This week I celebrated spending three weeks in Hungary. It seems as if I have been here so much longer than that, so it is a good reminder to myself that I am doing a lot and to not take things too fast. I love Hungary so far and even feel that I am adjusting to city life well. I do miss home and my family and friends, but try to treat everyday as an adventure and a blessing. I am now confident in taking the metro by myself around the city and am learning the bus and tram systems. I want to create good habits for myself, so have been thinking about goals and things I really want from my time here. One thing that I have decided is that since there is so much to see in Budapest, I am going to have an adventure every week. I count my trip to Poland as my first week’s adventure. The next week I decided to go to Normafa and climb Erzsebet tower. Normafa is the highest area in Budapest and from the tower you can see the city below nestled in the hills of Buda and stretching across the Danube. It was really beautiful and I hope that since it is significantly higher than Kelenfold where I live it will get some snow in the winter and can be my winter retreat when I miss home. Last week my adventure was climbing to the top of the citadella. The citadella is an old army fortification perched atop a big bluff along the Danube. It was used and abandoned several times throughout many wars, and finally was turned into a park and tourist area. It is a surprisingly short hike for how high above the river it is and it was fun to see people from so many countries there. This week I explored Margret Island with a friend. Margret Island is mostly a big park with two hotels, a small zoo, two pools and the ruins of some old buildings. It was absolutely beautiful especially the big fountain and the ruins of an old convent. The fountain has jets that spray water with music similar like Bellagio in Las Vegas just on a smaller scale and after dark it is light with all sorts of fun colors. Also on the island there is a memorial statue commemorating the two cities Buda and Pest becoming one.
Before you being to wonder too much, I of course have done some things in the past few weeks here besides being a tourist. I finally have a phone, which is really helpful and gives me a lot of confidence in getting around. I also finished painting my room with left over paint from around the building. It is three different colors, kinda wild but I think fun and makes it feel a lot more homey. I also have acquired a bookshelf and even have some Polish Pottery on display. I also just bought a bike and am excited to be able to get some exercise while seeing the city. The week I volunteered with Campus Crusade was fun. There were a few other Americans visiting for the week and we got to go into college classes and talk to the students and invite them to a seminar on personality, team work and conflict resolution. We also talked about the summer camps that Campus Crusade does and invited the students to consider joining. The seminar was really fun and many new students attended. This past week I also started language school. Language classes go from 9:00am to 12:30 each weekday, which sometimes is more Hungarian than my brain can handle. We have great teachers though and a fun group to learn with. It is so good to be able to say a little more and ask for things at the market. This week we are headed to a conference in Solvenia and so I am going to have to drop this class and pick up again in November but I am excited to have some Hungarian to practice until then.
One big praise is that I am starting to build relationships. The small group that meets in our apartment is really sweet and this past week we talked about splitting up guys and girls some weeks in order to have deeper and more open discussion. I am really excited to get to know the girls better and to be able to share deeper with them. Another friendship I am excited to see grow is with the girl that I went to Margret Island with this weekend. She is really sweet and I would love to see here plugged into Christian community here. Just yesterday I met a girl who recently started going to the church I attended the past 2 weekends and I hope we can get to know each other better too.
Something I could really use prayer for is finding a home church here in Budapest. I have three general options.
1) A church solely in Hungarian
2) A church solely in English
3) A church that does a combination of both
I really don’t want to go to an English speaking foreigners church, even though that would be the easiest and most comfortable, because I want to be somewhere where Hungarians would feel comfortable so that it will be easy for me to invite people to come to church with me. I also am not sure I want to go to a solely Hungarian church however because I would always have to have someone translate for me and it would be hard for me to join a small group or to be very involved. A mixed church seems like the best option to me and I believe there are two possibly three in the city. The one that I checked out was good, but no one was very friendly to me so it was slightly awkward. I really just want to know where God wants me to be and start getting involved. So I guess prayer for discernment.
Finally as we are on the topic of prayer, I just listened to a message this past week about being prayer warriors and advocates. One of the passages was the banquet in Matthew 22. Many are called but few are chosen. We are all called to be prayer advocates, but we have to respond. I want to be a prayer advocate for Budapest. What does that look like? Even in this time of not knowing the language or feeling like I am doing much “work” how can I be pronouncing God’s kingdom here?
Thank you all for your love and prayers!