(Only Spenciphilis will understand the subject sentence)
This week has been so gretchen long, but so short at the same time. These days feel like weeks.
We were about to go outside and all the rain just came down. It was awesome actually. So instead of going finding, which we usually do at the parks or in the city center, we did house to house. It was about how it was every time previously, people who answer the phone and ask who it is and hang up mid sentence. There was one house we stopped at, I rang the doorbell thingy and we were about to leave when the door opened. A young man, probably a little younger than me, walked outside to the fence were we were. It's still raining a lot and my comp and I have our raincoats on, but this guy doesn't. So i immediately started to think "well this isnt gonna last long, he's gonna go back inside." And The complete opposite happened. He stood outside with us in the rain and listened to a condensed first lesson about the restoration. He was attentive the whole time and took the pamphlets from us. It was awesome and I hope something sparks within him and his family. A couple houses later, an old man comes outside yelling at us because we didn't stand close enough to the camera, so he couldn't see us. Then he asked what we wanted, i told him who we were and it was like he summoned the savage side of him. He went off on us, but I didn't understand a thing so I was smiling the whole time, which only made him more mad. He turned away and all I said was "buonagiornata!" Which basically means "have a good day" and he stopped, stared at me for a second, and then turned away. I loved it. He obviously didn't like us because of an event that happened long ago, I had the courage to wish a man a good day after he yelled at me. We all went on our merry way. I had a couple dozen fliers for our English class in my backpack, so as we walked along, I stuffed peoples mailboxes with them. I hope our English class starts to grow because we only have two attendees total and they're old fellas.
These past 3 weeks have been a real test of patience. Patience with the Lord, with the language, with the people, with my companion, and with myself. I think right now, the Lord is testing me, testing my will and desire. When he sees that I am willing, he will use me as he intended when he called me to serve his children in Italy. The language and the people are kind of one. I want to be able to talk to people, more than ciao and buon giorno. I want to be able to understand what they say, to make friends, to do briscola finding with the old guys in the park and get to know them. Instead, the people see my nametag, hear me say who I am, and they cut me off and walk away after saying something that I didn't understand. It's irritating to not be able to talk to these people. All I can do is figure out a way to serve them, but I'm out of ideas. My companion... I'm just looking forward to these two transfers to end. I cannot wait for them to end. There's nothing more to be said. Good gretchen, patience with one's own self is somethin else, borderline impossible for mortals to achieve. Buuuut I'm 19 so I'm basically still immortal (so they (old people) say), which means I've got a shot.
So far, I wish I had done a few things before coming to Italy.
1. Learn how to cook (like really learn, not ask my mom how)
2. Learn how to grocery shop for a week worth of food
3. Learn to have patience
4. Studied PMG way more fervently and retained the information a lot better
Now Sunday comes around and it's fast Sunday too so I'm just about hangry. I looked out the window and what did I see? Not popcorn popping, but clear blue skies. About and hour later, it's pouring rain (like real rain) and thunder every few seconds. It was awesome. During church, the sounds of my growling stomach were overpowered by the thunder outside which was great. My companion and I got to spend the last hour of church with the two primary kids and it was a blast. We're singing a couple songs with them for Mothers day. I'll admit, the last song hit the feels and got me teary eyed because I love my mom. These little kids are so happy. Even though my singing is awful, I'm excited to sing with the primary kids. We meet with the ward missionary leader every Sunday at Sorella Rossi's house and then she feeds us some piadine. On our way to her house, my bike broke. It already had a malfunction from before I got there, but with the rain, bumps, and my weight, the Italian Stallion (the name i gave it) gave out on me. It was a long night from then on, but the piadina was delicious.
So now it's Monday, I don't have a bike and we have service to go to on the other side of town. A good hour walk. I look in the garage and see a different bike, so I try that one. We're going and it's an old bike, I could that. I got attached to it, but I didn't really have another choice of bike. I called it the Silver Bullet. About 5 ish minutes into our ride, the back tire basically crinkles. My companion was of absolutely no help at all. Instead he made stupid comments for the next 45 minutes. He's a real good test of patience. Now I don't have a bike, and everywhere we go is miles and miles from our apartment. People see us even more now that we aren't zipping past with bikes. There were two different people that stopped us and asked about our English class which is awesome because I told my mission pres that I wanted to start making our English class bigger. So many prayers for help to expand it. I've been stuffing the mailboxes with the fliers in the effort also. We wait and see what happens.
I had my first zone conference yesterday and I wasn't looking forward to it, but it was a good experience. I got to see Anziano Prince and that was a good break from my comp. I appreciate my p days and meetings a lot more thanks to my companion. In a couple weeks I get to see Anziano Lex which I'm so stoked about. Anziano Prince, Anziano Lex, and I have decided to beg to be put back together in every weekly email and interview with the new president in June or July. I love my last two companions.
I still cant make anything to eat other than the most basics of pasta. Any easy and cheap recipes would be awesome. The language is still not coming, but I'm making little progress which is all that matters. Little by little. Day by day. The other day in the park I saw a group of old guys playing briscola, which I had just learned how to play the night before. These old guys would get way into the game, but it was fun to see them interact with each other. That's all I want to do at the moment, just be able to start and keep a conversation going with random people I see. The way my companion tries to do finding is to say "we are missionary of christ, we have a message about him and God" and the intention is good, but it isnt effective. People stop listening after he says who we are. They don't care to listen to two boys who don't show interest in them. It's difficult to not be able to say anything to the Italian people. If anyone has creative finding ideas, please share them with me, I lack creativity.
I'm so grateful for all the encouragement and prayers, I'm definitely seeing simple answers to prayers. I love you all and hope everything is peachy. Have a good week.
Vi voglio bene,
Anziano Brady
No comments:
Post a Comment