Take the past week for example.
This year, actually last Thursday [the 24th], marks the 25th year that our cook, Rosa, has been working here at the Bible School. She is a dear lady and brings a lot of joy to our hearts... and to our stomachs. So, last Friday, we had a special lunch in her honor. We invited her two grown daughters, one of their husbands was able to join, and Rosa's husband, Felice, to eat with us. When Em and I got home from language school that day, we saw the feast that Debbie, the wife of our director, had prepared. We had chips and salsa, enchiladas, mexican rice, rotel cheese dip and [drum roll please.........] SWEET TEA!!!! That's right. Kyle, the assistant HUF director, made it and we served it with ice. ICE! It was a beautiful thing. Debbie also made a chocolate cake and we had it with espressi at the end of the meal. yum! They didn't leave until almost four and we were still cleaning up after. [Had to burn off some of those calories somehow!] After we took a nap, we tried to decide what we would do for dinner. We invited Tracey and Cecilia [the two girls in our language class] over for dinner at our favorite pizzeria, "Gallo", and a movie here at our place. They have been living in downtown Florence, though, so it took them a while to get into Scandicci. By the time they arrived it was almost nine by the time we sat down for our meal, but we took our time. I had a margherita [tomato sauce and cheese] pizza with prosciutto crudo, rucola, e parmigiana and finished it off with a panna cotta con ciocolato [holler!!]. Oh. and I also drank a large coke. Can’t forget that! Needless to say, I went to bed a full and happy gal that night.
Saturday, our friend Ermenita [a girl that goes to church with us here] cooked an authentic albanian meal for some of the HUF students and some of our other friends from church. We helped her shop for groceries, prepare the food and set up the room.. finishing just in time for the guests to arrive at seven. There were twenty of us in all and we had a huge spread. Albanian food is a lot like greek food I think.. cucumbers, tomatoes, garlic, lemon, potatoes and lots and lots of YOGURT. I mean.. wow. There were about six or seven different dishes and four of them consisted mainly of yogurt. It was interesting but really good and we had a great time with each other! Food is always a great way to bring people together.
Which brings me to Sunday. Sunday we had the “Corri La Vita” [run for life, sort of like Race for the Cure or Relay for Life in the states] in downtown Florence with the HUF kiddos. Of course, we weren't running, we were walking, but it really wasn't much of a walk either because we kept stopping to chat or to see a certain church or to grab a snack, of course. After we decided we'd done enough, we went to some garden [the name of which we never knew] for a picnic. But we didn't have the normal picnic fare, i.e. sandwiches, fresh veggies/fruit, etc. David Woodroof, our director, brought back a ton of stuff from the rosticeria like roast chicken, fried polenta, fried zucchini flowers, roasted potatoes, spinach and green beans. It was delicious, but it was probably too much, especially since, according to the free pedometer they gave each person at the beginning of the race that morning, I had only burned 200 calories in the corri. Then, to top it all off, we went for gelato afterward.. I got pistacchio and crema, if you happened to be wondering.
As soon as we got home, we took a short nap before getting ready for party we were hosting that night for the HUF group. Every semester we have the entire group over for a period of worship, games and, yes, food. Debbie decided to make chili and use some of the same things we used for lunch friday to make taco salads/texas pile-up. What I did consisted of washing and chopping six HUGE heads of lettuce and washing and dicing ten abnormally large bell peppers. Then I helped Debbie make sure we had everything and that things were set up well so that serving everyone wouldn't turn into a chaotic event. Everyone arrived at around 5:30 and we started worship at around 6, singing songs and reading scripture in both italian and english. Then we ate and ate and ate. For dessert we had ice cream with Debbie’s homemade chocolate fudge sauce. [Which is to-die-for, might I add.] YUM!
It’s here that the weekend ended... but don’t be mistaken. I have managed to have gelato four times since Monday, Rosa’s delicious “Sette Pi” [seven “p”s] pasta, a gigantic plateful of pasta carrottiera, lasagna made with pesto [rich!], a big bowl of leftover chili and five or six slices of homemade pizza. And that doesn’t even include the special day we had yesterday at the vineyard. Every fall, the HUF students go to Montefiorale to harvest grapes. It takes all morning and it is a lot of hard work... but it is worth the sweat because of the lunch they feed us. When we had finished all the work [p.s. look at that truck-full of grapes on the right!], we went to an open area where they barbecued ribs and sausages for us. I won’t tell you how much I had. It’s too embarrassing. But I will say that I don’t think I’ve ever put away that many ribs at one time in my life.
I’m hoping this account hasn’t made you disappointed in me. I do realize the truly dangerous side of Italy, though the crazy traffic and numerous pigeons aren’t to go unconsidered, lies behind the benign veneer of a delicious plate of pasta or an enormous ice cream cone and that I need to do something about changing my ways before someone [namely me] gets hurt. But if, by chance, I happen to fall by the wayside, I hope you guys will still love me.. even though I may have to be lifted by crane in order to leave my house.
Hope everyone is doing well! And I hope to write again soon!
