I would like to share a brief testimony of our trip to Romania. My wife, my youngest daughter Kimberly, and I, and two brothers from our church, Bro. Byron Dutcher, and Bro. Eric Smith, traveled together. We all had a very awesome experience. We started out by going to the USA headquarters of Hand of Help Ministry in Watertown, Wisconsin, where we joined up with our friend, Bro. Geno Schmit, who introduced us to the other staff of Hand of Help Ministries. Our team of six had a brief stop over in Munich, Germany, where we were able to tour a few historic sites. Later that evening we landed in Bucharest, where we were picked up by a driver and began our eight hour drive to the orphanage in Botosani. During our drive, we were accompanied by another passenger, Irene, who attempted to teach me Romanian. I thought that I could learn how to speak Romanian in that amount of time. I can say one thing, she tried! Just remember that we English speaking people don’t have the right kind of tongue to make the sounds that they can make, but we sure did have a good time trying.
By the time we arrived at the orphanage, it was way over in the morning hours. After a long flight and our car ride, we were all exhausted. We all just about slept the first day away. Our first afternoon was spent just fellowshipping with all of the children, meeting the staff, and touring the buildings.
We have had some good and bad incidents with food in our travels over the years in foreign countries, so from experience we were prepared to eat what was set before us, and to push over any dislikes. Well, to our pleasant surprise we were fed some of the best food imaginable. All the vegetables were grown fresh at the orphanage’s garden. I guess I will share one small incident that I thought was kind of funny. And by the way, my wife thinks I have a warped since of humor. We sat down to eat dinner one night, and Bro. Byron sat right across the table from me. In Romania, they serve soup just about at every meal, so they set a big pot of soup between us. Bro. Byron dipped into this soup and poured him a nice big bowl, which was very good fresh homemade soup. I’m not sure about you, but I think I could answer for most of us Americans that we are not expecting to find a whole chicken foot in our soup, and when I say chicken foot, it looked as though it came straight from the barnyard to the plate – claws and all. Maybe it was just me, but it looked huge! I’ve got to say that Brother Byron handled it well. You would have thought that he ate chicken feet every night. I can say he did better then I did. I got kind of tickled over it watching him very carefully go around that foot. He is not a selfish man at all; he just thought that maybe someone else might have wanted that foot!
Another experience we had was in a church service with some wonderful people one morning. We had had a great service and the Lord blessed us and them, but this particular morning they were planning a communion service. Well, again they do things a little different than we do in America. They poured one big glass of wine and passed it around. Don’t misunderstand me I’m not finding fault, it was just different than what we were accustomed to. Oh, by the way, I happened to be at the end of the line which was approximately person number 130. My wife was sitting with the other sisters and she was probably number 110 or so. Believe me, I was watching her with a little curiosity to see how she would do, and I have to say she did very well, but that’s not the end of the story. After the communion was completed, there was still a little wine left in the glass. The Pastor, being generous towards me, thought that I might like to finish it off. I gracefully bowed out. I should have told him I preferred my brother, and to give it to Brother Byron.
That is sharing with you some of our experiences with food. But now let me share with you about the ways and means of travel. One thing that is a little different is that you share the road with horses pulling wagons. I haven’t figured out why they paint lines on the road there, they didn’t seem to matter to anybody and they used either side whenever it was convenient. I’m glad that everybody that went with me was born again, but I can assure you one thing. Their prayer life got a whole lot better real fast while touring around Romania! You might be wondering what I’m trying to say. A slight comparison would be a Amish horse and buggy in a NASCAR race. We would be in the wrong lane going against traffic at hair raising speeds, weaving in and out of oncoming cars. I know you think that I’m exaggerating, but you will just have to go and experience this for yourself. I will make one suggestion, go ride in a New York City cab first. It might get you a little warmed up for a ride in Romania. Bro. Mike Boldea Jr. was telling me that he does not like to drive at night there because he said that the drunks would sleep in the road. You hear things like that, but is hard to imagine, so in our travel back to Bucharest, way late in the night going down a main highway, we come across a body laying in middle of the highway. I thought somebody has been hit by a car. Our driver didn’t seemed to be overly concerned and was going to keep on going, but we insisted that he stop. I thought we where going to find a dead man, but to my surprise this was a young boy drunk and asleep in the middle of the highway. He was upset with us for waking him up and getting him out of the road. They say that the highway blacktop holds heat and they will lay down and pass out. I’m not talking about some back road or side road. It was a main heavily traveled highway.
I’m thankful to God for giving us a opportunity to go to the foreign fields, sharing just a little of the lighter side of things with you that make a trip interesting and a little humorous. But we do go in the mind to do something for God. We helped many of the youth and adults alike. I believe that God used are efforts and finance to encourage and enlighten the people of Romania, and to challenge them in there faith. We are now making an effort to bring one of the young man over for a season to help us translate some of our teaching and messages into Romanian, for our future endeavors into Romania.
Pastor Rob Coones