Friday, January 23, 2009

TFG BIG conference 2009

Hello All!

I just arrived back from the Time for God BIG conference. This is the time of year when all of the TFG volunteers serving in the UK get together to learn, share experiences, and have a lot of fun! To reflect on our year so far, we were split into small groups - I was in the Arts and Crafts group, so to process what we have done and learned so far, we made books. These books could be anything from our imagination with the theme of 'My year so far...' (and the year yet to come). On the right is a picture of Me, Sara K., Elin, and Alpar with our books. My book turned into a scrapbook of sorts, with a page devoted to new foods, another to memories, some pages about SPEC, and some about me - it's a pretty fun book! I never knew how much fun arts and crafts could be, but I found it very meditative. I hope to make another one at the end of my year, with all of the pictures I am accumulating!





The other highlight of the conference was 'The Fringe'. A multi-cultural talent show! We saw performances of songs and dances from South Korea, Scotland, Hungary, America, Germany, and Sweden, among other silly performances of Little Mermaid re-enactments and an 'Air Band' (that was from the Americans :) ) We saw some tradition dress from both Germany and South Korea. Below is me with Martin and Annika in traditional Bavarian dress. The will still wear this dress to special occasions such as 21st birthdays and weddings!




Our other neat opportunity at this conference was to watch the inauguration of President Obama in Wales with young people from all over the globe. I have never been so 'American' in my life. There were 11 Americans at the conference, and we all stood when the people on t.v. stood, we sang the National anthem with the choir, and said 'Amen' at the end of the final prayer (a prayer which made us all smile). The British commentators were funny - as George W. left the white house for the last time, the commentator referred to him as 'A lovely man, though I know some don't quite agree with his politics'. :)

During this, a good portion of the other volunteers watched, and said that we were more interesting than the actual speech itself! But we were not the only excited ones. Obama's presidency has excited the world. There have been large posters of him in the tube, and when young people hear that I'm American, they always ask if I support Obama. It's nice to have Europeans seeing good in the US. I worry for him - he has a lot on his plate with a lot of people expecting great things. It seems to me,though, that he's got a good head on his shoulders, and isn't too cocky about the challenges ahead. These next few years will certainly be interesting!

Current prayer requests include TFG Volunteers heading back into their placements, Anthony visiting Zimbabwe, The new USA administration, and SPEC's young people, volunteers, and staff.

That's the quick update for now!

Cheers!

Picture links!!

Planting flowers with community and London trip with the girls, Click Here

TFG BIG Conference, Click Here

Saturday, January 17, 2009

Horses!

On Wednesday, SPEC had some unexpected visitors. We were patienly awaiting the arrival of a retreat group, but instead of young people, 15 horses showed up on our fields! They were beautiful - brown and white - but we were slightly confused as to how and why they were there. Turns out, there is a traveling community that takes these horses to different fields. The reason they do this is due to some funny English laws. If a herd of horses ends up in an enclosed field, then the owner of the field is then responsible for the well being of the horses, as well as any damage they might cause (i.e. running out onto a road and causing an accident). There are ways to get a court order to sort things out which costs thousands of pounds and takes about 2 weeks. What the traveling community does is take the horses to another field on day 13. So we potentially had 15 horses to feed, take care of, and keep safe for a couple of weeks.

Here's the cool part. This traveling community also comes to SPEC to collect scrap metals. So we called up our contact through that, and 5 people were in our fields taking the horses away within 30 minutes. One of the guys remembered coming to SPEC on a retreat as a youngster. The thought is floating arond that because we respect this community for who they are and give them our scrap metals and such, it wasn't a problem to take the horses right away. Amazing what acceptance can do.

Prayer of St. Francis

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury,pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
and where there is sadness, joy.

O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek
to be consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive;
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.
Amen

When I'm Lost on the Road


My Lord God,
I have no idea where I am going
I do not see the road ahead of me.
I cannot know for certain where it will end.
Nor do I really know myself,
And the fact that I think I am following
your will does not mean that I am
actually doing so.

But I believe that the desire to please
you does in fact please you.
And I hope that I have that desire in all
that I am doing.
And I know that if I do this, you
will lead me by the right road
though I may know nothing about it.

Therefore will I trust you always
though I may seem to be lost
and in the shadow of death, I will
not fear, for you are ever with me
and you will never leave me
to face my perils alone.

Thomas Merton

Risk

This is a poem that was used in our training and we also used in the retreat last week. I feel it is very fitting for this adventure.

To laugh is to risk appearing the fool.
To weep is to risk appearing sentimental.
To reach for another is to risk involvement.
To expose your ideas, your dreams,before a crowd is to risk their loss.
To love is to risk not being loved in return.
To live is to risk dying.To believe is to risk despair.
To try is to risk failure.
But risks must be taken, because the greatest hazard in life is to risk nothing.
The people who risk nothing, do nothing,have nothing, are nothing.
They may avoid suffering and sorrow,
but they cannot learn, feel, change, grow, love, live.
Chained by their attitudes they are slaves;
they have forfeited their freedom.
Only a person who risks is free.

Crisp Flavours.

England has an amazing amount and variety of Crisp (chip) Flavours! Here are a few of my favourites (like the English spelling :) )

Ready Salted
Cheese and Onion
Roast Chicken
Prawn Cocktail
Steak and Onion
Worcester Sauce

These are the normal ones that you'd find in a gas station. Crazy, isn't it?!

English Lingo

  • Lorry (Semi-Truck)
  • Rubber (eraser)
  • Ta (Thank You)
  • Cheers (Thank you)
  • Skip (dumpster)
  • Bin (trash can)
  • Drink (Tea)
  • Brew (Tea)
  • Cupper (Tea)
  • Chips (Fries)
  • Crisps (Chips)
  • Biscuit (cookie)
  • Chuft (Proud)
  • Lie in (sleep in)
  • Rubbish (trash)