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Hi!

We are now in the Czech Republic! I'm typing on a Czeck keyboard and its freaking difficult. We're going to prague castle today and i'm excited! im giving up on capital letters this is rediculous. well, we have to leave, but i just wanted to say i'm doing well, we have good internet, and i'll have a better update soon. love you!

My Art Heart

 I think tonight I will share what I’ve been thinking the past couple days.

Merel was our guest speaker for our art class in Amsterdam. She has a unique, profound, and infectious appreciation for art of all kinds, and when she would start explaining a painting she would get so excited she wouldn’t be able to take her eyes off it while she gestured with her hands, trying to express her love for these colors on the canvas. What I’ve been thinking about during Gabe’s lectures finally clicked while I listened to Merel, we think much more similarly and I have a little-sister admiration for her, she was amazing!

In her lecture, Merel explained that “art is not a puzzle, at one point it starts speaking differently to you. The lack of words  in great music and paintings mean that they can never be solved, not everything can be explained with words”. That was so true for me! I had never stood in front of a painting and realized that my world was suddenly expressed in the painting in front of me better than I ever could with words. I had been trying to “solve” art pieces like puzzles but during her lecture I took a step back and a few paintings did slide into focus and mean something important.  

The first time I ever encountered “The Balcony” by Manet, it was on the cover of our ~$3.95 copy of A Room with a View by E. M. Forester. When I first sat down to read this book (which is now one of my favorites) I stared at this picture and wondered why they always put ugly girls from ugly old paintings on the covers of these books. When I visited the Musee d’Orsay and stood in front of this painting in person it totally changed. There was the initial recognition: “Oh! This is the painting that was on my book cover!” and then the closer inspection to see if my reaction last summer was accurate. It wasn’t. The painting is huge: probably at least six feet high and four feet wide and details you are unable to fully make out in the background are clear in person. The gentleman and the other girl stare demurely to the right at the unknown view beyond the balcony with the attitude that they just arrived to their new hotel room and they’re exploring the balcony and all it offers for the first time. They seem a little travel worn and unsettled, as we all are when we travel. However, what really struck me was the girl in the foreground, the girl I had thought so ugly only a year before. She, unlike her companions, has an intense gaze that is hidden from the man and her friend as she looks off the opposite side of the balcony. It is a moment of privacy for this girl where she exposes what she is truly feeling inside, something rare in her society of the time as it seems by the contrasting blank face of the other girl.  She looks out with a look that shows how much she wants to be free, while the other two look frazzled and tired she looks anxious to move and think and experience life in this new place.

This is how I feel, traveling with so many people so often and how I have felt in the past when time alone is rare to non-existent. How often have I looked out at the view with this same feeling inside me, letting my mask slide off as I appreciate the view, the fresh air and the moment of having my own few seconds to let my true emotions come through. Manet has beautifully expressed this complicated moment of vulnerability, truth, and strength. J

The second painting is “Portrait of a Violin Player” by Matisse. Go listen to some violin music before you read what else I have to say, Merel played Mozart’s String Quartet 4 G Minor. With that in your head, look at this painting. This art is more modern than the Manet, the figure is faceless and stands playing the violin while looking out the window (are you seeing a trend here? You’ll see more!). The colors in this painting are also important, I think, they’re all mostly shades of orange and pastel blues. To me, this is peaceful and exhilarating all at once. The man stands calmly looking out the window, playing for no one but himself. But the colors! The bright orange brings in a feeling of intensity and playfulness while the contrasting pale blue accents underline the peacefulness of the man inside. Maybe contentedness is a better word.

How beautiful is that? To be still, looking out a window (psalm 46) while having the feeling of when you purely enjoy something that you find most intensely beautiful, that thing where you know God created it because it was beautiful and knew how much we would  soar with joy when we discovered it too. It’s when you sit and let the beauty soak into you just because you love it and don’t have explain why you like it to anyone else! It’s effortless and praiseworthy.   

I could keep going but it’s time for bed J Today we had a long day of classes again and then a private concert of a phenomenal violinist friend of Gabe’s in his apartment! To have a private concert of someone so talented (she played at least 30 minutes of Bach from memory and then, after the cookie intermission played at least another 30 minutes of complicated Hungarian folk music) was a chance of a lifetime and I enjoyed it immensely! We also had the chance to talk to her and she was so quiet and adorable and then couldn’t stop laughing when someone found an old P. Diddy CD on Gabe’s shelf—Gabe’s been giving us the impression that he is one of cultured taste and only listens to classical music...

It was a perfect way to end another day in Berlin. Tomorrow we leave to tour Sachsenhausen, our first concentration camp (different from an extermination camp) and it will be intense but I’m so thankful that I am able to 1. Acknowledge that these things were real and 2. Discuss and pray about them with a group who believes the same things I do, enabling us to encourage and pray together in deeper ways. After a few hours to process we'll have our night of karaoke, not to forget what we've just seen but to embrace being alive! Oh geez. I wonder if I'll go up??

I guess I'll let you know. Goodnight!! I love you!

Mumble-Jumble Post

Hi!

It's real late, and I didn't want to have to write something new but I wanted to post something, so here's part of an update I sent Bren that's all over the place. Sorry if it doesn't make sense but if it does, well, yay!

How is it being a month in? In our group our happy faces are starting to wear off and we're seeing the real sides of each other which is mostly good, but it can get tense sometimes. We had an awesome vespers tonight though where we all agreed that we're in this together and we need to start acting more respectful and loving towards each other than we have been. I mean it's been great but sometimes some people get on your nerves and it's harder to love them and easier to ignore them. I'm definitely guilty of this.

So real life starts to settle in but it's great. Alisha says that when people cry you see the real side of them. She said that when I was crying, because when I have emotions, I cry. Let's be real. And I was tired and hungry and frustrated at people and life, so I cried, and she said this beautiful piece of life philosophy and it made my runny nose seem a lot more deep and intellectual. 

We had vespers in this church that used to love the Nazis and worked their ideas into Christianity. In the church there's friezes of men with SS helmets and WWII nazi soldiers at the right hand of Jesus. The whole idea is that Christianity is a religion for men of strength who do not bow to anyone. There is the small hiccup in which Jesus happened to be a Jew, so they placed more emphasis on Martin Luther because he was a German who overcame the superpower to create a bigger, more influential movement... sound familiar? Crazy. We held Vespers here, where swastikas have been chipped off the walls, but worship is not affected by place but is in "spirit and in truth". We got real, especially the guys which is awesome, and God is really, really good even though we mess up like crap.

Then we had group dinner, and I LOVE group dinner because we totally take over a restaurant and hang out with everybody and I wore my contacts so I felt pretty and it was DELICIOUS WE HAD PIZZA at this candle-lit place under a metro track so it rumbled above every 10 minutes! It was called the 12 Apostles on Friedrichstraat.  

I love you! Tomorrow is a day of cabaret and class. wish. us. luck. 

Tourists or Travelers

There's a difference, isn't there, between these two kinds of people. Maybe you can't put your finger on it right at first, maybe you have some ideas, but I hadn't really thought about it until Gabe mentioned it in class today. As a tour guide, Gabe comes into contact with a lot of tourists, and really appreciates when we become travelers.

I'm sorry I haven't written in a long time! Internet connection has been slim to none this past week but now it's one in the morning and no one else is on, so the wifi is mine! Win!

Back to traveling, I thought I would bullet point some everyday life stuff that we now take for granted but are kind of funny. Also, you should know that an inside-joke of our trip is the twitter firstworldpains, where the writer basically complains about things in privilaged situations, like: "I really want to go to McDonalds for breakfast but I won't get up before 11" or one of ours is "My apartment in the middle of Paris only has one ethernet cable and so I have to go out and appreciate the city more instead of being on the computer"...firstworldpains: FWP. Some of these will be firstworldpains, and I think they're funny.

• The showers have either very hot or very cold temperature settings, and the nozzles all come as hand-held things with hoses out the bottoms of them, we didn't relaly know what to make of that when we first got to London. 
• The bathroom light switches are always outside the bathroom, and I still always forget to turn them on and hit the wall right inside the doorway first.
• When people here do american accents, they make really harrrd 'R' sounds and sound like pirrrrates, or like they keep chomping on their worrds or something
• Breakfast cereal is either corn flakes, museli, or chocolate
• People buy only one or two day's worth of groceries, and grocery "sacks" are 10-50 cents
• We always know the price of ice cream: Here in Berlin it's best so far: 80 cents for a scoop of gelato!!
• NUTELLA: actually these people are sugar junkies, they have crazy croissants with chocolate in them and other pastries for breakfast with sugar and cookies and cakes everywhere, it's rediculous how thin these people are when they eat all this.
• Walking everywhere, I love it!
• Women's style: flats, skinny-leg pants cuffed at the ankle, belt, collared shirt tucked in with a sweater or blazer over the top, very classy :)
• In my bag: water bottle, small notebook with pen, gum, camera, city and metro maps, bobby pins, euros, tour guide system.
• Amsterdam is WINDY. Makes sense with the windmills, but I never put that together.
• You don't have choices of coffee sizes, and they cost a lot but you pay for the table, they don't pressure you to leave, coffee is a thing to DO not to GET here.
• Travelling in a group: mass chaos of bags getting on and off trains, everyone trying to lead (too many cooks...) guys embracing their manly-ness and throwing our bags at each other while leaving us to fight for our lives through their elbows and shouting and bag throwing! ...And then we stand and wait for 47 tickets to be bought (elevator music)... and then parade through the station.... and AHHHH mass chaos all over again
• First thing everyone asks when we get to a place: is there wifi??!?!?! Personally, I think it does us some good when we can't get on Facebook every free moment we have :)

Me, Bry, Joanna, and Laurel sitting by an Amsterdam canal about to have lunch, it was delicious! :)
  

We're in Berlin! Coming from Amsterdam! Coming from Bruges! Coming from Paris! Yep, count 'em--4 countries in one week! AND yesterday was our one-month anniversary! Woot! But, as I think I've said before? I don't think in terms of weeks I think in terms of countries: this is our second day in Berlin, last 'week' was 2 days ago when we were in Amsterdam which feels like a year ago. Time is totally relative!

A quick recap, I have SO MUCH I've wanted to say and haven't been able to!

In Amsterdam we stayed in The Shelter, a christian hostel in the red light district, seriously. Girls were standing in windows that share the same portion of wall that our hostel door was cut into. People in our group either liked or hated Amsterdam, personally I couldn't tack this city down. What is Amsterdam? A beautiful city with gorgeous architecture and canals winding in concentric circles through the city, the city that hid Anne Frank during the war, a city with cobblestone streets? Or is it the city with coffee-shops (not coffeehouses, there's an important difference on what is available for purchase here...) on every corner and two in-between and the red light district, where girls stand in windows while men window shop. Seriously. 

Being in the Red Light district gave me a weird, and this is the only way to describe it, vibe. A lot of people in our group felt it, it was heavy, for the first time we had no desire to go out and explore the city and we stayed in the hostel when we had free time, which was awesome, actually. They had hamburger night--6 euros and you get burger, fries (with mayo, that's the thing), salad, drink, and vla (runny pudding stuff that tastes like...runny pudding)--we all turned up for it and made it an event, we talked with other people staying and working there, did some homework, played music, it was great :)

Our group enjoying Amsterdam Hostel's coffeehouse/cafe. 

We did walk through the red light district and my reaction was surprising. I think we all had the different reactions that God wanted us to. It is really, really hard walking through that place seeing so much of humanity gone wrong, these girls completely objectified and men talking about cup sizes and who they like best. It's hard to see the girls try to get attention, to see them wearing those outfits, to see curtains pulled and to see girls showing men out. There are no pretenses, it's very in your face. I was expecting it to really weigh on me, but it didn't, interestingly. Praying, "Father, look at this! Save them! I don't know how but get these girls out, tell them how beautiful they are, enable them to give and receive true love and give them a chance to live life the way you intended it!" somehow made me... confident, or emboldened. Instead of sadness and solemnity all I felt was a strong trust flow into me that

 "My eyes will watch over them for their good, and I will bring them back to this land. I will build them up and not tear them down; I will plant them and not uproot them. I will give them a heart to know me, that I am the Lord. They will be my people, and I will be their God, for they will return to me with all their heart". --Jeremiah 24:6,7

Some people had really emotional reactions and weren't ready to hear this. It's hard to leave them behind, knowing that we didn't even have the chance to talk to them. The only, and most powerful, thing we can do is to pray.

To be a traveler rather than a tourist, I think the key is to interact with the city and it's people more and look through my camera less. A tourist goes to see famous things with the purpose to say he saw them when he returns home, a traveler goes to places and tells stories about the true experiences she had there.

 I will be a traveler, and I will pray.

Sweet Chocolate Waffles

 Hallo!

I just finished skyping Mom & Dad and it was the BEST. I love you both very, very much and it was SO GOOD to see your faces!

Let’s see…

I. Love. Bruges.

It’s the quaintest little town you ever did see. Hannah and I went on a run through the empty streets this morning to explore: we ran on cobblestones next to the canal winding through the town, past bakeries that smelled so delicious and cozy in the morning, through the Saturday morning flea market and up to the hotel for breakfast. Is there a better way to start a day?

We have no schedule here in Bruges, which was badly needed! We have art homework to catch up on and I’m going to be honest, sitting in our clean, peaceful apartment sipping tea and reading through The Story of Art is amazing. I actually enjoyed studying, it felt good to really think and not just gulp down more museum plaques; I was getting full.

One of the rooms of our apartment! How cute is this? Joanna and I are sharing the fold-out-of-the-cabinet bed shown here.

Speaking of food--for lunch we went back to the market and we got the smallest rotisserie chicken they had, some cheese, bread, vegetables and hummus. It turned into a thanksgiving-style spread (minus the hummus, maybe) and having protein and vegetables was so refreshing! Of course, later, when I needed a study break I walked to the small Markt Square to Chocolatier Dumon, a famous little chocolate shop. After eating this chocolate, Hershey’s could be brown crunchy stuff it was so good. It didn’t even taste like chocolate! It was smooth, rich but not too rich, flavorful but not overdone…sorry I can’t bring it home! After a dinner of lunch leftovers, we went to get some Belgian waffles for dessert, seeing as we’re in Belgium and all. Mine weighed about as much as me and was smothered in melty Nutella. Different from home waffles, they were crunchy on the outside, sugary and bready and buttery on the inside. I would almost get them without the nutella to taste their flavor by themselves!

Needless to say, I had a delightful food experience today.

My HUGE HUMUNGOUS man waffle that was delicious.

Bruges is made of a small net of cobble stone streets opening into large squares with cafes lining the borders and a fountain in the middle. Today they had horse and buggy rides for tourists and under our window we could hear them clop-cloppity by. Locals ride their bikes everywhere, even little 80-year-old grandmas wearing their adorable headscarves! The buildings that line the streets have at least three stories and some of them were built in the 1600s. The bell tower is right by our hotel, Hotel Aragon, and we can hear the bells chime melodies just about every half-hour, luckily they're beautiful and not like the one's Bren might remember from Italy... :)

One of the squares at night, I love the sky!

I’m learning about what it means to have time with Jesus while being with other people. Because we’re together 24-7 it’s hard to get alone time! I always forget that God is understanding and flexible, he knows our time is crazy (but awesome) and is just as available as he is any other time. There are a lot of people who really, really love Jesus on our trip and we have had some awesome conversations together. During those special conversations I hear enough truth that I could have the Bible in my hands and reading; it would be the same. I guess I’m learning a new, deeper understanding of “fellowship” (one of those vague Christian words): the spirit of Jesus in me and my friends speaking truth and love to each other while praising God for giving us everything and for who he is. Does any of that make sense? It’s new, and I have a lot to learn but I’m excited that I am learning and that God is bigger than the box I put him into. I don’t have to get him out and dust him off everyday, he’s just never been in it and chooses to be by me, no matter what’s going on, instead.

Me, Alex, and Alisha having expensive coffee, tea, and hot chocolate talking about God. This cafe is in the square shown in the first picture.

We need a place for our Vespers to be held, pray that God would provide somewhere!

I love you!

Kenz

Dank U, Belgium

Hello world!

I write to you from Bruges, Belgium and I am quite happy!

Driving into Bruges, it reminded me of driving north on I-25 to Loveland. It smelled like cows and there were big flat fields with little farmhouses nestled between them underneath big trees. The only difference was that behind the fields were thick forests that I'm pretty sure are the inspiration for many a fairy tale: the limbs of the trees stretch out as if to draw you in to the funny light and who knows where the paths will lead!

Bruges is the quaintest. We are staying absolutely gorgeous apartments! I thought our apartment in Paris was wonderful, but it was nothing compared to this (although really, who can complain about any apartment in Paris??) It has a bedroom, a little couch room that only has a couch situated to look out the window, a huge bathroom, a hallway to a living/dining room and off of that is the kitchen. ARE YOU KIDDING ME? We are so, so blessed to be living in these places! The streets of Bruges are all cobblestone and lined with four-story, old buildings with colorful doors, of course. It was pretty funny to see all 47 of us rumbling our suitcases single-file along the cobblestone street to get to our hotel. We looked like a mini ant brigade.

This is Europe, as Mom said when we (finally!) got to skype!! Apparently Belgium's specialties are beer, chocolate, and waffles. Tomorrow the plan is to go for a run, do homework, eat chocolate, eat waffles, (probably skip the beer) and have a wonderful relaxed day!

I love you all,

kenz

What is beauty?

As one friend said to me today: this is 

CRAZY. 

It's not ending! We're going to be doing adventures for a long time! You know? Today we went to the Louvre and the Eiffel Tower, tomorrow we're going to Versailles, and then on friday we go to Belgium. 

No big deal.

Except it is  a big deal! We're coming to our 3 week anniversary, even long vacations are ending about this time and if I was on that vacation I would have treasured every day full of the freedom of travel! I think as a survival mechanism I've stopped appreciating everything we do. It was normal to go to the Eiffel tower today, and going to the Palais de Versailles tomorrow will be just another long day trip, meaning sore feet, sheep-herding-style travel, holding pee until we make a group run, and eating lots of carbs because that's all the french eat: that and butter. 

No! No. Here and now I'm appreciating this time for what it is, I want you all to know that. 

SO. Here is what I appreciate--

I took the Metro all by myself to the Notre Dame! Yes, I took Line 5 to Gare de Austerlitz and switched to the C RER train and got of at Sainte Michel and walked across the bridge to the island that the Notre Dame sits on and found my group and breathed in incense during the church service, sang french hymns,  and craned my neck to look up at the beautiful, beautiful stained glass windows high up on the cieling! 

I'm appreciating my classes:

In our Technology class, we learned that Gothic cathedrals are an incredible innovation because unlike the Romanesque-style class preceding them which were made to look strong, heavy, impenetrable with big columns and small windows, the Gothic cathedrals favor "height and light"! They have slim columns  along the walls to make the vaulted ceiling with pointed arches and, because of the thinner walls, are able to have big windows! There's a problem though, the thin walls and small columns supporting the arches can't support much weight, so the walls bend outward unless (dun dundun dunnnn!) they have flying buttresses!! Yes! Flying butresses support the walls, enabling us to experience the light from the stained glass and the magnificence of the huge cathedral. 

I'm appreciating my processing of what we experience:

How do I appreciate art differently as a Christian? What is beauty when looking through the "lens" (comm major motif...) of Christ when looking at art? I think cathedrals are absolutely stunning, God deserves to have such a thing built to glorify his name! But it wasn't, the king of france commissioned it because every great city has to have a great cathedral. God would rather me worship whole-heartedly in the gutter than have thousands of people attend a service with their cameras out the whole time. Or maybe not. How awesome would it be to pack that cathedral with hundreds of people singing praises to him! Our songs would echo and magnify off the big walls as we sing together! Harmonies would combine and twirl all the way up to those high arches! The bells would ring! That, I think, would be the most beautiful thing I could ever be a part of. 

The beauty I see now is broken, partial; maybe something becomes most beautiful when it becomes what it is supposed to be. Think about it: a view is the best when it is uninterrupted by smog or litter, friendship is the best when both people love selflessly, as Jesus did. We become more beautiful when we allow ourselves to be changed by Jesus! We are in a broken world, nothing is as it should be. One day everything will be f i n i s h e d and we will be the most beautiful we can be because we will be made complete in Christ, the way he intended. Ah! I can't wait! 

See? I just processed that. You don't have to read it, but it's definitely going into my art journal. 

I'm appreciating the food: today I had two baguette sandwiches (they're the cheapest thing here...), we've made AMAZING pasta dinners in our apartment! (speaking of apartment, our cleaning lady came today and when she walked in she asked for a coke, (what??) but ok, well, we have juice? She drank it so fast it dribbled all over the tile in the kitchenette, and when we came back... the now dried-and-sticky yellow juice was still there. So weird.)

I'm appreciating the language, I'm learning so much!

I'm appreciating having seen Hugh Jackman walk with his family to get dinner in the Eiffel Tower (300 euros a plate, apparently). I've always thought I would keep my cool when I met someone famous, but no. I got so giddy I could have been a five year old girl about to be adopted by all the Disney princesses plus Mulan. But still, it was awesome. Then the sunset over the city was absolutely stunning, and I was SO glad I went up instead of working on my paper. :)

So artsy...

I'm appreciating our man-neighbor across the street who we named Pierre and we're pretend friends with him. 

I love our group, there really isn't a bad combination of people to be with. 

and... now I must appreciate my night of paper writing--on the US policy of isolationism from 1918-1941 (woo-hoo).

I LOVE YOU!