Levice to Kalná nad Hronom

I ran out of yogurt this morning, so I had eggs for breakfast. When I cracked open the first one two yolks spilled out. I knew that happened sometimes, but I'd never seen it. When I cracked open the second one two more yolks slid into the frying pan! That's got to be a one in a million kind of chance. So I've had a four-yolk, over-easy kind of morning.


Last week I went to a jumping class in a village a few minutes from Levice. A student, and good friend, from our youth group teaches the class on Mondays and Saturdays. Everyone gets on these mini trampolines and you jump around for a while to peppy music. So fun. She told me it originated in the Czech Republic about ten years ago.

I had to take a bus out to her village, and she kindly found one and told me exactly how to get there. It was leaving from terminal 8 at 4:15, Kalná was the second village, and I'd get off at the second stop across from the cemetary. She'd meet me there and take me to the class. I bought a t-shirt at Lidl because all of mine were in the washing machine and had my roommate write down on a sticky note exactly how I should buy my ticket, "Celý lístok do Kalnej".

I got to the bus station that afternoon just in time to see my bus driving away. I'd been listening to Bastille and strolling around for too long. I called my friend and we found a later bus, but she wouldn't be able to meet me, and I'd have to get off at the first stop instead of the second. I waited around for a while. Told a gypsy I didn't want to buy a magazine. Listened to more Bastille. She sent me the address of the place so that I could GPS it when I got there.

My second bus came, and I got on with no issue. The bus driver gave me a funny look. I felt obnoxiously American. I sat behind an older man, and my friend called me again just to check that everything was going alright. Speaking English on a silent bus full of Slovaks is the opposite of comfortable.

I'd heard the man in front of me ask for a ticket to the same place, so I followed him when he got off and set my GPS. He was still walking in front of me about a hundred meters later when he turned around and said "Excuse me, are you Cory?"

I'd lived in Slovakia for one month, never been to that village, and never seen that man before in my life. Shocked is an understatement.

Jumping friend on the right

I said yes, of course, and he told me that he was my friend's father. He'd heard me on the phone with her and had called her to ask if she had an American friend coming out to the village. He also recognized me from camp pictures on Facebook. He walked with me to the jumping class explaining that the village owned the land that the nuclear plant near Levice is on, and so they get some of the taxes from it. We met his wife and son at on the street too, and they walked with us.

They got me to the class just in time, and I know I would have never found it without them. It was back behind a school in a dark building that looked mostly empty. I found out later that it used to be a part of the school, but they don't use the classrooms in that building anymore.

It's been incredible to see God care for me here in such tangible ways. To see him plunk a guide down right in front of me when I was in need of direction. It happens so often here, and it reminds me of his absolute sovereignty over people and circumstances. What a powerful God we serve.

The bus ride home was uneventful. I was pretty much a pro at it by that time. I had plans to meet with a student from camp that evening, but he cancelled so I skyped with a friend from home and ordered pizza over the phone in Slovak all by myself. I think it might have been my favorite day since coming here.