Update from Cluj

We just got back Friday evening from a trip through Hungary to Germany. (Freiberg, Saxony, to be specific.) It was fun! We got a great deal on train tickets from Budapest to Dresden--56 euros each round trip, purchased 60 days in advance. In contrast, the round trip tickets from Cluj to Budapest are 37 euros each. The sad thing about the Schengel zone is that I only got passport stamps at the border between Romania and Hungary, even though I crossed three borders on my way to Germany.

During the trip, we got to spend a couple days at the temple with one of the Hungarian groups, and we also went to church Sunday at Alex's old branch--now a ward--in Budapest. I liked being at the temple with the Hungarians, and I liked going to church in Hungarian again, but the whole experience was surprisingly underwhelming. It's the first time I've been to church in Hungary since the stake was organized, and I guess I set my expectations too high. Case in point: our little branch (~30 people) in Cluj sings twice as loud as the Budapest ward (100+) we visited. Also, there was nothing spiritual about the meeting, and next to no mention of Christ. The first talk was random nonsense (e.g. "it's still worth it to give PH blessings even if the recipient only feels better for one second"), and the second, though interesting (valuing and protecting the environment), had minimal spiritual relevance. I'm sure this isn't the norm for that ward, and I probably just picked a bad day to visit, but the overwhelming feeling I had from this underwhelming experience was that I live where I'm supposed to be living, which is not in Budapest. With the large group at Hungarian week in Freiberg, I had the same feeling. When I decided to move to Europe, Budapest was actually my first choice, but I eventually chose Romania. Today, in sacrament meeting in Cluj, I thought, "It is very nice to be home. This is where I belong."

Last week I ran into lots of people I hadn't seen for several years, and for the first time in a while, I had to explain to lots of people why I made the choice to move out of the USA to Romania, of all places. In case anyone thinks it was an accident--it wasn't! As I've been telling people recently, Cluj is my favorite place I've ever lived. That is not because I think it's the best place in the world for anybody; it's just because it's the best place in the world for me right now.

It is very good to be home. :-)