Traveling Freels

I just noticed that it had been to long since we last wrote. So to keep you guys up to date, here is a run down on why we’ve been so busy we haven’t written.

About a week after our very bad day we decided that it was about time that we went back to Florence to check up on people, students and friends, the church and our fellow avanti Italia workers. It was really good to see people if only for a couple of minutes and to tell them again that really we did love them very much and were still praying for them. It’s fun to still be able to be apart of peoples lives even if you’ve moved. Usually my moves have been so drastic as far as distance that it is nigh on impossible to even try to visit on a semi regular basis. So moving to only 3 hours away by train is a really rather lovely and refreshing experience. Anyway so while we were there we also “accomplished” some things. Matt wrote a search engine and catergorizing program for the school library, and I managed an impossible feat! I managed to get a promise of a reimbursement of 300 euro from the region of Tuscany!

As far as buracreacies go the italian one is pretty monstrous so when the guy at the insurance/health office in Vicenza told me that I had to pay for our health insurance again and that if I wanted money back from the last time I would need to ask the Region of Tuscany for a reimbursement I thought that the were sending me on the wild goose chase of all fools errands. But I thought hey it’s worth a try. So when we got to Florence I found the number for the region of Tuscany and then began to call. Twice I called and managed in those two calls to talk to close to 30 different people … the conversations went about like this…”Pronto.” “Yes I would like to speak to the person in charge of finances and reimbursements. I want to ask to be reimbursed for a double payment of health insurance in 2006. Do you know who I should speak to?” “Hold on.” “ok” “could you tell me again what you want?” “yes, I would…..blah blah blah” “Hold on.” “ok” “um…we’re not in charge of that I’ll forward your call to another department maybe they know.” repeat same conversation 15 times. So I decided that phone calls weren’t the best method. The next day I went down to the offices themselves and had the equivalent conversation in person except this time I was there in person and they knew I was american and they felt that they needed to do something. Turns out that they didn’t know who was in charge of those payments and that the account they were made to had changed anyway and wasn’t directly visible in there system but they still looked at my stuff said yes we will reimburse you and gave me a tracking number for my paper work, and asked me for address et. info so that they could send me the check. Whooo hooo! we’ll see when the check actually shows up but at least that is one step down.

Ok so after Florence we came back and had a week preparing for me to go to the Women’s Convention in Rome and for Matt’s Dad Bob and his wife Mona to come. whirl wind cleaning and food buying insued but we managed and they came and the visit was good (matt will have to write about that) and the Women’s Convention was awesome. I really love them they are my favorite conventions of the year. This time was interesting as well because I translated for about half the time for a couple of Ghanaian women from the churches who had come for the first time. It was good though I must say that I was rather tired by the end of it. When I got back Bob and Mona and Matt and I went to visit Padova. It was my first time there and I must say it really is a great city! I had alot of fun…and found the church where San Antonio was buried and went to the oldest botanical garden in the world! and saw a 500 year old or there abouts palm tree, it was planted in like 1572 or something fantastic like that! I do need to research who San Antonio is the patron saint of because I’m curious.

That brings us to last week. The week of Easter. So saturday Franco Verardi came he is a Italian missionary to Southern Italy that the church of Vicenza supports. So Saturday night the church met to here from him and encourage him and be togther with his family. Then Sunday we got up at 5:30 am to go to a sunrise service we’d been invited to on the base. Vicenza as you guys probably know from the news at least a little, has an American army base. It’s interesting though because even with all those americans living here we rarely actually see them. They tend to stick to themselves though I think if Matt and I were more involved in the discoteco scene we’d see more of them. Anyway so a couple weeks ago this american guy called up and asked to speak to the pastor. We called him back and told him we didn’t have a pastor and then he just hung up and didn’t tell us whatever he was going to tell the pastor. A week later we recieved a series of phone messages inviting the pastor to a sunrise service at the base. In the end Matt and I and Davide Fergani ended up going though all of us are under 25 and certainly not the church leaders. It was kind of cool though really quite too early! they had a black gospel choir and everything. And we got to meet the “Americans” I hadn’t realized before how many chaplains an army base would have. there are like one for every battalion or so I think.

Then later that day we went to our church and had a united service where everyone came Ghanaian and Italian. The place was packed there weren’t enough seats for everyone. That was a cool feeling. France Verardi spoke and also Abraham a preacher from Ghana that had just arrived to work with the churches with Ghanaians in the north of Italy until mid July. He’s really nice and Matt really likes what studies and sermons his given so far. I was with the little kids upstairs so I haven’t heard him yet. Then the Agape or potluck which is an interesting affair with that many people in such a small space. we do it basically in shifts because the line is long enough. After the Agape was over we got ourselves packed into cars with the raggazzi and headed up to the mountains. There were 8 from Vicenza and 6 from Aprillia and there were supposed to be 2 from Bologna but when we called them to see where they were on the road because they were already 30 minutes late they said they were still at work in Bologna and no weren’t planning on coming. This time we also had help! two adults from Aprillia to help with kitchen and crowd control and et. Milady a beautiful Venezualan women from Vicenza as cook. Marco Massini and Kelly Fann from Florence to help do Bible studies and Davide Fergani too! Marco and Kelly left on Monday morning but it was still night and day better as far as discipline than last time. We all slept for instance! counselors and raggazzi too! and all the studies went well too! Davide did his first camp devo ever and it was good. Marco and Kelly did a study Monday morning on purity and morality that was really great. Caterina, one of the girls from Vicenza, and I taught a evangelistic skit and everyone participated and had fun! Then for the grand finale….we did a passover dinner, complete with unleaven bread and all the traditional fixings of the Jewish holiday supper. It was really fun to watch the kids when they sat down to dinner and looked at there plates and saw only romaine lettuce (bitter herbs), a chicken bone (representing the lamb sacrifice) and a pile of brown stuff. “what is this dinner is this all! man … I’m actually hungry why can’t we eat something good what does this mean anyway! ” They lapped it up I have never actually seen them pay such acute attention to what was going on around them as at that dinner. They were even silent when Matt spoke! And the general excitement over the feet washing was good too. Only one most stubborn one refused. I don’t think that they will forget it any time soon anyway.

and then we came home yesterday evening. and slept. and this morning I’m writing you all this incredibly long post. Hope you have the patience to read it. God bless.