Festivals

Hello All!

For the past few weeks our mighty group of ten has been working with the Community Center, Center 68, to put on festivals and tournaments for the families living in one more impoverished neighborhood of Greece. This neighborhood is primarily Albanian immigrants. As many of you know, Albania was a Communist country which was highly oppressive and had closed borders. The President of the Bible Institute was telling us today that the Greeks were praying for the opening of the borders and the freedom of these people. When the borders were finally opened and Albanians came flooding into Greece, the Greeks did not know how to accommodate to this population spike. This caused many initial problems between the Greeks and the Albanians. In addition, many of the first Albanians that entered Greek society were convicts who had been released from jail and so upon their arrival in Greece, the crime rate spike dramatically. Previously Greece was a very peaceful society with little crime but when the first wave of Albanians arrived, the murder rates greatly increased. Because of this, a sort of racism began to fester in Greece that still remains, though not as prevalently, today. The Albanians inhabiting Greece today are just like the Greeks; they are families that are trying to make the best possible life for their families but they are handicapped by the criminal stigma that was established years ago. To further complicate things, much of Greece is Orthodox and if you are not Orthodox, you are harshly judged and sometimes discriminated against. Because Albania was a Communist state, many do not have any religion that they practice. For all for these reasons, Albanians are facing tough obstacles as they try to coexist in Greece. Children are negatively affected even though many are exactly like their Greeks peers except for their last name.

Many of the Albanians we are working with do not speak English. Only the teenagers speak English because they are taught it in school. This has not proven to be a problem for us, however. These festivals and tournaments have been mostly games that we oversee. Many of the kids are familiar with these summer programs from the past couple of years and are more than happy to play amongst themselves and laugh, lovingly, at us when we attempt to speak Greek. I have about three phrases and six words down. On the upside, I do know the word for orange, portokali, which is the most commonly used color when children are asking for balloons, face paint and bracelet colors. Alright! I was tasked with working the diablo station which is essentially making sure that the kids stay in roughly the same vicinity as I am in. What I found was that the kids actually preferred to walk all over the square, the main park/central area of the city, and I would just have to round up the supplies at the end of the night. The diablo is a rubber hourglass shaped object that is spun and thrown and caught with two sticks and a string. I was the only one familiar with the game because I had done it in my seventh grade circus unit in P.E. so I was put in charge of that. Some of the other people on our team did face painting, stilts, balloon sculpting, hula hoops, and general help with the group activities which mostly involved water. As the week progressed, we all sort of moved around and helped with different activities but I found that I was not exceptionally talented with face/body painting. The kids politely thanked me but looked less than thrilled with my rendition of a dinosaur. I was pretty good at painting butterflies and hearts, though!  I tried to send all the boys to Elise, one of the girls on our team, who was much more gifted in the art of face painting. In the last few days we have also been semi-assisting in the soccer tournaments. There is not too much for us to do here because the older boys and a few men run these tournaments so we mostly just marvel at all of these kids talent. There are younger boys and older boys’ brackets and all of them are tremendously talented. I love to see the little boys get so excited when they score a goal and all of their friends in the bleachers rush the field and jump on them. The older boys are a little more collected but are still stoked when their bicycle kick results in a goal. It was neat to see all of our talents, or at least enthusiasm, being utilized to make these festivals a success. Elise was master face painter, I was proficient at the diablo, Trevin was quite talented with the stilts with Kelsey's assistance, Camille had fun leading Twister with the help of her trusty translator Ana, Rachel got a kick out of leading the little kids in hula hoop games, Joanna, Tyler, and Jaimeson were great at following around Alex, the big boss in charge, and helping set up and run all the group games, Christi was our fantastic photographer and her son Carter was our mascot (drawing in all the parents and grandparents with his noises and faces). We have an awesome team and it has been such a blessing to work with Courtney and Alex in their efforts to put on these festivals and tournaments. Their passion and excitement has been such a motivator and we are so fortunate to be able to work with this community through simple things like water balloon tosses, hula hoop contests and soccer tournaments. I would love for all of your prayers for our success with these tournaments and that our efforts would bring joy to this community.


"Love what is sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good. Be devoted to one another in brotherly love. Honor one another above yourselves. Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor, serving in the Lord. Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer. Share with God's people who are in need. Practice hospitality...Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud..." Romans 12: 9-16

"Getting to Know the Culture"

Hello all! This is the evening of my fourth full day in Greece! WOW! Time has flown by "getting to know the culture," as Jaimeson puts it. I arrived at about 11 PM Sunday night (Greece time), just in time for the teams' day off the next day. On the way home from the airport, Jaimeson told me about the full, emotional day that the women on our team had. The women on our team had gone into the red light district to meet with a few madams and prostitutes there. Many women that they met there were there by choice because the women forced into the profession were very much kept behind closed doors. From what I was told about our teams' experiences, it was a time of both hope and sadness. Many of the conversations were of introductory nature but the opportunity to join the women's center, learn a trade and begin to provide for themselves in a way that would make themselves proud was offered again and again. This ministry has been in operation for about eight years and these women have begun to trust in the New Zoi (New Life) ministry. There have been a few women who have been able to remove themselves from a life that they claim brings them much shame and greatly hinder their ability to join society again with respect. I truly hope that I will get the opportunity to visit with some of these women to hear their stories and share with them the hope that the wonderful women of the New Zoi ministry have been sharing with them for the past eight years.

I have been very spoiled in that I arrived in Greece at a sort of lull in the workload. The rest of the team has spent the past couple of weeks picking up LARGE amounts of trash in Volos. Littering is a huge problem because there are no laws regulating the disposal of trash. In addition, it is seen as shameful to pick up trash, especially as a volunteer. When I arrived, however, I was informed that the next day was our day off and everyone would be going to the Acropolis! We all woke up, bought our bus/metro tickets and headed downtown. I looked like a typical American tourist taking pictures everywhere, including on the bus and the metro. I think that I sufficiently embarrased everyone around me! When we finally got to downtown Athens, ate together like a big, happy, Greek family and I loved it! We ended up getting gelato twice that day. Oops. I am coming to find out that food is something that our days revolve around. We eat, talk about food and worry about when and what our next meals and snacks will be. I LOVE IT! Finally people that appreciate food as much as me. It soon began to pour, veryunusual for this time of year, and so we took at look at the museum and then began exploring. The Acropolis is literally the center of the city. It is raised far above everything else and is the most important spot in the city. It was amazing to learn about the history of Greek good worship, especially Athena, and to be able to stand a few feet away from the Parthenon, built 448 BC! Today we were able to visit Corith where Paul lived, preached, and was tried. I was struck but the fact that there were still things standing. The Romans knew how to build their cities! Everything was marble and, I imagine, stunning to see. There were still marble slabs strewn across the area that was once the marketplace. It is easy to take allof this for granted but Jaimeson's excitement began to rub off on all of us. Paul, the Apostle, actually walked the same ground that we were walking two thousand years earlier! That just blows my mind! We also stood over the Corinth Canal which was eventually carved after transporting boats over land became too tiring and time-consuming. We ended our trip in Corinth with lunch and swimming in the Ionian Sea which was pristine. The sea was clear blue, with big stones in place of sand. The beach looked like a postcard and I had to keep reminding myself that I WAS actually swimming in the sea in Greece! I am still finding it hard to beleive that God has called me here, provided for me and is allowing me to do His work.

Our plans for the second day were thwarted because of th ehuge strikes taking place outside of the Parlament building. The Greeks were striking about the increase in food and gas taxes for the purpose of trying to repay loans so not to default. The political scientist in me wanted to hop on a bus to witness these strikes but it was a good thing I didn't. They got pretty violent and soon tear gas a a thick police line was being showed all over the news. Instead we stayed at the Bible College and cooked together. These small things are what is helping our team become so close and so much more loving. Our love for each other and for God is what will allow us to pour love onto the Greeks during our times here. Our plan for the day was for us to go downtown to meet with a woamn who helps run the community center in a more impoverished part of Athens where the primary population is Albanian immigrants. We ended up meeting with her the next day and she told us a little bit about what we would be doing as we worked with her for the next feew weeks. We will be assisting in putting on these annual tournaments and festivals which include sporting competitions, mainly soccer, as well as face pianting, crafts and games. The community center is the sort of central location and resource for these events to happen. This community center includes a game room, study room and computer room and has blessed many of these kids in a very large way. These festivals and competitions are something that not only the kids look forward to every year, but the whole families too. These events are what brings the community together and allows them to simply have fun. Because many of these ministries are nonprofit, they are run entirely by the church and voulteers.Our team is going to help run these programs in the comming weeks! I am so excited! I almost got a little choked up hearing about the amazing things that have resulted from somthing as simple as workig with these kids on the computer and giving them a plastic trophy for winning a soccer game. These programs have given these families, who are mainly refugees, the tolls to succeed in a society in which Greek is not their first language and culture is completely foreign. The same group also hosts a few week long camp in Calamos at the end of July so we will be preparing for that by cleaning, starting tomorrow, setting up and then as councilors the last week. I am so excited to learn more about this ministry. I know that God has been doing some amazing things here is Greece and I am just exstatic that I get to be a part of it.

"Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all of our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God." 2 Corinthians 3-4
* Written by Paul!!!!! So exciting!

Sorry this post is so long. I will try to keep them shorter; I just had a lot to write!

If you would like to write to me, I would love it!
My email is: ebadraun@msn.com
Address: Greek Bible Institute
               Adamopoulou 8
               Pikermi, GR 190 09 GREECE
(write my name on the lower left hand corner away from the address area)

Of course you can always talk to me on facebook!

I love you all so much and thank you for all of your support!

Love,
Emily

Praise the Lord! He does amazing things!

I am absolutely astonished at what God is able to do! He allowed me to raise 6,500 in support in about a month! WOW! I am utterly taken aback by the generosity of my family, friends and church family. God provided financial support in difficult economic times which is such a huge blessing and encouragement. Admittedly, I was hesitant to wholeheartedly jump into preparations for Greece because I knew that there were so many things that had to fall into place before I could hop on a plane. I was nervous about finances, subletting over the summer and general support. How foolish was I! I knew that this was what God had called me to do this summer and I should have been confident that he would have His hand in all of the preparations. Now I am set to join the rest of the team in Greece in just a few days!

The support that I have been getting the last few weeks, the sheer excitement that all of my peers and loved ones have been expressing, has been such an amazing blessing. Every time I saw my friends in RUF, they ALL asked me about how support raising was going and encouraged me with prayer. I have been so fortunate to have such an amazing family of believers here at school. They have been essential in my spiritual growth here at UCSB through their love of  both Christ and me.

Another huge encouragement has been from the intern team that I will be serving with in Greece. I have never met Rachel, Camille, Tyler, Joanna, Trevin, Elise or Kelsey but they have shown me so much love already! I have talked to them on facebook and they have told me multiple times how excited they are to meet me and how they are praying for me as I take finals and prepare to meet them in Greece. As I was looking through all of the pictures and blog postings about a week ago, I stumbled upon one that I was tagged in. Kelsey and Elise had taken a picture with their arms around an imaginary person and tagged me between them. I don't know why but I was so touched by this. I almost started crying because it was so sweet! I know, I am SUCH a sap! Haha I am just so excited to meet all of them!

Most importantly, though, I have been encouraged and comforted by God's word. As I was reading through John the other day, I was struck by how many times Jesus id described as comforting others. I especially liked the passage John 14:1-4 which says:

"Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God, trust also in me. In my Father's house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am. You know the way to the place where I am going."

God asks us to trust in Him and assures us that He has saved a place for us with Him! This assurance of his abundance of love is such a beautiful personal promise that encapsulates His goodness.

Sorry this is such a long post but there have been some pretty neat things happening lately! I  have been so blessed and loved and God is really revealing that to me. Thank you all for your love and support!

Love,
Emily