aLbAnIa AnD cOrFu

Not this past weekend, but the weekend before that, I had to leave the country with the rest of my class for a Visa exit. Since I attend the Greek Bible Institute and we are in an Orthodox country, our school is kind of not recognized by the government so I am not really able to get a Student visa...Because of that, we have to leave the country every 90 days, which is what we did! There were about 12 of us that went with a couple of our teachers. We had a 7 hour drive to Igoumenitsa, which is where we were going to catch a ferry to Corfu, a beautiful island off of mainland Greece. After a beautiful and very long drive, we found out that we would have to stay at a motel for the night because the weather was too bad for the ferries to leave. So we decided to get some dinner and get a good night sleep. When we woke up in the morning, we found out that we were not going to be able to get to Corfu because the weather was going to be bad over the next few days and we would get stuck on the island...Not a bad idea if you ask me...Getting stuck on an island?!? But my teachers did not think that was such a great idea so they decided to change up the plans. Instead of going to Corfu and then Albania, we were just going to drive to another closer city in Albania, get our passports stamped, and then drive all the way back to Athens. To say the least it was an adventure, we got lost like 10 times, when we finally got to the Albanian border, only a couple of us were able to make it all the way, including me. So we stopped at this lonely looking gas station to go to the bathroom where there was no toilet paper...Thank God, we were carrying some napkins...After we went to the bathroom, we decided to buy some coffee from the guy who owned the gas station since we just used his bathroom and were like the only people around for a few miles. The owner was so sweet and he got really excited when I said hello to him in Albanian but then neither of us knew any more of the others language so we just smiled! :)
We left Albania after a little bit trying not to look suspicious since we had only been there for a little bit but we got out fine and got our passports stamped. On our way back to Athens, we stopped in Ioannina, which is another popular city in Greece, and went to some caves and ate lunch. After that, we drove the long drive back to Athens, listening to the Gaither Vocal Band and trying to keep my 78 year old teacher who was driving awake....It was one adventure!


We made a pit stop at McDonalds...Sarah and I also gave "Ronald" a kiss on the cheek...haha


This is a picture of us and the gas station owner in Albania...He was really excited to take a picture with us!


The beautiful view on the way up there!


We stopped at one point on the road to take a picture!


This was after we got out of the cave!


Here's a fun video of us getting lost!


Welcome to Albania!

I am alive...believe it or not!

So some people thought that I wiped off the face of the earth but good news...I have not! I am alive and well...Just been having some amazing European adventures! The problem has been that I haven't had a lot of internet access. So where do I start?!? I might do a couple posts just to keep it from getting too long on one.

A couple of weekends ago, I had the chance to go up on the MorningStar boat. This is a boat that is owned by Hellenic Ministries, here in Greece. This boat is used most of the time in the summer. They have a crew and then they sail around to the Greek islands and go to each house evangelizing and giving Bibles. During the non-summer months, they try to have youth groups from the churches on the a boat for a weekend get-away. The boat is kept up at Porto Astro, which is the summer camp owned by the same ministry. It's about an hour and a half away from Athens. The land around the camp is absolutely beautiful and breath-taking and to go sailing around it is even better! We went up there Friday night and came back Saturday night...It was a quick trip but it was an awesome time to get away from the busyness of Athens and be in God's creation for a little bit. I also got to learn how to sail a bit, tie some knots, got to cook, and we saw dolphins!


Here is Sarah, my roommate, and I!


Old Glory...a little tattered but still as good as new!


Some scenery that was around us on the boat


These pictures are not showing the beauty of this place but at least you can get an idea!!



Here is a video of the dolphins...look really close and you can see them!

give it all away...

Lyrics from a song reminded me of this often forgotten concept...Am I willing to give it all away? Anything and everything? Often times, I think it's easy to say that we would be but are we REALLY??? Imagine, someone on the street randomly walks up to you and asks for a dollar; are you willing to give them the jacket right off your back even if they didn't ask for it? Let's take me for example! If you know me, then you know I love to shop and I love my clothes...Well, the Lord has slowly been working in me and changing me. I have actually been convicted when I go to buy something...How many clothes can a person really own! None of these things really matter in life. Matthew 6:20-21 says, "Lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." I don't want my treasure to be here on earth because I cannot take that with me when I leave this earth...It is so much more important for my cares and concerns to be on eternal things. Am I willing to give all my things away and everything I have for my Lord Jesus? He gave himself up COMPLETELY for me! He came to this earth and died for mine and your sins as a perfect, spotless, and sacrificial lamb and then was resurrected so that we could spend eternity with him. I pray that you and I are ready at the drop of a hat to give up everything we have if we are serving and following Jesus because He did not think twice about giving everything up for us.

Θεσσαλονικη...

Not this past weekend but the weekend before that I got to take a trip up to Northern Greece to Thessaloniki (which is what the title of this blog says in Greek). Thessaloniki is the second biggest city in Greece and it's the town Paul wrote a letter to in the Bible (1 and 2 Thessalonians). I went with 3 of my Greek friends and we took a long weekend since it was a holiday here in Greece. It was a 6 hr. train ride up there and the scenery on the ride up was beautiful! We saw everything...Green hills, snow-capped mountains, sheep, caves, small villages...I felt like I was in a movie! We had a very relaxing time up there; we didn't do anything too crazy and exciting! We saw the ruins and famous churches that are famous up there, we went to the zoo...I touched a baby snake...So scary! We went to my friend's village, which is like a small town...Which I was mistaken because when I hear the word village, I think: people coming out of huts and sitting around a bonfire...haha...but it was nothing like that...They just call their really small towns here villages. We went to a couple churches on Sunday and just walked along the harbor. I had amazing homemade Greek food as usual and just got to have a good time spending time with my friends. Thessaloniki is an amazing city...maybe even a little better than Athens...It's cleaner, has some really cool stores to shop at, some great little coffee shops to sit at, etc...Definitely a place everyone should visit and I would love to go up there again!


All of us that went to Thessaloniki...Fevronia, Fivos, Stathis, and me!


The White Tower...It was a Byzantine tower, then a prison, and now a museum.


Yummy...Eating delicious greek food...Maybe I'll be able to cook some when I get home!


The very famous...Arch of Galerius, who was an Emperor


This picture is crap...but it was seriously the most beautiful view I have ever seen...We were looking out and walking along the seacoast and there just cascades of mountains that were snow-covered...Breath-taking!


Being goofy in the door of the train station :)


Here is a video from the weekend! Enjoy!

ReCaP 2...

Here is the recap continued...

I got to babysit these two sweet kids one Saturday night. Their parents are missionaries from the States and they are working here in Greece. They were seriously the most well-behaved kids I have ever watched! Before we went to bed, we got to say prayers, read books, and the cutest of all was they sang some Christian songs...Oh and they call me Miss Ashley and it is so adorable!


Here is Fivos and I getting stuff ready for the Sunday school class that we teach...We look so serious..haha...It was really encouraging that Sunday because Fivos and I had procrastinated a bit with getting our lesson ready and we were going back and forth with how we wanted to teach them...but it ended up turning out really well and the kids were opening up their bibles and finding the answers on their own so it was really great!


Here we are doing ministry at Omonia Square on Thursday nights...handing out croissants, tea, flyers, and trying to share Christ with the people living out on the streets...


A couple of friends and I went to a cafeteria (a.k.a. a coffee shop) one night. They are everywhere here in Greece! If you can believe it I am actually starting to like cappuccino...ahhh! I never thought I would say that!


Ok, awesome story with this picture so I will tell it...Ignore the fact that I look a little freaky in the picture...haha...So last week, I took an Open Air Evangelism class. I was not too excited about this class when I heard about it because it is not really my thing...Going out on the street corner and painting pictures while evangelizing to people but my opinion did change a bit after the class. All we really did in class was paint, which was awesome, and learned how to tell stories. So one of the requirements for the class was we had to go out that week and evangelize but I asked my teacher if I could do it with the Muslim refugee kids that I work with and he said that would be fine. It was not the easiest task since if your remember these kids don't speak English or Greek so I had to paint a picture without words on the board and still keep it simple for them and my Farsi translator. I prayed about this all day before I had to tell it because I was nervous and did not know how it was going to go over with the kids. I knew something was probably going to go wrong...Well, when we got there...There was barely any kids, maybe 10 or so (there are usually 40 or more) and they were all young, which was bad because my story was for kids a little older...So I started to freak out a bit and tried to think of a Plan B but then I just realized all I could do was pray that these kids would still understand the story...We found out there weren't that many people because it was cold out, it was only like 40 degrees but that's cold to them here! Well, I started to paint my story out and when I looked back, every kid's eyes were glued on me. I had all their attention, which I have never had! They were totally interested in what I was painting and by this time a dew more older kids had come in. Well, I told the bible story about forgiveness and how we need to forgive people because Jesus was sent to us hear on earth to forgive us for our sins so that we could spend eternal life with him. Usually, the translation does not go over very well and I have to repeat myself while I am talking but this time it was awesome and I never had to repeat myself! At the end of the story, I told the kids that if any of them were interested in knowing more about Jesus and why He died on the cross for them them they could come up to me afterwards. Well, what do ya know?! A little ten year old Muslim boy came up and started to ask us all these questions about Jesus and why He died for us and we tried to explain it to him more. It was amazing...I have never had the kids attention and interest that much. It was such an answer to prayer so I will definitely be using this method to teach them again and you can be praying for it!


This is my lovely, wonderful, amazing roommate, Sarah!