In Case

the link to the pictures that we sent in our email didn't work for you, you can click on this below. It should work.

Frank Fotos

Orange Party

Hey!

We're having an ORANGE PARTY tomorrow night for my birthday!

Yahoo! I'm so excited!

Fourth Grade Meets David Crowder

This week in fourth grade Bible we've been talking about how God made man in His own image, which means for them that God knew they would have freckles, be athletic, or have hazel eyes before they were ever conceived, and that when God looks at them, He must see some of himself too.
On Wednesday we talked about David, and how God planned all the days and events of David's life, and we recounted what we knew about David and read some in 1 and 2 Samuel, too. On that same day I told my class that in the Bible it tells of a time when David had such exploding love for God that he felt compelled to remove most of his clothes and dance in the streets while the ark of the covenant was being brought into the City of David (2 Sam. 6:12-16). 2 Samuel 6:14 says that "David, wearing a linen ephod, danced before the LORD with all his might." As you can imagine, my ten year old studnets cringed at the though of David dancing in his underclothes in public, but after we moved beyond that, I explained to them the reason why. He loved his LORD so much that he was moved to dancing. I want to be like that, and opened the kids to that idea, too.
I then remembered a song by the David Crowder Band that fit this idea, so I brought it in today. The song goes like this...

I will dance, I will sing
To be mad for my King
Nothing, LORD, is hindering this passion in my soul
And I'll become even more undignified than this
Some may say it's foolishness
And it's all for you my LORD

The song repeats these words, and recounts that event I told my class about David dancing. I played that song for my class today, and they loved it so much we played it three times! My day is made when things like that happen. I teach for that reason. To see kids get excited about something true. David danced for God in his underclothes, and hopefully my fourth graders will be moved in that way, too.
Thanks for praying for them, and please continue to pray that God will open opportunities like He did today with that song, and that I will take each opportunity like that to better prepare my students for eternity.

Comings and Goings

Winter is a time at V.C.S. when lots of students come and go. It seems strange to leave or begin school halfway through the year, but it's a reality here in Vienna. Many of the students' parents are diplomats from their home countries to Austria. Therefore, they are not governed by the school calendar so much. This is specifically true for Korean families.
Many Korean families come to Vienna because one of the parents is a Korean judge. Korea has a program where they send judges to other countries for one year to study another country's judicial system with the intention to come back and better the Korean system. This exchange year begins each February.
I have a student who will be leaving V.C.S. February 1st. Her name is Jeong Eun, and her father is a Korean judge. She has learned proficient English during her year here, and she has made friends too. She will go back to Korea in a few weeks, where she will return to one fourth grade class of five in her school, where each class has between thirty and forty students. She told me today that she was sad to think about leaving Vienna and V.C.S.
I believe, because of Jeong Eun and other students, that V.C.S. leaves a special imprint on students' lives forever, regardless of whether they come for one year or ten years. It is truly a place where God is honored and the goal is to prepare kids for eternity along with preparing them for the next grade. Kids frown at the thought of going home each day, let alone leaving for what may be a long time like Jeong Eun. I'm really not joking, either. My students are sad to leave each day, because in this culture lots of kids live in apartments in the city and their friends live far away. There is little opportunity to just play with neighborhood kids like in the U.S.
So, all of this to say, it's sad to anticipate Jeong Eun leaving, but I'm trusting that God will go with her back to Korea, too, and bring new students for us to love here in Vienna.
Please pray for those students leaving and coming, that V.C.S. will hold a special place in their hearts and that they will trust Jesus with their lives because of what they experienced here.

New Units and Hot Cocoa Club

When January comes, it's a great time to begin new units with fourth graders, so this week we've begun many new things! We are studying the Islamic religion and culture along with the Middle East, and we're reading books about how to do and make things so we can then present some new skills we learn to the class. We even have parents coming in to do guest workshops next week. Hopefully this will motivate the kids to do their very best. So that's just an idea of what happens in fourth grade every week.
Just for the month of January as well we have Hot Cocoa Club. This is a time when students can enjoy a warm, fresh cup of hot cocoa from the U.S. if their behavior has been good that week. It's usually on Wednesday afternoons after recess. The kids really love it, but the only missing piece is falling snow outside. Unfortunately, we've only had flurries this year, and that was in November. Shucks. Hot cocoa is still worth it, and it spices up the January blues of being in school with no sight of spring yet.

Vacation

I guess we really took one. I mean, we had just over 2 weeks off for Christmas time, and we didn't write anything on our blog since Christmas Eve. Woah.
Now we're back and fresh into the new year. I guess that's not really such a big deal, cause so is everyone else - fresh into the new year.

Christmastime is here

and so are the Luginbills :)
It's been fun hanging out with Anne's family the last few days. And they've been flex, living in an apartment with us for this time. But it's not too cramped.
So, we were going to go to a castle tonight for a Christmas eve service in German - but we opted out of that just a couple hours ago. It would take about 45 minutes - an hour to get there, would last 1.5 hours in German (not so good for some of us that speak no German), and public transportation basically doesn't run anymore past 12:30am. So, we've decided to stay here.
We just ate a yummy dinner that Anne made - black bean casserole (except it was pinto beans), thanks to Mom for the recipe. Now, I'm not sure what we're going to do - maybe watch a movie, maybe open the "family gift".
Meg has done an impressive wrapping gifts - but we're waiting to have our Christmas until the morning of the 25th. Austrian tradition is to do that on Christmas Eve.

OK, so Fröhe Weinachten to all of you!!! (Merry Christmas/Happy Christmas)

Guess Who's Coming To Town?!?!?!?!

Nope - it's not Santa. It's Bono! He and his musical gang (AKA U2) are almost for sure stopping in Vienna to put on an amazing show in the first week of July!!! I'm super excited - want to join me? It's going to be at the Ernst Happel Stadion which is only a mile or 2 from where I live!! Perfect walking distance so I don't have to try to ride the bus or something along with 50 to 70 thousand other people. 

Looky here!! It's our Christmas tree! There's even a few presents for some of our lucky viewers. All you have to do is swing by our place to pick it up. See ya then. :) 

Wierdo, I guess

Anne and I were just riding on the U-Bahn (subway). There was an older couple sitting across from us and he was looking at me in the "normal" Austrian way. Just kind of observing me - not a big deal. I was checking him out too, cause he had this interesting ear warmer thing on with a big Edelweiss flower on it. After 5 minutes or so, he said a few things to his wife which I didn't try to understand. I just noticed he had a strong Viennese dialect - which is very different than the "high German" taught in schools in Germany and Austria.
Then, 1-2 minutes before we were getting off, this guy started talking to me. Honestly, I couldn't understand really anything he was saying. Normally, I can pick up 50-75% of what people say, and at least a little if they speak the Vienna dialect. But with this guy - gar nichts (nothing at all). He started getting more and more worked up with whatever he was talking about and then was talking to me and Anne. He wasn't asking us questions, but just kept right on talking while his wife just ignored the whole situation. It became sorta funny because he just kept right on going eventhough we said nothing - just sorta nodded our head like we understood. After all that, there was a lull in his talking and it was time for us to get off the U-Bahn, so I said to Anne that we needed to get off (in German). We got off and I don't know if that guy even knew that we didn't understand what he was saying at all.
Anne and I were sorta stunned and wondered what he was saying. I told her that the only words I picked up were "explosion" and "Russia", and maybe something like "down here". He seemed pretty upset about whatever that was - maybe something to do with WWII, since Russia occupied Austria then and supposedly were not nice to the Austrians.

Maybe that whole story was boring to you, but it sure was amusing to us. :)

Why do they argue?

Those 7th graders - well not all of them... but it sure is frustrating when they do. They have little logic, and what logic they do have they over-use. Then in this case they refuse to listen and interrupt over and over. Uuuuggghh.
Ok, so that's my frustration for the day, but it's Friday and I have a couple days off! Tonight is the elementary Christmas program at VCS, and it's bound to be entertaining. Anne is leading the 3rd-5th graders in reciting Luke 2 with hand motions. :)

An Indiana Minute

Whew! I just returned home about an hour ago from spending the quickest weekend of my life in Indiana! I went home last Thursday for my friend Heather's wedding in Indianapolis. Heather and I have been friends since high school, so it was great to be a part of her big day. I stayed at my parents' house and ate a yummy Dairy Queen heath bar blizzard in my few minutes of non-wedding free time. I also hit Target, Old Navy, and the grocery for a few goodies we miss. And I saw all of my grandparents. Cool. Ooh, the blessings of America. I realized, too, how thankful I am to have the opportunity to live in Austria and teach kids, which I LOVE. Despite the things that are different and annoying, I'm excited to be back in Vienna. I think I'm moving out of the major part of the transition experience that has plagued us over this first semester. Sometimes a dose of home is good medicine. So, overall it was a great weekend, and I'm happy that I don't have to board any airplanes for a long time!

Thanksgiving weekend

We've had a really great guest the past couple days - Kelsey. She's a friend of ours from Bloomington and was in our Bible study. She's been a lot of fun - and we've been showing her around Vienna at some touristy things and enjoying some more western/American type things here. She's been in Romania for months and they have much much less variety and choices with food and other things there. So she's been loving things here like vegetables, beef, butter, etc. that just isn't the same in Romania. Today we went to a cool outdoor Christmas market and to the main Vienna cemetary (to look at gravesites of lots of famous people like Shubert, Beethoven, Strauss, Schoenberg, Brahms, and more).
See the picture below for visual help.

Anne and Kelsey at a Christmas market eating monster-size pretzels. I helped, too. :) 

Parent Teacher Conferences

Well, it was just on Friday that the big day happened. Anticipation was in the air. An extra pot of coffee was brewing in the staff room. Ties adorned the chests of every male teacher in the hopes of a professional display.
But theses weren't just any old Parent Teacher Conferences - many were meetings with parents of very different cultures. Anne met with an animated Nigerian father. Chris met with a father, whose children have Indian decent but have been raised in Austria. But what made this meeting that Chris had so interesting, was the non-verbal communication between Chris and the Indian man. He was asking some great questions about how I try to make the Bible interesting since he finds it hard to communicate that to his kids. As I was explaining, he was shaking his head no. The more I spoke, he would verbally affirm that he understood and agreed, and then proceeded to shake his head no.
After a few minutes of me trying to ignore his mixed up verbal and nonverbal cues, I remembered something: shaking the head from side to side meant "YES" for his culture! Oh duh, Chris. I should have remembered that from when I spoke with refugees from that part of the world. So then I found myself nodding my head up and down in agreement as he was speaking. I thought, OH NO! I'm saying "NO" to him. So I tried to stop but it was so hard. :)

Anyhow, it was really funny in my head, but the father probably had no idea what was going on for me. :)

Panel

I had a panel today for my 9th grade Bible class. It was made up of some VCS staff who answered questions that the students wrote on cards about studying the Bible. It was pretty cool, and tomorrow there will be another one for my other 9th grade class. There were some good questions asked like "Do you think it's better to use a devotional book with studying the Bible, or just the Bible?" and "How do you keep from getting distracted when you read the Bible?" and "What exactly do you do when you study the Bible?"
I think it was helpful, at least to some of the students. :) Do your work, God. I'm just your weak servant.

WOWZERS!!

An awesome thing happened yesterday!! Two students decided to commit to following Jesus with their life!! Both are new students, speak very little English (they speak German, actually), and are brother and sister. I think their nationality is Macedonian or something in the Balkans, but they are Austrian. The boy, Dejan (day YAWN) is in my PE class and his sister Sonja is in my 7th grade Bible class. I could see a difference today in the light in their faces. And I feel privileged to just be a part of their lives and exposure to Jesus - the way the truth and the life. If you remember, a few weeks ago, I mentioned Dejan (I think) as the student who said I was his favorite teacher. I think that was just because I spoke to him in German and most teachers at the school don't speak much German. He's a cool kid, just gets distracted easily. I guess that's not rare with Jr. Highers. :)

Another awesome thing is that I've been getting to know another 7th grader named Rifat (RE faht) from Bangledesh. He's in my PE and Bible class - very smart and much bigger than all the other kids. He's Muslim and has been celebrating Ramadan. But he also believes some things about Jesus and the Bible. He and I met during lunch (but we didn't eat) to talk about some questions he has. He's really feeling stuck in the middle of both religions and seems to genuinely want to know the truth.

Please pray for these three kids if you can. Dejan, Sonja, and Rifat. Maybe I'll get a picture of them on here sometime. :)

The best ice cream in town, in our opinion!!! 

finally

It seems like it's been forever since I've had a complete day that I feel good about. I didn't get frustrated with lesson plans, difficult students, reprimanded by Austrians ("schimpf-ing"), or just totally wiped out by a long day. I actually got home around 5pm. amazing. einfach erstaunlich.

so it seems wierd that it's election day in the US. There just isn't any hoopla about it here. Good thing - but they sure do talk about US politics here more than Austrian politics (as far as I can tell). Maybe it's more interesting or entertaining. It sells, I guess.

Anne and I went on a walk for an hour and a half or so around "the Ring". It's basically the city center that has one main street that goes all the way around it. We saw all kinds of cool restaurants, cafes, a music museum, some old churches, and of course some Leckerbissen.

What is Leckerbissen you ask? It's German for a "tasty treat" - e.g. ice cream at Zanoni and Zanoni. :) it's open 365 days a year!! see the picture above