One week in the books!

On Thursday the 17th of March we completed the first week of our adventure in Belgium. It has been a time of Great Blessing. We attribute the blessings to our great God who loves to bless and answer prayers of his followers, and we are thankful for the love and leadership of the Goen family. Kyle, Amy and the kids made it so easy to find things and know what to do next. We started out with getting minutes on LifePoint’s temporary phones, opening a bank account, registering with Etterbeek Commune, looking for an apartment online, and walking around and looking for signs on buildings. We also got a recommendation for a real estate agent that specializes in rentals to expats. We emailed and contacted him and he never got back with us. On Sunday morning we visited a French-speaking Baptist Church and heard a message about the ministry of Wycliffe Bible Translators. In the afternoon we went to the locations of four or five apartments and ranked them. On Tuesday we went to see our first choice and really liked it. We weren’t able to reach our second choice. We saw the third choice the same day, but it wasn’t nearly as attractive to us. Our apartment at A.J. Slegers is right around the corner from the subway stop “Josephine-Charlotte” and is on the second floor. After we signed the lease on Wednesday morning we went to the City Commune Hall of Woluwe St. Lambert and registered and completed our residency cards. The picture ID will be ready in about five weeks and then we won’t be required to carry our passports everywhere we go. On Wednesday afternoon, missionary friends from Tennessee came to visit the Goens and us, and we moved in. That took about 30 minutes, because they have a minivan that held all of our luggage. On Thursday because we were blessed to be able to get our yearly Metro passes (all public transportation for Metropolitan Brussels). That cost 966 euro for the two of us - we were paying 9 euro a day for single day passes. After that we signed up for internet, house phones and mobile phones (called gsm’s in Europe).

Now we are setting up the apartment. It has lots of storage and is fully furnished so we just need to set up an office and do a little decorating! Next week we start looking for language schools.

If you have not contributed financially and would now like to, you can do so by sending financial gifts to: Dan & Elizabeth Christensen, LifePoint Church, 506 Legacy Dr. Smyrna, TN 37167
(Please put a note in the envelope signifying it is for Christensen - Belgium.)

You can also give online by going to http://lifepointchurch.org/give and specifying in the memo section that you are giving for “Christensens - Belgium”

Thank your for your prayers and support God is Blessing!

Dan & Elizabeth

"First Daze"

We have been in Etterbeek for a day and a half now and it has been very eventful.  We were on our way to Crainhem to go to a Carrefour  for school supplies for Jordan, Peyton and Evan and we walked into a Carnaval  Parade.  Of course we had to stop and get pictures and dance with the green characters - well I convinced Elizabeth, Evan and Jordan.  If I had danced, the party would have been over and my visa revoked.

On the way out of the subway station Elizabeth ran into a sign pole, because she was involved in a deep conservation.    Before those two exciting events everything has been going very well.  We landed in Brussels on Thursday afternoon and walked the rest of the day.  We went to the bank and were referred to another bank. The next day we finished the appointment and maybe on Monday we will have money available.  Also on Thursday we activated temporary phones - $35 for 60 minutes.

Tomorrow we are going to a French language church that is attended by the Leader of the Protestant Synod.  We are really looking forward to it!

More to follow!

P.S. to Larry - to your list "First Daze" you should add "Watch out for metal posts in the middle of the sidewalk".  Elizabeth has a big goose-egg on her forehead.