name day.

So Hungary has a name lexicon from which people can name their kids. If the name you want isn't on the list, tough luck kids. The plus side to having such a lexicon is that everyone gets a name day! It's like a second birthday. So, if you're like some people who celebrate their half-birthdays as well as their birthdays, you could potentially get up to three parties in a year. Pretty impressive, if you ask me ;]

Anyway, Wednesday, November 25 was Katalin, Katinka Day. That's right, my name is on the lexicon. And what a name day it was.

It started at some unseemly hour in the morning when I had to awaken...but if I'm really going to be accurate about describing this day, I guess it began while I was still salsa dancing at 12. Some of my friends that I work with and I went dancing after the student leadership meeting on Tuesday night. Needless to say, my salsa-dancing skills were uninspired, but everyone had fun nevertheless.

The reason I was now up is because Izi was going to teach me my first Hungarian lesson! It was so fun...we went through greetings and the alphabet. I confess that I still need to study. All 46 letters. There are some interesting ones, since letter combinations are included in the alphabet (i.e. if the English ch was a letter...). Dzs is the J sound, so if your name is Jennifer, you would spell it Dzsenifer.

The day just kept on being wonderful because after the language lesson, I met with a student at one of the universities here who I had first talked to last week. During this meeting, I was able to share the gospel with her and she made the decision to accept Christ into her life! Praise God for his faithfulness and for working in her life before we ever met! It was awe-inspiring to be able to sit next to this girl, who had just decided to make the most important decision of her life, and be able to pray with her to the everlasting God. I was encouraged because she told me that she could see the joy and hope in my life, which I know all comes from God. He is the one who was speaking to her, and he is the one who was preparing her heart for that day. It is the most beautiful thing in the world to see someone understand their position in relation to God, to feel their sin, and to desire the sacrifice of Jesus Christ in their lives so that they may experience a restored relationship with the God who created them.

In case you're wondering, my day peaked at 10:40am :] It doesn't get much better than that.

When I arrived back at the flat, Flóra surprised me with some name day treats. A mix of cookies and bubbles. As long as I remembered to swallow the cookie before I blew any bubbles, we were all good...

I also received a priceless treasure from another friend:

A health and safety advisory to remind me that, since I do not like tomatoes, I should not eat them. My friends keep me healthy :]

My night ended at the Fék weekly meeting, which was music night...

The Ambience...

The People...

The Talent...

Students could play and the Fék band played some favorites before Noémi Virág played. She is a music artist who is also a believer. It was a great end to a blessed day.

hot hoops.

There is nothing like avoiding something you're supposed to be doing by writing a blog. 'Tis a sweet distraction. A double edged sword. A...ok, maybe I'm getting a smidge dramatic.

Perhaps I shall write about some authentic happenings in Budapest.

Two weeks ago we had our Fall Retreat for students and it was awesome to see how God was working in everyone's lives. Students shared their testimonies and speakers talked about different facets of God. It was very encouraging to learn more about God's character.

My free time was, of course, filled with very spiritual activities, including, but not limited to:

1. MASH
2. Eating dessert
3. Walking in the fog
4. Playing extreme tournaments of this toy basketball game called 'Hot Hoops' (I lost most of the time and my finger was pretty tired afterward...what a workout...did I mention that I was playing with 10-year-olds?).

(These are not 10-year-olds)

[Balázs (left) is a Hot Hoops aficionado: "No flash photography please"]

For those of you who are secretly dying to know (and you know you are), after honeymooning in Norway I will live in shack in North Korea with my one kid while working as a jeep driving pirate. There were some technicalities with the 'dude' portion of the game, so the results are, unfortunately, inconclusive ;]

Fast forward to yesterday and I must tell you that it was a simply gorgeous day in Budapest. So wonderful, in fact, that I was motivated, for the first time ever in Hungary, to go for a "jog". Now don't get too excited. Running stinks, so all I can say for the experience is that it was marginally successful and that I am marginally sore today. Was this a lame story? Probably. Will I ever be motivated to run in Hungary again? Who knows? Not me...

But I do know, that you should have a lovely day!

budapest movie.

“We wanted to introduce Budapest as a city which is more than a mass of buildings. We wanted to look behind the buildings and show the intellectual power and invention potential that we have”, said István Madarász, the multiple award-winner director of the Get Engaged! movie.

-Budapest Business Region

ship the meat?

Drooling over the box of American candy, Rivers and I contemplated the ethical dilemma we were seemingly in. On one hand, no one was watching us hovering above the student prizes...on the other, the presentation that night was to be on business ethics. Oh, sweet temptation.

It was 7pm and we were at Tarkarét, the freshman dorm for Corvinus University, preparing for our English Club. This one was more energized than normal because we had six American businesspeople there with us for BHHP (Bringing in the Hungarian Harvest Project) Week. And when Americans come they bring candy...prizes...music...pizza...and PowerPoint! [ok, maybe I'm the only one who gets excited about PowerPoint...]

This is the dorm that Rivers, Rocco and I have been holding English Clubs at for the month of September, so we were hoping for a large turnout. Our boss-man, Laci, thought that maybe 20 would show, so with that in mind, we set up our room and went out to knock on doors.

Tangent Time: One cultural difference between Hungarian and American dorms is the door-knocking policy. Whereas in the states, we knock and wait, in Hungary, we do the knock n' go. Vast potential for awkward moments. For example (you knew there would be an example, didn't you?), one night last week, Eszter and I were passing out fliers in a dorm. Now, Eszter is a conservative door-knocker, meaning that she waits to hear if someone calls, "come in" before entering. That being said, there were several problems with this policy:

1. The doors are like THIS THICK.
2. Near fatal miscommunication of the head-nod.

So this is the situation. We knock. I am looking at Eszter, who is looking at the door, who is just sitting there being all thick and stuff. Someone on the other side says something indiscernible. I am still looking at Eszter and she is still looking at the door. She nods and issues a slight shrug, which I would later recognize to mean, "Yes! A student is home! But I don't know what they said, so let's wait and see if they will come to the door..." Not knowing this, however, I only see the nod. So I start to open the door.

Opening...

Opening...

Opening...

SHRIEKING! SHRIEKING!

Close door.

Run. Away.

Stop. Stare at each other.

Knock again on way back down hall.

Moving along, once all the fliers were passed out, Rivers and I played some ultimate foosball with a couple of students downstairs---and by played, I mean stood there while the guys basically went back to playing one-on-one, just more...challenged.

So a little while later...the English Club actually started, and not 20, but 45 students came! We all got closer to one another into the Tanuló...and Matt began his talk on ethics. The point was to encourage students to examine their values, and he explained that his value system comes from Jesus, who taught the reasons behind rules (i.e. rule: no sex until marriage; reason: so that people can be physically pure). He also had a scenario for us to discuss in small groups (to allow students to talk about their personal values). What follows is the abridged version:

You are the manager of a Hungarian meat-packing company. There has just been a report of an outbreak of E. Coli. You do not know if the E. Coli comes from your meat or not, and it will take the government one week to test all your meat. However, you have a shipment to make to a large client worth 200,000,000 forint ($1 Million). If you do not make the shipment, you will lose this money and probably all future business from the client. If you do ship the meat, you risk sending an infected product.

Would you ship the meat or not? Why?

Some great conversation followed and then we had a RAFFLE! By then it was time for us to peace out after a successful event. But there will be much more to come on the rest of BHHP week, so stay tuned!

And please pray that students come back to the English Club tomorrow night (Monday) [:

pattogatott kukorica.

Get some popcorn, ladies and gentlemen, and sit back and enjoy a video feast of what's been happening in Hungary for the past month ministry-wise!

All the videos were made by one of our fearless leaders, Laci. The first film documents our Student Survival Kit outreach. We use the contacts from this to follow-up with university students who indicate that they would be interested in talking more about God.

2009.09 :: Survival Kits from Laszlo Baczynski on Vimeo.

The second video documents the illustrious Staff Day and our canoe trip along the Danube. There's nothing like hard physical labor to cement your team ;]

200909 :: teamday :: csapatnap from Laszlo Baczynski on Vimeo.

And the last film is part humorous, part serious, and mostly embarrassing for yours truly (maybe I'm exaggerating :]). This weekend is Fall Retreat for all the universities in Michigan, and all of the students will be seeing this video, which is a promotion encouraging them to pray and inviting them to come to Budapest for Spring Break, SpeakOut, or do a STINT year! So if you're a student reading this...cooooooome toooo Huuuungaaaryyy...but seriously.

200909 :: Michigan Cru Retreat from Laszlo Baczynski on Vimeo.

On Sunday, a group of American Businesspeople are arriving to do outreach here. They will host English Clubs in the dorms, Evangelism, and be able to visit university English classes. Please pray for our weekly meeting and that we would be able to form meaningful relationships with students!

happy birthday!

Today is a very special day, because it is my cousin, Mercedes' Birthday! We always have lots of fun together, and I thought I'd put together a photo list of our favorite activities :]

1. Drawing and reading (lots and lots...and lots of books :])

2. Making faces.

3. Making faces while playing with stuffed animals.

4. Just being goofy...Mercedes, I want my sock back ;D

5. Going on crazy hay rides through the woods!

6. Slurping our food (yes, chicken can be slurped).

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MERCEDES!

I LOVE YOU!!!

over my head.

She said it was just a roommate dinner. Consequently, I did not find it suspicious that she banned me from the apartment until 7:30pm; nor did I catch on the night before when Nikki said, "See you tomorrow" and, in light of my quizzical expression, proclaimed, "Just kidding!" I didn't even get it at 7:20pm when Melinda literally smacked her forehead and said, "Oh, I'm so silly. I forgot to ask Flora something about bible study...can I stop by your apartment quick?"

We arrived and I walked into a SURPRISE! It was a 'welcome party' for the Americans from all the students! As I write this, admittedly, I am still a bit in shock from it all. I can't believe all the effort everyone took to pull off this surprise. And surprised I was...I have been well and truly had :]

The party featured the artistic designs from several talented individuals (there was even a decoration team). Susie sketched the portraits, she and Hajni made the paprika necklace, and Eliza made the awesome map that shows everyone's favorite cities in Hungary.
And then there was the food! A table full of Hungarian dessert items, I was obliged to try them all, but found that it wasn't such a hard thing to do...

The rest of the night consisted of music, games, and watching the guys eat paprika and pretend it was hot.

Eventually, the party train had to leave the station, and the aftermath still sits by our front door.
As I reflect on the night, so many emotions are surfacing. I am humbled, thankful, and so blessed. Perhaps the idea that stood out to me the most was that they started planning this night to welcome us into their culture before we even arrived in Budapest. And that couldn't have been inspired by anything other than a Christ-like love, which floors me. Psalm 139 talks about how God loved us and made plans for us before we were even born--before a single day had passed. And these students are living that picture out. They thought of me before they knew me. And they acted on faith. I am so incredibly blessed because I get to wake up every day with the knowledge that God planned this out before life began, that he called me to be here, and that he has prepared a place for me here.

You saw me before I was born.

Every day of my life was recorded in your book.

Every moment was laid out

before a single day had passed.

Psalm 139:16