(Really Far) Out of the Comfort Zone / An InterRailing Adventure

Our route (inc. very artfully-drawn aeroplanes for flights home)

This week has been incredible. I've spent the last 9 days interrailing through Europe with one of my language assistant friends from Germany, and we've had some amazing experiences - some mishaps as well, as to be expected - and met some very interesting people (in both senses of the word). It's been an adventure!

I'm currently on the train on the way to Budapest from Prague, having also made it through Vienna and Florence from our starting point in Lyon, France. We also had an impromptu overnight stop in Dijon, which was rather amusing, if nothing else, as we ended up not being able to take the train we wanted to get on overnight to Florence, and so spent the night at a (very bad) karaoke bar with an Australian traveller who was on her way from Barcelona and hadn't slept for for several days... Like I said, rather amusing!

Other incidents include almost missing our train in Florence due to laid-back Italian bus drivers and a lack of tickets on board the vehicle (we had to get off when the ticket inspectors came because we hadn't been able to buy any tickets); and a night-time excursion through Vienna due to missing the last metro by minutes (see a theme here?), and having to take the night bus back to our hostel - much more complicated than you would think (although the bus driver was very helpful this time).

A gorgeous strawberry & elderflower and grapefruit ice-cream I enjoyed in Budapest

Revising this at a later date, I feel I have to add our hostel stay in Budapest, which was easily the weirdest hostel experience I've ever had (and I've been to quite a few hostels this year). Having to wait for our beds to be constructed wasn't the best start, but then we discovered that our only exit was through the bathroom, which was always flooded, often occupied, and also had no locks.... Awkward situation probability = high.

Other experiences, however, were more positive, although some equally strange - being proposed to by a random Italian guy definitely lived up to the national stereotype, although sharing a train carriage with random Austrian and Czech strangers actually turned out to be not as scary as it sounds. We've also journeyed through some incredible scenery, for example the train ride through Austria, full of glimpses of mountain villages and sky-blue lakes - absolutely beautiful.

Thankfully, despite all previous incidences, we've made it safe and sound thus far, and haven't had to sleep in the woods as one of our fellow travellers resorted to doing when she couldn't find her hostel (please, no!!). It's been a great week-and-a-bit, and given me again an appreciation for those things we often take for granted (a bed to sleep in, for example AHEM Dijon). If anything, this trip has shown me that travelling is a great exercise in risk and trust. Out of the comfort zone!

En Casa?

Currently sitting outside in the evening sunshine, scribbling a few notes for the blog and enjoying the last few rays. This is the life!

Having now been here a month (a whole month!! I can hardly believe it), this week has been what I see as the reward for those three weeks of slogging when I first came here. Each day has given me something new and exciting, and while it's still been exhausting and at times frustrating, I feel that I can now begin to call this place 'home'.

A brief summary of my activities:

• A couple of stints working at different second-hand shops run by Betel - this is good fun, as you can go through the donations before anyone else gets their hands on them and grab any items that catch your eye! I've picked up a couple of treats already.

• Lots of driving, including up to Aguas Vivas, one of the men's houses (or casas de chicos), which is up in the mountains and has buildings that are used as a holiday/retreat centre for groups that want to rent it out. It's beautiful up there, and a fun old drive, despite the ridiculously pot-holed and bumpy track you have to take to get up there! Look left to see a photo of the (rather cloudy) view from outside the house.

• A rather sudden introduction into the worship team (they don't really 'do' giving you much notice here). I was waiting for the evening meeting to start at the church on Wednesday, and the musicians were rehearsing their final songs for the beginning of the service. Suddenly, one of the leaders came up to me and said 'I heard you play guitar. Why don't you have a go?' (but in Spanish, obviously...), and handed me his guitar! Luckily, I didn't have to play for the worship there and then, but we had a quick jam and I helped to lead at our morning devotional the next day. Yay :D

• The arrival of a new American girl has meant that I have an English-speaking companion in the house, which is rather nice. Although I have to say, my friendships with the other girls are developing well - we had a mad evening the other day, where several of them were jumping on/tickling me, while others tried to mess up my hair, and yet more had already tried to hide my shoes. All in the name of love, of course. And my Spanish continues to improve, gradually reaching that level where I can have some quite serious conversations and actually understand what's being said/have a positive input, which is a big step foreward. I look forward to more of these chats :)

• Finally, my pace of life has adjusted to fit in with the Betel routine! I still get hungry at 12 and 7, when food isn't for another two hours, but I've got myself a reputation as 'the girl who likes to eat', and it is, in fact, quite common to have a 'pincho' (snack) at these times anyway. On another topic, the pure fact that I have nowhere else to be/nothing else to be getting on with means that I have had no choice but to slow down, chill out and relax a bit - for example, there's no point cleaning an entire church in a morning, if that then means you've got no work left for the afternoon. It's quite nice, this slowed-down pace -definitely a lot less stressful than rushing for Uni deadlines (oh, final year!).

So, that'll be it for this week - keep those letters/prayers coming!
Adios amigos xxx

¡Hola, España!

Well, things at present are certainly a little different than they were in my last post! For one thing, I am no longer in Germany, instead currently residing in Madrid, Spain. Secondly, I am no longer teaching English to German schoolchildren, but volunteering in a centre for drug addicts and alcoholics, living with them and generally spending all my time in or about the centre and its various other working locations.

To explain, I feel I should give a little bit of background information on the centre and what it does. It's run by Betel, a Christian charity set up by Elliott Tepper, an American missionary, in the mid 80s. The principle aim was to give a recovering drug addict a place to live, food, clothing and spiritual support as he went through court proceedings. To pay for his keep (and keep him occupied), this man worked at the flat where he was staying, painting walls, mending appliances and such like. As he was doing so well, his friends started asking if they could come and stay too. Soon there were too many of them to live and work in one small flat, and they had to move out to a bigger house, and they started finding work outside the home, but always working together for the benefit of the whole house. Thus Betel was born. Now there are hundreds of centres all around the world, all giving practical aid and support to thousands of recovering addicts and alcoholics, and run by missionaries and ex-addicts (named Betelitos, people who have been previously taken in by the centres), and helped out by a fair few volunteers along the way. Here's where I come in. I decided to spend my time on Spain helping out at a centre like this, living with the girls at their house in Madrid, and working with them at their charity shops, giving out leaflets, doing collections for donations and generally making myself useful.

I've been here just over a week now, and the time's been interesting to say the least! I stared off on the first day helping out with cleaning at the church, and I haven't really stopped since then. It's been tough at times, particularly with the language, which I can mostly understand (thank God), but I find quite hard to speak. I've had to adjust to a lot of things in the Spanish Betel life, not least the eating times, which tend to be about 7 in the morning, 3 in the afternoon and 10 at night. I've also had to get to know the 20 other girls that I'm living with, no mean feat when half of them are Spanish, and the other half from various places around the world, including Russia, Poland, Brazil and Portugal, to name a few. Oh, and the pack of Internet access (only a couple of times a week, at the church), and my iPod, is killing me!

But I'm pleased to say that I'm feeling more and more secure every day, and I feel like I'm getting to know the girls and the organisation much better with each new experience I have. I definitely like the attitude towards coffee (always, and has priority over work), and the idea of a siesta is quite appealing too. I've heard some amazing stories already, and I'm sure that time will only reveal more. Life can be dealt with without constant Facebook access and music in your ears, however hard that might be. Only time will tell.

I would be grateful for any prayer people could send my way - that I can settle in well and start to make a difference, and also for the girls and their problems. Until next time - adios!

Much love, Nat xxx

P.s. If you want to read more about Betel and their amazing work, please check out their website: www.betel.org

Half-Term Holidays

The last two weeks have been school holidays (yes, two whole weeks for autumn half term!), and school holidays means travels! I have several colleagues who went for the rather adventurous destinations of Rio and New York, but I went for the slightly closer but no less worthy German cities: Berlin and Heidelberg. It's been a mad couple of weeks, and one to make me realise how ridiculously lucky I am to be doing this year abroad, assistantship, degree and all it entails!

My impressions of Berlin: constantly changing scenery thanks to the never-ending re-building of the city that's going on; never-ending nightlife thanks to the 24-hour clubs that stay open all weekend (we didn't stay that long, thankfully!); and the ever-changing faces of the people we had to share a room with in the youth hostel (some more welcome than others...).

Heidelberg was a little different - a beautiful old city right in the middle of Germany with a ridiculous amount of students!

I have thoroughly enjoyed these last couple of weeks seeing friends, meeting new ones and having adventures. It was only at one point, as I was (mildly) stranded in the middle of Heidelberg at night with nowhere to sleep and no way of getting back home that I began to appreciate the distance between myself and home. With a world full of so many people, I am truly grateful for those God-given relationships that fill my life and give it warmth. Life is precious!

p.s. I found somewhere to stay and a way of getting back home (eventually!). Thanks Abbii!