Lessons in Democracy

I know, I know. Two posts in one day. But there was an election yesterday in Poland and as that's where we intend to live and serve, it's good to keep you all in the loop on things related to that country.
Polish voters overcame apathy yesterday and learned that their vote does, in fact, make a difference. In 2005 when the last election was held, low voter turnout eliminated the chances of the Centre-Right party Civic Platform. Most of their supporters just didn't go vote because they figured that one vote didn't matter. So they got the government they deserve, as the adage goes. So for the last 2 years they have been increasingly embarrassed abroad by a ultra-Catholic nationalist/populist party who allied themselves with parties even more conservative-Catholic nationalist/populist than they were. The end of that coalition is what triggered this election. In the last election 2 million plus turned out and voted. The winner received about 27% of the vote. This time, 7million plus voters turned out sweeping Civic Platform to power with nearly a majority of seats--unheard of in multi-multi-party continental European nations. There were line-ups of Polish expats voting abroad. In Paris alone, it was a 2 hour wait. Not since the first free election in 1989 was voter turnout so high. This time, the winner received more than 41% of the vote.
On a more humorous side of things: As the party that was in power (Law and Justice) is largely supported by the more aged eligible voters, there was a campaign organized to "hide granny's ID card". Not sure whether it worked or not as the number of voters jumped from 2million to 7million. But funny all the same.

legend: PO - Platformy Obywatelstwa - Civic Platform
PiS - Prawo i Sprawiedliwosc - Law and Justice
LiD - Lewicy i Demokracji - Left and Democracy
PSL - Polish Peasants Party
S - Samoobrona - Self-Defense
LPR - Liga Polskich Rodzica - League of Polish Families
*interesting party names, i know.

Back to Normal?

Field Orientation pt. 1 is over. We will go through pt.2 in April. It was a tough time, but I think generally a good time. It's tough enough to do it while you have small children, but when one of those children gets quick sick with a nasty cold and has a fever for 4 days, that makes it much more difficult. That made it hard for Renata to attend many of the sessions during the second week.
We were challenged by much of what we talked about. Everything from cultural adjustment to how we live as the church in our communities and in the context of modern-day Europe. I'll share two quick things that we are thinking or talking about now (Renata and me): the first is the cultural adaptation. We have lived in the Polish culture for a reasonable period of time and feel we have a pretty good grasp of things there. But then it struck me during our first week of FO--I have never worked with primarily Poles in a context that would be considered their "turf". Living connected with international communities gets you around doing that sort of thing. But we are going to put ourselves in a Polish community, not an international community. So things will be interesting.
The second thing we've been talking about is the idea of blessing others around us. Particularly those we either don't know or are not part of our church-community. It's hardly an original concept, but seems to be rarely practiced when we get into the rhythm of just living life. But it's an interesting thing when we take the posture of desiring to be a blessing each day to people with whom we cross paths. Not doing this because we have a chance to tell them about Christ, but because we have been blessed with everything we have. Mind you, once we start doing it, it becomes fun to do. Especially in much of Europe where this is not expected. Laugh if you will, but I was so happy yesterday when I was able to give just 10cents to the young muslim girl in front of me in line at the grocery store. Buying about 5 cartons of juice she was going to have to leave one behind because of being short a measly 10cents. You should have heard the cashier when I put down 20cents to cover it. Just 10 stupid cents, but it was so much fun to do that. Trying to live as a habitual blesser.

off to FO

today we go north to Amsterdam where we will be until Sunday and then back her for part 2 of field orientation. could be fun because the people. could be a pain with Kaleb waking up at 5am. pray that things will go well for the next 10 days.

Pretty darn good day

So yesterday (Friday) was a pretty good day for us here (for me in particular). Although it started before 6am (thank you Kaleb) I dropped our oldest munchkin off at preschool for the morning (I always enjoy riding with him on my bike), then went to my favorite little espresso bar near one of the palaces of the Queen. I met a friend of ours there and got a chance to discuss some of the things he's been working on and with and got to pick his brain about all that (as well as having a terrific pastry and a couple of cappuccinos). From there I headed down to meet my friend and supervisor (within CAI) at his house and talk about Warsaw and how things are going with us, and to touch base after we had an industrious conversation a few weeks ago about what I'd like to focus on the remainder of our time in The Hague. It was a very encouraging meeting for me (as meeting with him usually is) and I came away greatly lifted. Heading back to the office I spent some time reconnecting with some of the staff I haven't seen a lot of in the last couple of weeks and then got to working on some videos for this weekend. So after doing that, I was affirmed by people's reaction to it and was again satisfied.
Now, one more really cool thing happened yesterday. Our good friends Rob and Sandra got married (we haven't heard anything so we assume all happened as planned). They were two friends we really thought should be with someone great yet had none. Not that one or the other was actually looking. In August 2006, while sitting in our living room in Toronto (after having thought about it for a couple of weeks) I finally suggested to Renata that I thought Rob and Sandra would really enjoy each other's company because of their personality types. Renata agreed and we set about our work of introducing them. As you now know, they did, in fact, enjoy each other's company. We are so happy for them and happy also for the fact that we will have our anniversaries one day after the other as Renata and I were married on the 4th. Pretty cool huh?!

Yesterday

So yesterday was Renata's and my 4th anniversary. It seems like it's been so much longer, but I mean that in a good way. It's been a pretty full 4 years.
It's difficult to do much to celebrate when you have such young children (Maja, at least) so we just had a nice evening here at home after Renata came back from meeting with her mentor in Amsterdam. It was also the first time we've had the resources to get each other gifts. Renata did good. She got me something I have wanted most of my life. An electric slot car track. Got a chance to play with it a bit last night after Kaleb was in bed. I'm going to set it up later and Renata and I will race.

lots of things goin' on

Okay, so yes it has been a long time since i wrote anything here. Sorry about that. The last couple of months have been rather occupying. Even now I don't have much time to write, but thought I'd just give a quick online update as to recent and future events. I attended the Global Leadership Summit this last Friday and Saturday. I really enjoyed that. Very challenging time and quite refreshing.
Tomorrow, a few of us from Crossroads have been invited to the U.N. Peace Palace to play "Abide With Me" at a celebration put on by the Indian Ambassador. It is the first annual international day of non-violence (i guess violence is okay on the other days of the year) and Mahatma Gandhi's favorite hymn was apparently "Abide With Me". So rather bizarre, but we'll roll with it.
We'll be in Field Orientation from the 9th until the 20th in Amsterdam and here in the Hague.
And in the meantime we are working on defining what our role will be at least for the interim once we return to Warsaw, as well as continuing in our roles here and making sure we finish well.
More to follow later.