Romanian Reminiscences 7

A meal to Remember

Ben entered the kitchen with various different thoughts going through his mind as he anticipated what might be on offer. He’d heard stories of people going off to far-flung lands and eating all sorts of wild and wonderful fair, such as grasshoppers, spiders, snakes and so on. He himself had once been to a Japanese Church fete and tried octopuses’ head, probably made more palatable by the batter around it, but nevertheless a bit of a culinary walk on the wild side, so he was fairly confident that he could handle even the most daring of Romanian dishes.

The kitchen was rather small, but there was enough space for him, Florin and Doina at the little table in its corner. The table already had plates and forks laid on it, not to mention some serviettes, a bread basket with chunky, freshly sliced bread in it and a couple of side dishes that Ben didn’t recognise. One was a saucer-sized plate with little white slices of what looked like the fatty part of bacon that people back home didn’t usually eat, although these slices were much thicker. If they were indeed from bacon, thought Ben, that must be one heck of a slice of bacon! The other strange delight was in a small bowl with a teaspoon in it. It was a reddy substance that appeared to be some vegetables mashed up and was presumably for spreading on the bread.

As Ben surveyed these things, Doina took a silver coloured pot that was extremely well rounded off the stove and emptied its contents into a large white ceramic container, which she then plonked on the table before Ben. This was obviously the main course. Looking at its quantity made Ben wonder how many more people were coming round to eat.

Steam was still coming off of the food, which Ben recognised as clearly being a rice dish. Ben loved a good curry, although he found the glistening of the copious amounts of grease in the rice disconcerting. Something gave him the feeling that this wasn’t going to be quite like the rice dishes he was used to from his local Indian takeaway.

Ben managed to ascertain that the name of the rice dish was in fact ‘Pilaf’. At least, this is a word that he heard both Florin and Doina refer to it by, so unless they were making some sort of derogatory comments, this must be its name, he concluded.

Doina produced a large spoon and used it to put a healthy portion of the ‘Pilaf’ on Ben’s plate. He would have been quite looking forward to it if it wasn’t for the grease that was oozing out. At least, he could spy some chicken chunks and carrots mixed into it, which he thought would be the saving grace.

‘Nu te rușina. Simte-te ca acasă!', were Doina’s encouraging words for Ben. Or at least they would have been encouraging if he had understood them. Also, they conveyed a hidden message that she had now already started to become familiar with Ben, switching to using the more informal pronouns full time as opposed to the more formal ones that she’d felt necessary to include in the beginning.

The meal went well. Ben did his best to try and drain off a little of the grease from the ‘Pilaf’ using his fork. It didn’t work so well, so in the end he just went with the flow as he was so hungry and ate it. He also very much enjoyed the red stuff on bread. If he wasn’t very much mistaken they were using the word ‘Zacusca’ for it, so that’s how he would name it too. There was a tricky moment though. Florin seemed to be a great advocate of the white stuff that resembled bacon fat. Ben surmised that this wasn’t going to be his cup of tea and after one mouthful, he realised it certainly wasn’t. Florin seemed determined to get Ben to eat as much of it as possible, and was waxing lyrical, presumably about its qualities, 'Slănină a fost mâncarea care a ajutat strămoșii noștri să construieasca România!'. Sometimes it was good to not understand.

Ben had started out hungry, but as the meal progressed, he could start to feel his stomach fill. A few times Doina had reproached him, 'De ce nu mânanci?' Ben didn’t need to be too well versed in the Romanian language to realise that she was asking why he wasn’t eating more. Indeed, ‘Mâncare’ and the related verb ‘a mânca’, ‘food’ and ‘to eat’ were two of the first words he learnt. It was good to know about food vocabulary so you wouldn't go hungry. This was Ben's strategy at least. Anyway, back to the question, he thought it would have been obvious why he wasn’t eating more as he had already lined his stomach with plenty of ‘Pilaf’, not to mention a number of slices of bread with ‘Zacusca’ on it, but Doina appeared to have other ideas about what constituted a good meal.

'Nu, mulțumesc', was a phrase that fortunately Ben knew, but he was struggling to say it assertively enough. He was evidently going to need more than a few ‘No, thank yous’ to get himself out of this situation.

He managed to force down a few more forkfuls of ‘Pilaf’, not to mention a couple more slices of bread with ‘Zacusca’. He even contemplated another slice of the white stuff, but he did his best to resist that particular option. He was starting to understand why he had seen a number of decidedly rotund people from his taxi as he had travelled to this, his new temporary home.

Ben was starting to get worried as Doina wasn’t letting up on the ‘have some more’ policy that she was intent on pursuing. He was unsure how much he could put into his stomach without it having dire consequences later on.

Fortunately, once again, as if someone was watching over him, at just the right moment, the front door of the flat swung open and in walked someone new, who distracted Florin and Doina’s attention from the food, that they were otherwise so concerned about.

Image by Harald Dona from Pixabay

Meditations: A Rash Promise

The Importance of Prayer and Knowing the Word

In life, sometimes it’s easy to make a promise without really thinking about the consequences. One time I said that I would help someone translate a document from English to Romanian. However, it proved to be a challenge as there were nine pages and it was legal language, much of which I didn’t even really understand in English let alone know how to say in Romanian. It took many hours and caused something of a headache. Not only that, but after doing the translation, I didn’t even receive a chocolate or other recompense.
In this situation, my decision to help resulted in some hard work and slightly regretted getting involved. However, I said I would do it, so I did. Ultimately, this wasn’t such a big problem and other than brief discomfort, it soon passed. Indeed, maybe I did something good as hopefully someone was helped by it.
In the Bible we read about someone called Jephthah. Not a very well known character and I have never heard anyone mention him as one of their Bible heroes, although if we read Hebrews 11:32 he is mentioned among the heroes of faith. So, who was he and what did he do so great as to be listed as one of the Biblical heroes in such illustrious company as Moses, Abraham and the like in Hebrews?
 His story is found in Judges 11 and 12. Here, he is described as a mighty warrior, who was exiled from his homeland of Gilead by his brothers, who didn’t want him to share in their inheritance as his mother was a prostitute. When a problem appears, the elders of Gilead nevertheless turn to Jephthah for help. He agrees as they promise him that he will become their leader.
The said problem was that the king of the Ammonites is trying to tack back land from the Israelites. Jephthah attempts negotiation , but when it doesn’t work, he goes out to battle. Before the battle, he makes a vow to God that if He gives him success, whatever comes out of his house to meet him first, when he returns home, will be given up as a burnt offering.
Indeed, Jephthah defeats the Ammonite king and returns home. Probably he was expecting one of his animals to come out to him, maybe a dog or a favourite lamb. This wouldn’t have been too much of a problem to offer as a sacrifice, but tragically it’s actually his daughter, his one and only child, who comes out to meet him first. 
Jephthah, although heartbroken, feels that he needs to carry out his vow in spite of the devastating fact that it is his daughter, who has to be sacrificed. He gives her two months to mourn with her friends, before sacrificing her as he vowed.
To us this might seem a shocking and tragic story, and it most certainly is. However, there are some things that we can learn from it.
The first thing that stands out is that Jephthah doesn’t seem to have known his Bible very well. In Leviticus chapter one, the conditions for a burnt offering are very clearly outlined. If Jephthah had been familiar with this passage, he would have known that only male animals without defects were supposed to be given up as burnt offerings. If the person offering the sacrifice wasn’t well off enough to offer cattle from the herd or a sheep or goat from the flock, there was also provision for offering a bird (dove or young pigeon – not a British slang meaning for this word). This sacrifice was meant to be performed in a certain way at the entrance to the tent of meeting. In others words, it was rash and showing a lack of scriptural knowledge on Jephthah’s part to say, like he does in Judges 11:31, that he would offer up whatever comes out of his door first as a burnt offering. Not any animal could be offered as a burnt offering, indeed in Levticus 22 there’s a list of animals that couldn’t be offered, and there’s certainly no suggestion that people should be sacrificed.
If Jepthah had been aware of this, maybe he would have thought twice about making the vow that he made. Furthermore, Leviticus 18:21 even forbids child sacrifice, so Jephthah, by his rash vow, is now in a position of having to do something that is otherwise forbidden in the Bible. Leviticus 27 suggests that in certain circumstances people, animals, or things that have been devoted to the Lord could nevertheless be bought back for set price. Maybe then, Jephthah could have appealed to this passage for help in saving his daughter.
Whatever Jephthah’s predicament and possible solutions, this is a challenge to us to think about how well we know the Bible. Many a time a Bible verse has come to mind in a particular situation and given me guidance as to what to do or helped me understand my situation. One such example, is Matthew 6:33 about seeking God’s kingdom first. On a number of occasions when I was thinking about what to do, this verse came to mind and I understand that God wanted me to do the thing that was best for serving Him and His kingdom. A specific example would be when I was debating about whether to come to Moldova or not. According to my logic it might have seemed better to stay where I was, but it just seemed that it was God’s plan to come here and in hindsight that seems to have been the right thing to do, both for personal growth as well as developing ministry opportunities. It’s good then to get as much of the Bible as possible into us because who knows when a certain verse will come in handy!
Another way of looking at Jephthah’s story is to compare it with a similar event in the book of Genesis. In Genesis chapter 22, we read the story of when God tells Abraham to take his one and only son and sacrifice him as a burnt offering on a mountain. Jephthah’s tale obvious conjures up a connection to this one as Jephthah himself is put in the position of offering up his only child, although this time a daughter, to God. There is however a very significant difference between the two stories. In the case of Abraham, he is very clearly told by God in Gensis 22:2 to take his son and offer him as a sacrifice, whereas in Jephthah’s case there doesn’t appear to be any such command from God.
Indeed, meditating on both the stories of Abraham and Jepthah, we see many occasions of communication between God and Abraham and much of what Abraham does is as a response of faith to what God has told him. Jephthah’s story is admittedly much shorter, taking up only just over a chapter of the Bible, as opposed to Abraham, who is mentioned over the course of 13 chapters. Nevertheless, we are still told plenty about Jephthah, but don’t see any moments of clear communication between him and God, the only aspect somewhat in this direction is when he makes his vow to God, and again this seems to be more out of his own initiative, maybe because he was afraid and wanted to try and assure himself of victory, than as a response of faith to a command of God.
So, the lesson here is about how important it is to be in regular communication with God through prayer. Otherwise, we won’t be aware of His commands and plans for our lives and so could easily end up going astray and getting into all sorts of difficult situations.

Meditations: Sacrifice

Giving your Best to God

I am a hoarder. I just can’t throw things away. However, when my Mum moved house I had to sort out all the stuff that I had accrued as it wasn’t practical for her to take it all to the new house. I spent many moments agonising over it all, try to decide what to keep and what not. Eventually, many of my Chemistry notes, alongside selections of Maths and Biology had a meeting with the shedder. It was hard to destroy these pieces of paper, even if I don’t often look at them, they still contained memories. It was necessary however to sacrifice them for the great good of a smoother house moving, and less junk to clutter up my new room. 
We are probably all familiar with the concept of sacrifice that is to say giving up something for the sake of a greater good. Likewise, most people are aware that in the past and maybe even in some cultures today, there existed an idea of sacrificing animals to divine beings in order to curry their favour.
In the Bible, we also see this idea of animal sacrifice, except with a difference. It’s not sacrifice willy-nilly with the hope that a god will respond positively as a result. There are vey clear instructions regarding what and how to sacrifice and for what reasons. The book of Leviticus in the Old Testament could be considered the Bible’s sacrifice manual, where most of the details are described.
Leviticus chapter one for example, talks about how to bring an animal to the Lord as a burnt offering. It would appear from Genesis and Exodus that the concept of a burnt offering was already well known, as it is mentioned in both these books. However, Leviticus starts with God speaking to Moses from the tent of meeting and thus setting down some very specific guidelines about how the sacrifices should be. As mentioned above, in many cultures in the ancient world, people brought sacrifices to the gods hoping for a desired response, but in Leviticus God makes it clear what sacrifices He desires and for what reasons.
 The first thing that we learn about the burnt offering in Leviticus one is that it can be performed using different animals. We see here in verse two a choice between an animal from the herd or flock, i.e. cattle or sheep most probably, or later on in verse 14 there is even the possibility of bring a bird mentioned. This shows that this type of offering was open to all, as no matter what type of animals someone kept, or was able to afford to bring, there is provision for them all. Even poorer people who probably didn’t have, or couldn’t afford sheep or cattle, could at least bring a less expensive dove or young pigeon and so were still able to participate in offering a sacrifice.
Next, we are informed that the burnt offering had to be a male animal without defect. Here, we could understand two things. Firstly, that the person bringing the sacrifice should bring their best animal that hasn’t any defect. It would have been tempting to bring an old or sick animal as the person would have had less use for such an animal. However, the Lord commands that the person brings their best, not an animal that they are happy to get rid of anyway.
A story is told of a rich man who visited a church once and put a large sum of money in the collection. At the end of the service, one of the church members who was responsible for counting the money realised that there was a much larger sum of money than usual and that probably the rich man had put it in. Slightly embarrassed by such an extravagant gift, the church member approached the rich man as he was leaving the church and offered him the money back saying that it was too large a gift for their church. The rich man replied however, that he was very rich and that for him it wasn’t such a large sum of money. At that the church member took the money to put back into the collection. The pastor noticed that something was going on and asked the church member what had happened. He explained about the large sum of money and that it was ok because the rich man had said that for him it wasn’t such a big sacrifice. To this the pastor replied that they would give the money back anyway because at their church they only wanted sacrifices that cost something!
There is actually a passage in the Bible that reflects a similar sentiment. David, after making the mistake of sending out his men to take a census that was not pleasing to the Lord, goes to make a sacrifice to appease God’s anger and stop the plague that has come upon the people as a result. He is offered animals and wood for the sacrifice by Araunah the Jebusite, on whose threshing floor he is told by Gad the prophet to make the sacrifice. However, David replies that he will not make a sacrifice to the Lord that doesn’t cost him anything (2 Samuel 24:24).
So, one reason that the sacrifice had to be a male animal without defect is so that it cost the person bringing it something. They were giving up one of their best animals. Beyond this though, if we know our Bibles, there is another obvious reason for this condition. The person making the sacrifice is told to lay his hand on the head of the animal. This symbolises the fact the person’s sins are being transferred to the animal, which was then killed and sacrificed in order to make amends for them. This is reminiscent of Jesus, who took our sins on Himself and then was sacrificed on the cross to make amends for them. Jesus was a perfect male i.e. the only man to ever live without any sin. We see then that this sacrifice was a symbol, a precursor of the one true sacrifice that was to come later in Jesus.
One more important aspect of this burn offering is that the whole animal was burnt. Again, the person bringing the sacrifice might have been tempted to keep some of the animal back for other uses, but we see here that in graphic detail all the animal pieces along with the fat, head, legs and even internal organs are to be used in the sacrifice. Maybe this was a pointer to the fact that Jesus died for all our sins, past, present and future!
Finally then, the question remains of how we are to respond to this. Today, we don’t bring animal sacrifices anymore because, as previously mentioned, Jesus was the supreme sacrifice, who filled everything we needed once and for all. Some people nevertheless still try to bring sacrifices to God to make themselves more acceptable to him. Maybe, they dress a certain way, get involved in a particular ministry or try to help those in need. These can all be beneficial things, but they don’t add anything to the sacrifice of Jesus. Instead the Bible talks about bringing a sacrifice of thanks to God (e.g. Psalm 50:14), which could include all these things, but it’s important to understand that we are doing them to thank God for what’s He’s done through Jesus’ sacrifice, rather than to gain any brownie points by doing our own versions of Old Testament practices.

Image by Mustafa shehadeh from Pixabay

Romanian Reminiscences 6: Decptive Appearances

First Impressions

Once inside the flat, Ben was pleasantly surprised. The outside of the block of flats looked like it had seen happier days. The stairwell inside also looked decidedly worse for wear. As far as the lift was concerned the less said the better. However, the flat itself, which Ben had just entered, told a different story. It was almost strangely out of place as if Ben had stepped into a different world.

The aforementioned door was not by any means the sprucing up of an otherwise decaying flat as one might have feared. Indeed, it was merely a sign of what lay beyond. The hallway of the flat had a shinny, laminated floor. Ben thought back to the kitchen in the house he had grown up in. It had had a dull, linoleum floor covering; a sort of poor man’s version of what Ben now found himself standing upon. Ben almost felt guilty that his dirty shoes and assorted baggage were ordaining to sully what was obviously a high-quality floor material. The feeling of niceness was augmented by the walls of the hallway, which were lined with a rough, speckled wallpaper, mimicking a granite-like finish and, in spite of its lack of authenticity, still exuding an air of grandeur. The ceiling was painted a clean white colour, which emanated freshness.

Ben was blocked in the hall by the older couple who had opened the door, unfortunate because he desperately needed the loo, which he hoped wouldn't be a hole in the ground, but nevertheless he could see further into the flat, particularly through the door to the kitchen, which lay on his right and the ajar door to what he supposed was the living room, which lay directly in front of him at the end of the hallway. The little he could glimpse spoke of quality.

The man and woman that stood before him were somewhere in their sixties speculated Ben. Both looked Romanian with ever so slightly darkened skin, tanned one might say. They were both a little rounded from what must have been a lifetime of eating well and perceptibly haggard from years of hard work.

The lady looked at him and to Ben’s surprise began to say something that he understood.

'You are speaking Romanian very bad!', she uttered with a stutter and a strongly rolled ‘r’.

Ben decided against commenting on her English and chose to receive it as constructive criticism. As a result, a pause ensued.

Breaking the silence the man asked, 'Cum vă numiți?'.

Maybe Ben’s Romanian was bad, but at least he knew enough to able to handle small talk.

'Ma numesc Ben. Si Dumnevoastra, cum vă numiți?, replied Ben, straining to pronounce the words as close as possible to how he remembered them from the recordings on his computer.

'Florin', answered the man.

'Imi pare bine de cunostiința!' said Ben, thinking that surely knowing how to say that he was pleased to meet someone would make up for any earlier Romanian misdemeanours. He turned to the lady and addressed the same question.

She looked at him briefly as if she was contemplating whether to accept him as a Romanian speaker or not. After a little consideration, she had obviously decided at least partially to do so and so replied, 'Ma cheama Doina. De unde sunteți?'.

Changing the verb from ‘to name’ to ‘to call’ and adding a new question seemed like a tactic to test Ben’s Romanian prowess, but he was capably up to the challenge.

'Eu sunt din Marea Britanie. Și dumnevoastră?'

Doina was slightly taken aback, evidently having misjudged Ben’s linguistic abilities. Nevertheless, not wanting to miss the opportunity to show off her own linguistic knowledge, she answered, 'I am from in Moldova.'

Ben almost smirked at the thought of someone being ‘from in’ a country; It is fairly obvious that if you are from a country, you are also from somewhere in that country, so no real need to specify that information. However, Ben refrained as this was definitely not a good moment to be impolite, even in spite of the earlier bravado from his hostess. Ben was so caught up in linguistic considerations that he completely missed the mention of Moldova, somewhere that was later to become very significant to him.

'Ți-e foame?', Doina asked, switching back to Romanian to avoid the possibility of misunderstanding or making a mistake.

Ben looked at her contemplating the possible meanings of this new phrase. The uncertainty was quickly cleared up, as the Doina started to rub her tummy. This was universal language.

'Da', replied Ben, not knowing what he was letting himself in for.

'Bine. Ia loc la camera de zi și asteptați putin'.

Ben was ushered by Florin into the flat’s living room (although he managed to negotiate a quick trip to the loo as they passed - it didnțt disappoint), which, as anticipated, was a lovely looking room. Ben plonked himself down on one of the arm chairs, an action caused by the inherent tiredness resulting from a long journey coupled with meeting a new culture head-on. He felt like maybe he was making himself too much at home, although the air of the couple he had just met was welcoming, if a little blunt, and encouraged such an attitude. He had tried his best to communicate with them using the polite forms in Romanian, something that took quite a bit of concentration as he wasn't used to doing this in English, but he noticed that they were fluttering between the two as they communicated with him. Obviously, they were older and had the right to speak informally with him if they wanted, but they also seemed a not very used to communicating with foreigners, which also made for an unclearity concerning politeness.

The living room itself was dominated by a fitted cupboard (if that was the right word for it) that stretched all across one wall. At either end, there were double doors concealing two large end storage spaces. Between them was a long sideboard with draws below and shelves above. The shelves were strewn with what looked like family photos and upon the sideboard was seated an extravagant looking plasma television, which belied Romania’s status as a supposedly less well-developed country. What was in the draws below the end cupboards, Ben could only speculate.

As well as the comfy armchair that Ben was seated in, there was another such armchair and a three-seater settee, all of high quality. Florin sat himself down in the other armchair and appeared to be preparing for conversation.

'Stiți Românești?', he began.

'Da, stiu puțin', answered Ben boldly, with a manner that suggested he knew more than the little that he actually knew.

'Sunteți din Anglia?'

'Da, sunt.' So far so good, but Ben was not ready for the storm that was about to be unleashed.

'Fiul meu lucreaza in Anglia. Aceasta este apartementul lui. Am înțeles ca Anglia e o țara foarte civilizata și oameni sunt cum se cade. M-a invitat să merg în vizita acolo. Nu prea vreau că odată am avut o experiența neplăcut când zboram cu avionul și acum mie este frică, dar se vedem, cine stie......'

Florin obviously didn’t get to do much talking and wanted to seize the opportunity to let off some steam. Judging by their meeting in the hallway, it was Doina who did most of the talking in this couple. As Florin talked along, Ben had no idea what he was saying, but he decided that it didn’t really matter. It was just good for Florin to get everything off his chest and so what if the person he was unloading to, didn’t have a clue what he was talking about? For Florin’s sake more than his own, Ben strategically threw in some 'da’s', nods and uh-huhs at what seemed suitable junctures in Florin’s discourse. Florin seemed satisfied that his utterings were being well received and so continued. This state of affairs must have carried on for about 20 minutes until the moment of truth finally arrived. Florin suddenly paused and looked at Ben waiting for something.

Ben, who by this stage wasn’t even concentrating on what was being said, realised that something was required of him, but he didn’t know what.

'Deci, care este pensie în Marea Britanie?' said Florin, evidently trying to solicit a response from Ben. Ben now found himself in a tricky spot. He had no idea what Florin had been talking about, even though the conversation had been going on for quite a while. He realised that a question had been asked, but he didnțt know what it was, let alone how to answer it.

As Ben was debating in his mind what to do, a voice rang out from the kitchen.

'Mâncare e gata! Veniți la masă!'.

At this sound, Florin all of a sudden seemed to forget about his awkward question and got to his feet.
'Haideți la bucătarie!' he said, motioning towards the exit of the room.

Phew thought Ben. Saved by the bell.

Image by Peggy und Marco Lachmann-Anke from Pixabay

Romanian Reminiscences 5: New Acquaintances

 Interacting with the Natives

After what seemed like an age, the lift jerked to a halt and the doors slide, or maybe more accurately said, jittered open. Ben was relieved to bumble his way out of the lift, dragging his luggage with him as best he could. He had spent most of the upward journey contemplating the best way to hang if the lift’s floor gave way. Now, though, his feet were on firm ground again and he could relax, for a few seconds at least, before he confronted the next challenge that lay ahead.

Said challenge began with the difficult of working out which was the right flat. His little piece of paper had 28 written on it, or at least this was the last number in the address, and by a complicated process of deduction Ben had reached the conclusion that the other numbers in the address represented different aspects of the flat’s location, such as apartment block, entrance and floor number. It was a far cry from 38 Park Avenue, the simple and straightforward address that he had grown up in. Postcodes and semi-detached housing made homes much easier to find, he thought to himself.

Looking around, Ben had four options set before him. Four doors, none of which had anything vaguely looking like a clue to the number of the flat, to which they barred the entrance, adorning them. How were you supposed to know which was which?

Reflecting upon the difficulties of getting this far into the building, it occurred to Ben that maybe the uninitiated didn’t usually make it to this point and so there wasn’t any need for the inhabitants of each flat to make it clear which was theirs. Alternatively, maybe adding a number to your door was seen as an unnecessary expense or just culturally not the thing to do. Whatever the reason for the lack of door markings, Ben was now in a predicament and going to have to use all his deductive powers to avoid an embarrassing situation.

Of the four options, two of the doors looked decidedly old, probably as they were when communism fell. Ben hoped that the flat that he was staying in wasn’t one of these. He decided to take both of these flats out of the running, not just because of wishful thinking, but as far as he was aware, the family he had been in touch with had promised European standard accommodation. Whatever that might be, thought Ben, it probably didn’t include a communist-style door. Thus, he had whittled it down to two options; two doors both of which looked like they wouldn’t have been out of place guarding the entrance to any safety conscientious European's dwelling place. But which one to choose? Here, he had no clues, except instinct.

He contemplated doing an ip-dip-sky-blue, but decided it was of no consequence. Pick one and go for it was as good an option as any. With regard to other decisions, he generally found himself hesitating beyond what was healthy, but in this situation, what was the worst that could happen? An irate neighbour, who anyway he wouldn’t have to see all that often? Who knows, he might even make a new friend.

So after a deep breath, he reached out his slightly shaking finger and pressed the bell of one of the flats before him. The bell squalled like an ailing bird. An odd sound, but no doubt effective for attracting the attention of the flat’s inhabitants, if not the inhabitants of the surrounding flats too, Ben mused. He waited a few seconds, nervously anticipating a response.

A few moments passed by and then he could hear shuffling sounds from beyond the door. It sounded like someone was preparing to open it. Would they, though, be friend or foe? Something clicked and the door began to give way to what lay on the other side. Ben was struck instantly by a warmth, but also the odour of food cooking. Then in front of him stood the figure of an old-ish Romanian looking lady with a man behind her.

'Bună Ziua! V-am așteptat', she said.

'Buna Ziua!' replied Ben, glad that his Romanian stretched this far at least.

'Haideți să intrați!' beckoned the lady to him. It wasn’t hard from her gesticulations to work out what she was suggesting and so Ben clumsily bundled himself and his belongings into the flat.

Meditations: An Unsung Hero

Shamgar

My sporting achievements are few and far between. One of the few was when I was at primary school. Every lunchtime and after school, I went to football training. However, for not hard to surmise reasons, I was never selected for the school team until one fateful day. It was my final year at the school before moving on to secondary school and the last match of the season was approaching hence my last chance to be chosen for the team. And believe it or not, I got the nod (probably more out of pity than anything else; a little reward for my persistence in coming to so many football practices without actually ever being picked for the team).
The day of the match arrived and the school bus sped it's way to the fixture with, for the first and indeed last time, me in it. We made it to the school where the match was to take place and the two teams lined up on the field to begin the match. I of course was watching from the side as I was a substitute. The first half went well and we raced into a lead. This continued into the second half where eventually it was three-nil to our team. So, finally the moment came when it was safe to introduce me into the fray. I could no longer do much harm as we were well ahead with just twenty minutes to go. However, more so than that after a few moments of headlessly running around and maybe the odd touch, the ball was crossed into the area and not only all the defenders  but also the goalie missed it. It fell at my feet with just a couple of metres to the goal and no one in the way. Even I couldn't miss and I didn't. Four nil a d I had scored the winning goal!
From then on  I can claim the best record of anyone who ever played for Rise Park Junior school; 100% scoring record that is a goal in every match I played and furthermore, a goal with every shot!
For obvious reasons, I have never received much attention in spite of this glorious footballing achievement. In the Bible, there are mentioned a number of people who did great things, but are rarely talked about. Unsung Biblical heroes we might say. For what reason I don't know. Maybe there are just so many Biblical heroes or maybe just some of them did slightly odd things.
I would say Shamgar definitely falls into this second category. I can't imagine that Judges 3:31 is many people's favourite verse, however it contains some deep truths, despite at first reading seeming a little strange to say the least.
We are told that Shamgar, the son of Anath, managed to defeat 600 Philistines using just an ox-goad. This raises a number of questions. To begin with though, I think it is good to look at the context.
The verse begins by telling us that Shamgar came after Ehud (incidentally, another unsung Biblical hero). In other words, he was just one in a long line of special people called, “Judges", who God chose at a particular time in Israel's history, to save them from difficult situations. The problems were caused by the fact that although the Jews were God's chosen people, they had the tendency to allow themselves to be tempted into sin by the other people groups around them. As a consequence God allowed oppression to come on them at the hands of certain people's. Just as suffering and difficulty today encourages many to seek God's help, so the Jews, when they were in these difficult times of oppression began to call out to God for help. He's response was to raise up these Judges to get the Jews out of the fix that they were in.
Shamgar is mentioned as having been the third of these Judges. He is described as the son of Anath. Anath is the name of a Canaanite Goddess of fertile. In what sense Shamgar was her son is debatable. Maybe it was  title to show that he was somehow connected to her or maybe it was his mother's name. Either way, it suggests that Shamgar might not have been Jewish, at least not 100%. Nevertheless, here he is being named as a hero who saved Israel. It just goes to show that God can use anybody he chooses to do His work, even unlikely candidates such as Shamgar who might not have even originally been a part of God's people.
The way that Shamgar actually goes about his task appears extravagant even compared to today's Hollywood offerings. We are told that he managed to kill 600 Philistines using just an ox-goad.
In this early part of Israel's history, the Philistines are mentioned a number of times as being enemies of Israel, so this explains why Israel would have needed help to get free from there. However, why an ox-goad and how did Shamgar manage this extraordinary feat?
In  terms of the question regarding the ox-goad, there is a clue in Judges chapter 5. Here in verse 6 it mentions the days of Shamgar and the days of Jael. Jael was the wife of Heber the Kenite, who is one of the starring figures in Judges chapter 4, where she kills Sisera, the bad guy who is leading the Canaanite King’s army. This suggests that Shamgar and Deborah, the female hero who motivates the Israelites to go out to battle the Canaanites who are oppressing them, were contemporaries. In verse 8 of this chapter we find out that at this time not a shield or spear was seen amongst forty thousand in Israel, in other words weapons were rare. Thus, we can surmise that Shamgar didn’t have access to more conventional means of fighting the Philistines and so was forced to turn to a more creative method, using an ox-goad, which would have been a piece of metal normally used to prod animals into working.
Additionally, in 1 Samuel 13:19-22 there is a passage which sheds some more light onto the situation. Here we discover that early in Saul’s reign as King of Israel, there was a period when the Philistines were oppressing Israel and one of their tactics to keep the Israelites under control was to ensure that there weren’t any blacksmiths around to sharpen weapons. Shamgar himself was fighting against Philistines, so maybe in his day there was a similar strategy at play.
In any case, the bottom line is that it seems like Shamgar used an ox-goad to defeat the Philistines because that’s all he had. It might appear to us to be an unusual weapon and it’s most certainly hard to imagine how he managed to defeat 600 men with it, but the key point is that Shamgar used what he had to bring about a great victory for God’s people. In the same way, although we might feel like we don’t have much to use for God in Christian lives, the main thing is take that which we do have, no matter how insignificant it might seem, and trust that God can bring about a great victory through it.
A simple example would be Dwight Moody, who was not very well educated and indeed after becoming a Christian could barely read the Bible due to his lack of education. Nevertheless, he dedicated what he had to God’s work and ended up preaching the Gospel to many, and even the President of America came to hear him!

Image by Frank Winkler from Pixabay

Meditations: Practical Discipleship

Different Approaches to Discipleship

There are many different discipleship structures. Jesus spent around three years of His life living 24/7 with the 12 apostles plus it would seem that many others were following along as well. The 12 apostles seem to have had special access to Jesus’ time and teachings. For example, in Mark 4 after Jesus shares the parable of the sower with the crowd, the disciples and other interested people approach Jesus and ask Him to explain the parable in more detail. Indeed, in Mark 3: 14 when the twelve are appointed as apostles, their main task is to be with Jesus and then to go out and preach and have authority over demons.
In other words, Jesus made disciples by spending time with them and through this time transmitting to them what they needed to know. Obviously, most of us won’t be able to spend all day everyday with those who we want to disciple, but there is still here the underlying principle that discipleship takes time and is more than just teaching someone a few lessons.  It could be said that discipleship is actually sharing our lives with our disciples (1 Thessalonians 2:8) .
There are various different practical ideas about how to spend this time with disciples and in what form. For example, in England as a student I remember one-on-one Bible studies being a popular way of both evangelising non-Christians who are open to studying the Bible as well helping younger Christians grow in faith. Whereas in Romania it was popular to form small groups of the same sex, a leader who was a slightly more mature Christian with 2 or 3 younger Christians who were students and to meet regularly to work through the ‘Fundamentals of Discipleship’ material.
In any case, each person is free to decide what works best for them in terms of group format. The key things are what we’ve seen above that discipleship necessitates time and sharing one’s lives with others, and also that spiritual growth needs not just theory, but also faith put into practice. I have grown and learnt the most as a Christian when I actually had to trust God and do something rather than when I just sat and heard the theory. For example, when I went to another country to get involved in Christian work, I grew a lot because I had to trust in God every step along the way.
In terms of discipleship, taking on the responsibility of discipling others or indeed the other way around, excepting to be discipled by someone else could be considered as practical steps of faith. Once the discipleship process is up and running though, it would be good not just to meet and talking about things, but also to have some practical sessions evangelising or getting involved in some sort of ministry together.
Following on are some more concrete principles about what to include in a discipleship relationship taken from ECC lesson 7 on, appropriately enough, discipleship.

A spiritual parent:

-prays for his spiritual children (e.g. Philippians 1:4) Helping someone grow in their Christian life is spiritual work and so no matter how well we do things, if God doesn’t work by the Holy Spirit there won’t be any fruit. Thus, we need to pray for those we are hoping to disciple. In any, case it’s natural that if we view someone as our spiritual child we should want to pray for them in much the same way that we naturally pray for those in our biological family. Prayer also helps strengthen our loving bond to those for whom we are praying.

-loves his spiritual Children (e.g. John 13:1). Jesus gave the supreme example of love by giving up everything He had, living amongst us on earth with all the difficulties that presents and then sacrificing His life on the cross, none of this for any good of His own, but rather for the good of those who believe in Him. In other words, love means to sacrifice what you have for the good of others and that not for any personal gain. Humanly speaking this is not possible, but if we are disciples who have experienced Jesus’ love and sacrifice for us then it is natural that we should want to share this love with others and He gives us the strength to do this. Thus, Christian discipleship means sacrificing what we have; time, energy, knowledge, experience, finances and the like and sharing it with our disciples. In other words, it costs something to do discipleship, but if we love are disciples than we should want the best for them and so the price is worth paying.

-Feeds his spiritual children (e.g. John 21:15). Here, there is a very clear analogy with biological children. Little babies need regular feeding in order to grow healthily. Likewise, new Christians need to start practicing and experiencing the aspects of the Christian life for themselves in order that they begin to develop them in their own lives. Jesus talks about being born again in John 3. No one is born fully mature, but rather as a helpless babe that needs constant care. With time, the baby grows and gradually starts doing things for itself. Eventually, all being well, it reaches adulthood, when it can fully look after itself and even start thinking about looking after others. The same is true from a spiritual point of view. After conversion, we don’t become perfect. We still need to start learning what the Bible teaches, how to read it for ourselves, how to pray and do evangelism etc. These things are not automatic. The aim of a discipler is to find good ways of helping their disciples to make progress in these areas and more.

-Protects his spiritual children (Luke 22:31-32). There are many temptations and difficulties that new Christians face, so an important task is to help them learn about what challenges they will face and how to deal with them.

-Instructs his spiritual children (Acts 20:27). A little bit similar to feeding new Christians, an aspect of discipleship is to teach new Christians the basics of the Christian life. There is a lot of overlap here with the feeding point, maybe a slight difference in that feeding has the aim of helping new Christians get to a point where they can do things for themselves, whereas no matter how mature we are, we will never be perfect and also need instruction and guidance from others.

Sharing all these things with new Christians is always going to be a challenge and we are rarely going to succeed in everything. However, God can take our weakness and make something glorious out of them (2 Cor. 4:7).
The fruitfulness of our discipleship efforts is going to depend to a certain extent on the receptiveness of those who we are discipling. Obviously, there is potentially a limited number of candidates for us to disciple, especially if we are concentrating on a certain category of people, such as students or are in situation where there aren’t many new believers around. So, I guess we need to pray and start discipling those who God gives us. That being said there are a few characteristics that we can look for which might help us nevertheless discern the potential of prospective disciples.
We can ask ourselves if they are seeking to follow God in their lives. They could well be difficult to disciple if they aren’t.

Are they faithful, dependable? (2 Tim. 2:2) Can we rely on them to take on board what we are sharing with them and eventually, one day, pass it on to others?

Are they available? They might be great potential disciples, but if they aren’t prepared to spend time with us, it’s going to be hard to disciple them.

Are they teachable? We they want top learn from us or do they think they already know it, or even want to teach us a thing or two?

In any case, the key thing is to pray and let God guide us to those who He would have us disciple, even if they aren’t perfect raw material!

Finally, there are a few little things we can take into account to help us in the discipleship process.

It’s important that our discipleship relationship is mainly based on the Gospel, but that doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t be interested in other aspects of someone’s life or, indeed, that we can’t do other things together. A bit of football doesn’t hurt anyone (as long as there aren’t too many fouls, devious tactics or big thrashings!), but it’s important to know the limits. In Moldova, students can spend endless hours playing board games, but after a few minutes of Bible study some are agitating and that’s if they have even come at all!

Try not to forget what your disciple is telling you. In Moldova, as an English person, you meet many Moldovans and they all remember you because there aren’t many English people in Moldova. However, as an English person it’s not so easy to remember them, as there are obviously lots of Moldovans in Moldova (although not as many as they would like!). I have had many a conversation with someone who knew me, but I didn’t really know who they were. That’s a bit uncomfortable and even more so if it’s someone you are trying to disciple!

One more thing is the importance of getting the balance right between being a friend and a spiritual leader. Our aim is neither to be so authoritative that we can’t develop a proper relationship with our disciple, nor so friendly that they don’t respect what we say or that we can’t correct certain inappropriate behaviour.

Overall, the key is balance. We need to encourage, teach and advise or disciples. This means sometimes discussing and dealing with problems. Indeed, it’s often better to address a problem in it’s embryonic stage, before it becomes a full blown burden. Nevertheless, it’s important to not get caught up all the time in such things, so that the whole disciple relationship becomes more of a counselling session than any thing else. It’s bet to deal with what deals dealing with in terms of problems, but to identify and concentrate on that which is most helpful for spiritual growth and to spend most of our discipleship time busy with that.

Image by freestocks-photos from Pixabay

Meditations: Difficult Circumstances

Jars of Clay

2 Corinthians 4:7 
But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us.

One time while organising English lessons for students in Balti, usually just a handful of students came and always known ones.
However, one lesson things had begun as usual. Just two or three students and I had launched into one of my famous (or for some infamous!) worksheets, when all of a sudden the door burst open and not just one or two students walked in, but five and more than that, one of them was a Christian girl who had been coming to our student activities, but the other four were non-Christian colleagues of hers from university.
I became nervous at this influx of new participants, but I’m always well prepared with way too many worksheets, so at least there was enough material to go round. We worked through what I had and then everybody went home.
The next week only two of these girls came. The week after just one and then after that none of them came.
Some time later, I happened to have a conversation with the Christian girl who had invited these colleagues and I asked how she had managed to get four of her colleagues to come to the English lesson. She said that it was easy. She just told them that an unmarried English guy would be leading the lesson and so they came. This then begged the obvious next question, why didn’t they come back? The girl’s response was, “Well, they saw you!”. After a moments silent reflection, she then added by way of comfort, but it’s better to be Christian than Brad Pitt!
Ideal would be to be both Christian and Brad Pitt, but obviously you can’t have everything and indeed it’s true that it’s much, much better to be Christian than a famous, handsome movie star.
Often in life we are burdened by our weaknesses. The fact that we are not anything at all like other popular people (even though in our imaginations we probably are!) or that others reject or take advantage of us.
We can have many difficulties in this life due to our personal failings or the challenges of dealing with those around us. It would have been nice to have gotten married, but it’s not easy when girls avoid or reject you or try to  have things their own way.
One girl that I knew (not that I had any romantic intentions towards her, but it illustrates the point well) levelled some criticism at me, but sometime later started contacting me to help her; “Hi! How are you? By the way, I need....” I did indeed help with what she asked for not with the hope of getting anything in return, but because I think it is our Christian duty to help those in need if we can. She did offer that she would return some of my help, although up into now she hasn’t. I don’t say this  out of any bad feeling, indeed I am glad that I was able to help her and would do it again and this is actually the idea. God has made us weak like jars of clay, which break easily, because when they break the light from within shines out.
A great example of this is given by Gideon in Judges 7. He has some self confidence issues, considering himself the least in his family, which is the weakest in Manasseh (Judges 6:15) and doesn’t think for a moment that he will be able to save Israel from the Midianites. However, God leads him to form an army of 32,000 men to fight against the mighty Midianite army of 135,000. Not good odds by any stretch of the imagination. However, God challenges Gideon to whittle the army down, first by sending home those who are afraid and then those who kneel down to drink water. Thus, Gideon ends up with only 300 men to fight a huge army.
Humanly speaking there is no chance, however by trusting in the Lord’s leading and doing something risky by going down into the Midianite camp, Gideon discovers that through a dream had by a Midianite soldier, God has begun to put fear into the Midianites before Gideon. Inspired by this, Gideon leads his men to encircle the Midianite camp, and with little more than a trumpet and clay jay with a burning torch inside each, they cause havoc in the Midianite camp by smashing the jars, blowing the trumpets and shouting, ‘A sword for the Lord and for Gideon’. The Midianites end up turning on one another and defeating their own army.
This was a great victory and the key is that it was all to God’s glory. There was no way Gideon and his tiny army could have won a battle, if it wasn’t for the miraculous way God worked.
Likewise then in our lives, although we as human beings are weak outside like jars of clay, the main thing is that God’s light should be shinning inside because it is this that will bring the victory. Furthermore, God has made us fragile because the more we break, the more of His light shines out from inside!

Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay

Fossa Cheese

A Cheese that Teaches a Life Lesson

We all feel like we are down in the dumps sometimes. Another way of putting it, is that sometimes we are stuck in a pit that we can't get out of.

The Italian word Fossa means just that, a pit. The interesting thing however about Fossa Cheese is that it is intentionally placed in a pit. Not the first place that you might think of for putting cheese into to ripen, but actually the time spent in the pit does the cheese a world of good, producing a delicious cheese worthy of being savoured.

How It All Came About
So, who first thought of the idea of producing great cheese by burying it underground? Or how did such a practise come into being?

Unsurprisingly, we need to look back into history to try and find the answers (Obviously, with today's health and safety regulations it is unlikely that someone would think of maturing cheese by burying it in a pit!).

Necessity is the mother of invention and certainly this seems to have been the case for Fossa Cheese. It is said that in the late 15th Century there existed aggression between King Charles VIII of France and Ferdinand of Naples. When French soldiers passed through two Italian towns, Sogliano and Talamello, inhabitants buried their Sheep’s cheeses in holes and covered them over in order to protect them from being stolen. After a time, when the town’s folk unearthed their buried treasures, they found that the unusual conditions that the cheese had been exposed to, had caused some unexpected, but pleasant changes. In particular, a deformed shape, forest floor aroma, but most significantly a spicy taste.


From Then to Now
Whatever the origins of Fossa Cheese, it’s clear that people in part of the Emilia-Romagna region of Italy realised that burying Pecorino (that is to say Sheep’s) cheeses in pits and leaving them sealed there for a time, resulted in a transformation of the cheese from standard fair into something a bit special.

The reason for this is that the lack of oxygen allows the microorganisms in the cheese to indulge in an anaerobic fermentation process, which changes and matures the composition of the cheese.

Over the years, the tradition developed of sealing small sheep's milk cheeses in the fossas around mid-august and then getting them out again on the 25th November, the feast of Saint Catherine.

Obviously, having a limited period when cheeses could be produced resulted in a limited cheese yield. Since then production has been increased to include other periods of the year, but using the same traditional methods. This results in a higher annual yield of fossa cheese and cheeses with different characteristics depending on the time of year when they are produced.

Also, originally cheeses were considered ready for consumption after being removed from the fossa, but nowadays cheeses are often subjected to a further maturation process even after coming out of the fossa.

Who Wants Dinner out of a Pit?
After a long day's work, probably food that's been prepared down a pit is probably not the first or most appetizing option that is going to come to mind. However, in the case of fossa cheese a number of precautions are taken to ensure that the final product is of a high quality.

The fossa is prepared for use by being filled with straw. This straw is then burnt in order to sterilize the pit and reduce moisture content. Before being placed into the fossa, cheeses are placed in canvas sacks. The fossa is once again lined with straw and then it is stacked full of cheeses (it wouldn't be a profitable business, unless the fossa is chockablock!).

Finally, the entrance to the fossa is sealed with sand and covered (traditionally with cobblestones in order to hide the cheeses!). This once again protects the cheeses and the pressure created also contributes to the ripening process.

Two for the Price of One
There are actually two main types of fossa cheese.

Formaggio di Fossa is made in the town of Sogliano al Rubicone by placing sheep's cheese in Fossa made out of tuff rock (which is actually not so tough, as it is formed from the remains of volcanic ashes and so lends itself to being hollowed out into fossa).

On the other hand, Ambra di Talamello is made in the nearby town of Talamello, where the fossa are made out of tufa limestone (harder than the rock at Sogliano, one would imagine, but nevertheless also suitable for digging out pits). Here, the final chees products is slightly different to that from Sogliano, in particular it has an orange color hence the name Ambra (Italian for amber).

Either way, the cheeses have a very specific sharp taste and are good for adding to regional soups (Cappelletti or passatelli), as ever great for grating over pasta or simply eating on their own with bread and maybe a little honey of balsamic vinegar.

Light out of Darkness
After our brief tour of the world of Fossa Cheese, one question remains. What is the life lesson that we can learn from it? Indeed, what can a cheese teach us about life?
We often think of pits as being negative places. Dark, dingy and not really where anyone would want to spend any significant amount of time. Although, as we have seen with the example of Fossa Cheese, spending time in a pit can actually have a beneficial effect. It's this time in the pit that transforms Fossa Cheese from standard sheep's cheese into a tasty, fragrant special cheese.

This then should give us hope that although sometimes in life we might feel like we are stuck in a dark pit, the things that we learn and the character that we develop in it can actually be positive and transforming to our life once we get out of the pit, and even while we are still in it.

If you want to know more about what to do in a pit, why not check out Psalm 40?

Further reading
The Oxford Companion to Cheese, p. 289
https://books.google.md/books?id=qRg1DQAAQBAJ&pg=PA289&dq=fossa+cheese&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjx59Lnrq3cAhWOyqYKHRRzBo8Q6AEIIzAA#v=onepage&q=fossa%20cheese&f=false

Romania Reminescences 4

A New Abode

Ben lugged his luggage from the taxi onto the pavement before the entrance to the block of flats that was from now on to be his new temporary abode. He turned and yelled to the cab driver, ‘Multumesc! See you later.’ Then, he turned back to survey what lay before him. He reflected on the fact that he was finally here to sit on his throne as the prince of....well, Crângași!

He had waited and speculated much time about what it would be like to spend some time in this most mysterious, but intriguing of places. The moment had arrived to find out. He moved with some difficulty, due to the weight of his baggage, to the entrance of the building before him. The instructions that he had received beforehand from his host were to type 0 followed by the flat number into the ‘domafon' (he figured this must be some sort of device at the entrance of the flats to use to contact the residents of a particular flat and alert them to your presence waiting to be let in to enter the building and, as he was about to find out, it was) and then finally to press ‘c'.

As he approached the entrance, he saw that his passage into the building was blocked by an industrial-strength metal door. It was foreboding and Ben thought sufficient to warn off intruders, at least any English ones. To the left hand side, he spied what he thought must have been the ‘domafon'. He followed the given instructions typing 0-28-c and waiting. The ‘domafon' started ringing. He had seen such devices before, although usually with a simple button to press for each address. This was a more general style for high rise blocks of flats. He wasn't used to such devices, but how hard could it be?

After a number of rings, a voice responded, ‘Cine?’.

Even if he hadn't understood the Romanian, which incidentally in this case he did, it was obvious from context what was being said.

‘Sunt eu, Ben din Anglia’, was his well-rehearsed response.

‘Cine?’, said the voice once more.

‘Ben din Anglia'.

‘Cine? Nu înțeleg. Vorbești mai tare’.

Ben felt a wave of disappointment come over him as he realised that his Romanian obviously wasn't cracked up to be what he thought it was.

‘Stii, Eu sunt din Anglia. Eu vine in vizit. Eu am vorbit stai la voi,’ he said mustering all his Romanian speaking prowess.

This was followed by a silent pause. Either the person on the other end was overwhelmed by his Romania speaking abilities or he had said something wrong.
He was getting worried, but after a while, he heard the door buzz. He hesitated, wondering what this meant, but then suddenly it dawned on him this must be the moment to enter. He hurried forward but was hindered by his luggage. Just as he put his hand on the door handle the buzzing stopped. Hopefully, he tried to yank the door open, but to no avail. It remained firmly shut. So, conquering said metal door was evidently going to be more challenging than he had initially thought.

He stood for a while contemplating what to do. He didn't fancy another ‘domafon' conversion, but how else was he going to get in?

He spent a moment composing himself before typing the number into the ‘domafon' when all of a sudden a burst of inspiration hit him. He could just wait for someone to come out of the building and when the person opens the door he could burst in like Mr Bean when he was stuck in a car park without a ticket for the barrier blocking his exit.

Ben took up his position, and waited for his moment to pounce like a lion hidden in the undergrowth waiting for an unexpecting bison to pass by. Sure enough, he didn’t have to wait long before he heard a click and the door began opening. Ben startled forward in an attempt to gatecrash the opening door. However, his English pleasantries overtook him and he hesitated in his approach towards the door. He wasn't accustomed to barging over others. This allowed the victim to advance her exit through the door and suddenly it was too late. The middle aged lady who was coming out already had her foot through the door and there was no stopping her now. Ben did the gentlemanly thing and stepped to one side to allow her to pass. Stealthily though, and quite inspirationally he thought, he looked at her confidently as if he knew what he was doing and as she passed by he whipped out his hand and caught the handle of the door before it began to close. He was thus able to manoeuvre himself and his things in through the door, allowing it to close behind him. He was in! In a foreign land, even simple tasks like entering buildings can be a challenge, he thought riley to himself.

He moved forward into the building with some trepidation. It looked just as foreboding as the doorway. An old-communist affair with worn stone steps and a plethora of dull, creaking metal boxes with flaps, strewn across the wall to the right of the entrance, which Ben assumed were to save the postman from having to penetrate too deeply into the building. He himself wasn't too keen on penetrating further, but he had no choice.

After lugging his things up the first few welcome steps he stopped by the lift. A small mercy that there was a lift, however it turned out to be by far the most foreboding aspect of all. Nothing at all about the lift conveyed reassurance. The doors were old and creaky. The button to call the lift looked like it was a remnant from Star Trek (the original series). When he pressed the down button a whirring sound began that wouldn't have been out of place in an old James Bond film as the archvillian prepares to reveal to Bond his latest weapon to destroy the world.

Eventually, the lift arrived and it's doors pinged open, inviting Ben to enter. Reluctantly, Ben did so dragging his bags with him. On the door it said the lift could take ‘6 Persoane' and judging by the people Ben had seen around and about as his taxi brought him to this address, malnutrition wasn't a common problem in this place. Thus, Ben himself being only half the size of many of the people he had seen, figured that even with his luggage he was only putting the equivalent wait into the lift of maybe one and a bit or at most two people.

As the doors of the lift closed behind him, Ben surveyed the lift's floor. He began to wonder if, when it said 6 people that was taking into consideration the fact that the its floor was partially dislodged and hanging freely, so much so that you could see through the gap into empty space. Surely, this would reduce the safe weight capacity?

Summing up all his courage though, Ben took a deep breath and reached out to press button 4, his floor number. The lift mechanism whirred once more into action and the lift started moving upwards. Now, there was no turning back.

Romania Reminiscences 3

The Arrival

On the train ticket, it said ‘accelerat'. But this train was anything but accelerated. It seemed to Ben like he had been on it for an age. As it chugged along, he reflected on what lay before. His trip to Romania wasn't so much about escaping elsewhere, but it was about finding himself and seeking meaning in life.

Eventually, he arrived at the station and with some difficulty got off the train, lugging with him what was surely too much luggage. He felt the need for the loo as the toilet facilities on the train had been less than appealing. When he saw the facilities at the train station, he decided that he could wait to get to the room that he was staying in.

The station was large, and bustling with people, but it wasn't hard to find his way through and exit. As he left the building through what seemed like the main exit, a man pounced on him, ‘Taxi?’ he asked hopefully.

Well, at least this was an international word that needed no translation and was indeed very opportune, as it was exactly what he needed.

Ben whipped out a piece of paper on which he had written the address of where he was staying. He'd found it through the friend of a friend's cousin as it were and the fact that he had easily found somewhere to stay was actually one of the things that had convinced him that it was the right thing to do to come and visit Romania. He looked at the paper and it said:

Strada Pădureni 41/7B/2/4/28, Crângași

Ben looked up at the taxi driver and announced that he wanted to go to 'Crangasi'.

The taxi driver stared at him, 'Unde vrei?'

Ben didn’t need to understand much Romanian to realise that the driver hadn’t understood his pronunciation, but this was an easily resolvable situation. Ben thrust the piece of paper in the driver’s direction. The driver peered down at and instantly realized where Ben wanted to go. This was the power of the written word.

'Am ințeles', said the driver. 'Hai să mergem!'. Then he beckoned towards a yellow car that Ben thought wouldn’t have been out of place in New York. He didn’t quite catch what the driver said, but the intention was obvious and so Ben, trustingly, followed on.

After they got into the taxi, the driver seemed to have something to do. He fiddled around with his shortwave radio and said to the person on the other end, 'Sunt ocupat cu un străin'. Then, he pressed some buttons on the taxi’s meter and they were off. Probably just usual procedure, thought Ben.

They drove around various streets for what seemed like a long time. As they went, Ben stared at the drab high-rise blocks of flats that dominated the skyline everywhere. In one sense, he thought to himself, very practical and quite an architectural feat, but on the other hand, they all looked like they had seen better days and were approaching a ramshackled state. He could understand why many would rather risk seeking their fortune elsewhere than stay in one of these moss-covered buildings.

Eventually, the taxi driver pulled over and signalled to Ben that he wanted to see the piece of paper again.

'Unde ar fi asta', mumbled the driver to himself after checking the address.

They then spent the next 20 minutes exploring various side roads. It was quite a good way to get to know the little residential area, but not quite what Ben was up for at that precise moment. Finally, after the driver had asked numerous locals, he said, 'Aici. Am ajuns!'

Ben recognised the word ‘aici’ from his Romanian lessons, and even if he hadn’t, it wasn’t hard to see what the driver was referring to. It meant here and so they were there (or here as it were from the driver’s perspective). One thing Ben had definitely learnt how to say was ‘Cât costa?’ – How much does it cost? This was a key phrase in any language. He decided that now was the moment to give it ago.

'Cat costa?', he asked, not sure if he pronounced it right, but, in any case, the driver definitely understood that one.

'5 million', the driver nonchalantly replied.

Ben suddenly realised that he had forgotten to check the exchange rate. That being said, 5 million sounded a lot in any man’s money.

The driver, seeing Ben’s perplexed look, turned to one side realising his mistake, composed himself and then turned backing saying, 'Ma scuzați, am în vedere 500 RON'.

Now, that made more sense to Ben. He knew that RON was the currency of Romania and he had learnt his numbers well. Cinci Sute – Five hundred.

Ben got out his wallet to pay but then had another sinking feeling. In the haste of being pounced upon by the taxi driver at the train station, he had overlooked the need to change his money into Romanian money. What to do?

'Euro?', he blurted out, as it was linguistically challenging to try to explain the situation and Euro was probably another one of those international words.

'Sigur,' said the driver. '100 euro'.

This was a currency that Ben roughly knew. 100 seemed quite a lot, but the man had been helpful and patient and had driven all around to the find the right address. Anyway, Ben wasn’t in a position to negotiate, so he just paid up. Slightly painful, but that’s just the way it goes, he mused. 

Image by David Mark from Pixabay

Previous - The Journey

Meditations: The Good Samaritan

True Love

Once on a very cold February night, I was walking back to my flat from the CSC student office. In front of me, I saw a man swaying from side to side as he crossed the road. In England, it's usually drivers whose cars sway from side to side who are drunk, whereas they joke that in Moldova it's those who drive straight who are drunk (if you see the roads here, you'll understand). In any case, this was definitely an English swaying.

Eventually, the man approached the other side of the road but collapsed before making the pavement. I was tempted to look the other way and carry on, but it was a cold night and the man was lying on the roadside. I reluctantly crossed over to try and help. Fortunately, he managed to get up and I helped him on to the pavement. He started to move on his way but quickly grabbed a lamp post so as not to fall over. He then just stood there clutching the lamppost swaying about.

I tried to talk to him, but he just kept saying to me ‘Italiano'. My Italiano is not too bellissimo so it didn't make for much of a conversation. Wondering what to do, I called a friend from church who advised me to call an ambulance, which I did. I explained the situation to the lady at the ‘skoro pomochi' (emergency help) centre. She asked me whether the man was going to still be there as it would be 20 minutes before an ambulance came. He didn't look like he was going anywhere in a hurry, so I said he would. Then we waited.

I tried to tell the man a little about God, but not in Italiano so it didn't make for much of a discussion. After about 15 minutes all of a sudden, the man built up a burst of energy, let go of the lamppost and headed off down the road. This was a problem because I had promised the lady on the phone that the man would still be here when the ambulance arrived. I thought about going after him and informing that he had to wait for said ambulance, but then I thought it was better to let him get on his way. Besides, I had had enough Italiano for one evening.

So, the man disappeared off and not knowing what to do, so did I. Except that after taking a few paces all of a sudden, an ambulance pulled over and said that they were looking for someone who had called. I was a bit nervous, knowing that he in England you can get in trouble for a false 999 call. However, as the ambulance door opened, I noticed the driver was someone I knew from church. Also, when I said that the drunk man had left they seemed more pleased than annoyed, closed the door and drove off.

In the Bible, Jesus tells in Luke 10:30-35 the story of a man who needs help, although on this occasion not through any fault of his own. He is a man travelling from Jerusalem to Jericho. On the way, he, unfortunately, falls into the hands of robbers who beat him and take what they can.

Two people pass by on the same road, one after the other. Both see him, but, like I was tempted to do in the above example, pass by on the other side of the road. This is not what you would expect as the first was a priest, the people who brought the sacrifices to God at the Jewish temple, so in other words, important and well-respected people in the Jewish religion. The second was a member of the Levites, people who were helpers in the temple, so once again people with a good position in the Jewish religion. Despite their religious status neither did anything to help the fallen man.

After this, a third person passes by. This time a Samaritan. Jesus was a Jew and on the occasion when he told this story, he was speaking to an expert in Jewish law. The Jews looked down on Samaritans because they considered them to have mixed the Jewish religion with other faiths. In 2 Kings 17, the story of how this happened is told. Due to the fact that the people in Israel hadn't been obeying God, he allowed the Assyrian King to conquer them and take them into exile. In Samaria, a large area of land in Israel, he sent other peoples to live in the place of the Israelites. These people also didn't worship the Lord, so He sent lions among them. As a result, the Assyrian King sent a Jewish priest back to teach them how to worship the Lord. However, they only started half-heartedly worshipping the Lord, keeping many of their former, pagan religious practices. Thus, over the years, a Samaritan religion developed that was based on the Jewish religion but that wasn't pure. For this reason, the Jews looked down on Samaritans. They even considered them enemies.

So, getting back to the story, a Samaritan was the last person that a Jewish audience would have expected to help the fallen man, especially as the man was travelling between Jerusalem and Jericho, so was probably a Jew himself. But, surprise, surprise, the Samaritan stops, assists the man in need and even puts him on his donkey, and takes him to an inn where he can rest and recover.

Jesus tells this parable as a response to a teacher of the law asking Him who is our neighbour that, according to Leviticus 18:19, we are supposed to love as ourselves. Thus, it seems like here Jesus is illustrating what it means to love your neighbour.

When I think of the word neighbour, a certain Australian Television show often comes to mind and when we think of love in today’s society, we tend to concentrate just on the emotional side of things as emphasised by, for example, the aforementioned television programme, which generally seems to be about the feelings people in one particular street have for one another.

However, I once heard a wise preacher give an interpretation to this parable that I have never forgotten. In the story, we see three different types of people, with three different attitudes to the traveller.

Firstly, there are the robbers. Their attitude to the man is 'What’s yours is mine if I can take it.' They beat the man and take by force what they want from him. It’s not too hard to see that rather than love, this is simply taking advantage of someone weaker.

Secondly, there are the religious people; the priest and the Levite. Their approach is 'What’s mine is mine if I can keep it.' In other words, instead of sacrificing what they have to help the needy man, they cross over the road and keep what they’ve got. To help the man would have cost them something, and they are obviously not keen on that. Again, not a good example of love.

Finally, there is the enemy, the Samaritan. He takes the position 'What’s mine is yours if I can give it to you.' He stops and gives up time, energy and resources to bandage the man’s wounds, then putting him on his donkey and taking him to an inn, where he can rest. There he also pays money so the man can be looked after. And he does all this, even though he was someone who others looked down on and could even have considered an enemy.

Thus, we understand from this parable that love is sacrificial. It means giving of what we have for the good of others, even if it costs us something, even if we don’t receive anything in return and even if we don’t like those who are in need.

Jesus finishes with a challenge, 'Go and do likewise,' which raises the question of how can we love others in this way. The answer we discover reading the rest of the Bible, where we see that this is exactly what God did for us in the person of Jesus, who sacrificed what He had for our good, even though He didn't have anything to benefit personally, and we humans were His enemies because of our rebellion before God. Indeed, it was humans who Jesus was actually helping by showing them the right way to live, who decided to have Him killed. This sacrificial love is what is known as agape love.

In conclusion, how can we show this sort of love to others? It’s very hard as my example at the beginning illustrates. However, it is possible because Jesus has already shown us such a love and as it says in 1 John 4:19 for example, if we have experienced this love in our lives then we are able, and indeed should show such a love to those around us. It’s not easy and sometimes we will fail, however, it is possible if we truly know Him.

Image by falco from Pixabay