Our First Sunday and Monday in Albania

Sunday has come and gone. We attended the service at the Church Ian and Caralee have started here in Korca and enjoyed the experience even though we did not understand the language. The service was much like the one at WFC in Lenexa, the IBCP in Prague and the Vineyard in Mazatlan. It is great to know that the Holy Spirit is alive and well wherever we go and that the same Spirit is of course omnipresent. We will add a brief video of a portion of the worship. You may recognize some of the melodies even though the words are different.

Sunday afternoon we spent at the Lorings for football, food and fellowship. The major attraction was the Manchester United match with Chelsea – United is the family's favorite team. Liz likes Chelsea because of the uniform color. I am one of the disappointed and struggling Liverpool fans. The Tottenham v Liverpool match played clearly on the Loring's TV – we watched the second half. However, the Man U game was scrambled by the satellite and we could not watch it. Several frantic phone calls by Ian and a friend who was also there watching proved fruitful as the picture appeared around the twenty-fifth minute. We (Ian, Holgre and I anyway) all concentrated on the match while Caralee fortunately concentrated on food preparation! We were served delicious multi-grain rolls and a oatmeal scotchie type bar. Ashlie watched some of the game but Isaac had a friend over and was otherwise occupied for most of it.

Isaac requested waffles for dinner and there was near unanimity concerning his request – so waffles it was – with maple syrup, bananas and yogurt. By the time we finished eating and had talked a bit more it was time for us to retire home and prepare for the next day.

Monday came quickly for us following a good nights sleep. Coffee, a little computer time, breakfast, showers and one load of laundry filled the early morning.

Ashlie reported promptly at 9:00 AM for school, but Isaac had his PE – a bike ride from 8 to 10. Ashlie and John did math and science together and were quite successful. Isaac did not come to 11:00 as he was stung by a bee on his bike ride and took a little while to recover from that. The Lorings have hired a young man to take either Ashlie or Isaac out for PE two days a week each. The normal routine is to bike one day and hike the other.

When Isaac came, John did Math, Science and spelling with him while Liz supervised Ashlies' Communications and World History. Liz and Ashlie also went on a short shopping trip for necessary food items to sustain us through school time. At 3:00 PM we declared school is out and the kids left for their house and lunch. We had grilled cheese sandwiches and fruit followed by a rest period.

Now it is time for blogging, games, coffee. We plan on taking a walk soon and looking for restaurants and other places around town.

We terminated our intended long walk early as rain started falling and we had some thunder and lightning.  We walked with our umbrellas up for a while, but it became evident that we were in for more than a short shower and returned home.

Liz fixed dinner with the few items we had - we were going to stop at the grocery store after our walk, but the rain changed things.  We played Quiddler and BananaGrams after eating.  The Internet was down but came back up in time for us to get this posted tonight.