Our First Zone Conference

We participated on our first zone conference this week and what a special treat that was.  In addition to the 28 full-time missionaries here in the Puglia Zone, we also had our mission leaders, President & Sister Morris, the assistants and a dear service missionary serving here in Bari.  It was an amazing time for us.  All the missionaries look forward to zone conference, which happens once each transfer (six weeks).  We all loved the opportunity to meet, learn and grow together.  We hosted Anziano and Sorella Jones, a senior couple serving in Crotone, about 5½ hours south of us by car in the Calabria region.  We regularly meet at district council with the Bari and Taranto districts, so it was fun to get to know the missionaries that serve rather remotely in the mission in the Calabria district.

We got to shuttle several companionships back and forth between the train station and the chapel, including our mission leaders.  It was nice to get to know President and Sorella Morris a little better.  In all, it was a very sweet day and couldn't help but think that any of the parents of these wonder missionaries wouldn't do to be able to attend and feel the amazing spirit of these meetings.  I felt very privileged to be there and participate there.  Words can't describe the joy we feel as we serve alongside these sweet Elders and Sisters.

In other news, Liz and I went on a field trip to check out Matera.  We had heard that it was pretty amazing  but didn't really know what to expect.  Well, it turned out to be pretty amazing after all.  The Sassi di Matera (Rocks of Matera) was an area settled millennia ago by people who carved their homes into the cliff walls along the river below.  Due to extreme poverty of the Sassi dwellers, the area was emptied in the 1950's with the inhabitants relocated to a new city built above.  Since the 1980's, as interest had increased, the Sassi have been gentrified and restored.  It was truly an amazing place to see.

Afternoon shadows forming

An old chapel carved into the stone cliffs

Overlooking Sassi di Matera behind us

Duomo di Matera

P-day and other travels

 On p-day this week we took a little trip out to Castel del Monte about an hour west of us. The castel (Italian spelling) is a beautiful octagonal castle built in the 1240s. Everywhere we look here seems like a reminder that our own country is so young in comparison! Castel del Monte is incredibly well preserved. As we walked thorough it I could imagine it being lived in. I do have to say that was absolutely freezing inside (even though it wasn't a terribly cold day). A reminder that I do appreciate indoor heating! One of the unique features of this castel is that had indoor plumbing. The builder of the castel took the idea from Arabic castles and apparently was ahead of his time!

After we toured the Castel we drove into the town of Andria. We happened to hit the town during pranzo and it was more or less a ghost town. Pranzo is interesting, in the big cities or tourist areas you don't see it as much, but the entire town closes up and takes a break. Everything closes, including all the restaurants. So, generally between 1:30pm - 4:00pm there are no stores or restaurants open. We wandered around Andria for about 45 minutes and only saw one or two people. 

We are putting lots of kilometers on our little car. We also did the drive to Taranto (about 80 mins south of us) twice this week.  The drive to Taranto is fun because we go past miles and miles of Olive trees. Apparently there is a castle in Taranto as well. We'll have to check that out after District Conference next week.

Adjusting to life in Bari

 We have been here in Bari for a week now. The weather has been unseasonably cold and we are looking forward to it getting warmer so we can get out more and explore our new home.  We are slowly figuring out what to do with our time. There is no set schedule for senior missionaries so we get to decide how to fill our time with meaningful activities. Right now most of our responsibilities happen in the evenings. I am sure as time goes by we will get busier and find more to do. 

On Saturday the missionaries welcomed us with a get together at the church. We were hoping to meet some of our Gans (Giovani Adulti Non Sposati or YSA) that evening but due to last minute scheduling it ended up just being the missionaries and one other sister, Sister Viterbo who is serving as a service missionary here. We were delighted to meet her and look forward to getting to know her better.

On Tuesday we attended District Council with our district in Bari. We have four Anziani (Elders) who work and live in Bari as well as the two Foggia Anziani. We have four Sorelle (Sisters) who are in  Bari also. After the meeting we invited the Anziani to have pranzo (lunch) at our home. Next week we will have the Sorelle. We enjoyed getting to know Anziani Sorenson & Stafford (Poggiafranco), Whitney & Olson (Liberta) and Seamons and Reynolds (Foggia).  We have been so impressed with all the young missionaries we have met!

On Thursday we drove to Taranto which is about an hour away from us. Driving in Italy is always an 'exciting' thing. Cars will whizz past us on either side of the vehicle whether there is a passing lane or not! My favorite move (and I use that term loosely) is when the cars pass on the left and basically go between the two lanes on a two lane road with cars coming at them. Nobody seems phased by this behavior and I wonder how long it will take for us to get used to it! Luke is unflappable as always and I have vowed to never drive here! 

In Taranto we attended the District Council for the Taranto area which consisted of two sets of Sorelle (serving in Statte and Lecche) and four Elders (serving in Taranto and Brindisi). After D.C we toured the empty sister apartment near the ward building. Taranto has a rather large group of GANS and we are thinking of using the empty apartment as our home base when we visit Taranto. 

The Taranto apartment is huge! It is sparsely furnished (a typical missionary apartment) but it is in a safe, modern building. It hasn't been used in over a year so it needs to be cleaned. The heat, water and gas are all turned off right now, but we are excited about the possibility of using the apartment to we can be more present in Taranto. 

One of the fun things about being in a new city is discovering the area. This week we went to the amazing open air market down the road. They have an excellent variety of fruits and vegetables for sale. We think we will shop there for most of our produce. We also have had fun sampling local cuisine. The missionaries pointed us to the best place in town for focaccia. Yum, it did not disappoint. Everyone is telling us we need to try the panzarotti (a deep fried pizza pocket), we look forward to trying that soon. 

We are so happy to be here in Bari. The members are wonderful and the missionaries have been so fantastic. We are hoping to start teaching English classes this next week which will give us more to do. We love it here already and are excited to be a part of this wonderful work.

                                                               

                                                    The open air market near our apartment!

                                                             

 

                                    Back Row: Anziani Sorenson, Stafford, Olsen and Whitney

                                     Front Row: Sorelle Beus, Viterbo and Cheney

Warm focaccia on a cold day!

Rome to Bari

We made it to Rome!

       We are finally in Italy! After years of dreaming of serving a mission, 9 months waiting after our call arrived, 2 weeks in the MTC and almost 18 hours of travel time we are finally here! We had a wonderful (and exhausting day) on Wednesday. We met Presidente and Sorella Morris at the mission home (The Villa). The three arriving couples were met at the airport by Anziani Bates and Stolt as well as Sorella Stolt. They took us to drop of our luggage and then straight to the Villa. We had a delicious lunch with the Browns, Denisons and Morris'. After that we ran off to get our Permesso (residency permission?) and then Italian cellphones. They intentionally kept us awake all day to help us get adjusted to local time more quickly. It was a very long day and we were exhausted.  The Weeds hosted us in their home overnight and we enjoyed getting to know another mission couple. 

         On Thursday we were able to do a temple session in the Rome Temple! We have visited the temple under construction twice and were so excited to finally be able to do a session in the beautiful temple. What a blessing to the Italian saints as well as to visitors from all over the world. The temple itself is stunning and perfectly reflects the heritage of this area. Luke was brave and did all his ordinance work in the temple in Italian. After the temple we toured the Visitor Center which is also amazing. After that it was off to Bari.

        The drive to Bari was itself quite the adventure. It is about a four and a half hour drive from Rome to Bari. Much of the drive is on the autostrada (highway) but there were sections that were two lane roads. One of the features of the mission car (Toyota Yarus) is that there is a recording that warns you when you are exceeding the speed limit. Every time the speed limit changed the new speed was updated on the dashboard of the car (no excuses for speeding here). Anyway, the mission has some sort of software program that warns when you are going too fast. Our observation about drivers here is that the speed limits are merely a suggestion. There was one section of the road that the speed limit was 60 Km, cars were zipping past us whenever they could. Finally a big truck came up behind us and he couldn't pass us because of traffic coming at us in the other direction. Anziano Ellsworth is going 70 in a 60 zone and the truck starts blasting his horn. When he speeds up a little the car starts reminding him "check your speed", finally he looks at me and says, what a choice, get yelled at by the car or squashed by the truck! Through it all Luke was unflappable. I on the other hand, have a few new gray hairs! After all the excitement of the drive we arrived safe and sound to Bari and moved into our cute little apartment. 

     We are thrilled to be here and are very excited to get to work! We have our first GANS (Giovane Adulti Non Sposati/ YSA) activity on Saturday. We can't wait to meet the missionaries and our GANS. We hope to be of some service in this part of the Lord's vineyard. More than anything we are looking forward to getting to work!