Budapest is sinking!
and I dont want to swim.

well its offical, the spring is here and it came a bit too fast and a whole lot too warm, not that we are complaing! but with the warmth comes all the melted snow from germany, austria and slovakia and as you can imagine it has caused plenty of flooding. although the water has gone down this week it is still expected to get worse as april is normally rainy season here. The danube river flows direclty through budapest and if you remember pictures of when we first got here and it was frozen, it sure has been a huge change, i'd say a good 10-15 feet higher. Its pretty incredible to think how much water that is! Pray that the rains would hold off until the rivers have gone down, there are many areas throughtout eastern europe and hungary that have been evacuated. I read in the papers that they expect up to 25% of Hungary to be flooded, you can probably guess that means farmers and many poor villages having considerable damage. I biked down to the river from our place a good 15-20 minute ride and the water there is right up to the dikes, which are a considerble distance from the river, you can see from the picture next to here this house was built on the wrong side of the dike, it is the only one I could see but if the waters rise again it could be only one of the many damaged. The other pics are in Budapest along the water front, the lower road is completely flooded and the tram that we used to take everyday to school is not running because it's tunnel is completely full. But budapest continues to roll along as if little is going on, spring is in the air and people are enjoying the parks and many fountains, like the boy here is! The picture here at the bottom is of a guy that we came across catching the action on canvas, it was really amazing painting, so detailed, he must have been there for days already, but what cracked me up is the street sign, couldnt be more true on a day like today, "just in case you dont see the washed out road, you may get wet!" Maybe this is a way of getting rid of the old junker in the front yard.
Pray for us also this coming easter weekend as it will be our first trip with OVM. We are heading to Retsag, which is north of budapest half way between that and Slovakia for you with your maps out. We will there for the weekend, with the book mobile doing street evagalism, practicing our hungarian, working with the local church who will have a service on the sunday or monday that we will invite all to come out to, pray that many would be open and interested in the real meaning of easter.