jonah

sometimes being a girl is so annoying.

we can experience every emotion under the sun at the same time! how is that even possible?

the other week was one of those weeks where the tears just wouldn't stop flowing. it was verging on ridiculousness actually, and being able to step back now to rationally view the problem, my issues weren't really that big a deal.

oh well. (ach jo)

one of my issues was a bitter, angry heart. i was just straight up angry and couldn't get over it. didn't want to talk to God about it either. i even googled, "how to pray with a bitter heart" (by the way - it wasn't helpful).

so once i was over it, i decided i should probably try to figure out how to pray when i'm angry, because i can't just let my emotions pick and choose when i can talk to God.

i came across the book of jonah one evening on my train ride home. the man has some serious anger, which i can totally relate to. he's almost like a girl.

God tells him to go to ninevah, so what does he do? he goes to Tarshish. you find out later he flees to tarshish because he was afraid God would be merciful to ninevah.

so, on the way to tarshish, God sends a big storm, and everyone on the boat almost dies. what's jonah doing? sleeping.

after casting lots, they fund out that jonah's the reason for the storm - because he ran from God. jonah knows the best thing they can do is throw him overboard, and so eventually they do. the storm stops, and jonah's swallowed up by a big fish.

what's cool is that God still pursued jonah in his disobedience.

for 3 days, jonah stays inside of the fish, and while he's there, he prays this beautiful prayer. seriously, it's awesome. it's like a david prayer, and he ends with praising the God of salvation.

then the fish throws him up on land, and he goes on with obeying God's command to go to ninevah.

at this point i sound very much like jonah - run from God, pursued by God, pray some beautiful prayers, and then obey God.

so jonah walks around ninevah, telling the city that in 40 days they'll be doomed.

but the people repent, and so God decides to save them. this is where we get to the good part:

JONAH DOESN'T LIKE IT.

he doesn't like that God is going to save the city (keep in mind, in my anger, i don't want God to show grace to others), and he doesn't like it so much that he sits outside of the city and sulks about it. he even tells God it would be better if he just died (drama queen!)

then, because it's so hot, God grows a plant for him overnight to provide him with shade. this makes jonah happy. but the next night, God has a worm come that eats up the plant, and then God sends a wind which makes jonah even more hot.

and again, he's not happy. so unhappy - so ANGRY - that again, he wants to just die.

and God lets him know that that's enough. God gave him that plant, and He took it away. it's not up to jonah.

so i don't know erally what this teaches us, but hey - God loves angry, disobedient Jonah. he made us girls with tons of annoying emotions, and we're perfect and sinless to him. that's amazing.

english camp reunion

so tessa and i didn't actually go to english camp this year, but we were still allowed to go to the reunion with the awesome pardubice youth group.

so we relaxed in the mountains, and these mountains were amazing. they were so steep that it literally took my breath away. on saturday we went out in groups, blindfolded, and had to do some crazy things in the mountains. unfortunately there are no pictures from it, but we had to:
-all be blindfolded (but one person - our leader)
-one person had to be "sick" and carried up the mountain (that was me)
-two people had to have their legs tied together

cars even had to stop for us. 5 people walking up a mountain, blindfolded. one blindfolded person being carried by a blindfolded person, two blindfolded people with their legs tied together. and one leader, laughing at everyone. it was great.
my favorite memory is skipping down a ski slope, holding eliska's hand, with these amazing views in sight. can't beat it.

plus we got to spend time with some pretty amazing people. my camera died (of course), but i got some good shots of the mountain.

meet some friends.

this is lucka. she's one of the sweetest people you'd ever meet

eliska is one of my faves. she does some great embarrassing things which i always catch her doing :) she'll also be teaching us some czech!

tessa, burak, me, and terka. such fun girls. these two went to english camp this year and now come out to the youth group.

tessa, anca, lucie, burak, petra, me, and terka...my discussion group this past weekend :)

mushroom hunting 101

czech people go mushroom hunting.

i love mushrooms, and tessa and i were grocery shopping with a czech friend. we went to get some mushrooms, and she looked at us inquisitively and told us just to go into the forest. so we did, twice.

the first time was unsuccessful, but we learned what a good mushroom looks like. we went again a couple weeks ago, and we're still eating mushrooms from then. but tessa has those pictures :)

here's some documentation from our first attempt.

this is a bad mushroom! only good for pictures :)

adults

how i came to czech and began teaching only adults i have no idea.

but it happened, and while i don't mind it (and even at times enjoy it - not dealing with discipline, that is), i'm not passionate about reaching out to adults.

but they're pretty cool nonetheless.

they grew up in communism and witnessed the revolution, so they can compare the now and then. i've never learned so much about pre-revolution before.

pre-revolution, they all learned russian in school (they were under russian rule) and were told they'd never need to learn english. a few weeks after the revolution, russian wasn't allowed to be taught, and the russian teachers had to start teaching english. this meant that most of the time, the "english" teachers were only one lesson of english ahead of their students.

during communism, if your family outwardly disagreed with the party, you weren't allowed to study at the good high schools or go to university. Babicka (grandma in the Kotas family that's been taking care of us) wasn't allowed to teach because she was a christian. and if you were too smart, the same rule applied. i suppose they understood that they could be overrun or outsmarted.

one guy was studying in prague at the time, and went to some of the protests on the square. but he was home with his family during the days of the actual revolution, and when he returned to prague he didn't know that anything had happened!

all the men had to join the army for a year, either after high school or college. they apparently didn't do much, but if you were the best at a physical activity, you ccould have the weekend off.

amazing stories - i'm thankful that my parents and grandparents don't have stories like this to tell!

present or past perfect? or past simple or present continuous?

i hate tenses. to my core.

czech (though not an easy language) has three tenses. they're called past, present, and future.

so it's hard for them to differentiate between our different tenses - or to figure out when each tense is correct to use.

for example:

present simple: i run
present continuous: i am running
present perfect: i have run

(note how present perfect uses present tense "have," but past tense "run")

so, how do you tell people who are learning english when to use each of these? thankfully someone else came up with the rules. i have them copied down somewhere in case someone asks me.

last week i taught a lesson (singular lesson; i refuse to teach more on this terrible topic) about tenses, and we had an argument in class about several things, namely the following:

a) What were you talking about when I (come)____ in? Of course the correct form is came, but the argument was about why it couldn't be "was coming"

b) How long have you lived on your own
   1. in this flat?
   2. before you met Lisa?
well?

c) (fill in with correct past or present perfect form of have)
Carla says she ____ sent the email, but I'm sure she _____ because I've checked three times and it's not there.
my certain tough student argued that it should be past tense "had" because of the verb "checked"

uff. i can answer these questions (and will, if you so desire). but come on...how annoying are tenses?

am i a missionary?

i suppose the picture of the missionary is glorified (perhaps romanticized?) to some extent...going to foreign countries, sacrificing family and comfort, helping communities to grow and thrive.

and so i feel a bit disappointed when i take a step back and review what i've been doing the last months.

because i'm just busy with work. seriously, every evening this week i've been at work. and when i'm not at work i'm doing something where i get frustrated with language and having to learn a new culture. today i walked for an hour because i missed the only available bus back home and i was outside the city, and during my annoying walk i just got more frustrated with all the boundaries i have right now. then i went to work for a couple hours.

so there's my little, boxed-in picture of my pity-me-self.

the big picture is that i've only been here six (or seven?) weeks, my schedule will be settling down, and i won't just be working. the big picture is that part of my ministry is to my flatmate (failing at that one), the family that has blessed us so much, the students that i teach and prepare lessons for, and the church that i am a part of and that God loves.

thankfully the bigger picture is that God is greater than any of my frustrations or annoyances. i didn't expect most of what's happened here, but God did. he's got this one covered.

reveling in the knowledge that my burdens are not my own.