Let There Be Light!

After the utilities guy turned on my electricity and gas, an electrician came to deal with the fact that no lights were functioning despite the presence of an electrical current, and two other men came to fix the hot water heater, I am delighted to report that this weekend I moved into my apartment, equipped with water AND light and heat! I am looking forward to putting everything in its proper place, and I love the apartment and its location. My landlords own the lamp store below on the street level; they are very friendly and have been so helpful in getting everything taken care of. I have been enjoying learning my way around town. Vicenza is not very large (population 110,000-120,000) and so easy to walk around.

Here I am with the awesome family with whom I stayed the past two weeks.

my apartment is on the top corner

view from my apartment of the main street through the center of town

Thursday afternoon I met my first new English student! He is from Sri Lanka and in his 40s. We began studying the Gospel of Mark, and he has a notebook in which he writes all the new words he learns : ) Thursday night was my first time at our mid-week Bible study, and we are currently in I Corinthians. The people from church are so wonderful, and I greatly enjoy their company.

Friday I went to visit a missionary family in the nearby town of Padova, as they had invited some friends over for a Christian evidences night. We watched two very interesting documentaries about creation and evolution, one of which focused on the Galapagos Islands. I spent the night there and really enjoyed getting to know this kind, hospitable family as well as the other missionary couple in Padova. It’s neat to have a mission team close by, since there aren’t very many American missionaries in Italy.

Yesterday morning I began teaching the Sunday school class for seven- to ten-year-olds! I made a Bible Jeopardy game to get an idea of what they had already studied, and we had a lot of fun. We had a smaller turn-out at church than usual because no cars were allowed in the center of town for the day except for those using methane or propane. Apparently the city does this once every few months in an effort to reduce pollution.