Athens, Greece

From an email to my dad... from Athens, Greece & the discovery of LEGOS:

Mom and i are here at an internet cafe, waiting out a rain storm that just came in!


we came out of the the National Archaeological Museum and bam! dark clouds swirling, thunder, and we tried to head to the metro, but saw an internet cafe, so ducked in, just before the rain came down! its clearing up a bit now, but its good to take a break.
thanks for your email; mom says hi!

"Quick" Updates; Spain, Switzerland, & Italy

Hi dear friends and family!

I am in Rome tonight... heading to Athens tomorrow morning to meet my MOM for a mother/daughter Greek week!! 
She's coming to spend Thanksgiving with me, and i think we're going to check out the cool stuff around Athens (like the pillars and buildings from a LONG time ago, and maybe visit some places like Corinth and Thessalonika, and maybe the Island of Patmos.

Pics: Switzerland L'Abri Adventures

L'Abri (Pronounced: La'Bree) was where I found myself for a few days in Switzerland.  I was so thankful to be able to stay there.  It was a large chalet, with about 20 young adults (mostly from the U.S.) living there for 1-2 semesters, taking a break from life to investigate their Christian beliefs.  

Pics: Switzerland, Autumn Walk

I took the train from Barcelona to Switzerland; my first overnight train in Europe!  It was FUN!  At first the conductor put me in the wrong room, with guys, but then he realized his mistake, so I got to move down with a girl from Japan.  In the middle of the night, as we were going through France, the train stopped at the border and police got on.  They asked us all for our passports (which I found out was standard procedure traveling through Europe); they took them, checked them, and brought them back.  This was a little difficult for me to do at first, because I heard that I should NEVER NEVER let anyone else have my passport.  But I gave it to them anyway.  And it came back fine.  One of the girls next to us was taken off the train and questioned.

Into the Home Stretch...

Its hard to believe, but I only have a month and a little left to this amazing trip.

I remember thinking when 1 month for a vacation would have seemed L--ONG to me.

But now that i´ve been traveling for 9 1/2 months (i just had to stop and count on my fingers... Feb, March, April...), it is merely the final chapter in a long book.

How do you write a final chapter?

Pics: Barcelona, Spain

Pictures of Meeting Eric Johnson and his wife Gina, in Barcelona!

Going out to eat with them, visiting cathedrals; learning to use the Metro system for the first time on my whole trip - Thank you, Eric, for teaching me!!  Great conversations with them about traveling (they are avid world travelers as well) and about God.  Gina's family invited us over for dinner, and it was so nice to spend time with a local family.  Gina's mom is an amazing artist.

Pics: Madrid, Spain

In Spain, I stayed with Molly, a friend of a friend, who graciously invited me in to her home.  She didn't know me at all, but is a missionary from Indiana, a little younger than me, teaching English in a Spain elementary school and working with a Missionary Alliance church in Madrid. A friend connected us.

When we visited her school, it was the day before Halloween, which I found out is an American holiday, and the Spanish teachers were teaching all about it to their students.  I thought, "Great.  What a wonderful holiday to spread."  But in one class, they did have an apple-dunking game that was really fun.  I taught the kids how to press the apple against the bottom of the bucket to hold it there while they bit into it. Maybe it was cheating. But it was funny to see my group come up with dripping faces and the apple every time!