Sunday, May 31, 2009

May 31: Church, Homemade Italian Food, and a Private Concert in Venice

Rialto Bridge in Venice
Massimiliano playing the piano for us after church and a great meal.
Clarke and Kelsey

The man who showed us around last night is apparently the pseudo-bishop of a ward nearby, so we went to church at his ward. Of course the lady selling bus passes needed to copy down everyone's passport number and name by hand, so we were 20 minutes late to Sacrament. 30 people...late. Yay! I was a lucky one and got a headset to listen to the missionary translator. They talked about achieving Zion. Jeannette, the first thing I thought about was you me and last summer. Bringing Down Zion '08 baby! And it's written ALL over Jacob Lake...When we go back there this summer we need to look for them.

The translator was funny when he couldn't fully translate things. He didn't have his English scriptures so he just paused and said, "...buh...somethin about charity." I don't remember the context in the other quote, but he just said, "um...hamburger" after like a 30 second pause. It made my day.

Massimiliano, the pseudo bishop and our private tour guide is apparently also an amazing cook AND a professional concert pianist (and famous at that). He and some people in our group whipped up a four course lunch for us in the church kitchen. We set up two long tables and they served us. We had bruschetta (I don't like tomatoes, but this was amazing), salad with homemade balsamic viniagrette dressing, pasta with tomato sauce, an hors d'uevres (SPELLING?) of some exotic cheese, prischuto (sp?) and olive, and a big Italian cookie with some gelatto and caramel things on it with frozen berries on top. I left feeling so satisfied. I will never forget my homemade Italian meal, which is much better than the Italian food we've been buying here. After we cleaned up we went back into the chapel which has TWO grand pianos in it, and he played us three songs. He is the most amazing pianist I have heard live. I got a couple videos of it, but blogspot takes forever to upload them. His fingers were going so fast at times that I felt like I was having a surreal experience. That was a weird sentence.

I am hoping I get a nap today. We'll see how that goes with four girls in the same hotel room. I just want to get to a point where I'm no longer a sleep-deprived grump. We are going exploring tonight. The weather here is SO cool here that I actually wore a jacket today. It's nice not to be sweating for once. The breeze is way nice. Venice is the only city in the world that doesn't have cars or even scooters, so it's pleasantly quiet here, even with people walking around. And there aren't even many people (that I've seen so far). 

We played "Have You Ever" on the bus ride home from church today. Would you rather have a moustache or armpit hair down to your waist? Would you rather have a unibrow or eyelashes 2 feet long? I think it's funny that people always think of physical deformities first.

I've been thinking a lot about physical things lately. Namely how people take care of themselves, how that affects how a person acts, how it determines how people treat you, and why people need that assurance that comes from a compliment. I've also been wondering how missionaries deal without physical affection for two years! I'm not talking about anything dirty...just simple hand holding, hugs, and kisses. Even just attention from someone of the opposite sex. Having it for nine months straight and dealing without it for a month, I have noticed a definite difference in how I act because I don't have that. I miss being able to show, and being shown affection. It is something so positive that it puts you in a great mood. I don't exactly know how, but touch is such a powerful sense. Return missionaries...how did you do it? 

Off to naptime. 

Love,
Kellie
Pin It!

1 comment:

Lanna said...

How do missionaries deal with non-affection? Well, if you're a sister, it's not a problem. I got oodles and oodles of cheek kisses and hugs in the Dominican Republic. Of course, it was always with women, which is definitely not the same thing as a smooch from a guy. :) But, I never felt PDA deprived (and I had TWO guys waiting for me ... sort of. Long story for a different forum). I've enjoyed reading your Italy comments. I'm insanely jealous.

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...