Brexit Looms...

Whatever your political view you can't get away from it, Brexit is coming seemingly faster every day. As a British national in an EU country this is obviously quite an important topic. I've lost count of the times people have asked me what this will mean for me. Slovenes who know anything about it seem to view it with complete confusion. I personally am quite interested in politics and like to be informed about what's going on. I've kept up to date with the latest developments but there are still many big questions. It was in this light that I was

told about a meeting with the British Ambassador which would hopefully shed some light about what it would mean for British people in Slovenia. It was held in a 4 star hotel in the middle of Ljubljana. At the last minute I decided to change out of my hoodie and I'm glad I did! It felt very much like a business meeting for white middle aged, middle classed men! I was there along with my housemate and another friend and we were some of the only women there let alone under the age of 35. There was a cameraman filming the event and because of our demographic I'm sure we ended up being filmed more than most people. I found this photo on the embassy Facebook page, oh and look, we're speaking to probably the only non white person at the event. To be honest it was an almost complete waste of time. The only information we were given were things we could have read (and I had already read about) in the news. We were told that things will stay broadly (!) the same. Apparently the negotiations have been broken into parts and the issue of most importance was that of citizens rights (they kept repeating that). There have been negotiations about all the things to do with actually leaving the EU but nothing to do with the continued relationship between Britain and the EU. This means that any specific questions were met with the stock answer that those things hadn't been negotiated yet. One important thing for me specifically was being told that things will stay the same until the end of the implementation period which is in December 2020. As I will be leaving in the summer of 2020 this means that I don't really have to worry about anything unless I want to come back and hopefully at that point things will have settled down considerably.

As with all meetings of this kind where you give people the opportunity to ask questions there were many that were either pointless (what colour will the passport be?) or not to do with Brexit (The Catholic church won't let me spread my wife's ashes in England!) At least we got given light refreshments at the end. The food was all canapes in little trays. You basically got one mouthful with every little tray. My housemate decided to use this opportunity to provide herself with dinner. She ended up basically following waiters around getting more canapes although she did pretend that she was getting them for other people...

I'm glad I went to the event, at least I know a bit more about what things will be like until I go back to England but I also know that the news is still a pretty good source of the information I need.

Settling in for Winter...

The weather is finally starting to turn and autumn is on its way out. I feel that this is a terribly British way to start my blog post this week but I won't apologise because I've learnt that Slovenes talk about the weather quite a lot too. I guess that's one of the reasons I like it here so much, it feels similar to England!

It has been a warm November and so I've been ignoring the fact that it gets much colder here than in the UK. My British housemate keeps telling me that I just need to survive winter in Ljubljana. Apparently it gets dark, depressing and cold. With temperatures set to drop next week to just above 0°C I've finally had to face the fact that I need to be better prepared. With emergency shopping off my list, I've been able to focus more on that fact that Christmas is coming! I've been aided in this by my other housemate who has been watching Christmas films since the beginning of November!

You may think that I'm early in talking about Christmas but the truth is at church we started thinking about it a few weeks ago - what the music will be, what the kids will do etc. I've discovered that working for a church means planning things well in advance! It's the unglamorous side of being a missionary, a lot of my time is spent in planning, admin and organisation. This is my current pile of books and notebooks. They are all in use and they all have a different purpose! (If you can't see, there are 16 on the pile).

Life here has been continuing much as it has been over the last couple of months. I've been very encouraged by the one to one/ two meetings I've been having. I've been having good discussions and lots of questions with the teenagers and with the other lady in the church I've been meeting with. I've nearly finished the studies on Proverbs and the book Battles Christians Face with the teenagers. It has been good to hear what they think on each of the topics and good for me to be reminded of what God has to say on each of these subjects. My plan now is to alternate between studying a topical book and a book of the Bible. We will therefore move on next to a book called What Do You Think of Me? Why Do I Care? by Edward Welch. I managed to read it in a couple of hours this week and it is a helpful Biblical insight on how we view ourselves, how others view us and most importantly how God views us. I hope it will be a useful topic for the girls I am meeting with. Please be praying for them as they are seeking to live as Christians in a culture where so few others are.

One answer to prayer for me has been that I've been able to start making Non-Christians friends. Until recently everyone I knew either went to my church or were friends with my housemates. Although they have all been very welcoming I wanted to get out of the Christian bubble a bit and make friends of my own. I have somehow found myself in the position of getting to know people who work with the Slovenia and Ljubljana rugby teams. It is not as popular here as in the UK as can be seen in the picture of a game between Slovenia and Andorra. It has, however been a bit surreal for me as I have found myself amongst the players, coaches and officials. Last Saturday was especially interesting as I assisted my friend in filming the match on a camcorder. We had to climb up an unattached ladder (whilst carrying a cup of coffee!) to a wooden platform that had big gaps between the slats! My friend kept forgetting that she was filming and that everything she said would be caught on film. Every so often she would ask me what was going on and so now there is official footage of me trying to explain rugby... Anyway, it's been really good to get to know a new group of people. Please be praying for me as I seek to be a good witness to these people and that God would give me opportunities to speak to them about the gospel.

Celebrations...

This last couple of weeks has been full of celebrations. It's always nice to write about the fun things that are happening here. I guess the biggest piece of news (if you hadn't already heard) is that I've been asked to stay in Slovenia for a second year. This is a very quick plea for prayer and support. I still need to raise the finances to be able to stay so if you'd like to help please let me know (s.re.deacon@gmail.com). I am really excited to be staying here longer as I feel like I've only just got here and settled in to the work I'm doing.

Another (reasonably) big celebration for me was my 30th birthday last weekend. I certainly don't feel any older or wiser but maybe that will happen more in my 30s. I was really grateful that both my sisters and one brother in law were able to come visit me and see a bit of the life I'm living here. I had a brief (1 day) holiday in Venice with my younger sister which was lovely but she kept telling me off for comparing it to Ljubljana (oops). We were very fortunate with the weather but after we left Venice was hit by big floods. We definitely came back at the right time!


This week has been very quiet as many of my normal activities were cancelled. The schools are on holiday and also there have been two national holidays. Both these holidays have great cultural and historical significance. Firstly the 31st October is Reformation Day. I love the fact that in a Catholic country Reformation Day is celebrated and is much more important than Halloween. The reason for this is down to one man: Primož Trubar. I don't have space to go into too much detail here but essentially he was a reformer in the 16th century who was also responsible for writing the first books in Slovene. Reformation Day is a great opportunity for gospel witness and that's why I found myself helping out with and event run by IFES last week. Lots of different organisations came together to run stalls offering everything from magic tricks to free literature and cake and coffee. We were trying to generate conversations with people passing by. My main job for the day was to hand out leaflets about the beliefs and life of Trubar. I'm not very experienced/ good at street evangelism but even I managed to have one good gospel conversation with a student. I'm praying that he will read the literature he was given and that he will want to find out more.

The second national holiday this week was on 1st November which was All Saints Day. This is where people remember the dead. As far as I'm aware (any Slovenes reading this please feel free to correct me if I'm wrong) the roots are in Catholicism. People go to the cemetery to light candles at the graves of their family members. I believe that this comes from praying for the dead to help them through purgatory more quickly. It is now more cultural than religious and everyone seems to take part. We went to the cemetery later in the evening and every grave had at least one candle lit on it. Everywhere you looked there were thousands of candles blinking in the darkness. It was very beautiful but at the same time very sad. I know that not everyone there was praying for souls in purgatory but many would have been.

I went with a couple of Swedish students with Slovene ancestry and for them it was about remembering their loved ones which is something I don't think we do much in England. It was a solemn occasion but very interesting to witness. What I did find odd though was the stalls selling hot food. (Buy your roasted chestnuts before you go visit the graves.) I think though that this day reflects the Slovene culture quite well: understated but beautiful.