Category: Czech Republic

Every post I wrote while we lived overseas.

Another First: Dinner in a Czech Home

Post author By Shay
Post date July 24, 2014
1 Comment on Another First: Dinner in a Czech Home

This is what I saw when I walked in to the Creative Communications office this morning. Water…and lots of it.

All over the desks, on the keyboard of one of the computers, and on the floor. How did this happen you ask? Our office is on the third floor and the ceiling slopes. There are no windows on the walls but they are ceiling windows that open. They were left open all night (not by me, but I’ll protect the guilty on this blog). It was raining pretty good this morning so when I got there you can imagine my shock. Thankfully and amazingly nothing was broken! But still… talk about an early morning heart attack. Yikes.

Earlier this week we got invited by Marcel and Silvie to have dinner at their house. They live in our town and had already invited Yorman family over (American missionaries) so they asked if we wanted to join them. Marcel and Silvie are part of our church here and Marcel has been helping me get our Internet upgraded at our apartment. They are a sweet couple and have two little ones, Dennis and Julia. Here’s a picture of all of us (minus me, of course):

We enjoyed a great time tonight just talking and enjoying the time at a Czech home. Believe it or not, this was the very first meal we have ever had in a Czech home. Silvie made a delicious dinner. I have no idea what’s it’s called but she hand made this piecrust-like bread filled with eggs, ham, cabbage, cheese…mmm, so good–I had 3 helpings! Here’s a few photos of the all the food and the amazing vine covered patio area:

Before and after dinner the kids played in the beautiful back yard. There was a great swing set and lots of toys to play with. Behind their property were turkeys running around so I had to get a few shots of them too!

Marcel thought everyone had eaten too much and suggested a walk to the nearby park with all the kids. We all agreed and off we went! For the kids it was more of a run than a walk, but I didn’t expect the incredible park we went to. One of the things we’ve loved about Czech is just how kid friendly things are and even how there are parks with lots of things to play on that you won’t find in safety conscious America. Merry go rounds, zip lines, teeter totters–this park had it all!

Here’s a video of the kids and me on the merry go round (I gave it an old-timey feel because it felt like a blast from the past):

It was a really fun night with Marcel and his family and the Yorman family. We’re so thankful for their hospitality to us tonight and for making us feel welcome here in Czech!

Tags Czechs, dinner, first things first, park

365 Czech Republic

Ministry Beginning and Enjoying Family Time

Post author By Shay
Post date July 24, 2014
2 Comments on Ministry Beginning and Enjoying Family Time

Years of prayer went in to today. For over three years Josiah Venture has been praying and actively searching for a team of people who will help create materials and provide support in the area of communications for the entire JV family. Today, with the exception of one team member who will be back next week, that team was working away in the JV offices together for the first time (shown above). The Creative Communications team that I have the privilege of serving on is a group of highly talented people, all missionaries, who work to support all of the ministries of JV by providing high quality materials such as design work, video, photography, writing, and lots more. Let me give you an example of something we’re working on right now.

Above you’ll see me sitting in Dave Patty’s home office here in Czech (thanks to his wife and daughter for grabbing some photos for our blog!). Dave is the president of Josiah Venture, but he’s also a highly gifted leader and a wonderful person to spend time with. Dave and I met today to work through a few new projects. Right now Dave, along with one of the JV country leaders, is developing training material specifically designed to train young, Christian leaders. The project includes booklets for leadership trainers and trainees to use which include Biblical studies tools that help build mature disciples of Christ. Alongside the book is a Web site for the trainer as a support tool where Dave and other staff can provide additional information for leaders to be able to use so they can go out and train more leaders. All of these materials will be made available to the 13 different countries JV currently serves in. But who will create all of those books and materials? Who will build and maintain a Web site with multiple languages and updated content? The Creative Communications team or “cTeam.” And the best part is…we love doing it!

Dave said something today that just hit me. I don’t want to misquote him, but he said something to the effect of, “These materials will lead to more fruit.” He’s talking about spiritual fruit and he’s talking about more followers of Christ. Dave knows the power of God’s Word working through the Spirit of God in the hands of people, and these materials reflect much Biblical study and thought and focus. The cTeam gets to be part of helping create them alongside Dave and other leaders and we too can hope and pray for more fruit. That’s why we’re here…that’s why God called us to this place. And that’s where it gets fun, and that’s where it really gets exciting!

After my time with Dave, I head the pleasure of spending a few minutes with his wife Connie and daughter Claire. If you haven’t visited it, I would recommend checking out Connie’s blog that she regularly writes on. It was fun to chat and laugh with them a bit this afternoon. Lord willing our family will get a lot more time with them!

Back at home Bethany took the kids to the park that’s close to our place. It’s a really fun park and the kids have lots of things they can climb on (as you can see above). We just love the look of the buildings on our street…it’s still really surreal that we live here, and I think that’s why Bethany took that photo just to show the kinds of places we see every day. Apparently it started to rain a bit while they were playing at the park and everyone ran for shelter, but Bethany said Titus braved the rain to keep playing (shown below).

After I got home we enjoyed a little time playing basketball outside. Titus was so excited to get his basketball hoop setup and all the basketballs pumped up. I’ve been wanting to do that for him for a while now, but just found the time tonight.

Bethany made a wonderful dinner tonight. She told me tonight that she is really trying hard to write down all the meals she knows she can make here in Czech. I think it’s also getting a lot easier to manage all the new things at the grocery store! Bethany has been doing so awesome and I’m very thankful for her selfless attitude during this transition time.

Here’s a few more photos from our evening together:

And our feast this evening… Pioneer Woman’s meatloaf and creamy mashed potatoes. Yummy!

Tags cTeam, ministry

365 Czech Republic

Bananas and Gummy Bears

On my way out the door this morning Bethany handed me two things: a banana and a package of gummy bears. Why? I’m pretty sure she was just anticipating my needs. I had to get a little bit of work done today at the JV office so she knows I’ll probably need something to snack on when I get hungry (banana) and then something sweet when I get tired (gummy bears). Only the best wives can anticipate those kinds of needs. She’s a great wife.

There’s a little restaurant near the JV offices which offers very affordable lunch specials so I went there today with a Czech named Dushan. He’s a quieter guy, but really nice. He works doing IT for Josiah Venture and he speaks pretty good English so we had a good time together this afternoon. He told me he was “alone” this week because his wife and kids were away for a few days with family while he’s working, but that he was going to see them again soon. I was glad to join him so he could have a little company at least for one meal.

We did one of those American style trips to the grocery store tonight. By that I mean we tried shopping for multiple days worth of meals. It seems that culturally they shop daily or every other day, but I guess we’re just used to shopping for more at once and since we have a larger refrigerator we can basically make it work. The only problem is you have to bag your own groceries and people don’t like waiting for you, so Bethany and I begin the mad hustle of trying to bag everything and keep it going in the cart while the kids are playing with everything and talking louder than the other kids…it feels crazy. And maybe it is? Maybe we’re trying to fit a square peg in a round hole and we just need to adjust. Definitely something for us to think about.

Bethany and the kids enjoyed a little picnic outside today. The weather was very nice and comfortable. Not too hot, but not cold. We had the windows open tonight and a nice breeze was blowing through our place. I thought it was supposed to rain today, but I didn’t feel a drop. Rain or not, it was nice to have a little break from the recent heat.

That’s it for me tonight. Time for bed and we’ll do this again tomorrow!

Tags Czech, Dushan, picnic, weather

365 Czech Republic

Thunder and Thankfulness

It rained today. Actually it was a really fun thunder and lighting storm. Us southern California kids aren’t used to thunder and lighting, but it’s definitely an exciting change. The rain also helped cool the temps down today which was a good break.

I spent most of the day at the JV offices which is about a 30 minute drive from where we live. I carpooled with a friend who also works out of that office. My team is working on a lot of fun projects that I’m hoping to share about at some point on the blog. Right now it’s just a lot of meetings and face time with other JV staff which is really fun for me.

Tonight Bethany made a really good meal and we enjoyed our first meal together as a family on our new dining table. We enjoyed a little family time tonight reading books and doing a large circle kids puzzle. Bethany got about 3 more moving boxes emptied today, mostly books that she’s put on our new bookshelves. After the kids went to bed we spent a lot of time working through our budget and making sure our accounts are in order. The past month has just been crazy. Looking at receipts and entering things into our budget software was just reminding how much we have done this month. God has been so faithful to us.

One of the best things about writing daily is it gives me a constant reminder of God’s goodness and leads me to thankfulness. I’ms sure that harder days will come, but right now I feel like the Lord is just simply letting us settle here without a lot of major interruption. For that I’m definitely thankful. I’m thankful for my hard working wife and our two little ones. I’m thankful to serve the Lord in this capacity. I’m thankful that God provides just what we need and even sometimes gives us a little more than that. I’m thankful for new friends and even old friends who took the time this week to call us from the States. I’m thankful that God has brought us here, taken us on an amazing journey, and continues to work in our lives.

Tags storm, thankful, working

365 Czech Republic

Church and the Zoo

Another Sunday in Czech and another great day with God’s people. Our church here in Czech has long been partnering with an American church and Welsh church to put on an English camp near our town. Today those two churches (the American and Welsh churches) came to our church to share about this past week’s camp and what God had done. In the above video, the whole camp sang “10,000 Reasons” and our friends said it was the first time they had ever heard an English song in this church since they came here three years ago. What’s neat too is that Bethany said she had prayed this morning that they would sing a song she knew the melody too. Obviously, the Lord provided the melody and the language. Amazingly, they also sang “How Great Thou Art” in Czech later in the service!

Today our friends Casey and Kristin (along with their two boys) took us to the zoo in Ostrava! We had talked about it earlier in the week and we thought this Sunday would be a good time to go and it definitely was. Although it was a little hot outside, we had a great time. The funny thing about the zoo here is it’s a whole lot more than a zoo. It’s very kid friendly and there must be a dozen little parks as well as water play areas. The kids loved it! We probably spent 70% of our time playing and the other 30% looking at animals. The Ostrava zoo is very nice and the prices of food and drinks is super reasonable so we enjoyed a lunch together as well. It was a really fun day enjoying the weather, friends, and the amazing animals that God created. Here’s a bunch of photos from our day.

Tags animals, church, kids, zoo

365 Czech Republic

If You Build It…

Today was mostly a “building day.” By “building” I mean I built a lot of IKEA furniture. In fact, I did some work with the screwdriver that I have two blisters on the palm of my hand as souvenirs from today’s IKEA marathon.

IKEA furniture is great, especially in Europe. It’s pretty reasonably priced, they are designed for smaller spaces (like European housing), and for the most part they are easy to build. After a while you just get the hang of where to put the little wooden pegs and how things go together. Today I built 2 book cases and our dining room table. Here’s a few photos (please forgive the mess, we’re building for your future enjoyment):

While I was putting together furniture, Bethany was hard at work trying to clear a walking path in our bedroom. It looks great in there, but it’s not quite photo ready. Our kids have been doing pretty well playing in their room and enjoying their toys again. Titus liked “helping” me by poking holes in cardboard with a screwdriver. We’ve amassed large amounts of cardboard the past few weeks so I’ve been taking trips to the recycling bin down the street pretty often. Today I took two huge chunks down there and tried to get it as flat as possible. When the piles are in the house both Titus and Avery will play and jump on them.

Speaking of Titus, he took advantage of Avery’s nap to work on constructing a “snake” with his building blocks. Below is a photo of him. He was very proud of his creation.

Also, he must’ve gotten ahold of Bethany’s phone because we found this photo on it tonight.

The weather has been very warm of late. It’s been in the upper 80s, maybe low 90s, and it’s so humid you’re usually just dripping in sweat. They don’t have air conditioning really here, so we’re running fans and guzzling water just trying to stay hydrated and cool. That’s not always easy and I really felt it today. Bethany and I both found ourselves longing for winter which is really funny because the winters are long and cold here. I’m sure we’ll regret saying we want winter to come, but we’re just trying to adjust to this humid heat sans air conditioning.

We had a relaxing evening at our friend’s house tonight. They made chicken tortilla soup and it was really yummy. They have two young boys so our kids really enjoyed running around (literally) their house and yard. At one point they were running circles (again, literally) around the couch and then then the house. I’m really glad they have friends who they can play with already. That’s a joy and a blessing for sure. It was nice to work hard today and then rest this evening. I’m looking forward to our fourth Sunday at church tomorrow!

Tags building, cleaning, furniture, IKEA

365 Czech Republic

First Haircuts

Believe it or not, I was genuinely concerned about getting a haircut in Czech. I think it’s because for the past 6.5 years I could literally walk downstairs at Paul Mitchell where I worked and April would cut my hair. Nobody wants a bad haircut. If you get a bad haircut, you’re stuck. For at least 4 weeks, maybe 6 you have a “thing” sticking out of your hair some place or one side is just not right now or… who knows?! But today, my fears were washed away in a nice salon sink on the 2nd floor of the building with the ATM at the bottom. Actually, they were washed away twice and she used some nice L’oreal soap!

Titus and I both got great haircuts today! Zuska is awesome and even though she can’t speak any English and I can’t speak any Czech she understands me gesturing with my hands. For Titus, I showed her a photo Bethany gave me of some kid on Pinterest and she took very literal, to point that she busted out the hair dryer and was flipping Titus’ hair up in the front exactly like the photo. It was great. My favorite part was when I was getting my hair cut Titus had to go potty. So Zuska saw him doing the potty dance and took him to the bathroom, helped him with his pants, and he came back out with his shirt tucked in (which we never really do). Again, it was great. Zuska even brought Titus some books to read while daddy was getting a trim. It was fun day. Titus and I walked back to our apartment from the salon and showed mommy. She was happy, I was happy…it was great.

Tags fun, haircuts, Titus

365 Czech Republic

Trains, Tolls, and Trusting Jesus in the Noise

Post author By Shay
Post date July 17, 2014
1 Comment on Trains, Tolls, and Trusting Jesus in the Noise

There a lot sounds where we live. Next door is a Catholic church with bells that ring literally every 15 minutes. On the hour, a quarter passed, a the half hour, a quarter till, and then on the hour again. They ring when there’s a call for mass and I’m pretty someone just rings them out sometimes for the fun of it. They ring all night with no breaks.

On our container day these very loud horns rang out from the fire station across the street from us. Come to find out those horns were actually going off because of four fallen Czech soldiers in Afghanistan, however, those same horns will go off every first Wednesday of the month as an emergency test. Something to look forward to, I guess. Forgive my sarcasm.

Trains pass often and they are only about 200 feet from our place, just next to the fire station across the street. In fact, we can smell the diesel as they pass. Sometimes they pass every 2 minutes, like right now as I’m writing. Most of them are passenger trains and are short, but loud. Sometimes longer trains pass. Often we’ll just shut the windows, but if you have them open Avery will say, “too loud!” Even Titus came into our room the other night and said, “I hear the train.”

For those of you who know the story of our condo in the States, you know that noise is something we have dealt with. I remember during sleepless nights just wondering if it would ever end. But I also remember a few conversations with Bethany where we specifically said, “The Lord may just be preparing us for Czech.” Everything we went through with the HOA for years–taking them to court, winning the case, the HOA appealing, and finally losing the case–it was something God was doing with us, or for us. He was preparing us for noise. The trains, the tolls of the bells, and the sounds we hear are just something we have to live with and God has prepared us for it.

You might think I’m complaining about noise, and that’s not it. I’m saying that I believe God was strategically doing things in our lives before we came here to prepare us for this. We love our new place. No doubt we’re adjusting to everything, but we’re making it our home. It’s coming together and Bethany is doing a great job getting curtains, decorating and making it home…our home. It’s fun watching it come together! And it’s fun to see God’s hand at work in our lives years ago to get us ready for this new life. Praise Him for His faithfulness to us and for always providing everything we need and taking care of us. As the hymn says, “Tis so sweet to trust in Jesus…” He is worthy to be trusted with our lives, even the noise in our lives.

Now for some photos (captions below each).

Here’s a shot of my desk in our new place. I’ve got this corner just about square away and it’ll be my little office at the house. That frame in the window says, “Never stop learning” and I can’t wait until I can hang it some place prominent as a daily reminder.

Here’s us at the bank today trying to open a Czech bank account. Looks like it’s going to happen after we fill out some paperwork and get some things cleared. It’ll be nice to easily pay our bills (and rent!) online.

More Czech lessons today! We’re working on simple stuff but even that can be challenging. I better finish this post so I can get to studying!

I guess Titus is tired of building IKEA furniture?

Tags bells, noise, trains, trust

365 Czech Republic

“What people are bad robot”

Post author By Shay
Post date July 16, 2014
1 Comment on “What people are bad robot”

“What people are bad robot.” That’s a translation we came up with tonight while studying Czech. It’s also about as clear as we are on this new language.

Tomorrow we’ll have our second formal Czech lesson and Jitka (our teacher) got us our new books and gave us a little homework. Czech is not easy. There’s no doubt in my mind about that. Just the basic greetings and salutations can be enough to make my head spin right now. There is a lot of formality to the greetings when you’re talking to someone you don’t know and if you use the informal and not the formal you can offend, so that’s a little tricky. I guess we’ll just have to take it step by step. See what I did there?

Even though there are no words, the IKEA instructions can sometimes be like learning a new language. I began building our wardrobe today and I’m just not in the groove of building IKEA furniture…yet. I messed up one hole and hammered something I wasn’t supposed to so I was little frustrated. In the end, I think I’ve got it right but I’m only half done. There’s another section to build and then I have to put the doors on. Hopefully I’ll have time this weekend to finish it off.

I’ve begun working a bit here in the Josiah Venture office and at home. My team (Creative Communications) has some big projects coming up and I’ve been helping with the discussions and starting to take a more active role. It’s been good to start slow here and get back to normalcy before diving head first, but I’m excited to get some projects going while we’re moving in and learning language.

Bethany made cookies tonight, but as she was about to put them in the oven I heard, “Oh no…” from the kitchen. Then I said, “What’s wrong?” Bethany replied sadly, “My cookie sheets don’t fit in the oven.” Welcome to Europe. Our tiny little oven/stove just doesn’t cut it with these big cookie sheets. Thankfully the oven has a few other sheets included with it so Bethany cleaned them and we used those. We got some great cookies, but I’m guessing we’ll probably have to get some cookie sheets that actually fit. Here’s a fun fact about Czech: you can’t really buy chocolate chips. Bethany brought a huge Costco size bag of them here, but if you want to make chocolate chip cookies without importing, you need to cut the chocolate chips up yourself! Oh the humanity!

I feel bad for Titus sometimes. These photos (above) kind of symbolize a little bit how his life is right now: upside down. Yesterday he said, “Dad, I want to go to In-N-Out.” Sorry, pal. Then tonight he said, “We go swimming there?” in reference to our friend’s house in California. Can’t do that either, buddy. I know this probably isn’t as hard on him as I think it is, but I also know that he understands our life is much different than it was before. We’re trying real hard to explain things to him like taking off your shoes when you enter someone’s house (cultural thing in Czech), and it’s going pretty well. It’s just weird for me to be experiencing the change with him and not having the experience ahead of him. I guess it’s like language learning–we’ll just have to take it one step at a time.

Tags kids, language

365 Czech Republic

Your World. Delivered.

I think it was a few years back, but AT&T had a little tagline they were using in their marketing. It just said, “AT&T…Your world. Delivered.” For some reason it just stuck with me and it summarizes well what we did today.

We spent the morning outside with the kids. The weather has been warm, but very nice. We’e been trying to find a good balance with making sure the kids are getting good, focused time with us and then unpacking and setting up our house. It’s going slow, but we’re making progress every day. The above photo is of the little yard we have access to at our apartment. Every time we open the garage Avery grabs all of the chairs so she can “sit in the shade,” as she says.

Our teammates and new friends John and Erin just had their first baby, a little boy named Shade. But they are good planners and asked us months ago if we could spare a little room in our container to bring them an American baby crib. Once we knew how our space was looking we told them yes so they had it delivered to our house in California and we put it on the container. Today we had the privilege of delivering it over to John and Erin here in Czech. It took me a bit to figure out how to arrange the seats in our new car to get it to fit, but we got it in and I’m excited that their little family will be able to enjoy it now. If you look in the photo above you’ll see the top box has a number “3” and little hearts around it. It was box number 3 of our 200+ items and I think since Bethany loves babies it got the added hearts.

Sometimes when you drive you get stuck behind a tractor and a bike rider.

The last thing on the agenda today was to take a big trip to IKEA for a bunch of much needed furniture and lights. It’s been hard to know exactly what things we really need and how much space we have to accommodate those things. Tonight we got a lot of great things including our wardrobe, new lights for the kitchen, low wattage light bulbs to save money, and a carpet for one of our living rooms (yes, it’s like we have more than one…hard to explain). We had a few more items on our list, but we just couldn’t fit it all in our car.

We’re planning another trip back to IKEA which is about 35 minutes away from where we live, but we’re thankful to have the funds we need to setup our home and space here. Things are starting to coming together. Slowly, but surely we’ll have a home that feels like home and when that day comes we’ll definitely post photos! Until then, here’s a few from our time at IKEA today.

The sky as we drove tonight was just amazing. Czech is a beautiful country, and we love the clouds that roll through our part of the country. Bethany told the kids, “Look, it looks like heaven!” and Avery repeated loudly, “DADDY! It looks like heaven!” Yes. Yes, it does, Avery.

Tags car, driving, IKEA