I enjoyed it when I was able to get to the square, but that wasn't very often.  One day I made a point of it and was able to catch a folk music and dance group performing. The dance was pretty lame (compared to the fast paced, competitive Ukrainian dance of my youth) but I really enjoyed taking pictures of their costumes.  They really intrigued me.  Now I'm even wondering if I should buy myself one of their traditional blouses as they are very pretty in my mind and would stand out against traditional Ukrainian clothing.

Someone's funny belt got loose!

There is one thing about Easter in Slovakia that I'm not very stoked about at all. It is their Easter Monday tradition of throwing water on girls and hitting them with willow sticks. It is meant to bring girls fertility or something but I think it was more of a spring flirting ritual as all the young guys are the ones going door to door dowsing people. Apparently Slovak girls even like it. So I am praying very hard for nice weather Monday so I'm not freezing when I'm wet! As for the willow sticks- we saw tons on sale in the square but Shay didn't buy one so I think I'm safe on that account. 

This Easter was the first time that I had ever prayed the Stations of the Cross. A Slovak Catholic friend took us and it was great!  I can't believe that I had never been exposed to this before. I think it was one of the moments that I realized that ecumenism is something that is important in Canada too. If I had been part of an ecumenical group in Canada, who knows how my relationship with God would have grown and matured? So even if you are Protestant, take some time to think about the death of Jesus.   You can find a prayer outline here that was made for youth, but I'm sure there are many more around. Really check it out!  

Have a Good Friday and Great Easter.  

He is Risen. He is Risen Indeed!

India Was Amazing!

I wasn't even able to tell you that we were going to India until we came back. But now we are back and I'm happy to share photos!

Agra

The tourist center of India is everything it is cracked up to be and more!  I had so much fun here!

Indian Portraits

I've been putting all my energy into my newsletter and severely neglecting this blog. It's sad I have no time to update. But here are some pictures that we took in my new sari. You can't go anywhere without Indian children!

Beautiful!

Bratislava Christmas Market

I love Christmas. I don't think I realized until I spent a year in a warm, foreign country without my family.   Now I don't take Christmas for granted. So when we were able to go to Bratislava for the Christmas Market last weekend, we were so excited. It ended up being quite the adventure too!

Janko hosted us at his own home and also some of his friends let us stay at their flat. However, we arrived Saturday morning to go into the city and found that one of the other residents of the floor had changed the lock on the metal gate. And no one seemed to be home to let us in or the people inside out!  Thankfully one man came home from his shopping and had the new key. But the stress of wondering if  we were going to get them out is pretty crazy!

This is our group minus me with all the identical flats behind us.

The UFO Bridge in Bratislava from the castle.

 My favorite church in the world! Not quite as beautiful after they cleaned it up, but I think it is still my favourite.

 Bratislava Castle from across the river

The view of the castle from the top of the UFO bridge. That is one fancy restaurant!

Enough of just the pretty city. Now for the Christmas stuff!!

This says Christmas Market on the signs. 

 Some pretty little Christmas shops. I think they are adorable!

Nice little trees on a side street

 Lollipops for Christmas?

Cute hanging gingerbread house.

Hot Honeywine (Medovina)

It was so nice to have a Christmas adventure with a somewhat cold climate
 (even if we didn't have any snow at all). 

Banska in the Fall

Is it still fall?  It kinda feels like it, it kinda feels like we need more Christmas music and to have some snow!

We walked into the shadow of the mountain last weekend and found FROST!  It was three in the afternoon and it was cold enough that the frost has survived in the shadow of the mountain.  I thought it was very pretty and made me excited for snow to come for real! (Which began today with flurries that haven't really stuck as of yet, but hopefully will last if it keeps snowing!)

On our way up the mountain, they have a switchback path cut into the hillside (really this mountain is a big hill).  They have a rain drainage system built in. Shay is showing how he could climb inside it and hold on with no hands.

 This was Shay's find at the top of the mountain.  A "pillbox" or bunker sort of thing where a guy could sit and watch and shoot down the enemy through a little hole in the cement looking out down the mountain. I think it was really cool because we are in Europe. The world wars were fought here. People actually were in this cement box.  And it is just on the side of this hill, left as a reminder of the horrific things that have happened here.

And with the earlier time the sun is going down we got this nice lit up view of the city below us.

Hopefully my next pictures will be of us with snow!  

Healing

(BE WARNED:  This post might mess up your theology and/or the way you live)

I haven't really been updating you on what we have been learning in our lectures so far this month. But this week, I can't NOT tell you because it is so amazing!

We had a week to learn how to heal and heal on the streets.  Really the expectation is that Jesus told us to go out and heal the sick (Mark 16:18, Matthew 10:7-8, and many more times) so we should do it.  The men who were teaching really take Jesus simply at his word and it was so beautiful to watch and learn from their lifestyle.  It was all about Jesus and how much he loves people and how he has given us authority to heal.

I know of a couple amazing healing stories from Canada. One is of a woman who had brain cancer. But I had never been present when someone was miraculously healed or even prayed for someone who was healed of something major over a longer period of time.  This week we learned the basics of how to pray for nonbelievers for healing and how these men have experienced healing to work. After learning that we saw legs grow longer, spines straighten, and pain leave knees and shoulders.  I'm sure there are more things, but even that was amazing!   It takes an open mind to believe that it really happened and that there isn't some other way to explain a healing. And it also takes being there. I can imagine that two years ago I would not have believed that someone was really healed or would be really healed.  And if I saw a video like this one, I would have thought that it was a hoax.  (This man really challenges me, because you know that he just knows how much God loves people and wants to draw them to Himself. And this guy is willing to look a little crazy if someone is gonna get healed.  Because when they are healed, you don't look so crazy anymore.)

I now am left wondering how I'm going to make this information part of my normal life at home. Can I actually be brave enough to walk up to someone in Canada and ask if they would like prayer for healing? Could I even pray this way for my friends and family or will they think I'm crazy too? Obviously I would hope that people would be open, but I thought that this all was pretty crazy two years ago.  I wouldn't blame people for not being open or interested or whatever.

All Saints and All Souls Days

At the beginning of November Slovaks celebrate All Saints Day and All Souls Day.  So for a week or two before hand there was a market of flowers that people buy and put on their loved ones' graves.

The close flowers are actually plastic. Eww. 

But these are all real!  

While we were walking away, we saw this car with pretty flowers sitting outside and inside the back (yellow flowers). I figure that this was one of the vendors' car. And I like the picture because its such a nice old Slovak car!

So during the holidays of All Saints Day and All Souls Day the cemeteries are all lit up with candles. We were so busy those days that I didn't get to the cemetery at night to take a picture. So this is the day after, but some candles are still going (pretty impressive!) 

My photos are only this nice because I am using a gorillapod!  Shay was so nice to get me one and it make low lighting pictures work out so amazingly!  Long exposures are probably my new favourite thing!

Newsletter Update!

The time to leave Europe is fast approaching and I can't wait to tell you all about it!

However, information on the next three to four months of our trip will be available exclusively by email, and often using somewhat less obvious language.

So after a weekend of getting the hang of an online newsletter service,  our newsletter is born!

This is not our newsletter, it is Shay reading my hometown newspaper here in Banska.  

A picture like this got printed in The Voice a week or two ago! He's famous!

We don't want to send you emails you don't want, so we need you to subscribe to receive this newsletter. We want to get this newsletter out to as many of our friends and family as we can, but we don't want to push it into your inbox either.   So don't worry if you haven't talked to us in years or feel like a stalker, we want to share our adventure with you!

To sign up all you need to do is click on the "My Newsletter" button at the top of my blog or click on this link.  If you really want to be a nerd, you can use a QR reader on this code:

 If you sign up soon, you will get our first newsletter that will get you all caught up on the last two months of our trip. It should be good!

Cheers!
Alison