Not much more I could imagine pumping into a month than what we have done so far...
Back in Spain now, things are still going nuts. In case any of you haven´t heard, the countries Jon and I made it to are so far: Ireland, Denmark, Germany, Switzerland, Italy and of course Spain... Italy is my favorite. Can´t say anything bad about any of the countries, but Italy had the cutest girls, nicest people, best food and prettiest countryside, and yes, I am totally biased.
The ministry and meetings have still been the coolest part about the trip, we have been able to go to meetings and\or Bethel in almost all of the countries we have visited so far, and all of the brothers have welcomed us with open arms. The one family that we stayed with in Switzerland spent around 400 dollars on us, buying us groceries and other things, they are amazing people. As I have said before there is too much to explain in a blog, there have been a few times when Jon and I have had some close calls, but all in all we have been doing pretty fantastic. Over the next few days we are going to be checkng out some more of Gaudi`s work, lots more to do in the ministry.
Jon and I have already had the opportunities to be victims of theft, but on the smallest scale possible, we were hanging out with some young people from the local spanish hall at an arcade, and while i was playing a basketball game, little kids were running up and stealing the tickets as I won them. I didn`t care but when Jon saw it happening, he jumped in front of the ticket dispenser and started grabbing the tickets as they came out, then the little kids tried to pull Jon out of the way but Jon wrestled em`off. Like Jon said ¨for me it`s not about the tickets¨.
Word to the wise though, don`t play ping pong in a spanish park past 10:00 at night,
Saving the best stories for in person always, from seven countries... Barcelona Bombero (Dougie B)
Monday, April 28, 2008
Sunday, April 13, 2008
Fightin' Irish
A lot has happened in the past couple days!
We arrived in dublin about 1:30 yesterday, and it has been a nonstop adventure ever since. we got on the bus, and almost immediately
Jon struck up a conversation with a man about religion, Jon talked with him for about a half hour. When we actually arrived in the city, we realized how
actually frigid it was outside, I bought a sweatshirt and some gloves at this one store and then as soon as we stepped out there was a huge protest going on in the middle of
the street, and there were police everywhere. We got a lot of pictures and some video. After that we went exploring the city.
Now nobody told us that the streets of Dublin look a lot like a spiderweb, and it is really easy to end up in some strange part of the city... Because of this, Jon and I saw nearly all of
Dublin on foot, the outside of buildings that is. But we found a lot of little hole in the wall places that are everywhere.
Today was pretty cool, we had in mind to go to the meeting in Ireland, so we found a kingdom hall, and got ready to check it out. We woke up, called a taxi and left for this tiny
little kingdom hall on Wesley St. Now Jon and I have taken about 5 taxis and 4 out of 5 we had a great witness with our driver! There is a great need here for witnesses, in total we have gotten about nearly 8 hours of informal witnessing time between the 2 of us. The majority of people have had it with the catholic church and their hypocrisy..
The meeting was awesome, the hall is modern and actually quite stylish even though it was small..But after a brother invited us back to his house for
coffee, and he ended up serving us a good lunch of meatballs, eggs, and "dry bread''. The houses here are really cool on the inside.
Finally we went to the Guiness Storehouse, and were able to see how Ireland's most famous beer is made, and even try a pint. It's in an awesome modernized building, Guiness owns half the
city.
I'm saving the best for when I see any of you directly, but know that the Irish like the movies "Smokey and the Bandit" and anything by Groucho Marx.
I think the saying we found on a bar in the public square says it all, which read "there is a good time coming, be it ever so far away."
We arrived in dublin about 1:30 yesterday, and it has been a nonstop adventure ever since. we got on the bus, and almost immediately
Jon struck up a conversation with a man about religion, Jon talked with him for about a half hour. When we actually arrived in the city, we realized how
actually frigid it was outside, I bought a sweatshirt and some gloves at this one store and then as soon as we stepped out there was a huge protest going on in the middle of
the street, and there were police everywhere. We got a lot of pictures and some video. After that we went exploring the city.
Now nobody told us that the streets of Dublin look a lot like a spiderweb, and it is really easy to end up in some strange part of the city... Because of this, Jon and I saw nearly all of
Dublin on foot, the outside of buildings that is. But we found a lot of little hole in the wall places that are everywhere.
Today was pretty cool, we had in mind to go to the meeting in Ireland, so we found a kingdom hall, and got ready to check it out. We woke up, called a taxi and left for this tiny
little kingdom hall on Wesley St. Now Jon and I have taken about 5 taxis and 4 out of 5 we had a great witness with our driver! There is a great need here for witnesses, in total we have gotten about nearly 8 hours of informal witnessing time between the 2 of us. The majority of people have had it with the catholic church and their hypocrisy..
The meeting was awesome, the hall is modern and actually quite stylish even though it was small..But after a brother invited us back to his house for
coffee, and he ended up serving us a good lunch of meatballs, eggs, and "dry bread''. The houses here are really cool on the inside.
Finally we went to the Guiness Storehouse, and were able to see how Ireland's most famous beer is made, and even try a pint. It's in an awesome modernized building, Guiness owns half the
city.
I'm saving the best for when I see any of you directly, but know that the Irish like the movies "Smokey and the Bandit" and anything by Groucho Marx.
I think the saying we found on a bar in the public square says it all, which read "there is a good time coming, be it ever so far away."
Friday, April 11, 2008
Never Tell Me the Odds...
OK
I know I said I was going to write sooner, but I honestly haven't had the time! The first day was amazing, even just the trip to Spain was incredible, on the plane there was a lot of extra room, so for the first time i was able to have an entire row of seats all to myself, I can't even begin to explain how great that felt. Then since there was an eight hour flight to Barcelona from Newark airport, they had music and movies for entertainment, I was blown away that they had all my favorite tv shows, movies and music...
The rest of our days have been spent just exploring the city, mostly of stuff that Gaudi designed, and a lot of parks and such..
I will show you all pictures of everything when we get back of course, it is the best way that I can explain how awesome everything is out here! We went to the zoo yesterday, which was awesome! they have unbelievable animals there, including grizzly bears and dolphins, and because this is a foreign country, a bunch of the more peaceful animals were allowed to roam free in the park.
Getting used to the metro and city environment is different, and being able to drink alcohol (in sips) is new. The food is gross to me since I am not a fan of fish and pork which are the chief food sources here, beef is scarce and expensive, so we haven't had any since we got here...
Had a chance to go to meeting last night, which was great, it is the english congregation so we were able to understand pretty much the whole thing.. Not kidding the sisters are beautiful here..I was able to use what little french, spanish, and english for that matter that I had. Service here is the best part, everyone is super receptive, and will start bible studies without blinking...
Anyway, Europe awaits, I will try to keep this current, feel free to give me a hard time if it isn't. Tomorrow, we are off to Ireland, followed by Denmark, down through germany and switzerland to italy, from milan we are going to fly to rome, then from rome we are going to take the train back through near Como Italy toward France, back to Barcelona, it is going to be crazy! Chao!
Dougie B
I know I said I was going to write sooner, but I honestly haven't had the time! The first day was amazing, even just the trip to Spain was incredible, on the plane there was a lot of extra room, so for the first time i was able to have an entire row of seats all to myself, I can't even begin to explain how great that felt. Then since there was an eight hour flight to Barcelona from Newark airport, they had music and movies for entertainment, I was blown away that they had all my favorite tv shows, movies and music...
The rest of our days have been spent just exploring the city, mostly of stuff that Gaudi designed, and a lot of parks and such..
I will show you all pictures of everything when we get back of course, it is the best way that I can explain how awesome everything is out here! We went to the zoo yesterday, which was awesome! they have unbelievable animals there, including grizzly bears and dolphins, and because this is a foreign country, a bunch of the more peaceful animals were allowed to roam free in the park.
Getting used to the metro and city environment is different, and being able to drink alcohol (in sips) is new. The food is gross to me since I am not a fan of fish and pork which are the chief food sources here, beef is scarce and expensive, so we haven't had any since we got here...
Had a chance to go to meeting last night, which was great, it is the english congregation so we were able to understand pretty much the whole thing.. Not kidding the sisters are beautiful here..I was able to use what little french, spanish, and english for that matter that I had. Service here is the best part, everyone is super receptive, and will start bible studies without blinking...
Anyway, Europe awaits, I will try to keep this current, feel free to give me a hard time if it isn't. Tomorrow, we are off to Ireland, followed by Denmark, down through germany and switzerland to italy, from milan we are going to fly to rome, then from rome we are going to take the train back through near Como Italy toward France, back to Barcelona, it is going to be crazy! Chao!
Dougie B
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