So. Hot. Still. We hit 37°C, 98.6°F, plus all the humidity of Niagara Falls without the falls.
It's time to tell the story of what has come to be known as the Great Dough Scandal of June 14th. Disclaimer: This is in no way spiritual or uplifting, but it is funny. Ever since a member taught me to make pizza in Pesaro, I've enjoyed making it from time to time. To do it completely correctly, one should let it rise over night. As missionaries, we don't always have that kind of time. On the day in question I wasn't able to make the dough the night before, so I made it the next morning. I wanted to have it rise quicker, so I decided to put it out in the sun. We live on the fourth floor of our apartment building. Our balcony wasn't in the sun, so I decided that instead I would put it on the windowsill. We have a decently large windowsill, so I wasn't worried about it going anywhere. Fool am I. Quick Italian architecture lesson: Blinds aren't really a thing. Instead we have tapparelle, which are basically solid strips of plastic or metal that come down outside of the window to block out sunlight. Think garage door, but with six inch beams of plastic. Anyway, we usually close them when we go out to keep the house cool. Anz. Johnson, unaware that a bowl of pizza dough was out on the windowsill as he closed it, I heard the usual "thud" of the tapparelle closing, plus an extra "clang!" that only meant one thing. I ran to the window and pulled up the tapparelle. Dough... gone. All that was left was the lid. We looked in horror over the windowsill. The bowl was sitting on a ledge about two feet under our window. The dough however, was sitting on the two subsequent windowsills and the courtyard below. Because we're responsible, we decided to clean up our mess. Anz. Johnson got a scrub brush and some water and climbed over the windowsill down to the ledge. He was decently safe. It's a big ledge and he was holding on to the window. Anyway he's cleaning and I'm making sure he doesn't fall, when all of a sudden we see the head of our elderly neighbor pop out of the window below. She exams the dough mess. Anz. Johnson cringes against the wall hoping that she doesn't look up and see the missionaries hanging out the window. As if in slow motion, her head rotates upward to see Anz. Johnson on a ledge and me leaning out the window trying to clean up the mess. She asked what we were doing and we explained the situation. At this point, if I were her, I would A) freak out that the kids above me are hanging out a window or B) freak out that there's dough all over my apartment building. As we wait to hear the reprimand she looks up and says "Boys! Don't put dough out on the windowsill! It gets to hot and then it won't cook right!" Classic Italian response. Kids hanging out a window, apartment covered in dough, and the main concern was that the Americans weren't cooking their pizza correctly. Later, our landlord angrily confronted us and was surprised at our willingness to clean up the mess. He laughed as we climbed a ladder and hosed down his apartment building in the rain. At the beginning he was grumpy and by the end he was laughing. Overall, it made for a good experience and I also learned the correct manner to make pizza dough.
Back to the spiritual stuff.
This past week I've been trying something new. I'm keeping a tally in my planner of all the people we talk to. It's a bit inaccurate because sometimes we go for a while without having the chance to write the tally in my planner or I lose track sometimes. Anyway, my best estimate is that in the last nine days we've contacted about 350 people. I've enjoyed keeping track because it helps me keep an eternal perspective. Even if not every person stops to talk with us, I can at least say that I'm doing my part. And sometimes I can get home at the end of the day and ask myself if there's more I could have done. My personal goal was to contact 40 people a day. Some days I exceeded it, and some days I didn't quite make it that far, but the goal really helped me to keep going. I also saw blessings come from going "beyond the call." Classic missionary scenario: We were ringing doorbells the other day and it was about time to head out. We reached 40 people contacted conveniently at the end of the apartment building. I felt though that we needed to keep going for whatever reason so I suggested that we go down the street a ways to ring one more building. Person #41 didn't let us in but right before she hung up the intercom she stopped and asked, "Aren't you that church that does a lot of genealogy?" Anz. Johnson replied that we have the biggest genealogical library in the world and that our genealogy center in the church is free to the public. She asked if we could leave some information in her mailbox, which we were glad to do. The Spirit of Elijah is growing here in Italy. (See Malachi 4:5-6).
Our Nigerian friend was able to finally make it back to church, the one who walked an hour because the busses weren't running. He was very sick with the flu in these past two weeks, but he was able to return this last Sunday. He said he felt something missing in the time that he wasn't able to come. The members were happy to welcome him back. He is a very active participant in Sunday School and the members are surprised at his knowledge of the scriptures and life in general. He knows his Bible veeeerryyyy well, which is hard to come by in anyone. Although he's not 100% in his Italian abilities, he tries very hard and doesn't let that stop him from participating and forming friendships. He even used an Italian word that even the Italians didn't know. I watched him with two Italians as he was trying to convince them that the word he was using was a real word and the two Italians denying it. Finally, one whips his phone out, looks it up online, and what do you know. It's a word. Anyway, he is making his own progress and it's exciting to see. Right now his baptismal date is set for July 5th. We're confident he can make that. I'd love to see him be baptized on my birthday.
Transfers are next week. A large part of me wants to stay, but I've already been here almost six months. That's usually the limit. We'll see! Transfers are always a bit stressful, but usually pretty exciting too. Change can be good. I've learned to accept it in the past year and a half.
Have a great week. I love you! Love, me.
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