Totzke Prayer Communique
From: syltotzke@wideopenwest.com
Sent: Tuesday, June 17, 2003 12:46 PM

Dear Praying Friends,

Ahoj! That’s the informal Czech greeting for hello and
goodbye. Just think of the Beatles song, “You say hello
and I say goodbye.” It’s all ahoj to the Czechs.

Sylvia got here last Wednesday trouble free. It took a bus
ride and two metro changes to get to our pension where we
stay that is owned and operated by a Czech widow named
Yarka. She is very helpful and speaks English. The pension
has a beautiful garden with many varieties of shrubs and
flowers. That’s where we eat breakfast and just relax
after the day is over. All of the team members will stay in
this pension when they arrive beginning in a few weeks. It
will be very convenient for us to be involved with them
because of this arrangement.

We are settled into a routine that we will have until the
teams arrive. After breakfast at the pension we walk the
mile to George and Cindy Swain’s home for a morning
meeting. At that time we do some administrative stuff, pray,
learn some Czech words and phrases, and plan the ministry
activity of the day. Last Friday we went with George to
Beroun, a village that is a 30 minute train ride southwest
of Prague where we distributed 700 Jesus film flyers. George
states that within the first two weeks of a flyer
distribution, they get a 2.5% return which is higher than
the normal return for a similar distributions. George has
10,000 flyers to distribute, so we’ll be busy seeing the
countryside surrounding Prague distributing these flyers all
the while praying for the recipients’ response. The
Ashland team will be helping with this project when they
come, too. Yesterday, Monday, we went to a village a short
bus ride away and visited people who responded to the flyer
awhile ago, got the Jesus film and viewed it. One woman was
a young mother who was interested in Bible studies; another
older couple was very hospitable and invited us back for
another visit but didn’t have any interest in spiritual
things. They do know some of the Czech people in the work
here, so that it an opening.

We’ve been learning our way around Prague. On Saturday we
were on our own and found our way to the castle, old town
and many other attractions. It’s an easy city to navigate
since it’s quite compact and visitor friendly. You can
hear many languages spoken wherever you go. We still have
lots more downtown time in the future so that we can become
comfortable knowing where the important things are located
– bank, post office, restaurants, major sightseeing
venues. We do walk a lot and when we go to bed at night,
we’re tired.

Thanks for your partnership with us and thanks for praying
for Sylvia’s sister Lin. She went home from the hospital
on Thursday and is feeling stronger each day. After having
only an IV drip for almost 10 days, she’s being careful as
to what she decides to eat. She has four cats and has found
that bending over to feed them and then to change their
litter pans is something that she won’t be able to do for
a awhile. She wants to thank all of you for praying for her
while she was in the hospital. Please continue to pray for
her full recovery.

Larry and Sylvia