Larry and I have just returned from our third 2-week jaunt to Martin, Slovakia. English as a Foreign Language (EFL) has been our purpose there (and will continue to be the thrust for Larry and me as we make Martin our residence for the next 2 years). What a fantastic, exhausting, rewarding, revealing time we had. If I get really handy with this Blog thing, I will post some pix of various "moments of significance" with the Beginner class. But for the moment words must serve as my paint brush.
Making Bread in a Bag and an intro to American money via an auction were hilarious moments for a class ranging from HIGHLY energetic eleven-year-olds to reluctant high schoolers to eager classroom teachers seeking as much English knowledge as they could pack into their brains to take back to their own classrooms.
Turns out that bread making is a dying art in Slovakia since widespread bakeries provide literally the daily bread for most of the country. Though to make bread brought initially raised eyebrows, within 2 hours the class had out their cameras in full force to record their first-time venture with flour and yeast, kneading, shaping, and then waiting as the aroma of rising and then baking bread filled the classrooms. Each table insisted on marking its own particular loaf with its table number to stake the claim on each table's particular handiwork! My team members from our church were magnificent in keeping this venture from total chaos (total is the operative word here!)
And the $$ auction? Well, since Slovakia's currency is now the Euro, our own money system is easier to teach. So, money id was quickly taught. But the auction--do you have any idea how "in-demand" such simple items as assorted candy, fake money, miniature soccer balls/ baseballs/ basketballs, and small canisters of Farp are? (I'll leave it to your imaginations the noise Farp makes when one pokes one's finger into it!!!!!!!!!!) Let's just say that the cultural reserve of the classroom kinda' dissolved!!!!!! The laughter and enthusiastic bidding with fake $$ was heard throughout the hallways! What a way to end the morning session.
Aside from the classroom memories, our Bible School hosts treated us to several jaunts into the surrounding country side. One such trip took us up into a national preserve overlooking the mountain valleys very much like the opening scenes from Julie Andrew's "The Hills Are Live with the Sound of Music" number. We roasted delicious sausages and bacon chunks (hopefully we ate enough bread to soak some of the fat!!) and watched the sun set as grand thunderheads formed to bring in rain, lightning, and thunder later in the night.
Another outing brought us to a tiny round stone church built on the hillside sometime in the 12th century in a picturesque village that no longer uses that church except as a place for weddings or other special events. (Imagine--no regular worship services take place there anymore.) But as a group we joined together for communion with our Slovak friends where our voices lifted praise to the God of all ages, breaking bread together as we sang--and none of us will be the same again. I like to think that the stones within that little sanctuary absorbed and added our voices to those of past believers so that "even the rocks will cry out in praise" to our Lord. Maybe someday we'll have ears to hear this beautiful choir of believers from across time.
Can you tell that we have once more been touched by this far-away country that will be our home for the next two years?
Stay tuned for more!
