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I'm long overdue for an update.

Since it's now '07, and anyone who considers himself even slightly hip has to have a 2006 best of list, here is mine.

I decided to stray away from the music and movies I liked and go for most memorable things about 2006. These are in no particular order:

Most Memorable Things about 2006:

-making the move to Prague and finally realizing something that had been inside me for over 2 years.
-the Thursday night community group, aka "foch aspen" and all the good food, and good conversations
-seeing Lake Bled, Slovenia and all the beauty that God made. Plus the cool people we hung out with for a few days. Graham and Cheryl, where are you?
-the Explosions in the Sky concert back in January in Austin. A great show with tons of friends there. Add in magnolia cafe and the nice name we got called by the near the bathroom and night definitely goes down as one of my most memorable concerts ever.
-the kids from my Life Skills class at College Station Middle School. They were/are so special to me. It's crazy how attached I got to some of them.
-the prayer time everyone at Messiah's House in Amarillo had for me back in June. God still manages to surprise me with his love on occasions like that.
-Alice Gahbauer.
-all the trips I made to Austin with Kellie, and getting to hangout with K.C. and Adam while I was there. I miss all our Parlor/Jackalope/Side Bar/Beauty Bar nights.
-the roadtrip John and I took from Texas to LA to see Aaron and Lindsay. Such a great trip! The snowstorm, conversations, clove cigarettes, In-and-Out Burgers, beaches, etc are all good memories. Even that dingy hotel in Arizona is fun to look back on.
-the new mewithoutYou album. Why can't there be more bands like this? Lyrics and God and real-life. Simply amazing.
-my going away party. What was supposed to be my "funeral" morphed into a zombie takeover. Beautiful.
-Clifton and I's first DJing experience at Club Nebe. I think it was kind of like a dream come true for both of us, and it went beautifully.
-staying with Erik and Valerie when I went back for John and Janet's wedding.
-the crazy wedding I went to with Carrie Graham back in May. You know you're in rural Texas when the groom's cake is made to look like a bottle of Budweiser and a group of guests ends up getting in a fight outside.
-brunch at the Griddle in LA with John, Aaron, and Lindsay.
-having my sister come to visit and being her tour guide for Austin.
-doing the CELTA in Prague. 4 of the most intense weeks of my life so far.
-the morning Clifton and I discovered brunch at Fraktal here in Prague. Breakfast Enchiladas and Johnny Cash on the stereo-- what more could you ask for?
-having friends visit here in Prague. Matt, Ginger, and Simon-- fun times.
-John and Janet's wedding. It was beautiful, and i loved getting to see so many good friends in one place.
-my family visiting me here in Prague. We had a great time and I loved being able to show them around this place that I love.
-staying out until 6am with CELTA friends. Those were crazy intense weeks with crazy intense weekends.
-going to Cesky Krumlov with Alice, Angela, and Clifton. Our "early dinner" on Friday night was unforgettable.
-going to the Blind Eye here in Zizkov when it was operating like a speak-easy.
-many, many nights in the couch-bar.
-the roommate struggle on Boyett st.
-the Oktoberfest trip. From the train breaking down on the way there to our 10:00am arrival at the beer tent-- it was a fun trip.
-getting to now my students here in Prague. They're great people who I feel are more like friends than students.
-the Bouncing Souls show here in Prague and meeting Jake and the crazy Australian girl.
-Clifton and I's thirty-hours in Dublin. Our trip to the Guinness Brewery was unforgettable, mainly because I got us lost and we were exhausted--fun though.
-reading the Irresistible Revolution by Shane Claiborne. By far the best book I read this year-- he is able to synthesize a lot of information and make SO many good points without shoving it down your throat. Very, very good.
-all the times I spent on the porch on Boyett st. with John.
-going to World Mandate with Michael.
-selling my car for more than I wanted to-- and my daily trips to the car wash that lasted for about 2 weeks.
-selling A LOT of my posessions on ebay to make money for the move.
-heidelberry Gluevein (sp?) from Kristkendlmarkt in Nuremberg.
-the Manhattan Short Film Festival screening here at Kino Svetozor.
-discovering the Arrested Development phenomena.
-receiving a phone call from my Dad telling me that my grandmother had just died-- and then realizing I was far away from a lot of people I loved. I definitely cried that night.
-the PCF fall retreat. I was really skeptical going in, but it was a great weekend.
-wearing a cow costume on the Prague metro, and all the Czechs who were staring but were trying not to look like they were staring.
-that fall Saturday that Alice and I walked all over Prague. The leaves were so pretty.

Beer maid. How in the world does she carry all those?

Our crew in Munich: Elizabeth, Alice, Roger, and me (james is in the picture below)

Because of a Czech holiday, my friends and I found ourselves with a long weekend at the end of September. So what did we do? We headed off to Munich to experience the world famous "Oktoberfest" for ourselves. We stayed with my friend Roger, an American who I met during our CELTA training in Prague.

It was a great weekend. Oktoberfest is basically an enourmous fair. There are tons of booths set up selling all kinds of food-- sausage, cheeses, breads, chocolate covered fruit, nuts, etc. There's also tons of rides-- rollercoasters, log rides, carousels, etc. And of course, there is the beer. All the big German brewers are represented, each one having it's own tent. You basically pick the tent you want to get in, (hopefully) find a seat and have one of the German ladies bring you a beer.

As you can see by the pictures, we had a great time experiencing the German culture, both and Oktoberfest and in Munich.


The front of the Spaten beer "tent."

Inside of the Hoffbrau beer tent. Most of these tents hold around 5000 people. Crazy.

I was excited.

" "<-- Insert your own comment here.

It wouldn't be complete without these.

Life is beginning to look more normal now. Clifton and I just hosted 2 people at our apartment. First was Joe, a cool guy that we met at our hostel in Lake Bled. He's doing the backpacking thing all over Europe, and we told him he'd have a place to stay when he came through Prague. He took us up on the offer, and we had a good time getting to know a new friend.

My friend Simon visited after that. I met Simon last year, as he was one of the other guys on our Prayer Journey through Eastern Europe last summer. I had a great time hanging out with him this past week. Lots and lots of good conversations about God and how we live out this abundant life before us.

I've been thinking about how Jesus' offer of a full life begins in the here and now. When he stands up in the temple and reads:
"God's Spirit is on me;
he's chosen me to preach the Message of good news to
the poor,
Sent me to announce pardon to prisoners and
recovery of sight to the blind,
To set the burdened and battered free,
to announce, "This is God's year to act!"
And then he tells everyone that this is happening now. How amazing is that? The kingdom is here-- meaning that God's rule, the re-establishment of things being like they should be... restoration has come. And who are the first to notice the kingdom? The first to experience it are at the bottom of society's barrel. The homeless, the prostitutes, the thieves-- the most unliked people of society experience LIFE first.

I've been thinking about this, and also thinking about what it means to "love my neighbor" like Jesus says. I think this thing we call "Christianity" might be simpler than we think. Before anything else, we accept God's love for us. And then we LOVE.

We LOVE. Not through programs or ministries (though these are not always bad!), but WE love. We love our neighbors-- those around us who we see daily. We love our friends. We love our co-workers.

This, my friends, is a simple thing. We can try to wrap up our life purpose in ministries or mission statements, but when it comes down to it there is only we thing we need to do-- LOVE.

We love others, not for what the can do for us, but for what God did for us. We love others not for how they feel about us, but for how God feels about us. Because God feels the same way about them, and he has done the same things for them.

But, as Shane Claiborne mentions in The Irresistible Revolution (read this book!), "it's simple, but it's not easy." But it doesn't mean we don't try.

In the midst of the religious institution of the day, Jesus points out that the the Kingdom is here and it's available to anyone. Life-- life more abudantly is wide open for the taking. And we access this through LOVE.

As Paul pointed out:
"If I speak with human eloquence and angelic ecstasy but don't love, I'm nothing but the creaking of a rusty gate. If I speak God's Word with power, revealing all his mysteries and making everything plain as day, and if I have faith that says to a mountain, "Jump," and it jumps, but I don't love, I'm nothing. If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr, but I don't love, I've gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I'm bankrupt without love."
We can spend our lives doing ministry and still never LIVE. Without LOVE, it doesn't matter.

So that's me. Learning to LOVE more and do less. It's simple, but it's not easy.

I'm back in Prague after 6 days in Slovenia. Good times.

After a 13 hour train ride, plus another hour and a half on a bus, we arrived in Lake Bled, Slovenia. We spent 3 days in this beautiful place. It's basically a lake that is surrounded by the Julian Alps-- complete with a castle overlooking it from the hill, and a small church built on an island in the middle of the lake. There's also a gorge near there that we went and explored (pictures below).

The area around Lake Bled must have been really fertile, because there was fruit growing everywhere. Tons of apples, pears, plums, grapes, blueberries, raspberries, etc. When we walked back to the town from the gorge, our trip probably took twice as long because we were spending so much time picking and eating the fruit as we walked by.

We also met some really cool people there, including a couple from Australia, and a girl from Canada who had been living in Rome. That's one thing I love about the hostel environment-- you meet so many people from all over.

We also had a couple of days in Ljubljana, the capital. We had planned our trip to coincide with a Gogol Bordello show that was going to be there on the night of the 30th. Unfortunately, the band canceled. Clifton and I were not happy, but we made the most of it. Ljubljana was a great city-- really artsy and laid back. It's also small, so you can walk everywhere.

Overall, it was a really fun trip. I'll have to say though, I was ready to get back to Prague. I guess that's a sign that I'm adjusting well to here and enjoying it.

Sorry this was short... I meant to post more details about the trip, but with no internet at home yet, well... this is what you get.

Hope you are all well, wherever you are right now...

Clifton rowing us (Graham, Cheryl, and Me) out to the island.

From the castle, overlooking Lake Bled and the island with the church.

The castle.

Clifton didn't like this picture, but I wanted to show the grapes growing on the building. There was fruit growing everywhere.

The island is in the foreground, with the castle and Alps in the background.

Waterfall at the end of the gorge.

Bridge over the gorge.

This is what the walkway over the gorge looked like most of the time. Our Australian friends, Graham and Cheryl, are in front.

Ljubljana Castle.

Ljubljana has some really nice and unique architecture.

Dragon Bridge. (dragons are the symbol of Ljubljana)

Part of the Old Town near the River.

Strange sign. I think they make these so that people language can understand, but umm... yeah.

Me at the Castle.

From the Castle, overlooking the city and the Alps.

One thing you can't help but notice in larger European cities now is the abundance of graffiti. There's lots of it in Prague, even on older historic buildings.

Ljubljana had lots of graffiti too, but much of it was different from what you typically see. A lot of times it's just "tags"-- a few words written in a crazy font, but much of what I saw in Ljubljana, especially in the center, was more like "street art." How do you draw a line between street art and graffiti? I don't know. I guess what is one man's art might be another's graffiti. Regardless, I found the art in Ljubljana fascinating.

I think what makes street art so interesting is that it's painted somewhere obvious, where the artist knows his creation will be seen. Unlike someone who just uses a studio at their house, these people put art out in the open. Some of it was political, but most of it was just, well... look below and you'll see.

Finally, it's over. My TEFL training course ended this past Friday, August 11th. I am now officially CELTA certified through Cambridge. I actually did pretty well-- I got a "Pass B", which something like only 15% of the course graduates get. Hopefully that will help out with job opportunities.

Sorry for the lack of posts, but seriously the course has taken up almost all my time. Work everynight and at least one paper to work on every weekend.

But it's over... thank God.

More posts soon...