Journal Entries from Scornicesti Trip 2003-2004

In the winter of 2003, Danut and I decided to go on a mission trip to Romania for the winter. The mission trip would be located around the town of "Scornicesti", which is the hometown of former Communist Leader Nicolae Ceaucescu.

Scornicesti is a small town of about 5,000 inhabitants located in Oltenia, one of the poorer "counties" of Romania. Oltenia is known for it's Poverty and Orphanages. In Scornicesti, they have a few factories where they make jeans, and this is one of the main occupations of the residents that live there.

The city is not well kept, and in fact it looks like a city that has gone through a war (though I doubt it has). Romania in general feels like a country stuck in time. If Romanians are reading this, I apologize if I make your city or country sound poor, but it's fact. For the Americans reading this I would like to say that we, as Americans, live in Extreme Luxury. Kids here drive cars and can go eat out at restaurants every day if they wanted to and still have money left over to be well off. The people in Scornicesti have to worry about what they will eat and whether or not they will have heat for the winter season.

One last fact about Scornicesti, I don't know if this changed, but running water for the faucet or bath works for 4 hours every day, 2 in the morning and 2 at night. They are trying to "conserve" water, though most people fill up their bathtubs with water for daily water use throughout the day (probably wasting more water if anything).

Scornicesti has one orthodox church and a christian church which is hopefully completed by now.

Part of the purpose of the mission trip was to help set up the "Zile de Bucurie," which means the "Days of Joy" translated. This Christmas celebration is a 3 day festival held in the Town's Cultural House during the evening hours. The other purpose of the trip was to visit the many Orphanages throughout the country. The visits to the Orphanages was one of the most shocking parts of Romania and changed my life.

I will be entering random journal entries from my Trip to Romania. I never had the intent of sharing these when I wrote them, but I hope they make sense. There might be more personal stuff that I will not include in the blog. Just so you know, the entries have an overall "sad" tone to them.

I created a new blog to hold my journal entries and it is found at the following address
http://daysofjoy.blogspot.com

This is me taking a comfy nap...I sleep like that every night! 

back to bloggin'

I think I will start this bloggin' thing again because it's such a great way to keep a journal. I think it's also an excellent way to encourage friends and to share how God works in your life...

i'm excited about this so I plan to re-blog soon!

By the way, I have dropped my coke addiction! I cannot believe that! Since my last blog in December so much has changed that I cannot even begin to describe!

The Lord has blessed me with an awesome job at Motorola where I work with my brother (this is an answer to prayer and fasting! it's seriously a miracle!). This past year the Lord has drawn me so much closer to Him and he has released me from the sin that bound me far from the Lord. Through that God has given me peace, and now I know what it means to be at peace and content with Him. This doesn't mean that I never go through hard times, it just means that I am dependent on God and realize that He is my only source of Strength and that the Bible is my source of Truth.

-mic