welcome! (part 3)

The next room I'm going to show you is the kitchen.  I love my house and each room in it, but the kitchen is probably my favorite.

before...

...during...

...after!

One thing my kitchen has is LOTS of drawers!
Sometimes we have a hard time finding things.  :)

The cupboards, oven, and stove-top are secondhand,
but they fit perfectly in our kitchen.

I love the wood stove in the kitchen.  It toasts bread beautifully and is very helpful for melting butter, not to mention that it keeps us warm in the cool weather!

melting butter and coconut oil

Doesn't that look cozy?

The kitchen pictures were taken before we put the plants in there.  Jonathan had the jade plant and the ginseng tree before we were married, and we recently got the orchid.  Often houses here will have an orchid along with several other plants in a front window.  I love orchids, and since they happened to be on sale the other day, I figured we should get one - you know, just to fit in with the culture around us.  :)

This pot belonged to one of my ancestors.
I really like how it looks in our kitchen!

And just as a side note, this little critter was on our front walk the other day.  :)

Thanks for visiting us today!  Stay tuned for more tours...

welcome! (part 2)

Now that you've seen the layout of our house and toured the upstairs, it's time to let you tour the rest of the house!  In case you need a refresher, here is the layout:

The first room you come to is the living room.  It is the first room on the right when you walk in.

before...

...during...

This wood stove is fed in the kitchen and goes
through the wall, keeping both rooms warm.

...almost there...

...after!

Yes, all those shades of green really are the same.  The light really plays with the color!  It turned out a little brighter than we were anticipating, but we we really love it!  We got the furniture second hand, and it was just what we were looking for: light, easy to clean, simple, and comfortable.  It softens the brighter walls and makes the room very welcoming.  The couch has storage inside and also folds down into a bed.  Come visit sometime!  :)

In other house news, Tuesday we had a bird in our attic.  :-(  I was going upstairs to get the laundry off the line, and when I opened the door I saw him trying to fly out the closed windows.  I quickly shut the door and did what any good girl would do: called for my husband to come up and take care of it!  :)  While the bird was over by the balcony door, he was able to open up the windows and it just flew out.  We're not sure how he got in, but hopefully that won't be a frequent occurrence!

Next up: the kitchen!

Immigration office - update to Urgent Prayer Request

Dear praying friends,

This morning, we left around 8:00 to pick up our translated marriage certificate, and to take all of the necessary documents into the immigration office. We picked up the certificate, and took everything to the immigration office. The lady there was nice, but mentioned something about our land deed being a few months old (the deed is only officially good for 30 days). She also told us that our bank statement from the States (as proof of income) could not just be a printed out bank statement, but needed to have an official bank stamp and signature. I asked if I could give them a bank statement from my bank here in Romania with a stamp and signature. She said that was fine. So, off to the bank we went! They gave us a bank statement, but said we needed to go to their branch in another part of town for the official stamp and signature. We were able to do that, and also took in the old deed to a notary so they could get us an up-to-date deed. Unfortunately, this process takes at least several hours, and we only had another hour or so to turn in our documents. Also, Thursday is the only day the immigration office accepts documents for residence permits, so if a recent land deed was needed, we would have to wait until next Thursday to take in all of our documents again.

We decided to go and take the documents we had, including the bank statement with stamp and signature, back into the immigration office. Praise the Lord, nothing more was said about the deed, and there was no problem with the bank statement, even though I don't really use my account here, and there certainly isn't much proof of income in it! :o) They accepted all the documents, and we went into the back room to get Kristy's picture taken, and that was that! Well, so we thought. About half an hour after we left, they called and said that I needed to pay an additional consular tax at the bank they use and bring them the receipt. So, we went to the bank, paid the tax, and brought the receipt to the immigration office. Everything seems to be fine and in order, and they said we can pick up Kristy's residence permit in one month! We are praising the Lord for this answer to prayer, and pray that we will be able to pick up Kristy's residence permit next month with no problems! Thank you so much for your prayers!

Rejoicing,
Jonathan and Kristy

Jonathan and Kristy's March Prayer Letter

This has been a rather eventful month with lots of things happening! First of all, here is an update on Kristy’s residence permit. We got Romanian health insurance for Kristy, and thankfully, that went well.Thursday, we took everything in to the immigration office. Fortunately, the problematic woman wasn't there, and they were only concerned about Kristy's last date of entry into Romania (which was March 5th). The man that was there looked at our things and when he got to our marriage certificate, he said that it needs a special apostille, since Romania and the United States are part of the Hague Convention. I wanted to make sure of this, so I asked to have an interview with the head boss. About half an hour later, he was available, and sure enough, he got his book with legal information in it and told us we need to get this apostille on our marriage certificate from the Secretary of Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. He also said that Kristy cannot get a permanent residence permit, but must get a temporary one. Thankfully, he was very nice, and apologized that we had to get something more. That day, Kristy's dad was able to go to Harrisburg and get the apostille on our marriage certificate. He sent it to us via DHL that day. We got it Monday (March 31st) and took it into the city to have it legally translated. Lord-willing, Thursday (April 3rd) we will again take everything in to the immigration office, and everything will be good, and we can get the process started. Please be praying for this.

Although there still have been a few times this month when no teens came to church for the teen class, one week, there were quite a few teens outside. Several of them came over to the church building, and it was good to have an actual, nice conversation with them rather than having them be obnoxious. Unfortunately, Rebeca has not been coming. She said she is now registered at another church, so she’s no longer coming to ours. I am not sure what is going on with her, but she has been rather cold lately. Gugu, the boy that had the brain tumor, is back home and seems to be doing fine. Please continue to pray for his salvation, as well as for the other unsaved young people. Please also pray for the ones who have made professions of faith that they will live for the Lord and come faithfully to church.

Ion (Yone) continues to attend the reading classes faithfully. He has been improving, and although the going is slow, during one class, he was recognizing words easily. Even his wife, Mariana, was pleasantly surprised. Please continue to pray for Ion’s salvation.

The children’s classes have been going well. They have been pretty well-behaved, which is a blessing. It’s always so encouraging when they know answers to the review questions, and they have been doing very well with them. Some of the little ones that seemed to just be in their own little world during class are actually saying Bible verses! Praise the Lord!

During one of our services, several children outside were banging on windows and causing disruptions. It took several people going out and dealing with them, and one person stationed outside until the end of church, to keep things quiet enough for the service to continue.

Thank you so much for all of your prayers and support. We appreciate you and are blessed to have you as part of our ministry with the Gypsies in Romania!

Serving Him,
Jonathan and Kristy Heisey

Urgent Prayer Request

Dear Praying Friends,

Several weeks ago, we began the process to get Kristy a residence permit for Romania. Normally when one comes into Romania, one has a 90 day tourist visa. This was typically renewed every time that person came back into the country. So on March 5th, we spent the day in Hungary and came back into Romania, expecting this to give Kristy another 90 days in Romania. However, we found out that the law has changed and states that one only has 90 days in Romania in a 180 day period. The first time that we entered Romania in the last 180 days was December 28th, which means those 90 days expire on Thursday, March 27th. So we quickly got everything together and sent off for Kristy's new passport (with her new name), which we thankfully received back on Wednesday.

So, yesterday, we got together the documents necessary for applying for a residence permit for Kristy and took them to the Immigration office. They told us that Kristy needs Romanian health insurance first, and then we can apply for residency. We are planning to go to the Health Insurance office Monday to see what we need to do to get Romanian health insurance for Kristy, but this usually takes a few days. Please pray that we will be able to get everything necessary to apply for residency before Thursday, and that we will be able to apply for a permanent residence permit next week. The one woman in the office has been particularly problematic, and seems to tell us (and other Americans that have had to deal with her) something different than the other people that work there. She said that Kristy cannot get a permanent residence permit, but that she has to get a temporary residence permit. The other people that I have asked there at other times said she will receive a permanent residence permit since that is what I have. This woman also said that the 90 day visa is calculated from the last entry into Romania (which was March 5th), but I'm not sure we can trust that. So, we are praying that they will give Kristy a permanent residence visa, and that we will be able to apply for it next week.

Often official government workers are arrogant and rude, so please be praying for everything to go smoothly, and that we will have helpful, friendly people dealing with us. The Lord has this all worked out already, and we are looking forward to what He will do through the prayers of His children!

Serving Him,
Jonathan and Kristy Heisey

welcome! (part 1)

Welcome!  Finally I am getting around to posting pictures of my home.  We're going to start with a tour of the inside since the outside isn't completed yet, but first I have to post a couple pictures of what's been done so far on the exterior!

before

as of this week!

I'll post more outside and exterior pictures at a later time, but right now let's go inside.  To begin with, we'll start with the basic layout.

Our house is one-and-a-half stories.  The downstairs is illustrated in the following diagram:

The front door is actually located on the side of the house as you're facing it from the street.  This has proven quite confusing on many occasions, as we sometimes refer to that as the front of the house, making the opposite side the back, and sometimes we refer to the street side as the front.  Oh well...

A central hall runs down the middle of our house with rooms on either side of it.  The living room, kitchen, and bathroom are on the right side, the unfinished room (which will probably be the guest room) and bedroom are on the left side, and the pantry and stairs leading up to the attic are at the end.

the hall as the previous owner had it

going upstairs

looking down the steps
They are very narrow and shallow -
"mortal" as one man put it.  :)

Upstairs are two long rooms that pretty much run the length of the house.  One composes about 2/3 of the attic, and the other about 1/3.  We're hoping to someday put a couple of rooms and a bathroom up there.

the attic as the previous owner had it

the main room of the attic - I often hang our laundry up here

this is on the other side of the dividers

we'd like to put a bathroom in here someday

a view out back from the balcony

This completes the first part of your welcome tour.  Thank you for joining us!  Stay tuned for more pictures of the (finished!) downstairs rooms!

a trip to Budapest

I mentioned in my last post that we have been quite busy recently.  One of the reasons for the busyness was due to our trip to Budapest (Hungary) last week.  Our coworker had to make the trip there to pick up new passports for his children.  We were planning to go out of the country at some point in the near future to get my 90-day tourist visa renewed upon re-entry, so he invited us to go along.

Our trip there was uneventful.  We didn't have any lines crossing the border into Hungary, and despite the heavy fog that morning, we made pretty good time.  While our coworker took care of his things at the embassy, Jonathan and I walked around Budapest for a little bit.

St. Stephen's Basilica was just one block down the road from the embassy.  We didn't go inside, as it would have cost us to get in and we didn't have a whole lot of time.  But the outside was beautiful!

"I am the way, the truth, and the life."

Don't you love the black van obscuring the view??

After walking around the basilica, we walked up and down a couple of the nearby streets, peering in shop windows and enjoying the gorgeous day.

Soon we met back up with our coworker, made a couple other quick stops, and got back on the road.  After a couple hours we reached the border, getting out of the car to stretch our legs while we waited for immigration to process everything for our re-entry.  When the officer returned our passports, he declared that I most definitely could not stay any longer than 30 days in Romania.  "Thirty days maximum, and then she must return to America."  We were quite surprised at his declaration, but thanked him and drove off down the road, figuring he was probably just trying to intimidate us and throw his weight around.  Everyone coming into the country gets 90 days... it should be the same for me, too, right?

After we got home, we started looking around online to see if there was some reason the officer would have told us this.  And sure enough, a few months ago immigration laws changed so that one can no longer stay more than 90 days in the country within any 6 month period.  Once you've been in 90 days, you have to be out 90 days.  

This was quite disturbing news, as you can imagine.  We hadn't been in any rush to apply for my residency because in the past you have always been able to go out and re-enter the country to get a new 90-day visa.  Our plan was to get a fresh 90-day stamp, send my passport in to the embassy to get my name changed, and then begin working on residency stuff.  But the Lord had other plans.  Instead of 90 days to work on everything, we now had less than 30.  

So we quickly got all of my passport documentation together and called the courier to come pick up our package.  They said they would come Friday.  Friday came and went with no courier.  We called again that evening, and they said they had it marked to be picked up on Saturday, and that it would still arrive at the embassy first thing Monday morning.  No problem.  Saturday we waited for the courier to come, but again, he never showed.  We called the office again, only to discover that they closed early in the afternoon.  It would have to wait until Monday.

Monday we went into town and dropped our package off at the office.  The lady was very nice and apologetic for the mishap.  She told us the passport would arrive at the embassy by 10 the next day.  Upon leaving the office we walked the couple of blocks to the center of town where many shops, offices, and services are located.  One of the requirements for me to get residency is to turn in a translated copy of my marriage license (since my reason for getting residency is because I am married to a permanent resident).  So we stopped in to inquire about the service at one translation place.  They informed us that they were unable to do it because our license didn't have the necessary colored stamp on it.  It is a certified, sealed legal copy, but here the official documents have colored stamps, so they said they couldn't do it.  So we walked down the street to another translation office.  This one didn't seem to have a problem with our certificate, so Lord-willing when we pick it up tomorrow there will be no issues with it.  The rest of our paperwork will have to wait until my new passport arrives so that all the documentation has the correct identification on it.

There will be lots of paperwork and running to and from offices in the next few weeks, but we are so glad we found out about this new law when we did!  We had been considering getting my name changed first and then going out of the country when my 90 days were almost up.  Praise the Lord we didn't do that, or else we'd be finding out about the law with only a couple days left on my visa to get everything done!