Cut your Brain

We continue to plug away at Albanian. 

I have gone through many phases in my Albanian language learning. 

You know how they talk about pregnant brain? 

Well I don't care what anyone says, that is a true fact. 

The last few months of my pregnancy with Taliah my brain just would not work. Like there was no space in it for anything new. 

I could barely put my dishes away in the right place. 

Conjugating verbs? Ya right. 

I would sit in the lessons and just listen to Cory and our teacher. 

I zoned out, got angry or fell asleep. 

Now, my brain is coming back. 

I have seen Cory and Blerina look at me a couple times in shock like, "she's back!" 

I don't think I realized how bad it was. I knew there was a road block in my brain but I didn't know how obvious it was. 

I have probably learned more in the last month than I did in the 3 previous months combined. 

And I am really enjoying it. I don't feel discouraged anymore and even though I know this will take a long time, and a lot of hard work I feel excited about it, not hopeless. 

We are hearing so much. It's so weird to know what people are saying but not be able to answer them back. 

The other day I went on a visit to one of my bible study girls house. 

Her mom asked me how old I was when I got married. 

"3 years." I said with a smile...

Everyone exploded. 

I thought she said how long have you been married...

I know why they say you have to be willing to embarrass yourself...I do that all the time anyways so I'm glad it's not a new experience for me for people to laugh at me in my face. 

Another thing we have learned is that even though you may know all the words to say something, that's not necessarily how it is said. 

In fact, the Albanian language is very literal...

You do not catch a cold. A cold catches you. 

You do not make a decision. You cut your brain. 

You do not call someone on the phone. You take the phone. 

The word for young and new is the same. 

If you are in another room and you cannot hear the person talking to you you are supposed to "take your head out." 

Something does not smell good rather the air that is falling smells good. 

If you want to ask someone what they are doing you can say "how are you passing the time?" To which the answer is "Good." 

So, even as we learn words we realize that it is a whole different ball game to put those words together correctly. 

More and more we see the reality that you don't really literally translate things. You have to learn to say it as it is said in that language. More often than not there is no literal translation. 

We will be learning this language until we die. 

But it is beautiful and we love learning it together.

And we are thankful that even though we are kind of mute, at least we are not completely deaf anymore. 

In fact, we can hear when people are talking about us. And it happens more often than I realized. 

I hear people saying "Is she Albanian?" or "She doesn't speak Albanian." Or "Where are they from?" 

So sometimes I answer when I'm standing right there and people are trying to figure it out. 

"I'm American." And then they just smile, kind of embarrassed and kind of surprised that I am speaking Albanian. 

They are actually really encouraging about our language learning efforts. 

When we speak Albanian they will say "Oohhhh you are learning Albanian?? Very good!" 

And one of the phrases they have that we will use until the day we die is "Avash, avash," which is something like "little by little." 

Avash, avash we will learn this language and this culture and this country. 

And one day, our kids will be correcting us on everything thing we pronounce and say wrong. 

What a day that will be! 

And here is Shiloh with her "Mamby," who has become a part of the family. 

One year in Albania

On Sunday, we celebrated our one year anniversary in Albania. 

This afternoon Cory walked into the kitchen super excited and said "That was the first time since we've been here that I have been able to pay all three bills in one day!" 

There is no online payment plan. There is no mailing system for bills. 

You go directly to the office, wait in a line that goes out the door, and try to pay your bills. 

Ours have been messed up since January. Sometimes Cory would be gone for hours and come back, the bills still unpaid. 

He had to go to a different office, or talk to the landlord, or didn't understand what they were saying. The line was too long, or we had been charged the wrong amount, or the office was closed. 

We've had our electricity shut off, our water shut off and our internet has stopped working. 

But today, the bills were paid in less than a half hour! 

A year ago, on June 6, Cory, 5 month old Shiloh and I left America with a one way ticket to Albania. 

First family pic in Albania, One year ago

And the fact that we are celebrating paying the bills, illustrates what has been "difficult" in this last year. 

Simple life kind of stuff.  

The cold winter. 
New food.
Health care. 
Learning to shop each day. 

Sometimes I wanted to just be baking in Malibu. 
Sometimes I wanted Ezekiel bread really bad. 
Sometimes I wanted to just go to the doctor. 
Sometimes I wanted to drive to Costco and get 8 carts worth of food. 

But yesterday I was talking to one of the girls in my bible study. I asked her what her parents thought of her being involved in church. 

"Oh they like it," she said. "My mom and dad have been reading the Bible and they think it is good." 

"Your mom and dad read the Bible?" 

"Yes the Bible you gave me. I took it home and my parents have been reading it." 

"What are they reading in the Bible?" 

"They started at the beginning. I have told them everything I have learned about God and about His son Jesus and how He has died for us and given us life." 

"And your parents are reading the Bible?" 

"Yes they read it together." 

6 months ago this girl wasn't even part of the church. She got involved through the Christmas play. 

Now she is telling her parents everything she has learned and they are reading the Bible together!?!

And this is the nature of our first year in Albania. There are so many stories like this. 

A boy who's Dad is broken by reading the story of the prodigal son. 

A woman who says "the seeds have been planted deep in my heart and I believe in Jesus." 

A woman who says, "I don't know what has happened to my sons. They have changed." 

 A girl who says, "My whole life has changed because of Jesus. Everything about me is different." 

What is long lines for the bills when you are watching Christ transform people? 

In all reality, this year has been so much more amazing, rewarding, and "easy" than I anticipated. 

I was bracing myself to struggle more often than not. 

BUT it really is true that watching Christ work SO clearly brings incredible joy. 

It makes everything else truly seem less important. 

And I knew this was true but I am kind of amazed at how I have seen this happen in our lives. 

Not intentionally. 
Not because we have worked hard to make it that way. 
But because it actually, naturally happens. 

And we feel privileged. 

We feel privileged to be in a place where the harvest truly is plentiful. 

There are extremely hungry hearts. 

It's like we've spiritually struck gold. 

Life has hard things no matter where you are or what you do. 

So, rather than feeling like we are "sacrificing" we feel incredibly blessed. Like its not fair to everyone else that we get to be here and watch God work in this way. 

And I understand that He is working all over the world. Obviously. 

But there is something pretty impactful about seeing him work in a country that just over 20 years ago was an Atheist nation. 

Many spiritual minds are blank slates. 

We feel humbled to be able to watch what God is doing here. 

On Sunday as we were singing in church I was thinking about the past year. 

And as we sang the songs in Albanian, I realized I understood almost all the words in every song. 

"Jesus is King."

"He is alive." 

"Jesus has defeated death." 

And hundreds of voices filled the sanctuary worshipping God in Albanian. 

We are so far from family. We are so far from what we know. We are so far from the culture of America. We are so far from comfortable. 

But, God is here and He is working. 

And more than anything this year we have seen that. We have been impacted by that. 

And when we think of this year we think of all the things we have seen God do. 

And we are thrilled for all the years we will spend here. 

House Hunting

There are so many things we love about our home here in Pogradec. 

View from our balcony

We love that it is in the center of town and it's easy for people to stop by. 

We love the spaciousness of our kitchen and the busy view outside. 

We love that we have space for teams, family and guests. 

We love it. But one day, we would like to move. 

Not from Albania, not from Pogradec. Just to a different home. 

We are so thankful for where we are right now but would eventually like to find something with more longevity. 

Right now, we live on THE single highway/road/freeway that runs through Albania. 

Like living on a 405 on ramp. If the 405 wasn't paved and there were just as many people as there are cars...and a few donkeys.

It is extremely loud and dusty and busy. 

I love to look out the window and watch the busyness as I drink my coffee in the morning, but I also don't like the 18 wheeler earthquakes at midnight. 

We would like a place where we can sit outside. We would like a place with some sunlight in the winter. We would like a place with an entry way instead of 25 marble steps right inside the front door. 

Just one day. 

But that kinda means that we have to keep our eyes and ears open right now. 

Why? 

There are no "homes for sale" listings in the newspaper. 
There's no website.
There are no realtors. 
There are no "for sale" signs. 
There are no new developments being built. 

So what do we do? 

We walk around Pogradec and if we see a house that might work, we ask in our broken Albanian if it is for rent. 

We ask the shopkeeper across the street. 
We ask kids in the youth group if they know of anything. 

The reason it is hard to find something here is that families build their own houses. Grandparents, aunts and uncles all live together. 

So people don't commonly rent homes. They rent apartments. And the homes are custom built. 

When people do rent homes, that usually means them moving out of their home and renting a smaller apartment so someone else can live in their home. 

Sometimes we hear of homes that are for rent and have to go find them. I think there are addresses here but nobody goes by them. Everyone gives directions based on landmarks. 

So today Melodie heard from a taxi driver that one floor of his home was for rent. 

These were the directions we were given: 

It is behind the pazaar, behind the school. It is the house across from the house with the big chimney...

There are like dozens of homes back there. They all have chimneys. What's a big chimney? 

We walked around for about a half hour and asked for the house of the taxi driver and we actually ended up finding it. 

The Grandma was there taking care of her grandson and very graciously showed us the home. It was beautiful but only one floor was for rent and there weren't separate entrances. 

When we were saying goodbye, she offered us a candy (Albanians always have a bowl of candy they offer you when you visit). Cory and I both took one and then she offered Shiloh one. 

(Shiloh scooped up the last 8 pieces into her arms and took off running the other way...we are working on her manners, among other things.)

So we will continue to house hunt until one day we hopefully find something new. 

This is also an illustration of how life just "takes longer." 


For instance last Tuesday our power was out all day because our landlord had backed up bills she hadn't paid for since before we moved in. 

Cory went outside to flip the power switch and their was a locked padlock on the box...

He has spent hours going around to offices, talking to the landlord, trying to get the bill figured out. 

It ended up coming back on 5 hours later. But in the meantime there wasn't much we could get done. No oven, no internet, no washing machine. 

I understand that some people live like that some places but their life is set up for that. 

On the contrary our life is set up for electricity. But then the electricity doesn't work. 

Cory fixing the overflowing toilet in the dark

So it feels like we are living in a houseboat that has holes in it. It kinda floats...but it kinda...sinks. 

So it just "takes longer." 

On Sunday Shiloh had some kind an allergic reaction that literally covered her body. It was really scary looking. We ended up driving to Greece to see a doctor and get some groceries like I have mentioned HERE. 

We drove two hours only to find out it was a Greek holiday (they have SO many holidays) and the doctor wasn't there. 

Thankfully she came into the office when I called her and took a look a Shiloh. 

But that was our whole day. The doctor. 

Before we moved here people would ask, "What will you do every day?" 

I had a broad idea. I knew what our goals would be. I knew what our mission would be. And since moving to Albania, I have written about our bible studies and youth group and meeting with kids and the drama and the 6 week challenge and the women's bible study. 

But, 

what is hard to put into words is that sometimes, the every day tasks take much longer than we are used to. 

This is partly because of the language barrier. 
This is partly because of the cultural barrier. 
This is partly because some things are simply less streamlined here. 

Sometimes entire days are wrapped up in solving one problem. 

In fact, often many days are wrapped up in solving one problem. 

Many hours are spent trying to complete a seemingly simple task. 

Many hours are spent trying to fix a problem that we spent hours accidentally creating. 

Such is our new "normal." 

And I know that working through these things and solving these problems is part of obeying God. 

He has called us here and that doesn't just mean that we get to lead bible studies and watch people come to Christ. 

While that is our greatest joy and our ultimate motivation, it is not what we do 24/7. 

We also "live life." But that's part of what God has called us to here. 

And even though I want to bang my head against the wall sometimes, it is also an extremely incredible adventure. 

Kind of like being Shiloh Belle's mom :) 

3 Years Ago

Cory and I first came to Albania in 2012. 

The first year, everything was new. 

The second year it felt like we were coming home. Of course we noticed new things and learned more about the country and the culture but that first wide eyed "shock" was gone. 

Last year we moved here and in living here, learned 1000's of things we never would have on a summer missions trip. 

Cory's parents are here this week for the first time and it's such a blast to show them around because it's as if we are reliving that first summer all over again. 

They are noticing and commenting on things I have long forgotten are weird, or different, or shocking. 

I'm sure in 10 years I will read the blogs from my first year and laugh at what I wrote about. 

Cory's mom has taken a ton of amazing pics of our family but also of Albanian life. Here are a few...

This is a section of the "Pazar." 

It smells of rotten cheese. And everyone wants you to buy their cheese. They even let you taste it. 

The plastic bottles of Fanta are actually filled with olive oil. 

I have yet to learn what many of those herbs are. 

This is what Cory and I call the Sheep swap meet. Every Thursday on this hill, there are hundreds of men and their sheep. And goats. They seem to be "swapping" them. As you drive by in both directions you pass shepherds herding their sheep, or driving them in a horse drawn cart or a beaten up truck. I've never seen anything like it. 

And this, I love. 

I love it because it means so much more to me after living here nearly a year, than it would have if I had seen it before that. 

That sweet old lady is a widow. 

Widows dress in all black after their husbands death. For the rest of their life. A lot of women here are widows for decades.

I didn't know that 3 years ago. 

These clothing shops surrounding her are owned by families. 

They all sell similar things. 

It is their livelihood. 

Every morning and every night they take everything out and put everything back. 

3 years ago I wouldn't have known the weight that lays in them selling a shirt or a pair of socks. 

3 years ago I didn't know any of the words I was hearing. Now I can understand what is going on around me. I recognize the numbers, the questions of "how much is this?" 

And if I had seen this picture without ever coming to Albania, 

I wouldn't be able to hear the shouts of the shopkeepers yelling out the prices of their goods, or the crunch of the gravel under everyone's feet. 

I wouldn't be able to smell the tobacco smoke, the Turkish coffee, or the mothball scent of the clothes. 

I wouldn't be able to feel the dust in the air, the humidity of the weather, or the cash in my hand that has become my only form of payment. 

And when I first came here 3 years ago, I had no idea how dear this place and these people would become to me. 

And I can't wait to know and to understand more. I can't wait until I hear every word. 

And I'm so thankful for how both of our parents have embraced our life here, supported us in every way imaginable and encouraged us with their words and prayers all along the way. 

And this....

what can I say? 

Taliah Pauline Cramer

Time flies when there's a newborn in your home. 

The days and nights blur together. 

Hours fly by like seconds. 

So, nearly a month has flown by and I will pick up where I left off...

Although we had been nervous about our time in Tirana, we ended up having a blast. It was a special time with Shiloh as a family of  3. There is a lot to discover in Tirana and we spent much of our time walking and exploring. 

So while we were ready and waiting, we enjoyed the time in between. 

While there were some crazy moments in the hospital, Taliah's birth itself could not have gone smoother. I was only in labor for 5 hours. We ended up arriving to the hospital 45 minutes before she was born. 

And...that is why we spent the month in Tirana. We actually wouldn't have made it to the hospital if we had been in Pogradec! 

The greatest challenge was the language barrier and the fact that I wanted a natural labor. The doctor had a bit of a different philosophy.

In the end, I agreed to "collaborate" by being silent and monitored during the end of my labor. Probably the hardest 45 minutes of my life. 

It is unnerving when you are being talked about but you don't know what is being said. 

And the fact that I came in at the end of my labor absolutely freaked the doctors and nurses out. 

There was a distinct moment when I remember thinking "This is very different..." 

We had just arrived at the hospital, Cory and Melodie were stopped at the entrance to put on surgery garb, and I was literally pushed into the delivery room by myself. 

I could barely open my eyes from all of the florescent lights, there were 4 gloved, masked nurses staring wide eyed at me. One was trying to stick an IV in my arm while I tried to pace through a contraction. Another was trying to make me sit on the bed. 

I picked up words but not complete sentences. I legitimately didn't know what was going on. 

The doctor was snapping his gloves on without a word. 

Finally, Melodie came in and was able to talk with the doctor and express my wishes. I could not have done it without her. Knowing someone knew what I wanted, was able to communicate that and was fighting for me was huge. 

20 minutes after the doctor told me I wasn't close and needed an epidural (which I refused because I'm terrified at the idea of having a needle in my spine)...

Taliah was born at 10:15 pm on her due date, healthy and beautiful. I was able to leave the hospital less than 24 hours later. 

In the end, the doctor said it was "a perfect birth." 

I've recovered quickly and she is gaining weight and eating well. 

I'm so thankful and relieved and feel very blessed and undeserving. 

We are back home in Pogradec and getting used to life as a family of 4. 

Thank you for your prayers and encouragement as always. I know that people were praying for me and for us all along the way. 

Taliah Pauline Cramer 7 lbs. 8 oz. 19 inches long

Melodie :) 

My Dad was able to visit a few days after Taliah was born. We had the best time with him and Shiloh sure does think he's the best! Love you Dad! 

Here we are in an alley in Tirana trying to get Taliah's passport. It was quite a long day if you can't tell...

I really love these girls :) 

The girls in my bible study came a few days after Taliah was born and had this beautiful cake made for her. They brought hand made gifts and were so excited to celebrate with us. 

Now, Pogradec is coming alive in so many ways for us. Not only is the weather warming up but our life is so much more full here than it was a year ago when we arrived. 

We are so thankful to be home and so excited for what the next months will hold.