Serbia Update....

Week 2
Week two went by very quickly. On Monday the girls helped out at a local kindergarten which is sponsored by the church we attended on Sunday. R.J. and I went to work out with one of the local baseball players (George) which included some baseball practice and then lifting weights at his gym. Everybody met up around 6:00 for the EUS meeting. Tuesday we traveled to Novi Sad. Wednesday kindergarten then baseball. Thursday we hung out and greeted Mike (a post-grad from UW who came over to visit the Balkans and talk with some local churches) then went to a local Gypsy community and visited the pastor there. He told us about the difficulties that he is having largely that about 99% of the gypsy population are Muslim the prayer meeting followed by more Salsa dancing at the Fashion Café. The evening was very cool because of the lightening storm with no thunder or rain.
Friday morning the girls left to go to Kosovo for five days. While in Kosovo they worked with a couple other missionaries there and helped run some kids camps. Since the girls were gone we dubbed Friday “Man’s Day” which included a few hours of hanging out at Café Domino which is right down the street from our flat. Then we grabbed some Chinese food and watched an American movie at Slobadan’s flat. After the movie we hung out and walked back home at around 2:00a.m. Saturday the guys returned to Novi Sad so that Mike could take in the sights. We visited both the Catholic Church and also the Serbian Orthodox church in Novi Sad and the fortress. We were also able to see three bridges that were bombed in 1999 in order to disable transportation and communication during the war. The night was topped off with me jumping around and doing flips on a trampoline that was set up in a local park (it was set up as part of some festival and I was the only person above the age of 12 that went jumping). Sunday we visited the Anglican Church which also happens to be the only English speaking church in Belgrade. It was a very interesting service. From my own experience it mirrors the Catholic Church service. After church we headed down to the local African museum for an African festival. The food was great and there some really neat exhibits to look at. The night ended with some fellowship and spending time with some of the guys.
Monday began with our Bible study at Domino Café followed by setting up and preparing for the EUS meeting where Mike gave a talk on “Singleness”. Immediately following EUS we all went to a Blues concert downtown that EUS sponsored. The band was compiled of artists from various countries although most of them were from the U.S. Tuesday was a rather slow day which started out again with our Bible Study. Most of the day was spent helping clean and organize the EUS office and also spending one-on-one time with the students. Wednesday was a pretty exciting day which included the girls returning from Kosovo, some baseball and also a successful 6 on 6 game of American football with a Serbian style barbeque afterwards.
Things have been going very well. Our prayer requests would just be that we are able to continue to meet and connect with Serbians and to be able to love and serve them however that may be. We are also striving to maintain strong communication in order to build and strengthen our relationships here. That is all for now.
Ciao,
Team Serbia a.k.a. Team Dominate