New things!

I decided to change the background of the blog to something a little happier. I know it's not quite spring in Memphis, but maybe this will help you have some springier thoughts :) I know it sure helped my mood!

I have 3 new students! Roberta is a 17 year old girl that came to the building last night. She needed help with an English report that she has to give in class today. She had a really difficult English text to read. I even had trouble understanding it! I think we got it all sorted out, though! I will find out tonight how her presentation went.

There is also a mother and 6 year old son that I have not met yet. They are planning to come on Friday. They live quite a ways out of town, so they will only be coming once or twice a week and staying for at least 2 hours each time. I am excited to meet them!

Chad moved to his new apartment today! Well, his stuff moved but he is still here. I think he is just using us for our internet access. (Just kidding Chad...I know you love us so much that you can't stand to leave us quite yet ;) He is excited about having his own place with his own space. I am excited about getting everything ready for Lindsay who will be here in just over a week! If you haven't checked out her blog, you can see it at
LindsayWalle.blogspot.com
She has been very busy at the Bible School and is doing great!

Lindsay is in Italy!

What a week! Chad and I had a wonderful week in Florence, and are now safely and happily back in Catania!

David and Debbie had invited some previous Avanti workers, who are still in Italy, to come meet, talk, and pray together. We spent most of the day on Thursday with Julie Giordano, Kelly Masini, Sarah Bailey, Katy Cross (who is now working in Milan) and the Woodroofs (David, Debbie, and Jim) It was a very productive get-together. We talked about all kinds of things from Italian culture to the difficulties we may face as missionaries in Italy.

One of the most interesting things to me was something I had not even really thought much about in the time that I have been here. It had to do with the fact that there are so few members of the church of Christ here in Italy, or any non-Catholic faith, for that matter. In the states (especially in the south) we are surrounded by other Christians. Even those that don't believe in God, respect that we have the right to believe (usually). When we are young we attend worship services 3 times a week, we go on retreats, we have VBS, we go to camps...we have plenty of opportunity to be with our Christian friends, without much effort on our part. We have a support system. The kids in America are taught from the time they are young how to be leaders as they get older, so that the church does not die out with the older generation. Here in Italy, most congregations (only one per major city) meet once a week and then go to their homes all over and outside of the towns alone. Even those who want to be more involved have to work 6 days a week and have families to take care of. It's just not feasible to spend a lot of time fellowshipping with other Christians. The children in each congregation are the only Christians they know. I have come to respect even more the Italian Christians because of the effort they must put into being together, and to live out their faith when there are so few of them here.
As an example, there are about 5 million people in Milan, with one church of Christ of around 60 members (which is a large congregation for Italy). One 10 year old boy asked Katy, "Am I the only 10 year old Christian in this whole city?"

Even the problems that we have within our congregations in America are usually taken care of by our Elders, which do not exist yet in the churches here because of the young Christians who are not yet qualified for different reasons. I also realized how much I appreciate our Elders in the states and all they have to do. Thanks, Elders :)
I think everyone benefited from our time together at the Bible School this week. Please keep the churches in Italy and all over the world in your prayers. I know it's not easy to be a Christian anywhere, but there are different types of obstacles everywhere you go and I think it's important to realize that. We have brothers and sisters all over the world with entirely different struggles. I know I have taken for granted how blessed we are in the States.

After our meeting, we went bowling. For anyone who is wondering...yes, I am just as terrible at bowling in Italy as I am in America. The new HUF group had 2 extra tickets to the opera that night, and Chad and I were lucky enough to get to go. Now, I am not exactly an opera-lovin' kinda girl...but it was pretty cool! We saw Pagliacci. It's the one about the crazy clown that kills his wife. Yeah, weird. But it was really interesting to see an actual Italian opera in Italy...for free!

On Friday night Lindsay flew into Florence!!! We were so excited, but poor Lindsay was so tired! We wanted to talk and spend time with her, and she was such a good sport! She has started a blog, and you can follow it by going to LindsayWalle.blogspot.com.
She will be here in Catania on March 6th, and I CAN'T wait!!

Also, you can view the other new Avanti newsletters here.

Today has been absolutely wonderful! We had an ALL day Agape (fellowship meal) after worship services. It is so good to spend time with the Christians here! They are SO much fun, and I love them more everytime I am around them. You can see pictures from today here. There are also pictures of Chad's new apartment, that he will be moving into tomorrow.

Also, Catania's soccer team won today so everyone is happy. All in all, it's been a good day :)

Bella Firenze

It always feels SO good to be back in Florence. It's like a second home. I absolutely love this city.

It has been quite a day! We got up (what I consider to be) very early to head down to the government office building to turn in more paperwork and get finger printed for our Permessi di Soggiorno. (Permission to stay) Upon entering the building, we were each given a number and herded like cattle with hundreds of other immigrants into a large cold room. A very loud, scary looking man called out groups of numbers, about 20 at a time. When our group was called about 30 minutes after arrival, Chad and I got so excited thinking that all the horror stories we had heard about "wait times" from previous victims had merely been urban legends. Alas, as we were standing in our new line, we quickly realized we were there only to receive...another number. I'm sure these amazingly wonderful Italian people have perfectly logical and reasonable explanations for the "systems" that they have. Someday, I would love to find out what those explanations are. By this point, we had our new numbers and were ushered back into the same room we had just exited. My number was B166. I looked up at the board. A32, F868, D120, C521. Hmm...where are the B's? Nowhere to be seen for quite some time. Then, there is was: B114. Five hours later (not joking) B165 popped up on the board, and I was ecstatic! Finally! I jumped up from my seat to prepare for my turn. B166-window 6. I ran. Someone else was already standing in window 6. "No," I thought, "No." I waited patiently. Eventually, I was waived to another line. I took care of business in window 5, and was given a sheet of paper, explaining that we are due back in Florence in June to go through this whole process again. At least this time we will actually RECEIVE our permessos that make us legal for this year! Then, we have to renew them in September for next year...and you guessed it...do this ALL over again :)

Valentine's Day!

I hope everyone had a wonderful Valentine's Day! Thank you SOO much to EVERYone who sent me a Valentine's card!! You all have no idea how much it meant to me! I was SO excited!! I don't want to embarrass him...but I can't go without saying something about the BEAUTIFUL roses and Valentine's package I got from Jared :) I was completely shocked! I had no idea that sending roses here was even a possibility! Even though I was so far away, I felt the love from each one of you from across the ocean and I am so very thankful to all of you who thought of me!
I love you all! You made my day!

Last night, Chad and I had dinner with one of our students and his family in their home! He is the one with the 3 year old son. I have never seen so much energy in a single child! He is so happy, and so much fun! Their whole family is really wonderful to be around. We talked for hours and ate pizza. It was interesting because they speak very little English, and well...you know about our Italian. The best part was that they were at worship services this morning!

Tomorrow, Chad and I will fly to Florence to take care of some paperwork to keep us legal :) We will be there for one week. I am very excited about being back in Florence and getting to spend time with some of my friends from there. On Friday, Lindsay Walle will be flying in to start her work here! We are all VERY excited about Lindsay's arrival! She will spend two weeks in Florence before flying to Catania. Please pray for ALL of our safe travels (including my Dad and Steve Grinder who are in Costa Rica with the Rojas family. I'm sorry if there is anyone else who is with them that I don't know about!)

New Students!

I have two new students; a teenage boy and girl from China. They are really sweet! The high school students I have met here amaze me! They all know at least 2 languages. These two students are actually from a town near where Xin is from. It's interesting how both Brandon and Chad's experiences teaching in China are helpful here in Catania!
Xin's English has improved so much! She is really excited about it and constantly tells us how much she appreciates what we do. Remember to keep Xin in your prayers. She is very anxious about college and her future.

Our schedule is set up with hours at the church building so that students can stop by anytime we are there, even if they don't have a scheduled lesson. Because of this, many of our students have met each other and are even beginning to form friendships by spending time together. This is really exciting! The more comfortable they feel, the more interested they are in staying for activities with members from the church.

Chad's New Place

One of our students helped get Chad an apartment!! It's a great place for a really good price, not too far from here. When Lindsay arrives in March, Chad will move to his new home. Then, when Brandon and Kristen leave in April, this apartment will be ours. I just met the owner of this apartment a few minutes ago. He seems very nice. He will be coming in March with all of the paperwork work for Lindsay and I to sign. It's hard to believe that it is almost time for the Edwards to leave!

This afternoon's lessons went great! First of all, while I was with Xin, the other Chinese women from the restaurant (that I mentioned before) came in. They will be back for their first lesson tomorrow! Xin was able to speak with them in Chinese and let me know what they were saying! Then, I was having an English lesson with a woman who is a member of the church in Catania. One of our other students, who is not a member stopped by and wanted to study. It was great to have a non Christian Italian student with 2 Christians of 2 different languages. (Does that make sense?) My 2 students were able to help each other. The non Christian knew more English, so he was able to read and explain to her the text in Italian, and the Christian woman was then able to explain to him the spiritual aspect of what they were reading. I was just kinda there. Just kidding. I was able to help them with the words they didn't know and their pronunciation. It was such a great experience! My hope is that more of the Italian Christians could come be a part of our lessons to help our non Christian students really understand what they are reading from the Bible, because so many things get lost in translation.

Questa Mia Candelina

Brandon brought us a wonderful lesson on Sunday morning. At least, I think it was wonderful. It was all in Italian. He told the rest of us English speakers what it was about afterwards. I can usually understand Brandon's Italian better because of his accent, but it's really hard to listen to speakers talk so quickly. We went to Enna again on Sunday night. This time we went with Aldo and Margherita, another couple from the Catania congregation. They are the parents of Deborah and Rachelle (if you remember from the pictures)

Everyone's classes went really well today, and they all lasted right into singing time! I never get tired of hearing the Italians sing at the top of their lungs with their whole hearts!

Now, we are enjoying a "family night" of spaghetti and Indiana Jones. This is Charlotte's favorite movie. She loves Shia Labeouf.

It's Spring!

It is an absolutely beautiful day here in Catania! The sun is shining, the temperature is perfect, and it's SATURDAY! This morning was the first time that it was warm enough to eat breakfast outside on the terrace. It was perfect!

This has been a very busy week! We have had a lot of English/Bible lessons, our Tuesday night singing and prayer meeting, and our mid-week Bible study (that actually got moved to Friday because of the congestion in the streets that the Festival of St. Agatha caused). We were able to see a lot of fireworks from our apartment. After dark, there was a firework show almost every hour ALL night long for 3 days!! There are 2 videos in my photobucket that you can watch. Later today, we are meeting with the rest of the members at the church building to clean it, followed by a downtown distribution of fliers for the English/Bible lessons.

Here at the house, Charlotte has begun eating cereal and she is getting two tiny teeth! She isn't very excited about the tooth part, but she is handling it like a little lady. Xin brought us all some Chinese tea to try, and a movie to watch this weekend. The tiny bonsai tree that I planted named Alan finally sprouted! He is just a teeny tiny little thing now, but his picture will soon be on photobucket, so stay tuned! I hope you are all having a wonderful weekend. Spring is here in Catania, so hang in there and it will be in Memphis before long!

The Great Redeemer

When we got home last night, I made vegan cupcakes to celebrate my 3rd weekiversary of being in Catania! They seemed to be a big hit! You can see their pictures here. Some of them got a little out of hand in the oven. I had forgotten that they grow in there. Thanks for the recipe, Mom!
You can also see pictures from the Sicilian country side and St. Agatha lights there. Sorry for the poor quality. I was in a moving car.

Well, the Festival of St. Agatha has arrived! The whole city looks like a fairground, complete with cotton candy and balloons! It's very crowded and noisy...especially at night. The traffic is crazy. It is important for you to understand that the traffic here is crazy anyway. Most of the intersections don't have traffic lights OR stop signs. People just go. You think I'm kidding. People literally just pull out into the intersection and honk at each other until someone goes. This happens at each intersection all day long. So, you can only imagine how crazy it is now.

Once a week, we bring Chinese take out home for lunch. While we are waiting for our food, Brandon and Chad talk to the ladies at the restaurant about their experiences in China. They are very friendly and have gotten used to us coming in. Today, one of the ladies said that she is going to send some of her friends to us for English lessons!!

The English songbooks and Xin's Bible arrived today! Thank you to EVERYone who was involved in getting those items here! Xin was SO excited, and very appreciative. We used the English songbooks tonight in our singing service. We would sing a song in Italian, followed by the same song in English. It went really well! It is neat to hear the Italians all singing in English. My favorite was "The Great Redeemer." It was really cute :)
The songbooks will be delivered to Paterno on Sunday.

Etta's family has arrived in Catania! She brought them to the singing night. Her two sons are 15 and 8.

By the way, there is a Friday the 13th this month AND next month.
So...get ready.

Artichokes

Yesterday, Chad and I had the wonderful opportunity to accompany Stefano and Rina Spina to the church in the small town of Enna, which consists of one older couple. On the way there, we were able to enjoy the beautiful Sicilian countryside! I have never been to New Zealand, but it looked a lot like the pictures I have seen, complete with an overwhelming number of sheep. When we arrived at the apartment of the Christian couple in Enna, we worshipped and had a meal. It is amazing how well you feel as if you know someone after having worshipped and eaten together in their home...even when they speak a different language!

When we sat down to eat, there were two fresh artichokes on my plate. As I had never seen an artichoke served in this way, I was unsure how to go about eating it. (For those of you who are accustomed to seeing an artichoke with its leaves, please don't judge me) So I cut into it, took a big bite, and started chewing. And chewing. Ten minutes later, when I was still chewing, I decided that I must have done something wrong. As I continued to chew the impossible piece of steel artichoke, I began looking for a way out the dilemma that I had gotten myself into. I didn't want to appear rude, ungrateful, or just plain stupid. I sneakily put a napkin up to my face to "wipe my mouth," quickly spit out the unchewable mass, and slid the entire napkin into my pocket. Yes, my pocket. Classic. What in the world was I supposed to do? And now all I could think about was "How am I going to finish the rest of the food on my plate??" As I began to cut into the artichoke again, I got caught. Thank goodness. "Kensey, no no! We eat this with our hands!" Rina turned over my artichoke and pulled off one leaf and showed me that the only edible part was a tiny bit at the end of each leaf. After all the leaves have been nibbled on, only the center is left. Thus the artichoke heart. It was delicious.
Soon after that, I learned the proper way to eat an orange.
I told them all that I had learned so much, and everyone had a laugh...at my expense. It was a really enjoyable night nonetheless. I have learned to accept being a spectacle here.
If you do something wrong in Italy, the Italians will happily correct you instead of sitting silently, staring, and then laughing. For this, I am thankful.

Chad and I spent this morning with our student who has the 3 year old son. (You may have noticed that I have not put his name...I just think he would prefer that at this time) He is such a joy to be around, and always excited to learn. He teaches us a lot, too. This morning, we learned that it is a tradition in Catania for a baby not to have its nails clipped until it is one month old. At that time, it is given paper money to hold in one hand, while it's other hand is manicured. Babies are traditionally not to have their hair cut until they are one year old...but some mothers cut their babies hair in secret from their mother-in-laws :)
Also, instead of a tooth fairy, a mouse brings the children money in exchange for the teeth they have lost!