Chris and Pat's Italian Mission Adventures: March 2017

Random Italy shots

I had to have a picture of this fellow. He was having the best snooze in the middle of a busy piazza.

A lady that the sorelle found that was a less-active member and was thrilled they found her. She is from Malta and will be seeing us Sunday at church. We have found many people that are from outside of Bari that can't come to church on Sunday because they don't have a car and the trains and buses sometimes don't run on Sundays. It's a big problem.

Proper driving in Bari is "on the line" and make 2 lanes when there is only room for one lane. Chris has started to adopt this Italian way of driving...so watch out for Chris on the roads in July!! Also, you can go through red lights as long as no one is coming in the other direction and butt-in anyway you can...Oh, and lots of drivers are undecided as to whether they want to go in the right or left lane so they'll just drive in the middle--like I said--On the line..BTW..Texting is mandatory while you drive. Yikes!

Just another boring day by the sea....

One of the most beautiful places in the Puglia area is Matera. I have blogged about it before but we just accompanied 2 sorelle who hadn't seen it before so we got a few more pictures. It's a remarkable place. Details of Matera are given in my blog from Jan 19, 2016.

Amazing, isn't it?

Moving day!

We have a family that we are teaching right now that had to move out of their rental and so we all donned our "moving" clothes and helped. It was great fun. Why is it always more fun when it's not you that's moving? Took about 5 hours because we had to go up 4 flights of stairs (long flights) to get to their top floor. The Elders worked so hard--I was really proud of them. The sisters and I did a lot of packing of dishes and we had a ball.

This beautiful cathedral was right across the street. As we were doing the move, a bunch of men just stood watching the whole time. This is a common past time of Italian men--just standing on the street and talking and watching people go by.

Chris was the "Tetris" guy and loaded everything beautifully

This is just one set of stairs (of 4) that had to be climbed!!

The grocery store came to us. This truck parked right next to the apartment so the fresh produce was a great snack. These trucks go all over Italy communities everyday. Fresh produce is standard fare for Italians and it's so inexpensive. They import very little fruit and vegetables.

Here's a produce market in Bari--I will miss this when I go home!

The Sorelle had a game of Frisbee with their kids--Tony (11) and Kimberly (17) to entertain them during the move ...

Pranzo and Pirisi

I have to say that we have the best district of missionaries in the Rome Italy Mission. We just love all these wonderful people. They keep us young and are a great example to us. We just finished our weekly district meeting and decided to go for pizza. YUM!

From left: Anziano Whitaker, Anz. Brown, Anz. Bowers, Anz. Lancaster(just visiting from Lecce), Anz. Mariucci, Anz. Carroll, Anz. Hinckley, Sor. Sargeant, Sor. Hess, Sor. Holmes, Sor. Coz-Baccera.

Normally we head over to a Panaficio close to the church for lunch and we have become quite good friends with the 3 brothers and mother who run the store.

Momma, and 2 of her 3 sons

Love those yummy panini!

A year ago I posted that we went to the San Francisco casa di cura (senior's home) and celebrated Fratello Pirisi's birthday--well--here we are again--he's a year older and still as sweet as can be. We did a little singing before we visited in the cafeteria with all the residents and Sorella Holmes accompanied us. from left: Sorella Coz-Baccera, Sorella Holmes, Anziano Whitaker, Vito Caricolla, Anziano Hinckley, Chris and I.

To celebrate his birthday (and another resident) , the residents and the staff all danced--they had a DJ entertain us. The music was so loud I can't believe the seniors liked it so much--We did a conga line -(-couldn't get Chris to join in for some reason)and Fratello Pirisi looked really happy.

Carnivale Italy!

Carnivale is like New Orleans' Mardi Gras. It lasts 4 days and is just prior to lent. There are lots of parties going on and everyone likes to dress up. Both wards here in Bari celebrated with a party. Chris and I were asked by the Poggio Franco ward to do the games for their Primary Carnivale so we got busy and started by making a pinata. Here's the beginning....