Making something useful out of something old

The property that we recently acquired has some old buildings and mainly an old village house. Our plan will be to someday just remove all the buildings and start a new structure. But in the meanwhile, since the village kindergarten building has not been repaired from the explosion, they asked to relocate in the old house. They are using two rooms in the house. And then, we received another request to use the other two rooms in the house for a hairdressing salon. Djusha, who took hairdressing at the Planters training center, wants to open up her own salon in the village. We can't wait to show you pictures of this new enterprise in the village. It really pleases us to see her desire to use her new skills.

Women's Meeting

It was a great time getting to share with several of the ladies in the village who recently have accepted Christ. Just to understand and to learn what struggles they are dealing with in their "new life" is so special. They commented that the peace and joy they have experienced in their walk is something they never have had before. I think we could have talked all day if we had the time. The picture doesn't include Noci who left early to take care of her little boy who was at home.

Monday News

Today was a day off for most business and schools. It is a muslim feast day and so we thought it best not to do any home visits when families are getting together for a special day. We took the opportunity to get some more paper work done and meeting with friends for coffee.

Notes of Interest

Saturday morning during our children's meeting, this little guy, Kevi, came with his homemade bow. Arjan, the leader of Vlashi village, is so great with these little ones. He has been working with Planters for 10 years. This is such a blessing!

We were able to visit Vera in her shop last evening. She loves to have people stop in and just chat with her. She is doing great but like so many of the rest of us would enjoy having business a little bit more healthy. Her shop carries a wide array of merchandise but her main focus is to carry American made products. (don't we all wish that to be the case when we are shopping) Getting the merchandise into her shop is one of her biggest challenges.

Albania at its Finest

There is seldom a visitor that comes to Albania that doesn't say home visits are the highlight. We just got back to our computer after two days in the village where we were visiting everyone again. We just want to share with you some photos of our hosts. David sure seems to have a way with the "elder" group in the village. The baby, Pamela, was just born in August and was considered to be in danger and was delivered early. She looks and acts very healthy now. Djusha who is in the picture with both of us has just accepted Christ. She has been attending our girls' training center classes. There is more to tell of this story in a later blog post. The rain showers have followed us everywhere since we came. Thankfully, it isn't a bone chillin' rain. In fact, the air is more balmy than not.

Thursday is Kasalle Village Meeting

We were about to lose heart after working 5 hours and 3 techs to get our internet going. It was a joyous time to see "Google" again. We really don't want to know what happened to the cable line from here to there. It was something like "community sharing" I think.
This morning we had a staff meeting with Genti and Shpresa and then this afternoon we took off for the village with Arjan's team to Kasalle. Today's story was Nicodemus. The children were very attentive listening but what really touched my heart was their singing that rang out from the building. I just stepped out to take a picture of the view from the balcony of the building where we meet. With the background sound of music of "Oh Be Careful Little Ears What you Hear", I couldn't help but reflect of the contrast of worlds as I snapped a picture of a mosque and a Catholic church just within a good throwing distance from us to them. Will these little minds someday be able to understand the meaning of all of this? Just like Nicodemus...hopefully they will ask the question of what it means to be "born again".

Leaving on a Jet Plane

It is that time again. Tomorrow we will be leaving to return to Albania to mainly get end of the year business done. Sounds like no fun to me. Anyway, we are looking forward to seeing everyone once again. The main thing is to get lots of pictures taken for some new blog posts so that all of you can enjoy the latest news. Next entry will be written from Tirana.

Pastor's Meeting

This week the Pastor's Alliance of Tirana held their meeting at our center in Vlashi. It was a great opportunity to share our work with a group of leaders in a format that is difficult to just duplicate anytime. They were able to see firsthand what we do in the village.

School Time

It was just last month that Planters finally got the keys for the newly acquired property that has been in the works for over a year now. The family finished their new home and recently moved and so we have the key to use the property as we need. Little did we realize that the community kindergarten would be interested in using the facility for their classes. They previously have been meeting in our main building but now they can have more space and their "own place". Here are some pictures of the new tables and chairs the children will be using.

Summer Camp

Last week there were 6 youth from Vlashi that went to church camp in northern Albania. Genti and Shpresa organized these youth to attend the camp with other members from the church in Tirana plus with some visiting young people from Germany. Here are some pictures that Genti emailed today. Planters had a scholarship program for these youth so they would be able to stay for the week.

Summer Visit

Diane, from Florida, arrives with luggage missing.
packing gift bags for the home visits

on the village trails going to the home visits

Bukeria wouldn't let us leave without a gift of flowers from her front garden. She had a baby girl two days later.

having a Bible study with Bartha (center)

getting together with the girls from the girls training center

My intentions were to have this news sent while I was in Albania but there was trouble getting reconnected with the internet server. Also, most of my time was spent in the village and there is no internet in the village. I did arrive home in Illinois last night and so today I'm pretending it was last week and this is the news that I would have written then.

Village Summer Pics

Village School Games

Last week Mandi organized a school game field day for several of the mountain villages. Darshen has a great game field and so the schools of Selbe and Shkalle joined for a day of fun and competetion hosted by Darshen. Games of volleyball and soccer were played. The winning school was Shkalle. The second place school was Darshen.

Springtime on the farm

Planting corn has been a sparce activity these days. Either it is too cold or too wet to put the planter in the ground. Now that we have turned May's calendar page over, time is not on the farmer's side anymore. The corn must go in even though conditions are not optimual. I took a picture of David as I delivered lunch to the field today. I also got to ride a couple of rounds with him and was introduced to his new on board "computer" touch screen monitor that tells him about anything he would like to know about the seeds that are going in the ground. David was getting concerned about row 2. It was planting doubles every once in a while.

Saying Goodbye

Goodbyes are never what we enjoy when it comes to very good friends. Lela and her son Xhulio (Julio) left Vlashi to go live in Italy with husband and Dad. They have been waiting for eight years to get papers for living there. They were the neighbors across the street from Genti and Shpresa. They were the neighbors that became the closest of commrades. Lela was a young woman who was distant and difficult to ever see smiling. Things changed after she met Shpresa. Little by little, mostly through their sons developing friendship, did the friendship grow and Lela began to trust Shpresa. After a short two years, Lela and Shpresa depended on one another from carrying for the other's son to guarding the house and to knowing what made each other laugh or cry. Lela left this past Sunday and will be missed by many of the young ladies in the village. We can be thrilled with one thing for sure. She has accepted Christ as her Savior. Our prayer is that she will find another good friend like Shpresa that will continue the mentoring and help Lela to live out her faith in her new home.

Kindergarten Class

The village kindergarten moved in last week. So far it seems to be working out well for them. I like the one picture of the gender segragation. It starts at an early age.

Genti also wrote news that one of the Albanian TV channels, Top Channel, was holding a news special featuring the evangelicals and their aid to the people in Gerdec, the village where the explosion took place. VUSH, the evangelical consortium, asked to hold this interview at our ministry center in Vlashi. We'll update you as to what went on with this meeting.

Just a Bit of News

Arjan sent some pictures this week of some of the clean up going still going on at the ministry center in Vlashi. The box that Mersin and Anselmo are carrying is filled with broken glass from windows and glass doors from inside the building. The broken slats of wood are off storage doors in the loft area on the second floor of the center. There are four doors that are going to have to be repaired.

Also, today I was reading from one of the articles listed on our side bar of "related articles" that said investigators that worked on 911 wreckage sites and also the team that worked at Oklahoma City are currently in Albania working at the blast site.

Lastly, in another article that I was reading, Albania was all excited since NATO has extended to them an invitation to join. Only now, they are in a mild panic because they realize they must clean up their "extralegal" affairs --where up to 90% of business and property assets are part of the black or gray economy.

Monday in Gerdec: location of explosion

(Notice the temporary housing in the background)

Today we received an email attachment from Genti showing what a group of them did and experienced in Gerdec, the closest village to the explosion of three weeks ago. Genti mentioned that Mandi and his family, Olti and Anselmo (from Vlashi), and himself went to help distribute aid to the families that experienced complete devastation from the blast.

Distributions

Today we found out that several families in Vlashi village have relatives that lived in the village that took the direct hit from the explosion. Their homes are completely gone and they are not going to be able to use their land because of the contamination. Genti and Shpresa took boxes of food to the families of Vlashi that now have the extra burden to house and to feed their relatives from Gerdec.

The other news is that the kindergarten in Vlashi will be moving into our ministry center on Monday. Their building was destroyed from the concussion. Next week hopefully we will have pictures to show you.

We talked with Mandi on the phone this week and he said that there was so much snow in the mountain pass that they were unable to go to Darshen this week. We guess spring hasn't completely come everywhere yet.

"Rain, Rain, Go Away, Come Again Some Other Day"

(Shpresa, tour guide, tells the history of the amphitheatre.)
Eating our picnic lunch inside at the center.

This was a day to be full of photo ops, great insights, sharing past history lessons, and much conversation. We had scheduled to go to Durres to visit a 1st century amphitheatre and to go for a picnic on the Adriatic with several of the ladies of the village. But the rain detoured our great plans. With great optimistism we loaded up the two vehicles and headed for Durres, but upon arriving, the rain still had not subsided. Therefore we ended up running for shelter anytime we could inside the amphitheatre and thus our pictures are terrible. For several of the ladies this was their first exposure to this great site. (It is only 15 kilometers from where they live) What a privilege it was to share with the ladies that this site tells us that Albania was a Christian nation before it was Muslim. As Americans we owe a debt to the martyrs that gave their lives here for this was a prelude for the gospel being spread throughout Europe and thus to the west. It was so great to see the smiles that came on their faces when they realized that we appreciated their country for giving us our faith. A certain twist that they had never heard before. When we left, soaked and cold, we decided to stop for a hot coffee in a warm and cozy coffee bar to decide what our next strategy would be. It was concluded the rain had settled in for the day and we might as well take our picnic lunch inside back at the center in Vlashi. Even though we didn't get to enjoy Durres as we anticipated, it was worth it all just to share the day with the ladies and to let them know their country has played a part in our spiritual heritage.

Hair Salon

Since the news of the explosion has taken precedence the last few blogs, we haven't gotten posted some of the last activities of the Florida team. On the last day in the village, Kayla, Kristi, and Joanetta had their hair done by Duska and Susha. These girls have been learning hair styling at the training center this past year. It was a great experience for interaction between the team and the girls in the village. Can you imagine how much a village girl would be impressed that a girl from America would let her do her hair?