more crazy stories about living in an apartment in Berlin

Back in September, Katie and I were offered a free mini-fridge (you know, with the tiny brick-sized freezer in the top corner). In order to save money and avoid the hassle of finding our own refrigerator, we took it. We soon discovered that there was something majorly wrong with the temperature inside the tiny freezer as frost built up over the entire thing. Well, Katie and I were already learning how to get on without using a freezer so it didn't seem like a big deal. That is, until the frost starting building beyond the freezer walls and making it so the door wouldn't close. Problem. Since then, Katie has been going at it once and while with a knife to break it up. This results in an icy, snowcone-like mess across the fridge and floor. We had kept talking about just defrosting it and starting from scratch and finally today, we decided to just do it. In order to keep all the food we had in it still cold, we put it all in a small cloth bag and right now, it is literally sitting outside on our tiny windowsill in cold winter air with the window closed on the handles to keep the food from falling three floors to its death on the courtyard ground.

In similar news, my bedroom heater is still shutting off on me randomly. I especially feel bad when it happens in the middle of the night and I have no choice but to wake Katie up with the sound of the hammer smacking against the metal pipes. But it does make for a continuous hilarious story for the both of us...

"You haven't converted me yet..."

... Tim said cheerfully as Stu and I chatted with him over lunch in the mensa (campus cafeteria). After striking up a conversation with him, we proceeded to talk about life, religion, Christianity and truth. Tim told us he grew up atheist, but is curious about Christianity and often thinks about the bigger questions of life's purpose and the existence of God. After sharing with him the gospel and what we're doing here in Berlin, he told us about his experience with friends who are Christians and his times at church and that he's listened to what they have to say, but in his own words: "you haven't converted me yet...". These kinds of conversations are actually very encouraging to me, because they show that God is really working and placing a hunger for truth and understanding in the hearts of students. :)

Mid-year

The last week in January, we had our STINT mid-year conference in Nerja, Spain. It's such a great time to relax, be encouraged and refocus our hearts on minds on the real purpose of why we do what we do. Last year on our day "off", I went to Gibraltar, so this year I went to the Alhambra in Grenada. The picture above is of Jennie and me by one of the many intricate parts to this amazing palace. Unfortunately our tour guide, though very knowledgeable, wasn't very good. He was very quiet, seemed flustered and confused and his cell phone kept going off. And he kept apologizing for it being winter right now and telling us that we should come back in the summer. Anyway, the actual grounds of this city/palace were awesome (even in the winter!). The thing that was most striking to me was the smell, which seems strange, but it was so fresh, sweet and piney. I don't know how to best describe it, but it was very distinct. No wonder the richest and most powerful lived there! It was also interesting how, as the palace went from being controlled by Muslims to Christians, the architecture was changed or added on to in a very different way. I also learned that the word "grenadine" actually comes from Grenada's pomegranates of the gardens of the Alhambra. Who knew?

It's exam time right now for Berlin students. As you walk on campus, you can just feel the stress in the air. The semester ends next week and we'll soon be evaluating and planning for the next semester. Please pray that we'll be able to evaluate and plan well and really seek after what God wants for this city.

Praises

Michele's arrived! We are so thankful that our teammate from Brazil is finally here in Berlin with us. Please continue to pray, though, as we still need to figure out how to get her a visa while she is here in country (probably a student visa). And pray for her adjustment to Germany and to us (as a crazy group of Americans, haha).

Also, praise God for a good week of going sharing on campus. I feel like I had several really good conversations this week, being able to share the full gospel several times with students who really wanted to listen. I am so thankful for the ways I see God working here!

Christmas and Silvester Freizeit

Christmas is so lovely in Germany. I can't imagine a better place to be for it. After a candlelight service at my church on Christmas Eve, we gathered at the Kent's place in south Berlin for some Christmas dinner and gift exchange. On Christmas day, we as STINTers spent the day at my apartment with dinner and games. We also took a quick trip to the hospital to visit a German friend of ours who broke his arm falling on ice a couple days before. He needed surgery and they kept him in the hospital over Christmas (so sad) so we totally needed to bring him so leftover Christmas dinner and cookies. :)

We just returned from our student conference out in the Erzgebirge of Saxony towards the Czech Republic border in a tiny town called Pockau. This was one of my favorite things we did last year and this year could very well be the same. It's such a great experience to see German students break away from their lives as students and really focus on their relationship with God. The theme this year was "Original" and they had talks and seminars on our identity in Christ. The students are so great and so fun. It was especially great to do worship songs right into the midnight on New Year's Eve. Max, one of the German Campus staff in Leipzig, challenged the students to really follow after God, take a step of faith and do whatever it is He is calling them to do. So special. We then had a hike with torches through the forest right up into a little dilapidated castle! These are the moments when I'm like "this is my life?!". So cool.

The picture on top is of me making salad during the Silvester conference and on the bottom is the STINT team in Dresden.

December in Germany (mostly)

It's been one crazy (but really great) month. Here's a quick update:

At one of our city-wide Campus meetings (Fire-Abend), we had a talk on the importance of evangelism and the simple steps students could take to start making it a lifestyle. Our speaker (a German Campus staff member who works with business leaders) told the students that if they have questions about sharing their faith, they should ask us as the STINT team. He said how we've come to do this in a different country, in a different language and do it all the time. He even said we are heroes! I was so surprised and touched to hear him say that (got a bit emotional, haha).

My homegroup at church had a big Christmas party this month. I love going to an international church for many reasons, but one of them, honestly, does have to be how many different and awesome foods I get to eat. Of course, I also love how I can feel comfortable and at home with a group of people that represent 10 different nations. But most importantly, they represent Jesus. :) We sang "Silent Night" in all the native languages we had there, which was so cool and special. It's such a once-in-a-life-time opportunity to be a part of something like this.

I also got to go to Dresden this month. Dresden was the most destroyed city in Germany from WWII so it's almost entirely rebuilt. But they rebuilt the "old city" part of it almost completely replicated. So it's absolutely beautiful, especially during Christmas time. In fact, they have the oldest Weinachtsmarkt (Christmas market) in Germany!

Believe it or not, I was also in America this month! Three of us 2nd-years went to New York for the wedding of our teammate from last year, Jon. It was just for the weekend, so it was kind of overwhelming and exhausting, but really fun and really cool to see a bunch of my teammates from last year. :)

In more random news, my heater in my room broke for the second time this year. After calling the heating people, they said they were overwhelmed with complaints with heaters breaking, because of the abnormally cold temperatures Berlin is experiencing right now. He told us just to give it a whack with a hammer - not kidding. So Katie and I picked up a hammer from the boys' apartment and did exactly that. And guess what. It worked! So I'm super thankful that I have heat in my room again. It's been below freezing for about a week now. This is definitely the coldest and snowiest I've ever seen Berlin. After four years in Syracuse, I should really be used to this...

I wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a good slide into the New Year! ;)

Happy Thanksgiving!

Sometimes, it's really hilarious what we hear from the mouths of students on campus. This past Tues., Stu and I were doing surveys on the TU. One girl we talked to, Anne, was very closed to anything really having to do with spirituality, saying that she doesn't believe Jesus ever lived and that she can't even imagine what it would be like for God to exist. She said it's just not possible for her. The very next student we talked to in the very same building, Christoph, was from the Czech Republic and new to Berlin. When asked about his desire to know God personally, he said "of course, everyone wants to know God!". How ironic we would talk to these two very different students back to back. If only they could have heard each other's thoughts and see how contradictory they were!

Yesterday, of course, was Thanksgiving. We celebrated as a team and enjoyed each other's food and company. I made an apple pie (see pic), which was really fun to make, but actually a bit disappointing for me, because what I really wanted to do was make a pecan pie. But I searched far and wide, and this country does not have corn syrup. It just doesn't. It's also funny to have off on a day when the rest of the world is going on and going to work/class just like normal. I really feel my "American-ness" on such a day!