I am not always the best at explaining things. Many of the things that I do, I do because I don't think about them too much. For example, going to college was a given, moving to TX sounded like a good idea and going to Europe was a realization of a lifelong dream. But what do I hope to get out of this trip? Renewed faith? Healing? Some kind of direction? I have never really explaied it very well, but tonight I thought of this analogy.
Imagine deciding that you need more culture, more depth to your life. You hear that a new composer has composed a symphony and you decide, "what the hell, why not go." You get the ticket, get all dressed up and go to the theater to listen to this new piece of music. The lights dim, the composer comes out and shortly the first notes reach your ears. You decide to close your eyes in order to experience the music more fully, without distraction. Sitting there listening with physical eyes closed, your spirit is lifted on the strands of the music. As it becomes more happy, joyful and light you soar with the music, your soul rejoicing near to bursting with all that is good in creation. As it goes on, the music drops to a more dark and sinister place, and you decend with it as well, into all that has gone wrong, all the pain and sorrow and without meaning to you begin to cry because what you feel has so overwhelmed you. The song fills you and awakens parts of your spirit that have been dormant, parts that you didn't even know that you had. It awakens feelings that you didn't know you could feel, brings up things that you thought were buried in the past that had no meaning in the present... now you know differently and you know that when the music stops, you won't be the same person who came into the theater. Even knowing that, you can't leave without riding the music to the very end, until the last note has died away and you can open your eyes again.
That is where the analogy ends, this trip is the song... God is the composer... where his song will lead me, I don't know. Who I will be when this movement ends, I don't know either. I'm learning to trust in the Lord and to have faith in his love for me. Like so many other things in my life, I've always accepted Christ as being a given, of knowing Him in an almost scholarly way - by that I mean that I've accepted what I've been taught as true, questioned it occasionally but always come back. I've felt the love of Christ occasionally in a dynamic kind of way, at retreats and things when I was in high school, but the feeling always faded. Slowly I have started to feel the joy of the Lord - to see with new eyes the wonders of the world and of how He works in it. I hope to come back a different, better version of who I am. So, my friend, please pray for me, and for Ana as we take with journey through Europe with the Lord.
Wednesday, November 28, 2012
Sunday, November 25, 2012
I can remember...can you?
Berlin. I am older so I remember the fear or determination put into Americans or at least my generation to not let Communism (with Berlin being the showpiece) win. I remember being told how bad Communism was and I remember the television showing the horror of people trying to get free from East Berlin. My most vivid memories are a woman caught in the barbed wire trying to get free then two soldiers pulling her out and taking her back; as well as, the beautiful day the wall came down, what a picture (still brings tears to my eyes). I cannot express the pain and joy I have here remembering what I saw as a young person and what I have learned now staying with Mandi's friends. They have such a wealth of knowledge and a gracious spirit of hospitality. I have learned from them that they have been taught to never repeat such atrocities and the struggle the city has had rebuilding. They still have plastic up close to the Sony Center that looks like a building but is just a picture of a building that will someday be there. Most of the city is new and rebuilt but there are some remnants of what was. For example, where the wall stood (Brandenburg Gate, at least in one place) there now a busy road/intersection but they have placed brick in the road signifying where the wall was. We even found a plate showing the dates of when the wall came down. The memorial Mandi talked about is brilliant. The stones are about the shape of a grave but have different heights from up to my knee to well over my head (I would say it could signify time or age) the space between each stone is the same but the pathway also has different heights (hilly maybe). We were there at night so it was difficult to get a good picture but I think it had more impact on me because of the dark. There was a second monument earlier in the day for the Jewish children who were taken by train to their death with fresh flowers placed on it. Berlin has a massive park where they gather for big events with a centerpiece, the Teirgarden or victory tower, this monument still has bullet holes from the war to remind the German people to not repeat history. A Russian monument with fresh flowers was not to far from Brandenburg Gate to honor the almost 20,000* soldiers lost in WWII. I did enjoy the etched picture of President Regan in the sidewalk quoting "...tear down this wall." Great memories of freedom. I have always loved my country maybe not always what actions she has taken or even what it seems she is becoming but history is written by the victor and I for one am again grateful for being the victor. Now, with that said I am also grateful for those who have lost with integrity. It takes a good person/country to admit they are wrong but it is a great person/country to try to fix what they have done wrong. From what I have learned Germany has made huge efforts to not make the same mistakes and that is worth noticing. If Maria and Bjorn are examples of what Germans are or have become I pray for the day they can hold their heads high and have the past be the past.
On a side note, Maria took Mandi and I out to shop for supplies we both needed. For example, shoes, reusable hand warmers, thermal wool underwear, wool socks and so on. I am happy to be warm and I am sure Mandi is happy to not have to reapply duct tape to her shoes. =o)
Lots of Love from Berlin
Ana
*correction - the Soviet Union lost an estimated 8,800,000 - 10,700,000 soldiers in WW2
On a side note, Maria took Mandi and I out to shop for supplies we both needed. For example, shoes, reusable hand warmers, thermal wool underwear, wool socks and so on. I am happy to be warm and I am sure Mandi is happy to not have to reapply duct tape to her shoes. =o)
Lots of Love from Berlin
Ana
*correction - the Soviet Union lost an estimated 8,800,000 - 10,700,000 soldiers in WW2
Saturday, November 24, 2012
Berlin... and reconnecting with old friends
It's been 12 years since I met the German exchange student who came to my high school during my junior year. Twelve years ago we became friends and I told her that someday I would come to Germany to visit her. We lost contact after high school until about 4 or 5 years ago, when we reconnected over Facebook. Again, I told her that someday I would come to Germany but it never seemed to happen, so finally I decided not to tell her that again until I had actually bought the plane ticket to come over. So last year, I was finally able to tell her that I would be coming to Germany, the ticket was bought and we should meet up. Just a few days ago, I saw her oustide the U Bahn station and we have been her guests while we are in Berlin. It has been so good to reconnect with my friend - and I find it interesting that, of all the people I went to high school with, she is the one with whom I have the most in common. We've been reminiscing about people and teachers and comparing American traditions with German ones and it's just been great.
We wandered Berlin a bit on our own while Maria was working. We toured the East Side Gallery and Alexanderplatz and ended up finding the plaza where Hitler burned the books from the college (caught someone saything that's what it was) and the museums. We found some neat churches and everywhere we look there is still more construction going on. Then we went out with Maria and Bjorn to see the government buildings, they have their constitution written on glass outside one of them, and it was fun to see them reading it. We also climbed the victory tower to see a great panorama of Berlin and the Teirgarden... many, many steps up a narrow staircase... my butt is going to look great after this trip... just sayin'. We also got to have typical Berlin street food - currywurst and fries.
Maria and Bjorn live in an old GDR building in what was once East Berlin. It's been interesting hearing about the reunification and how it worked with East and West Berlin because of course, West Berlin was totally surrounded by East Germany, so they had to train, drive and fly in supplies to the city. We found out the reason why "checkpoint Charlie" is named that - there were 3 checkpoints to get into the city, one on each road and one on the wall to East Berlin. They were named checkpoint Alpha, Bravo and Charlie. We saw where the bricks that are the memorial to the wall follow where the wall once stood, as well as the Brandenburg Gate - the official gate to the West from the East. We also saw the Holocaust memorial that is built right acrosss the street from the American Embassy. So all in all it was a very productive day in Berlin! It's basically the oldest new capital in Europe! The construction and modern buildings around remind you of the devistation that they had to deal with after WW 2, and we were told that some of the "hills" around Berlin are not natural hills. They were made with all the rubble from the remains of the city after WW 2.
It's true that history is written by the winners, and quite often in America it's impossible for us to grasp the true scope of the rebuilding that would need to be done. We hear that we paid countries to help with the reconstruction but quite often in history you don't think about the people who had to pick up the pieces and try to go on. Or the people who lived in the city under constant strain of the prospect of being bombed. We hear about the Cold War, but we can't really comprehend the level of paranoia and fear that people were living under. And that ended fairly recently. We see the pictures of the wall coming down, but we can't imagine the lenths that some people went through trying to escape East Berlin for the West (getting caught in razor wire, building secret compartments in cars, trying to hot-air balloon over and my favorite, building a one-man submarine). And now Berlin has to figure out what to do with the fact that they have two to three of the kinds of buildings that most cities only have one of. For example, they have three theaters, which is two more than they need, but what do they do with them? I can see how this would be a constant political thing which many people have opinions on.
So I guess to sum up my impressions of Berlin, it's a great city to visit, you'll definitly get a different perspective on the war and the years after the war. There is also a zeal that most Germans have when referring to Nazi Germany - they very much intend that what happened in the past is NOT to be repeated.
As for connecting with my friend... well, it's priceless. It's been a wonderful visit and I really don't want it to end. I fully intend on not letting another 12 years go by before we see each other again.
We wandered Berlin a bit on our own while Maria was working. We toured the East Side Gallery and Alexanderplatz and ended up finding the plaza where Hitler burned the books from the college (caught someone saything that's what it was) and the museums. We found some neat churches and everywhere we look there is still more construction going on. Then we went out with Maria and Bjorn to see the government buildings, they have their constitution written on glass outside one of them, and it was fun to see them reading it. We also climbed the victory tower to see a great panorama of Berlin and the Teirgarden... many, many steps up a narrow staircase... my butt is going to look great after this trip... just sayin'. We also got to have typical Berlin street food - currywurst and fries.
Maria and Bjorn live in an old GDR building in what was once East Berlin. It's been interesting hearing about the reunification and how it worked with East and West Berlin because of course, West Berlin was totally surrounded by East Germany, so they had to train, drive and fly in supplies to the city. We found out the reason why "checkpoint Charlie" is named that - there were 3 checkpoints to get into the city, one on each road and one on the wall to East Berlin. They were named checkpoint Alpha, Bravo and Charlie. We saw where the bricks that are the memorial to the wall follow where the wall once stood, as well as the Brandenburg Gate - the official gate to the West from the East. We also saw the Holocaust memorial that is built right acrosss the street from the American Embassy. So all in all it was a very productive day in Berlin! It's basically the oldest new capital in Europe! The construction and modern buildings around remind you of the devistation that they had to deal with after WW 2, and we were told that some of the "hills" around Berlin are not natural hills. They were made with all the rubble from the remains of the city after WW 2.
It's true that history is written by the winners, and quite often in America it's impossible for us to grasp the true scope of the rebuilding that would need to be done. We hear that we paid countries to help with the reconstruction but quite often in history you don't think about the people who had to pick up the pieces and try to go on. Or the people who lived in the city under constant strain of the prospect of being bombed. We hear about the Cold War, but we can't really comprehend the level of paranoia and fear that people were living under. And that ended fairly recently. We see the pictures of the wall coming down, but we can't imagine the lenths that some people went through trying to escape East Berlin for the West (getting caught in razor wire, building secret compartments in cars, trying to hot-air balloon over and my favorite, building a one-man submarine). And now Berlin has to figure out what to do with the fact that they have two to three of the kinds of buildings that most cities only have one of. For example, they have three theaters, which is two more than they need, but what do they do with them? I can see how this would be a constant political thing which many people have opinions on.
So I guess to sum up my impressions of Berlin, it's a great city to visit, you'll definitly get a different perspective on the war and the years after the war. There is also a zeal that most Germans have when referring to Nazi Germany - they very much intend that what happened in the past is NOT to be repeated.
As for connecting with my friend... well, it's priceless. It's been a wonderful visit and I really don't want it to end. I fully intend on not letting another 12 years go by before we see each other again.
Wednesday, November 21, 2012
The city from my memory Prague.
I had such fond memories of Prague and the Czech. I was actually here in 2005 one year almost to the day of my baby brothers passing. That time I was here on a mission trip and met some amazing people. This time no mission just fun & education. Mandi and I have enjoyed the free tours and tour guides. The things we get to learn about the city and the culture is great. We have been to two different kinds of free tours one group has tour guides from different places like the US and Australia and the other only uses locals. I prefer the one with the locals because they are patriotic, they love their city and they have an understanding of their culture a foreigner could not understand. The other tours are good don't get me wrong but Americans have a pride about them, again don't get me wrong I am proud to be an American (and Texan), but the history they give is more like reading a script. The locals tour from their experience/culture and give personal suggestions on where to eat and drink that is cheep and good. For example, our guide Klara gave us three restaurants to go to and told us if the place has smoking permitted it is Czech with local prices. She also told us if we have a hang-over in the Czech the locals say I have a "monkey" instead of a hang-over, we saw the guide a week later and Mandy told her she had a small "monkey," Klara loved it. Prague was still as beautiful as I remember it. Since we were there for a week we were able to see and photograph a lot as you can see from the post. I will try harder to keep that up to date. Thankfully since it is winter here there were not a lot of tourist but it is cold. I know I have lost my mind when I am happy it is 40 degrees outside. I am happy to say I found Mulled wine, yummy. Annie (from VA) good call on the wine add a few scoops of sugar and grrr. I will have to confess when you told us about it before we left I thought you said "mold" wine. That did not sound to good to be honest. :) The buildings here are amazing and the original town of Prague was covered over and the new(er) town built on top because of flooding. We could have gone down to see it but it cost and since we are saving what we can we avoid anywhere it costs to go into. If we had unlimited funds we could but we are still staying here till March so we must be wise.:) The Charles Bridge was fun to go over however I remember more musicians from before. I did miss the palace last time and we saw it twice, once in the day and once at night. We also saw the John Lennon wall and the Love Bridge (with many locks). There were also horses with earmuffs, you must know it is cold if you have to put earmuffs on a horse. We also saw the Jewish quarter and learned before the war there were about 35000 Jews and now 3000 or less. They had a memorial set up with drawings from children (so Klara said) who believed they were still going home and they were just at summer camp. Klara said it is very sad and be prepared if we paid to go in it is very difficult to see. We again opted not to go because of the fee and we were not sure we could recover after Klara's warning. We were also told that before the war Jews were required to wear a yellow hat (almost looked like a Micky Mouse hat from back in the day) to separate them and it may have been where Hitler got his idea for the yellow stars (FYI: did you know when the Jews had to register to get their stars they had to pay for them?) Our last day, we decided to make our last walk around and I actually had a lady "hiss" at me, very strange but I prayed and asked the Lord to be with her then we went on our way. All in all I still enjoy Prague and will continue to have fond memories of it.
Lots of love from between countries,
Ana
Lots of love from between countries,
Ana
Late again.
Brugge was a beautiful city with great chocolate, yummy. I liked that our hostel was only about a mile away from the train station and the old town was 1/2 mile from our hostel. We had to stay an extra day because we forgot the 8th of November. How we could loose a day before we even had the day is beyond me. So when we arrived, thank God for the Internet, we reserved a room for one day then had a totally different room for the next three days. Moving our stuff is not a big deal now. I will say it is funny how Mandi's bag seems to explode in each hostel but she can get it all back together faster than she walks (I am saying RoadRunner fast). Well, with the extra time we were able to really walk the town to get chocolate, drink beer, drink hot chocolate, and enjoy local food (yummy waffles). There were several canals, churches, horses and bikes. I am praying we will not end up of America's funniest home videos being clipped by a biker with the the other one of the two of us laughing so hard we cannot breath. It is nice because we have felt safe in all the city's and towns we have been in but we are still being careful. My favorite part of Brugge was the beer tour. Personally I am not a beer drinker I like sugar to much, however I did find a Rose beer that was fantastic (4% alcohol). The lady on the beer tour said that beer is for children. Oh, to be young, again.:) It has been fun getting Mandi to drink all sorts of beer, you know she fights me every step of the way, she keep telling me I am trying to get her drunk. Seriously, I am not because I could never find our way back to the hostel without her navigation skills. I am positive that if Mandi was not with me I would still be in Frankfurt, Germany trying to get out. Mandi has been a great friend and buddy for this trip I could not have asked for anyone better. Thank you Lord for preparing our path and making a way for us.
Lots of love from the Czech,
Ana
Monday, November 19, 2012
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