Romania Update - July 2009

“You crown the year with Your goodness,
and Your paths drip with abundance”

-Psalm 65:11

Hello everyone!

I hope you are all doing well. Another month has come and gone and for me another decade! I celebrated my 30th birthday this month on the 9th. And unfortunately for the second year in a row I was sick on my birthday. I was however, still blessed to receive many birthday greetings from friends and family. And the week after my birthday my good friends here took me out to dinner (twice actually!) to a GREAT Lebanese restaurant to celebrate! The food was so good and I had really been craving some spicy and “different’ food! Sometimes I just miss food from other other countries so much! It was fun to get “all dolled up” and so great to have such wonderful people around me to celebrate this special day with me!

This month has also broken my own record for “days sick”. I was sick for 3 full weeks this month! The first two I’m not sure exactly what was up, a sinus infection of some sort, then 2 weeks later I came down with bronchitis! I’m actually still sick with the bronchitis and am on my second round of antibiotics this month. But this only leads me to such a praise at how the Lord takes care of me. When Cami (the woman I work with at the hospital) heard I was sick again, she set up to have me seen by a Dr. at the hospital where I work. The Dr. was really nice and very knowledgeable. And she saw me for FREE! She reassured me that soon enough I would not be getting sick anymore. The only problem is, I don’t work with the “really” sick kids all the time, the kids I work with are more physically and mentally disabled and I only go down to the floors with the really sick babies a few times a month, so it’s taking longer for me to build up my immunity. But it seems without fail that every time I do go down to those floors I catch something fun from the babies! I think eventually I will have the strongest immune system in the world!

I was blessed to be able to spend two weeks in the hospital with my kids and with Cami. It was so sweet, when I returned after my birthday from being sick, a little boy Raul, who we have seen a lot of lately, had made me a birthday card and drawing! The drawing says, “Happy Birthday, Rachel-Raul.” It is a picture of him in the front and me in the back “running towards him”. So sweet! It made my day! He was supposed to leave the day before I got back, but ended up staying an extra day so he was able to give me his present himself. The second I walked in the room his face just lit up and he started speaking so fast that I had a hard time understanding him. I love little kids with glasses. Too cute!

We had another little boy, Nicusor who has spent a lot of time with us in the past. He is with us because he is 9 years old (although he looks about 6) and can’t speak. He basically only says “nehneh” for everything. We work with him on his speaking and he is getting some sort of a set of injections that are supposed to help. So he comes to us every other month or so and stays for a few weeks while he is getting his series of injections. I adore him. He had his 9th birthday about a week before he came to us this last time and so I was able to give him a shoe box that we had donated by a group from Germany for his birthday. He was SO excited oh my goodness!

It seems that eventually I always end up with a favorite and Nicusor is certainly one of them. We discovered the last time he was with us that he really enjoys making car sounds (beep-beep!) and small simple words “pa!” which is like “bye!” He also likes to take care of one of the baby dolls we have. He cracks me up, we gave him a diaper to put on the baby doll, and he must have spent an hour putting the diaper on, taking it off, then taking the baby over to a bucket we have on the floor and holding the baby over the bucket and pretending it was going to the bathroom! I guess in the village he comes from, he must have a ‘bucket potty’! I adore him. We also received a donation of old “Tourist Agency” magazines. He loved those too. Actually all the children really loved looking at all the pictures of the beaches and the nice hotels and beautiful food and people! We were surprised. One day Cami caught this series of photos of Nicusor and I. I love them. He was sitting next to me with his legs crossed and his little arm laying on top of mine as we sat and looked at magazines together. It melted my heart that he felt so comfortable with me.

There was also another sweet young lady, Cristina who painted me a miniature flower painting, ‘just because’. She was so excited to paint and we told her she could paint something and take it home with her, but when she was finished she gave it to me! It’s neat to see the different personality types in the children. Cristina was such a “helper” but also very sensitive. We gave her a shoebox for her 10th birthday that she had while she was with us and when she received chocolate in her shoebox, which she is not allowed to eat due to her condition, she gave the chocolates to the nurses. She loves to give things to others just to see them smile!

I spent a lot of time with my neighbor Nuti this month. We went to a great outdoor farmer’s market that I had not been to, but will now for sure keep going back to. I found pinto beans there, which made my day! Refried beans! Yea! I have been craving Mexican food. We also went on a very long walk to her daughter and grandson’s house one day. I had a lovely time with them. Her grandson had bought me a magnet from his trip to the Black Sea for vacation. We had coffee together and talked about their vacation. I found out that her daughter Vali and grandson Alex are very crafty! They showed me all the neat things they made and told me about a craft store in town. So hopefully in August we will all go there together. At the end of my time with the family Alex asked “are you coming back tomorrow?” Unfortunately I couldn’t but he is just the sweetest thing. I am really blessed and so happy to be building more relationships with my Romanian friends.


The other day Nuti showed up at my door with a bag full of little toys she had collected, I had seen them in her house before. She proceeded to tell me that she wanted to give them to the children at the hospital to play with cause she didn’t need them just laying around when the kids could use them! I was so shocked and so blessed! This came out of no where. It was just something on her heart, she told me she also called her daughter Vali and said that she should go through Alex’s toys and donate the ones to me he doesn’t use, Vali agreed so one day in August I will go over there with her and “pick” out some things. It’s amazing to see this, we are somewhat used to things like this in America, but here, you very rarely see people donating items like this to those in need. This was a HUGE blessing!

I was finally able to take Cami out to dinner this month. I have been telling her I wanted to for over a month now, but had not been able to. My friends Sarah and Mary paid me to clean their house this month, so I was finally able to take Cami out! We went to a little Romanian Fast Food place and had some pretty good chicken. One thing I love about Romanian restaurants, you can sit there for hours after you are done eating and no one says anything! So we stayed for almost 3 hours just talking and eating. I asked her all kinds of things about communism and her life in general. I love working with Cami so much and this was the first time we were able to do something outside of work together. She is such a blessing to me!

Well thank you all for your prayers and support as always. It seems that even though I was sick for 3 weeks this month, I managed to fit a lot into those 2 weeks I was well! The Lord is always good, isn’t He?

Prayer Requests:
1. My health!
2. Please pray for Cami’s husband to find a job, it is very difficult here with everything going on in the world to find a good job.
3. Direction and wisdom in general
4. For the Lord to continue to provide for all my needs
5. Please also lift my mom up, she had hand surgery a couple of weeks ago and is healing, pray that she would have a full recovery soon!
6. Nuti, Vali, Alex, the kids and staff at the hospital, and the Budila Gypsy Teen Girls Group!
7. For August, another busy month ahead!

Two quick notes!
- You can now support me through PayPal! Click here to find out more.
- If any of you ever hear of anyone who may need some “work from home” type of clerical work, data entry, transcribing or possible photo editing done, please let me know, I am always looking for ways to earn some extra money, since I am not “legally” allowed to work here. Thanks!

Grace and Peace,
Rachel