It's a Beautiful Day in My Neigborhood...

I thought you might like to see some of the sights that I see every day here in Olsztyn. These are some of the places that we frequent in our little neck of the woods here.

The picture of the little shop is our local bread store, called a Piekarnia. I love to stop in there and get a fresh sunflower seed roll after language class. The ladies who work there are really sweet and help us with our Polish ordering skills.

The picture of the other store (called Malwa and pronounced "Malva") is our grocery story of preference. Grocery shopping is an ongoing process here in Poland. Since most people don't have cars (including us), you can only buy what you can carry in small amounts. Most things here are packaged smaller, making them easier to carry, but also meaning that you use it up quicker and have to go back to the grocery store! We go several times a week and have a feeling that we're becoming known as the Americans who smile a lot and have no idea what's going on.

Finally, the last picture is of one of the bus stops that we use. Just like in most big cities (So I'm told...oddly enough, Huron didn't have a public transportation system!), you have to figure out which bus to take to get where you want to go, then figure out which stop to go to AND which side of the street you need to be on. Confusing! Fortunately, I came to Poland with the human GPS; Amber's really good at that stuff and LOVES reading maps. (On a side note: I had a teacher in HS who actually made us practice folding maps because his wife couldn't do it and it drove him nuts. Quality education right there.)

So, short of a picture of our language school, these are the places that are pretty much a part of my daily routine here in Poland. Hopefully, I'll have some pictures soon of where we are meeting to hold our English conversation/Bible study meetings with college students. That's a pretty big prayer request right now. We've got a few leads, but haven't found anything definite yet, and the semeseter is getting well underway. We want to start meeting with students very soon but, of course, need a meeting place first! We're waiting to hear from a few different places, so I'll be sure to let you know when we hear anything!