A Carnival in Berettyóújfalu - CCBCE Vajta, Word of Life & GoodSports

What happens when 40 Americans, 9 Hungarians, 2 Koreans, 1 Cuban & 1 Indian get together with 120 kids?  FUN!

On April 21 we spent the afternoon at the Berettyóújfalu Children's Home with a team from Word of Life in New York, and a team from Calvary Chapel Bible College in Vajta, Hungary.  This multinational team joined forces with GoodSports to put on a Carnival for the 120 children who are residents of this orphanage.

Our day included streamers, balloons, games, competitions, prizes, face painting, a BMX demo, a skateboarding demo, and a testimony time.

The games included bowling, jump roping, Q-tip wars, extreme snacks (garlic, onion & cat food), and more!

We did the prizes Chuck E. Cheese style.  The kids earned tickets by playing the games, and got to select their prizes themselves.  By making choices concerning which prizes they wanted the kids had to decide: "do I get a smaller prize with the tickets I have?  Or do I go play more games, to collect more tickets, so I can get that really big prize I want?"

The day was wrapped up with a personal testimony from a Hungarian Christian.  Many personal conversations occurred throughout the day, most as a result of the testimony that was shared.  Keep these kids in prayer!  Many of them are still searching...

Easter in Berettyóújfalu

When planning an Easter celebration for 120 children, 20 caregivers, and 20 volunteers good weather is a helpful element.  After postponing our celebration once due to terrible wind and snow we took a leap of faith and went ahead with the celebration today.  God blessed us with clear weather!

People came from Hajduböszörmény, Debrecen, Hajdunánás, Mikepércs and Flagstaff, Arizona to help us celebrate!

We had three stations set-up: sports, Easter crafts, and an Easter Puppet Show.

For lunch we ate pörkölt from a bogrács – nagyon finom volt!

Thanks to the generosity of people in the Heidelberg community we were able to bless the orphanage with several boxes of donated toiletries, clothes, and soccer balls.

Easter Celebration in Miskolc

 This past Saturday we celebrated Easter at the Miskolc Children’s Home.  The Adams family drove in from Heidelberg for the occasion; friends from Arizona, Debrecen, Hajdúböszörmény, and Germany also joined us. 

We started off the day with crafts and cooking.  Working together the kids helped us dye 45 eggs, make paper Easter lilies and salvation bracelets.  We also made spaghetti and meatballs with garlic bread for lunch.  The kids were all excited to pitch in and help with both the cooking and the clean up.

After lunch we were thoroughly entertained by our friend Keaton and his skills on the banjo, harmonica and mandolin.

Then we talked about the Easter story – Christ’s crucifixion, death, and resurrection.  We prayed, took communion together, and enjoyed this beautiful praise song by a friend of Russ’ (translation provided by Pápai Melinda).

To round off the day Josh brought along some crazy games, and we had a good old-fashioned Easter Egg hunt – complete with both chocolate and toothpaste (provided by the Adams family).

\ 

What is the GoodSports Team up to?

Thanksgiving and Christmas are always an extremely busy part of our year.  Now, since that season has come and gone, what is the GoodSports team up to?

While Russ mourns the sight of snowflakes and his bones ache for the sunshine of his native Hawaii, the rest of us are enjoying winter.

Our newest intern, Josh, is out dodging the snowflakes to get the baseball boys on the field for practice.







Despite the cold, Phillip is coaching football in 2 different countries (Hungary & Slovakia), and still maintains the lead for our activities at the Miskolc Orphanage.






Zoli is back at Calvary Chapel Bible College in Vajta for his 4th semester.







 Meanwhile, I (Kara), am planning Bible Study lessons for both orphanages, leading our activites at the Berettyóújfalu orphanage, and have already started working out the logistics for our 5 upcoming summer camps.





Keep us in prayer!  God has many amazing things in store for 2013!

Leo: Berettyóújfalu Christmas 2012

Our Christmas celebration in the Berettyóújfalu Orphanage was an amazing success this year.  Much of the thanks goes to Leo Burmedi, a Boy Scout from Heidelberg, Germany.  For his Eagle Scout project he collected, sorted, wrapped and delivered gifts to all 120 children in the orphanage.  We asked Leo to tell the story from his perspective:

Leo, Russell & Béla at the Tuskevar house
of the Berettyoujfalu Orphanage

"I have been a boy scout since I was in fifth grade and I was a cub scout for five years before that.  As soon as I finished my Boy Scout Life Rank, I started looking for an Eagle Award service project to complete.  At first I did not know what kind of project I should do.  I thought about a lot of different kinds of projects until I remembered a project Shauna Moffett had done the year before with the Cub Scouts.

Working with Good Sports International, Shauna Moffett had filled plastic cartons with useful items and toys for orphans at the Miskolc Orphanage in Hungary.  It was the first time I had heard about a project like it, and I admired her for running the project.

My project was similar, except that I put together boxes for the Berettyóújfalu Orphanage nearby.  The first thing I did, was to write Russell Chun, the contact person for Good Sports International in Debrecen.  He told me that they needed shoe boxes for 120 orphans that Christmas.  As I kept on planning the project though, I kept on thinking about the problem of transportation.  So when I emailed Russell, he offered to take some boxes back with him in the first weekend in November because he was going to talk about the orphanage at the Patrick Henry Village Chapel in Heidelberg that Sunday anyway.

Later that day I talked to Shauna Moffett, and she told me that she still had a lot of materials leftover from last year’s drive, because many of the donations had arrived after she had already delivered the boxes.  So we decided to put together 30 boxes for the female orphans and send them with Russell.  I met Russell for the first time when we gave him these boxes, and then I got to see him the next day at church, too.  It was really nice to finally get to talk to him in person and to meet his son, Levi.

Now I had to start collecting materials for the rest of the boxes, so I asked for permission from the Garrison Command to set up collection boxes and conduct drives, which they granted.  Then I went to the local commissary and PX, and they agreed to let me set up the boxes and have the drives there.  Over the next two weeks, I collected enough materials to start putting the boxes together.  I labeled the empty boxes and spent a long time deciding what should go in each one (I wanted each box to have roughly the same contents so none of the orphans would feel jealous).  

On Sat, Dec 8, I met with a group of volunteers at the Scout Hut and we wrapped the boxes.  We also made a bag of candy for each of the children and labeled a package of hot chocolate for each of them.  I didn’t want to put any of the candy into the boxes because Shauna Moffett had warned us that strong smelling toiletries might make the food taste funny.  Once that was done, I packed big boxes for each of the orphanage houses and put larger presents, and gifts for the house mothers in them.

Soon thereafter, Kara and Edy Fulop came to collect all of the boxes.  With the help of volunteers from my troop, I loaded the van up and waved it off to Hungary.  Everything was done except from my trip to Hungary.

I left Germany on December 20^th, but sadly because of bad weather and travel delays, I only arrived in Debrecen on December 21^st, shortly before Russell departed for the orphanage.  When we got to the orphanage we went to one of the houses and sang carols.  We sang "Silent Night" in Hungarian for them and they sang "We Wish You A Merry Christmas" in English for us.  Russell also told the children the true story of Christmas.  Then we distributed the presents.  I was proud to see how my project had brightened up the orphan’s Christmas and how happy everyone was. It was probably one of the most enjoyable days of my scouting career."

Kara: The Teams of April

In a previous post we mentioned all the different teams that are scheduled to come.  Thus far, we’ve had three successful team visits, and there are many more to come! 

For Easter we had our team from Kaiserslautern.  With their help we dyed Easter eggs, played soccer, had a traditional American Easter meal, and had an “Easter Egg Hunt” – although with nearly 600 eggs in the tiny orphanage yard, we use the term loosely.  We were also able to share the true Easter story – Christ and His resurrection.

Off to the Easter Egg Hunt!

Not two weeks later we had a team from the Calvary Chapel Bible College in Vajta (south of Budapest).  Our own, Mate Zoli, lead the team of 5 students – 4 Hungarians, and 1 Chinese.  For 10 days they worked endlessly in many different areas, with many different audiences.  With them we were able to:

-Feed the homeless of Debrecen, in conjunction with the Hungarian Reformed Church’s Reménysugar (“Ray of Hope”) ministry.

-Teach English in a local primary, and secondary school, in conjunction with LOGOS Language School.

-Visit two different orphanages, Miskolc and Berettyóújfalu, in conjunction with on-going GoodSports ministries.

-Attend two different university outreach events, in conjunction with the International Mission Board and Calvary Chapel Debrecen.

-Conduct a worship service for the Roma community of Hajduböszörmény, in conjunction with Calvary Chapel Debrecen.

-Conduct an outreach event for disabled/handicapped children, in conjunction with the Hungarian Reformed Church’s Immanuel Otthon (“Immanuel’s House”) ministry.

-Conduct an outreach event for the children of the E.U. Refugee Camp, in conjunction with Menedék (Hungarian Association for Migrants).

-Paint and do building maintenance for Calvary Chapel Debrecen.

-Attend and assist with the Youth Group for Calvary Chapel Debrecen.

-Teach Kid’s Church for Calvary Chapel Debrecen.

…and so much more!

We also had a large team from Word of Life (NY) join Vajta & GoodSports for a sports day at the orphanage.  Because of the specific needs of house three we had several indoor activities – complete with a presentation of the gospel (video).  The weather was beautiful (thank God for no rain!) and with 20 orphans, and a combined team of 60 we had sports, games, crafts, a scavenger hunt, and a BMX exposition (video). 

Word of Life, Vajta, GoodSports & Miskolc Orphans

All in all, it’s been an amazing month for teams visiting GoodSports!

Russ: Baseball is a roller coaster

Baseball can be like a roller coaster ride.  How so?  Some days are like the long hard climb up to the top of the roller coaster ride.  Learning how to catch a ball without it hitting your face (or other body places).  Hitting an oh so tiny ball traveling at 50 miles an hour.  Running to the bases, but being tagged out when we forget to keep our foot on the base...all the things that make baseball so challenging.

Then there is the high point.  When it all seems to come together and you can see forever (we've won all our games so far)...but then comes the equally awful plunge...when your seniors team simply does not show up for a game on Saturday.  Then the very next day, Sunday, your majors (the littlest guys) decide taht fishing is a better idea and skip a game, leaving you to wonder, "is it all worth it?"

GoodSports continues to build it's baseball field backstop at the Christian Camping Center (called Dorcas).  it is a month after the planned completion date, but MOST of it is up.  Two boys even showed up to try to help (they spent half of the time swimming though).  But serious momentum in getting our little league field in shape for use.  Last year, our contractor skipped out on us, taking 500,000 HUF (about $2,500).  So our recovery has been a slow and costly one.

Our dream is to have the only place where the Hungarian Baseball League can host games, and have the kids sleep over for the weekend (there is a pool at the campground).  GoodSports hopes to handle the evening programs, and to introduce the idea of good, clean, fun and even demonstrate Christ's love.  It is still a dream, we have yet to play a game there, but we persevere.