PRAGUE BLOG.

Hey guysssssss,

Sorry I’m  late on letting you know what happened this weekend! I went to Prague, which is in the Czech Republic. There were 3 trains that got in on Saturday : 3 AM (anything we could do in Prague at 3AM in Prague would be illegal), 2PM (pretty late for a 2 day weekend), and 10AM.. but there was a glitch with that one! We had a 6 hour layover in Vienna.. being the college students we are, we decided we’d just sleep in the train station somewhere. (most have this warm box type thing outside, like a smoking hut.. but not) However.. the train station we stayed at, did not. So we decided to sleep in the bathroom! There was a long hallway with about 8 toliets, but they closed off ¾ of it since it was 1AM, and there was just a little stretch of a hallway with one door to a bathroom. Chelsea, Gizzy, and I said a rosary with another group of FUS students going to Prague, and then they left, and we decided to get comfy! We laid close together against the bars of the gate.. for 45 minutes, when we were awoken by security!! Needless to say, they thought we were homeless, but we explained to them as best as we could that we were just waiting for our train, but they said we couldn’t sleep there.. and to find a hotel. We were paying for a place to stay in Prague, so we didn’t want to in Vienna (and it’s pretty pricy there!) So, we decided to go outside and see if they had any of those huts. They didn’t. They had a hut without doors, so freezing cold wind was coming in the whole night.

Now usually on trips, students do not get much done due to traveling and being so busy.. but my body would not let me sleep because it was so cold, so I worked on my homework.. and I dominated it! Not only did I save souls by being very cold and suffering for Christ, but I got the rest of my summaries done for Theology of Christ. (37 of them, done!) and then I read all of my papal documents needed for my Christian Marriage class (3 encyclical) and did some work on my philosophy paper! It was great. With about 2 hours left, I remembered that I had Chelsea’s NCIS season 2 in my computer, so I watched an episode and then at 5am, the bakery opened, and we ate delicious baguettes and such before catching our train!

We had a car to ourselves which was so great..we got to Prague and I was surprised to see how beautiful it was!! The cobblestone roads and the architecture was just fabulous! We got on a tram and found our adorable hostel. It was like an apartment, probably the nicest hostel I’ve stayed at so far, and the cheapest!! (besides LaSalsa in Ireland.. but that only had 2 beds for 4 ppl) There was a kitchen, 2 full bathrooms, and 2 bedrooms (we had neighbors but we never met them or anything) After we got situated and such we went out and explored the town, finding the cute market square where a food festival was going on and an international cooking show! They were skinning and cleaning very large fishes. (fishes keep following me around.. everywhere!) We explored some churches, walked across the gorgeous St. Charles Bridge, with beautiful images of Christ, some stations, and saints. We walked the steps to the Prague Castle, the biggest castle in Europe, and saw St. Nicholas’ (which is inside the Castle and resembled Notre Dame, eh.) After that we went to the Infant of Prague church, where we had our Sunday obligation mass in Spanish! We prayed in front of the infant and met up with the other girls to have dinner! We had dinner in this little underground restaurant, which was an odd little place to say the least, but I had CHICKENNNNNN, and it was delicoussssssss!!!!! After dinner we went to a pub crawl.. but we were too tired to really participate, so we took advantage of the free drinks and walked home to sleep!





We left around 10AM and got into the train station at 6pm after a few train mishaps (2 hours earlier than we were supposed to!) and then a nice Austrian lady picked us up and drove us back to the Kartause! It was so nice.

That was my weekend.. it was a nice, simple, relaxing, type of trip.. and now I’m sort of stressed with papers and stuff, but I’m doing well! I got all A+’s and 1 B on my finals. I don’t know how I get better grades in Europe, traveling around and all.. but it’s all good (: I’m leaving for Medj tomorrow! I’m so excited! You’ll all be in my prayers for sure! Our Lady is still appearing there, isn’t that awesome??

Oh yeah.. and my football team, the Savage Swans, are going to the championshippppppp!!!!!! What?! Yeah, I’m so proud of em’. I played QB for a few plays the past couple games, it’s awesome hahaha But, I’m more needed on the line, but it’s okay—I can say I did it!



Peace and Blessings,

Erin

off again!

hey peeps!
just wanted to give a little shout out of my plans! I'm going to Prague this weekend (czech republic)for a 2 day weekend,  where the exchange rate is the bomb.com.. so it should be a pretty cheap weekend, which is nice because i'm determinded not to spend over 150 euros until my next 10 day (w/ the school to Rome&Assisi) I'm going to Medj with about 70 or so students next weekend for the 4 day.. Our Lady is still appearing there, so that's really sweet!! :D

Miss you guys
Love you guys
Praying for you guys,
e

10 day adventures!!

Hello, Hello, Hello!

Long time, no blog! Well, let’s see here..

         On Thursday (10/7), Mrs. Newton, one of the Karatuse mom’s drove us to the train station because we were pushing it on time.. we boarded the train and continued on until Salzburg.. where we missed our connection to Venice. (as did about 30 other FUS kids) A very nice conductor dude helped us all get to our specific destinations and we arrived in Naples 2 hours later than planned, at 4pm on the 8^th. (Which was Rachel Rea’s 20^th Birthday!! WOOHOO!) We arrived, met by 2 volunteers with the MOC’s, who walked us to the convent (thank God they were there.. we never would of made it, it was all back alleys) Naples isn’t really the prettiest city or anything, quite dirty actually..and the convent was just a little hole in the wall.. but it was beautiful. The Sisters led us to our room, which was this cute little apartment like thing—with a classroom type thing for the little kids that come once a week, a ‘dining’ room area, a bathroom, a bedroom, and a door to the outside where there was a sink to wash our dishes and also steps that wound up the back of the building to a roof where we could do our laundry!-- We got situated, took a nap, ate dinner, and went back to sleep for the night.. ready to start fresh in the morning!

         Saturday (10/9) rolled in and we went to morning mass at 7:15 with the sisters, which was in Italian, but was amazing. After breakfast we were told to split up 2 and 2, one group going upstairs, one going down.. Jen and Danielle went down, where they worked on organizing the donation closet all week, while Hannah and I went upstairs to the men’s home. Sr. Marie Bernadette, a feisty older sister from Italy, runs the men’s home, which is a place for handicapped or poor men, both physically and mentally. Our first task was to sweep and scrub all of the steps of the 6 story convent.. 68 large steps later, we went back upstairs and scrubbed the floors of different rooms and moved furniture around in the hospital type room.. Sr. was QUITE picky and indecisive, changing her mind after we moved furniture over and over again. “Yes, we will get it right!.. I am very similar to Mother Teresa, she was like this, too!” So although working under her was at times frustrating, we grew to just love her and appreciated how precise she was. The medical situation was so poor there.. many men had casts on that looked very old and grotesque, Hannah and I were sorting random boxes of pills and medicines, a man came in and gave himself an insulin injection.. it was just sad I guess.. hard for Hannah especially since she’s already a LNA and will be a nurse.. we also washed the men’s clothes and hung them (exactly how Sr. liked them) After work was done (around noon) we ate lunch, took a nap, and then had adoration with the Sister’s at 2:45. After that, we cleaned a disgusting barrel of grapes together and saw a group of women popping off little fishies heads and throwing them into the sewer-like canal they had there. It was rather disgusting.. but don’t you worry-I’ll come back to this! :D After that we had our first of many encounters with the soup kitchen!! About 500 men and women (not including the 50 or so from the men’s home) came for the kitchen in 2 round, about 350 in the first and 150 in the 2^nd. We worked both shifts. I was always with 3 other Italian volunteers, who would try to speak to me in Italian, but then be super excited to find out that I was American! (: It was here that I learned the most Italian words, ‘beese’ means more, and ‘paco’ means little/half/less, and formagio means cheese.. and that’s about it. Between the two shifts, we’d have to hurry up and wash as many trays as possible for the 2^nd shift.. 

after that we had an experience of a lifetime.. before we got to eat our dinner, Sr. Luccia (the sister from Egypt who was like our main sister/helper) asked for our assistance in the kitchen. Danielle and I went, where we found the bucket of the decapitated fish from earlier.. which they wanted us to help fry. So Danielle got the job of placing the grotesque fishies into a bucket and giving them to me and I sprinkled them with a flour mix to fry.  It was the 2^nd grossest thing I did the entire time there, but nonetheless, it was quite the memory. There we met ‘the fish lady’, who didn’t speak a word of English, but was hilarious. She scolded me numerous times for not properly covering the fishies and then when Jen and Hannah came to help, she saw how frightened Jen was of the raw fish in the bucket and chased her with one of them.. she was a riot and we all loved her very much. We also met ‘Uncle’ Angelo this day.. who spoke a wee bit of English and told us that his brother is in the mafia in New York (“Me, good..he, bad”) After the fishie adventure and Uncle Angelo, we ate our delicious Italian dinner and went to evening prayer.. which is in English because the MOC’s main language is English, which was nice (: After they prayed and sang to Our Lady (like Carae Domini!!) , Sr. Luccia asked us if we’d like to go out with them! Of course we said yes, even though we didn’t know where we were going.. So us four, 3 sisters (Luccia, Joselise[Poland], and Mother Joes Elaine) and some of the men from the men’s home all ‘snuck’ out of the barred convent doors and walked a few blocks, in the busy Saturday night life of Naples, and knocked on the back door of a church.. where a man in Italian told the sisters, no.. but w/ persistence we were allowed in.. Mother, from America, said “Oh, we cause trouble everywhere we go!”.. so we all snuck in and got to watch about 25 minutes of Naples popular opera type drama/play about the martyr of Naples, St. Gennario.. It was VERY interesting, but fun ( : On our way home, Sr. Joselise stopped by a crying child and comforted her.. most
 heartwarming thing ever. Then we got back to the convent and went to sleep.

                Sunday came (10/10)and we went to morning prayer with the sisters, also in English, and then went back to bed until Sunday mass. It was a beautiful Italian celebration with many more people than regular daily mass. After mass we had the soup kitchen for lunch instead of dinner and then we had a long break before adoration so we went outside of the convent again and explored Naples. We shopped at little shops and saw how gross and dirty the place really was.. and then made our way back to the convent for adoration at 2:45..  after adoration we helped the sister’s out with a few things but they don’t work very much on Sundays because it’s a day of rest, so we went out again for dinner (where we learned that everywhere in Italy has a 2 euro butt charge—If you put your butt on a chair, a 2 euro charge is applied, which is almost 3 American bucks! RIDIC!) We found a wine shop that had 3 bottles for 12 Euro, what a deal! We got back and had a glass or two before crashing because of exhaustion!

                We started the week on Monday (10/11) with quiiite an incident! We went to morning prayer at 5AM and I was holding the key to our door, Hannah (who is quite the prayer..  aka she would of stayed there all day if we would of let her) asked for the key to leave.. so I knew something was up.. so I let her go for like a minute and then followed her down-Thank God I did! She sat on a chair in our dining room and told me to find her a bucket, while I was looking for a bucket I saw her falling off the chair.. I was a little too late, but I caught her legs before they hit, however her head already smacked onto the hard floor. She had passed out and I panicked. After a few choice words and prayers, she came to. The nuns spoiled her the rest of the day! H slept during morning work, so Jen and I went upstairs with Sr. Marie Bernadette again, while Danielle chopped veggies in the kitchen! It was raining quite badly.. but we went to serve and so we did! Sr. asked us to pull the awnings over the outside patio/roof where the men often gathered to hang out.. so we did, me in a white tee and all! We pretended we were in a water park w/ the MOC’s.. it was great (: we then washed clothes, under a roof, but then hung them to dry.. not under a roof, so they got all wet again? It was interesting.. btw this is all hand-washing! I had motherly skill during 10 day.. it was impressive to say the least! Jen and I then straightened up and made some people’s beds, Sr. asked us to find the one man a sweater and said, “I hope he doesn’t get any fatter, but I can say that because I, too, am getting fatter!” She was so funny. Lunch, adoration (where the fish lady gave Jen cough drops), soup kitchen and then we organized some of the closet that Jen and Danielle did the day before, where we made up a song about fish lady. This was the first day I felt very spiritually dry, I just was so mad at myself for not taking full advantage of being with the MOC’s, taking a break from school.. kind of like I do in general here in Austria, often getting frustrated with myself for being depressed or upset because I’m here and I should take advantage of it, right?.. I was just distraught and I thought it was mostly spiritual..  I’ll continue on with this later..

                Tuesday the 12^th came and we did morning prayer and mass again, where an ADORABLE Italian priest had the service, he looked like a rolly polly and he went to every person in the congregation to say ‘pace’ (peace!), and he was a classic Italian, talking with his hands during the entire homily. Hannah and I arranged Mother Teresa cards and such and holy knick knacks with Sr. Luccia where we got our MOC souvenirs—lotsa prayer cards and Mother Teresa medals which are really beautiful! (: We had lunch and instead of sleeping for the other part of our break, we did our laundry on the roof! Which hung on the same lines as the MOC’s sari’s (their habits) It was BEAUTIFUL out, so I decided to wash my hair on the roof, too! It was a splendid time! Soup kitchen again, and then Hannah and I helped Sr. Luccia with some of the local kids.. 2 of which were the worst behaved children I’ve ever encounter, one of my least favorite parts about the 10 day.. which I was surprised at, because I love kids.. but it is sort of hard to be around them because none compare to my adorable sister.  We had dinner, which was probably some form of pasta, and then we decided to push our 4 beds together as one to have a nice big snuggle party! I started and finished a biography about Momma T, Something Beautiful for God, which was just incredible. “Everything we cling to for safety is shown to be impotent.” (I’m pretty sure this isn’t from that book, but I have it written w/ my notes for that day.. ) I just continually felt the Lord telling me to let go and let Him. That if I decide to be like these gorgeous examples of Christ’s bride, I’ll have to give away everything I hold dear, including my family and friends. I’ll have to just trust. Trust that no matter what happens to them or me, Jesus will protect us, and we’ll all meet in heaven.. I’m still getting to the point on this, bear w/ me.. you’ve read this far!

                On the 13^th, we did the normal morning routine where we ‘swopped’ the men’s home (that was how Sr. Marie Bernadette said mopped) Hannah and I also cleaned the men’s kitchen.. which was VILE! Where the 2^nd nastiest thing happened to me, while cleaning the bottom counters, I found a dish that smelt like dog vomit, where I found some type of solid in an oil/grease/fat base.. after almost vomiting, I took it to Sr. who asked me to drain and clean it into the sewage system(hole in the wall).. which I did. GROSSSSSSSSSS! I’m not going to keep repeating myself about my day unless something interesting happens just so you know.. at adoration on their little chalkboard w/ the #’s for mass was written, “In thanksgiving for our friends from USA”.. I almost cried. It was so freaking adorable. The Missionaries of Charity were thankful for us!!! AHHH. Later that night, we were singing ‘umbrella’ (ella, ella, ella.. a part) and Sr. Marie Bernadette came out of a door behind us and goes ‘AA-AA-OOH-AA!”, it was HILARIOUS. She was such a joy. After the night activities, we wrote the sister’s a letter of thanksgiving and wrote our intentions and we planned to give it to them after night prayer w/ our donation.. however we got the surprise of a lifetime when all 6 of them came into our room about a half hour before night prayer! They  hung out for about 10 minutes, a couple of them gave us little gifts, including a miraculous medal which is really special to me because that’s what Momma T always gave out. Sr. MB was again hilarious, as always.. and after we said good-bye they invited us to sing w/ them in front of Our Lady that evening and process around the church by candlelight for the feast of Our Lady of Fatima.. TALK ABOUT AWESOME?! WE SANG A DECADE OF THE ROSARY AROUND THE MOC’S CHAPEL IN NAPLES, ITALY BY CANDLELIGHT FOR OUR LADY OF FATIMA.. WHAT?!?!?!? <33333 it was the best possible way I could of asked to end our time there.

The next morning we cleaned up, went to morning prayer and left the sisters :\ We had some train confusion for a bit, but figured it out enough to get to Pompei! We found our hotel, which we didn’t expect to be much, but was ADORABLE. It was a small little community-ish hotel where the man spoke very good English and was like the sweetest and most helpful man ever. Our room was gorgeous and it was just perfect and the Lord really rewarded us! We got cleaned up and situated and then got gelato (had to in Italy!) and saw Our Lady of Pompei/Our Lady of the Rosary before heading to the ruins, which were really sweet! The land is like massive, so we didn’t get to see it all because we were pretty tired but we stayed for about 2-3 hours and left, very cool though! We went back to Albergo Pace before metro-ing to Sorento, one of the most beautiful ‘beaches’ in Italy.. I put it like that because it was more just a beautiful water location, we looked for sand and water for awhile.. and we found this really small boat docking area that had black sand.. so we hung out there. But it was so gorgeous nonetheless!  We drank a little wine while having our feet in the Mediterranean sea! Very neat.  We had dinner at this place, Pizza and Pasta, where we got 10% off because we were staying at Albergo Pace.. I got gnocci and Hannah got pizza and we split it, delicious!! After that, we returned home where I got on the computer to look up our hotel reservation for Friday’s hotel.. but then saw my dad’s email that something at home had happened.. so I called  right away. I found out about Mary Kantoski’s passing and my heart just sunk. I forgot all that the Lord had told me at the Missionaries of Charity and was selfish to be upset with the Lord for taking yet another person out of my life. I was/am to an extent sick of people dying, especially such beautiful and wonderful people in the past year or so.. after being upset in the hotel, I went to the church (only a block away, so nice) which was locked, so I sat on a bench by a fountain outside the church of Our Lady, where the Lord just took my heart and held it closer to Him than ever before. Everything I felt/experienced w/ the MOC’s was to prepare me for Mary’s death, He wants me to be His Beloved more than ever and I have to realize that when I finally say yes, I’ll be giving Him all situations like that. I can’t be at home to console friends and family now, and I won’t then either. I can’t talk to my parents and tell them how upset I am here in Europe, and I won’t be able to then either.. get me? The Lord is just great, and Mary holds me like a child all the time. I LOVE IT!

We woke up on Friday to a lovely breakfast at the hotel! We metroed back to Naples where we had lots of train issues.. transportation and us weren’t too good of friends over 10 day! Our train was super delayed and because of that we would miss our connection, so we decided to take a bus to Foggia (outside of San Giovanni Rotondo), which took like 3-4 hours I believe? When we got there, the bus to San Giovanni left in about a half hour, so we got some lunch and then hopped on another bus! The turns to San Giovanni  were super duper steep/turny just like in Ireland! When we got there, we walked around a bit until we found our hotel.. which was beautiful on the outside but our room was miniature-bumma. And then we went to Padre Pio’s shrine.. where his body is no longer exposed(bumma!!!) but we got to touch his casket in the most BEAUTIFUL mosaic chapel ever. They were so modern and large and beautiful, I just can’t express how much I loved that chapel! And the mosaics weren’t the normal ones you see.. Jesus during the temptation in the desert w/ the devil was one of them-very cool.  We got to see that, some of his articles/things, his confessional that he used almost 11 hours every day!!! And used until  the day before his death, we saw lots of pictures of him, and some of his outfits, his letters, his cell, his first casket, the place where his body was exposed, and the cross from which he received his stigmata! After our Padre Pio high was over, we tried to go to Mont St. Michael, a grotto where St. Michael appeared and consecrated an altar (the only church not consecrated by a priest because he did it!) but.. because of our luck w/ transportation, we got on the bus to find out that there was no bus back to San Giovanni Rotondo.. so we got off at the first stop we could and went shopping at a thrift store type thing.. we then walked back to the hotel and slept!

In the morning we went shopping and got some Padre Pio things and then got on a bus back to Foggia, where we took a train back to Gaming and got in Sunday morning at 9am! It was a long day of travel, but it was so great to be back at the Kartause. It would have been better to be coming home to 677 Avalon Road.. but that’s okay, soon enough!! : ) I lectured at the 10am mass, which was really great, and then I just slept and was lazy all day.. which was SUPA! And much needed.

And now here I am! Just trying to catch up on work and papers and such.. praying for all of you every day, striving to be saintly. Thanks for reading this massive blog, you’re great and I’m proud of you for doing so! You are a true Erin blogger devotee! Woot-woot. <3

To Jesus through Mary,

His Beloved, EB 

back to Gaming!

hello readers!
Just wanted to let you know i'm back to Gaming, Austria after my amazing ten day! I'll hopefully post my big ol' blog about the whole beautiful trip later on this evening or tomorrow sometime.. be patient, I know i've been gone awhile!

I will ask a favor of you though.. i'm sure most of you are from Altoona or around there.. but if not, my basketball teammate and friend from high school, Mary Kantoski passed onto heaven after a car accident on Monday.. my family could not get a hold of me to tel me of her passing until Thursday of my break.. It defintely put a damper on the rest of my trip, but I was able to pray for her and her family in front of Padre Pio's body, which was good I guess.
Anyways, please pray for her soul and espeically her family.. she was the baby of the family and the only girl.. I'm sure her mother is not doing well. :\
Thank you.

"Loving Mother of the Redeemer, Gate of Heaven, Star of the Sea, assist your people who have fallen yet strive to rise again."

2 down, 3 to go!

today is tuesday.. i'm leaving for my ten day break on thursday.. i've got 2 midterms down.. 3 to go.. that's a good and bad thing: it's a good thing because my hardest was on monday.. it's a bad thing because there is still 3 more, and my easiest was today. 

I'm so excited for 10 day.. I'm just so excited to be able to serve the Lord in this way, and possibly discern vocation, too! :)

I don't know if it's the weather or maybe because of what's supposedly going on with terrorists all over the place, including Italy.. where I'll be for the next ten days or maybe because of midterms but probably because my family is just so darn great and I miss them..  but I've been having some wicked bad nightmares and I truly only feel content in the chapel.. where Jesus hasn't been exposed because of midterms (They take Him in around 7pm) and I just sit there.. It's really peaceful and it brings my heart consolation. 

Besides that, I'm doing well.. I'll give you a break down of my 10 day since this will be the last time I post for awhile!! :)

We're leaving Thursday at 7pm from Gaming and training from Austria to Naples.. we'll get to Naples around 1:30 on Friday and will start with the Missionaries of Charity. We will live and eat and work with them until Thursday morning when we take the train (or bus if possible) to Pompei! :) We'll get to see the ruins and hopefully visit Capri, a very beautiful beach on the west coast of Italy.. we'll sleep in Pompei that night and then train to Foggia on Friday morning, which is an hr bus ride to the little town of San Giovanni Rotondo, where Padre Pio's incorrupt body is (and his friary and such). We'll spend the night there.. in a VERY beautiful hotel with a Catholic chapel inside of it!! :D and around lunch time on Saturday we'll catch the train back to Gaming, which will get us here around 9 AM on Sunday, which is really nice for us to be able to recover all day and then go to evening mass.

so that's about it.. i'm pretty excited about it :) I think it'll be really great, challenging but beautiful! I'll keep your intentions with me, if you have any specific ones, please email me ASAP so I can keep them with me during my work there. 

This is a clip from a Barlow Girl song that I've really been jamming out to.. and I just wanted to share it w/ you guys:

I can't explain why I suffer though I live for You,

Those why deny You they have it better than I do.
Cover my eyes now so that my heart can finally see
That in the end only You mean anything. <3

Suffering for Jesus is the best.. As long as I'm doing His will, I suppose :)

Take care, God Bless, I'll post in ten or so days! 

Love,

Erin

HAPPY BIRTHDAY GRANDMA!

Tomorrow is my grandma Zita's birthday! And I am missing it.. what a bummer! But since I'll be busy doing mid-term things tomorrow I decided to say hello to my grandma and let everyone know it's her birthday on here! woohoo!

Midterms stink the big one. I just finished my FOURTH massive mid-term review section.. it's crazy! School wasn't this hard as a freshman! But, I'm trying to stay optimistic because as soon as this week is over i basically have a month off of school.. not really, but kind of! I have my first 10 day break (going to Naples, Italy to work w/ the MOC's) and then 2 weeks of school (but one has a 4 day weekend where I'll go to Medj!!) and then our next 10 day break w/ the school in Rome and Assisi!

Hope everyone is doing well.. I am!

ps- Thanks for all the letters and cards, grandma and happy 50th birthday!(ha-ha!)  :) I miss you!

love,
Erin