Vienna and Greece

Just realized I haven't posted for a while, oops.

I spent a week in Vienna and loved it. Had gorgeous weather the first 4 days, followed by rainy weather the last 3, but it was still good. I went to a fantastic symphony orchestra concert of Beethoven's 9th symphony and absolutely loved it. Following that was a famous Viennese cafe with my couchsurfing host for hot chocolate and some chocolate truffle torte, excellent. Vienna was split up into 2 hosts, both of which were great. The first one was a couple who I really connected with, we had a ton of fun. The second one was a Polish woman aged 36 who I enjoyed getting to know as well. Plus she insisted on feeding me every meal, okay, you twisted my arm, I guess I'll let you cook me every meal :) Made me think there might be something to these mail-order brides if they're anything like this haha, jk, kind of.

Went to Athens late Monday night, didn't get to my host's until 12:30 at night, at which point I show up and they're having dinner on the patio, gotta love those Greeks! Got up the next day and spent all day walking around the Acropolis and the National Archaelogical Museum, both of which were truly fascinating. I saw heiroglyphics at the Museum, how sweet is that?! Not to mention the Parthenon is as great as it's made out to be, would definitely recommend it to anyone.

Yesterday I came over to Santorini on a ferry ride. Picked up a scooter today and was super excited about driving a scooter again. Only difference was that this time I had the less-than-great experience of laying my scooter on its side as I wiped out. Haven't been this scraped up since riding bikes as a kid. Oh well, what's life without a few scrapes and bruises along the way, right? Went to a beach this evening and got to see a wonderful sunset, which I forgot to take pictures of, of course. Santorini is beautiful, I'd highly recommend it to anyone looking for a great getaway. By the way, Santorini is the first place where I've had to stay at a hostel. I thought I was going to in Prague but my couchsurfing host let me stay another night. Oh yeah, second host in Prague was way better then the first one, wasn't in the same ballpark. He was an American so it was nice to talk to someone with a similar background.

Well, I can't really think of anything else right now, so I'm going to sign off.

Till next time,

Justin

one week

Well, at this point I've decided spending a week in one city is too much time to spend in one city. Maybe from here on out I'll volunteer in different cities or something. You can truly do only so much sight-seeing before you feel like you've already seen all the main hotspots in a city. This is the point I've reached here in Prague. I've seen a lot, but everything else that I could see costs too much money.

Lately, I've found I really enjoy hanging out in local cafes and reading and journaling to God. It's been really nice to get back in the Word and also spend some extended time in prayer for people back home. I can spend 2 or 3 hours easily in a cafe before I'm ready to move on. I have a Kindle so I have plenty to read, plus I've been getting a copy of The Economist in every airport or train station that I've been in so far so that provides plenty of reading and catching up on current events as well. For whatever reason, I really love The Economist now, maybe that's a sign of growing older. Or just of me being a geek, as one friend so lovingly puts it.

I went on a couple of free walking tours in different parts of Prague on a couple different days so that was fun. On the first tour I met a lovely woman, probably my mom's age, and we talked for the entire 2.5 hour tour. She was an economist, so of course I had plenty of questions for her. She also owned her own business so I was also interested in that as that's something I've considered doing down the road. She told me to enjoy this trip, because I'd probably get snagged by a woman when I get back home. I thought aloud, "Yeah, I probably wouldn't be able to travel a lot if I started dating or ended up marrying a woman." I mean, even if the other person likes to travel, suddenly now it's twice as expensive. Plus they would probably not be down with couchsurfing, which would add enourmous expense to a trip. The only way I'm able to do this trip is because of couchsurfing. Tomorrow I'm staying in a hostel for the first time on this trip, and I will have been traveling for about a month so I'd say that's a pretty good job of getting couches along the way. She also said that if you want your own business to become successful, you basically have to eat, breathe, and live your business. According to her, you can either marry a business or marry someone, but usually not both. I'm sure that's the reason behind a lot of divorces, but in the same breath I know people who either have their own business or are the CEO of a business and still manage to find time for their spouses. At this point I think I'd rather marry a business to be honest. That way I could provide jobs for people in this tough economic climate. I still remember my pastor asking me a couple of years ago what people needed (he was starting a church and wanted to meet needs in the community.) I told him, very simply, that people needed jobs. How cool would it be if a church had a program for either training people with basic job skills or having a database of companies looking for people so when someone came to a church and needed help with a job we could really help them? Just an idea. I have lots of ideas, unfortunately they usually don't gain a lot of traction due to my inability to stick with a project for very long.

I'll be in Australia in a little less than 3 months, and I think I'll be ready to settle down in one place for a while by then. Need to start praying for a job to open up when I get there. I've got the first part down in already having a work/holiday visa so that part is taken care of. Another thing I need to arrange will be renting a flat somewhere in Sydney. I got in touch with a secretary from Hillsong Church and she gave me a list at the time of people looking for renters so I'll be in touch with her again soon so I can look at some options when I get there.

Well, that's all for now. It's been nice catching up with some of you over the last couple of days and hopefully I'll be able to contact more of you either tonight or tomorrow.

German history and a concentration camp

Well, I've been in Berlin for a few days now so I figured it was about time to write again. Relax, it's about my trip this time, for the most part. I don't think I can write a whole post without inserting at least some opinion, lol.

I arrived in Berlin's Tegel airport on Monday night around 9:00 pm and their customs consisted of grabbing my bag and going on to the information desk to buy a 7-day pass for public transportation. No, really, there was absolutely no one who checked my bag and no passport control whatsoever. Maybe that's normal for internal EU flights, I really don't know at this point. I did find it extremely interesting and completely foreign to what I'm used to when I travel anywhere overseas.

The first stop was getting to my couchsurfer's place by successfully following his directions. I'm getting pretty decent at that, which is saying a lot if you know my sense of direction. When I arrive, I'm greeted by a smoky haze caused by 2 girls smoking in the bedroom. 'Great,' I think to myself, 'this is just what I need to sleep tonight.' Then they ask me if I want to 'go out.' 'Sure,' I say, not having any idea what I'm getting myself into. All I know is that if it's anything like 'going out' back home I probably won't enjoy myself as that isn't really my scene. So we go to this techno club with everyone 'dancing' which really consisted of people barely moving, reminded me of when I try and dance. Oh, and we had to say a password so we wouldn't have to pay a cover charge. I tried saying this password for about 10 minutes and the bodyguard laughed and said, "Nice pronunciation." To which I replied, "I've been practicing for 10 minutes!" My couchsurfer's roommate asks me if I want to play table tennis and I think I mishear him. 'Did he just ask me if I want to play table tennis? Where exactly are we supposed to do that here?' Much to my surprise, we go to a back room, again smoke-filled and lo and behold there's a table. Now, I've never seen or played table tennis like what I did that night so I'll try and explain it to you. After getting our paddles, we join in this circle that encompasses the table with about 15 to 20 people walking around it and hitting the ping-pong ball in turn. If you mess up, you have to sit down. Then the last two standing battle it out with a game to 5. Definitely different than what I'm used to and I never got to the final two people standing but I enjoyed myself all the same. It was far better than pretending to enjoy dancing and making terrible small-talk with people who I don't know. After the club, probably around 2:30 or 3 in the morning, we head back to the couchsurfer's house. Thankfully, he left the window in the bedroom open and the smoke had cleared by the time we returned. There were 2 twin beds in the room on the floor, and there were 2 guys and 2 girls, go figure. I got one of the beds, one of the girls got a mat and a sleeping bag, and the other 2 shared a bed. Don't worry, though, they were 'ex-boyfriend and girlfriend,' riiiiiight.

The next day I go to Alexandre-Platz which is a hot-spot for tourists. They have an outdoor exhibition with huge pieces of art with words describing what the scenes were portraying. Being the nerd that I am, I spent 3 hours reading through the whole thing, which discussed the peaceful revolution in East Germany in the 1980's and early 1990. Very interesting stuff I must say. Basically, the East Germans were under communist rule and wanted a democracy like the West Berliners who were separated by a wall. After several desperate attempts to squash the opposition leaders and movement, the East Germans won their democracy, without shooting anyone, imagine that, it is possible. After that, I head back to my couchsurfer's place for the night. At this point, I haven't even opened my big bag because I know I will be switching couchsurfing hosts in a couple of days. That's right, I wore the same outfit for 2 or 3 days straight, I don't even remember at this point. Probably gross to most of you, but they were comfortable clothes so it didn't bother me at all. Also, probably not the only time that will occur on this trip I'm sure.

The next day I wake up and get ready to go to my new couchsurfing host's place. My current couchsurfing host has graciously offered to drive me there which I readily take him up on. Before we go, though, he eats one of my fish-oil pills. Not just swallowed it, mind you, but actually chewed the thing. This is coming from the same guy who informed me he smuggled hashish into the EU from Morocco by sticking it in his, ahem, 'backside.' A weird dude for sure. He was funny though, so that kind of made up for it.

Yesterday, I arrived to my new couchsurfing host's place around noon and set my stuff down and head out as he has a meeting to go to so I need to leave his place. Some couchsurfers give you a key, as the one in London and the one in Amsterdam did, but some of them don't want you home without them being there. Fair enough, so I go out and head to the German Historical Museum. I spend 3.5 to 4 hours in there, because I read about everything they have to offer in the exhibits and find it truly fascinating to go through the whole history of the Germanic people. After that, I go to a cafe and get a coke and relax for a bit as my host told me he wouldn't be home until 11. Then the fun really begins. I text him to let him know I'm on my way and he lets me know he's already home. Perfect, I think, now just to get there. I look at my public transportation map and behold! I find a shortcut to get to his place. Some of you already know where this is going. Well, of course the underground didn't go all the way to the stop I needed it to, so I have to take it back to where I came from. Then other things happen and a half hour journey turns into a 2.5 hour catastrophe, at one point with me thinking to myself, 'Well, I just might have to spend the night in this train station.' I finally get home at around 1:30 in the morning and apologize to my host for being so late. He's astounded that I didn't ask for help. No, no, no, that would make way too much sense. I'd rather try it on my own and fail miserably thank you very much.

Today, I went to a concentration camp just north of Berlin. It was pretty intense, to say the least. It was very sobering as well, to think that 250,000 people had been interned there and 100,000 of them put to death. How could something like that happen in a civilized society? How could God let that happen? These and other questions swirl in my mind as I take in everything from the rebuilt barbed wire fence with an electric fence behind it to the bunks to the camp prison. 6,000,000 Jews were murdered it's generally agreed upon. Some people say it's closer to 5.4 million but either way just an unfathomable act of terror. There were also Roma and Sinti people sent to the camps, which made me think of the article in the Economist that I read last week about Sarkozy kicking out the Roma out of France. Why is it that certain people groups are hated throughout the ages? Particularly the Jews, I can't even begin to imagine. I mean, you've been told your whole life that you're God's chosen people and then something like the Holocaust happens? How does that play out in your faith? Not to mention a history of being slaves to other nations and regularly occupied. Really makes me question the goodness of God. It's not like I'm going to lose my faith or anything, but I don't see how something like going to a concentration isn't supposed to shake you up a bit and make you question what you believe.

I came back tonight to the house and had a great dinner of lasagna. It seems like with some couchsurfers I eat better than I do at home. On top of that, even when I don't eat at a couchsurfer's place I eat out and the portions are so much smaller. It's no wonder I've dropped some weight. Now if I can just keep up the small portions when I get back to the states, that'll be the key.

It occured to me the other day that technically speaking, I'm currently homeless. I put all my stuff in my friends' garages so I didn't have to pay for storage and when I get back 'home' I'm not sure where I'm going to live quite yet. Interesting. So far I've been having an amazing time living off the generosity and hospitality of others, but what do I do when I get back. Oh well, there's plenty of time to figure that out between now and then. It is interesting living out of a backpack though. It hasn't bothered me up to this point, but I'm sure there will come a time when it gets old. Hopefully I'll be in Australia by then and can rent a room in a flat for 3 months to kind of settle down for a bit.

That's all for now, hope you enjoyed!

The results of Christian fatalism

I've been wanting to talk about this topic for quite some time now, so here goes nothing.

In the Christian faith, we believe that Christ will come back someday and replace the existing heavens and earth with a new heaven and a new earth. Now, there's nothing wrong with that and I subscribe to that belief myself. However, a problem arises when we take that to mean that we might as well live however we wish because it's all going to pass away anyways. I've heard several fellow believers say things like, "I'm just not concerned about the environment because it's all going to pass away at the end of time." Along these same lines are the thoughts and motivation behind 20th and early 21st century evangelism. "These days may be awful, but put your hope in Christ and you'll go to heaven when you die." That sort of thing. That kind of evangelism converted 80% of Rwandans to Christ, and then they had the genocide which had Christians killing Christians within their own congregations because of a different tribal descent. I would argue they had been taught an incomplete gospel, which is still being spread today. As Christians, we are to work on bringing the kingdom of God to this earth, here and now, not off in some distant future. If we have nothing to offer people in the here and now then we have nothing to offer them at all. People are in the midst of suffering and the best we can do is, "Well, you don't want to go to hell when you die, do you? Then put your hope in Christ." We need to do better than offer fire insurance. What about the abundant life that Christ promised? Was he not speaking in present tense when he said that? All people will suffer, and Christians even more so since we are to expect persecutions on behalf of Christ. The difference is we are to live a life of abundance that Christ promised right in the midst of all the suffering. I've heard it said that a life lived to the fullest is a life lived for others. I love that. Those who want to lose their life will gain it, that type of thing.

My friend is a summer director for a Christian camp in the middle of Florida. He got a lot of emails/calls of concerned pastors and parents when he said the theme for last summer was going to be "Dirt", talking about creation care. Why would people be upset about that? They were upset about that because they saw Christianity through a myopic lens, one that only focused on the soul and what happens after you die. That type of belief system isn't enough for me. I need one that addresses life in the here and now. A belief system that has something to say to the ills of this world and not just about believers' individual lives. Our churches should effect change in the world around them, not just within their walls. Are our communities better places because of our church's presence in them? To quote someone else, I forget who now, "Would anyone object if the city came and closed down your church, besides your own members?" We need to wrestle with these issues.

Evangelism has to be about more than handing someone a tract and telling them they are going to hell without Jesus. We have to meet peoples' needs. The gospel is to be good news to the poor. How is it good news if we hand someone a tract and they are still homeless? Especially if we have a spare bedroom in our homes that isn't being used. We need to bring a gospel that effects the whole person and the people around them, not just their souls.

Anyways, I rant. Sorry for those of you who thought this was going to be a blog solely about my world adventure. It's also a blog about thoughts I have on certain things. I didn't mean to mislead anyone.