Thank you and Good Bye! 🇨🇭
After months of preparation, the time has come. At the beginning of September Tim and Anna were the first to leave our home country and drove in 10 days with the packed car via Austria, Hungary and Romania to Moldova.
I spent another 10 days in Switzerland with Lara, Ruben and Elia visiting friends and family. We enjoyed the last days with them to the fullest, had deep conversations and said “goodbye” far too often.
On September 13, a friend, thanks again Pädu, drove me to Milan airport. “Will this work alone with two small children and a baby? What if Elia cries all the time?” Yes, I had jitters about the three-hour flight – for nothing. The kids did just great and so we arrived tired but happy in Chişinău on this humid Monday evening. Tim and Anna picked us up with our Van and together we drove to our first accommodation.
From 🐇 Rabbit Hole
and the 🏛️ Palace
The first three weeks we lived in the basement of the OM office building. To be exact, we slept in two dormitory rooms and cooked in the communal kitchen. During the week there was a lot of activity. On the one hand, that was nice because we always had company and were integrated into the team right away. On the other hand, it was sau exhausting when we constantly had to clean up allthe toys, the kitchen had to be cleared for the others by 9 o’clock, or when our kids had a big fight in the stairwell in the middle of a work day.
After three weeks we moved from the underground to a big house. Another OM family usually lives here, but they are on home leave in South Africa for three months and we are allowed to look after the house. Having so much space and our “own” kingdom makes everything much easier. Finally we can leave the dirty dishes from breakfast until the evening. 😊
Our task 🇲🇩
Currently we are learning Romanian. It’s not even that easy, although it is a Latin language and we can derive some things from French, English or German. But the small feelings of success come more and more often, for example when we order “două sute de grame de cașcaval” at the market (and we really get 200 grams of cheese) or when a stranger asks us what time it is and we can answer with “este nouă fără un sfert” (quarter to nine). Also «Noi suntem familia Schoch din elveția. Acum locuim în Moldova» 😉
Besides the Romanian lessons we have weekly meetings with the team, chase our residence permit, still don’t have a bank account or tried for two days to find a store for Ghüderschüfeli in the city because the dog (= our children) broke one. There’s always something going on, but sometimes it’s difficult for us to accept that after four weeks we’re not yet fully integrated in the day-to-day business. But since hardly anyone in the villages speaks English, nothing works without Romanian or Russian. Besides, things are starting to happen: since this week we are teaching English once a week in a nursery school.
This is how it continues 🚀
We may stay in this house in the capital Chişinău until the end of December. At the latest from then on we would like to move to “our” village Vadul lui Voda or surroundings and start working. The Baptist church already runs a nursery for school children and distributes meals to those in need. There are many ideas (parent ministry, teen ministry, bible groups, …) and once we are there we will see where we can get involved specifically besides the nursery.
But for that we first need an apartment or a house. Unfortunately, there are hardly any rental offers in Moldova in the countryside and if there are, the apartments are often expensive and in poor condition at the same time. For a family just starting out in the neighboring village of Criuleni, the team leader walked around the village randomly approaching people to see if they knew anyone who might want to rent something. Now they rent a small cottage with an outhouse in the garden, which they are currently renovating completely at their own expense. So we pray that we can find a nice, cozy, clean, warm home that fits into our rental budget.
Financial support ❤️
Thank you to all who support us financially. The first three months are covered by partners, generous individual donations and own savings. Since we do not receive a salary from the organization – and with our humanitarian residence permit we are not allowed to do paid work on site – we depend on regular support for our long-term work.
Consider contributing a monthly amount to this valuable work. And maybe you can recommend it to someone who also cares about working with kids. If you have any personal questions, just get in touch and we’ll look at it via Zoom over coffee together.
How are we doing with it? 🧔👩👧👸🧒👶
Quite well, again. There were a few days in the rabbit hole when we missed you and our old home enormously and would have loved to turn back. It was quite gloomy in the basement, we had little privacy and the many impressions were very challenging. For the children and for us parents.
After two weeks in the new house we feel much better and almost a bit at home. Our everyday life has a rhythm and Tim can already cover the one or other car route without a navigation system. We cook, wash the dishes (by hand), the laundry (not by hand), vacuum, feed the fish and so on. The normal everyday life just.
The children have also started homeschooling again and we even have the luxury of a classroom where they can withdraw and work in a concentrated way. Once a week we do a family day. For example, we enjoy the beautiful autumn weather in one of the beautiful parks or just relax and play in our cottage.
Mulțumim – We thank you!
Greetings and God’s blessing
from Silvia and the rest of the family
