The Happy Holidays

I am talmente stufato with writing emails. But hey, it's all good. I
only have a few left.

Merry Christmas everyone, and Happy New Year. I will recount the
holidays, and that should be all.

Christmas Eve, we went over at 11am to the Senior Couple's home.
Sister Rust had prepared lunch for us, and it was a delicious lunch if
I may say. We then played cards with them, and their daughter who was
visiting. We rode our bikes home, and then had to catch a bus an hour
later to Aviano. We met Renato at a Pizzeria for dinner, shared our
Christmastime testimonies, and Anz. Douglas gave him a copy of Jesus,
the Christ. Since Renato is an English-speaking Italian, the copy was
in our native tongue, and should help him practice !

Christmas was nice, a beautiful Sunday. We made it to both Ward
services; the Italians read scriptures, The Americans had a musical
program. Then we took ourselves out to The Moschetta family's home.
She is an English student, who's always loved the missionaries, but
never has been interested in being a member. She made us Hungarian
dishes (where she's from originally), and also Italian dishes. They
were all so good! And the best, Ravioli with Gorgonzola and Walnut
inside....oh so delectable. We stayed and talked after dessert (a
Hungarian poppyseed roll) and they showed us almost every photo from
their vacation to Argentina...but hey, It was really fun. It was nice
to meet her son and husband, and to bring a joyful spirit into their
home. (It's a rare wood home...while most in Italy are cement) oooh

Of course, that night after we made it home, we were able to bike to
the church and Skype our families. They're doing great, and in my
opinion it was the best video-call session I've had in the
mission...the last one!

Cool, that's all for now. Love you!
Don't forget to make someone's day.

--Anziano Benge
1- La vigilia di Natale, Anz. Douglas presents Jesus, the Christ to Renato
2- Natale. Il pranzo. The Moschetta Family (the son took the photo)

Christmas, Sickness, it's the time of the year...

Another Pordenonese week over here for me! How is everyone doing?
For those lucky enough to Skype me on Christmas, you can tell me on
Sunday! I am extremely happy to have a mission in a country where
celebrating our Savior's birth is a big thing!
Last Thursday we went to a Mission Conference in Modena (home of
Balsamic Vinegar!) and met with Elder Paul V. Johnson of the Seventy.
It was by far one of my favorite conferences! He is a very intelligent
man, and a very good teacher. I was able to walk away at the end with
ideas on how to serve better here in Pordenone. Of course, the office
had bought our tickets home, which means everything was ill timed. We
ended up getting home from Modena at 11:10pm...exhausted, and tired of
trains.
Friday was less appealing. We did visit Renato in Aviano. But the
rest of the day was phone calls. Saturday was finding and showing the
Christmas video on the street. Then I made phone calls to prepare for
Sunday.
And kaboom, Sunday worked out perfectly. We had a wonderful sabbath
meeting, and a new move-in inactive named Daniel showed up, (the main
calls I made on Saturday were to him). Afterwards he was happy and we
took Luca (a strong new convert who hopes to move to the U.S.A soon)
to visit Daniel's new home and get to know him. He hasn't been active
for almost four years, but was extremely impressed with every member
he'd met and wanted to take baby steps to becoming active again. It
was a really good visit. After that, we had a delicious dinner with
the Senior couple Rusts, and Luca. (Sesame Chicken, just like my
mom's)!
Monday I was sick. I think it was food poisoning, but my stomach
was NOT ok. Darn that Chicken. It's the only thing I can openly blame.
Anyway, Monday night was also the Ward party for the Italians. We
went, and it was a really good experience, there were a handful of
non-member youth that came. (And some how I beat them all in Foosball)
Yesterday was just our normal meetings, with District meeting, and
Correlation with the Ward mission leader, and the Family Home Evening
thing we did. But different than normal, we had a service project from
8:30-11 in the morning. Lifting all the furniture tore some of my
muscles, and I'm pretty sore now. But everything is ok.
Nobody expect me to return with massive bulging muscles, cuz it's not
going to happen. Even with all these furniture movings up flights of
stairs and the morning exercise, I seem to only get weaker.

Well. Sorry. That was a lot to read. Love you all! I know God's
kingdom is here on the earth! Do what you can to build it!
Arrivederci
--Anziano Benge
No new photos

The Endless Week

I'll keep this week's email sweet and succinct. 

(Ed in italiano per loro che abitano qui)

Tengo quest'email settimanale che sia dolce e succinto.

We spent a majority of our mornings in the Questura, the government offices, trying to figure out Anz. Douglas' permit to live here.

Trascorrevamo la major parte dei mattini alla Questura, provando a quadrare il Permesso di soggiorno di Anziano Douglas.

No luck. We're supposed to wait for an appointment that they wrote and sent in the mail, but A) we don't have a key to our mailbox. And B) Douglas' name isn't on the mailbox. So, this should be a strange week.

Senza colpo di fortuna. Dobbiamo aspettare una lettera su cui è scritto il nostro appuntamento, però, (A) non abbiamo una chiave della cassetta postale e (B) non c'è il nome di Douglas sulla cassetta neanche al citofono. Dovrebbe essere una strana settimana a venire.

Thursday we had Zone conference in Mestre (along with a Thanksgiving/Christmas dinner together.) and it was a good day. Sunday night we had an exchange with the Venezia zone leaders, so we had to go to Mestre again until Monday.

Giovedì facevamo la conferenza di zona a Mestre. È stata una buona giornata ed c'era la cena natalizia insieme nel mezzo. Domenica sera siamo andati a Mestre di nuovo fino a Lunedì di fare lo scambio di colleghi.

It was actually the best exchange i have ever been on, and I've never had some much success as a missionary while finding. We were using this year's Christmas video, and in one hour we had several people stop!

Veramente è stato lo scambio migliore di ciò che mai ho fatto; non ho mai visto successo così facendo la ricerca per strada. Usavamo il video natalizio #SiiunaLuce ed in un'ora singola, parecchia gente si fermavano!

I have seen this gospel change people, and it's changed me. Be a Light and see what you can change, see who's heart you might touch.

Ho visto i cuori cambiare dal Vangelo, eppure mi ha cambiato. Sii una Luce e vedi che cosa puoi cambiare, guarda per chi la verità tocca.

Vi voglio tanto bene!

P.s (shoutout to Mauro and Ester, both recent converts who have been members now for just about a year!)

P.s (auguri a Mauro ed Ester, i convertiti che compirà un anno nella gregge di Gesù! Vi voglio bene. Un abbraccio a ciascuno!)

--Anziano Benge

1-Sunset after a late lunch. Tramonto dopo un pranzo tarde

2- Cose natalizie a Pordenone. Christmas stuff in Pordenone

3- the zone. La zona di Venezia (Pordenone are the first 2 missionaries on the left in both the M and F rows)

Italy Treats one Well

And insipidly, another week has fled.
And I don't have any more photos for you, I'm sorry.

This week our ward was on a trip to the temple. So we focused our week
on passing by long-missing members. We traveled to Porcia to pass by
them. En route, we met a man named Robert. He is from Ghana, and
really didn't speak English that well.
At one point in our discussion, Elder Douglas said "Awesome!" And
Robert thought that he had said a word in the Twi language "boasom" or
something. Which means "I love you."
So of course Robert just starts cracking up, and couldn't even finish
the conversation because he's laughing. He left us like that, without
us getting his number, but at least he was in a good mood.

Saturday we had dinner with the Giurintano family. And Elder Douglas
had his first experience with trying to play chess with a 90 year old
Siciliano. I usually play, but I escaped it fortunately.
Sunday was really nice. Belal, from Pakistan, came to all three hours
of church and participated in the lesson. He says he likes
Christianity, but still doesn't quite understand Christ. Of course, do
any of us? As we learn, you can only teach someone as far as you know
for yourself. We did our best, bearing testimony in Gospel Principles
class, but it still seems he uses church only as a past time.
For dinner, we were invited to the American bishop's home, and we ate
South Korean food, and Philippine food, and then went to another
member's home for pies, pies, and more pie.
Americans are so awesome in a completely different way than Italians
are, but it is very hard to switch cultures like that for me.
Yesterday we had troubles with Elder Douglas' documents, so we have to
go in Friday this week. Aye, I've spent too much time in government
offices. Beh, persevereremo

Va bene, quel è tutto per questa settimana.
Sii una Luce. Sii come Gesù, la Lace del mondo.
Tvb
--Anziano Benge
(Austine, a recent convert in Firenze, emailed me this photo of him,
Iyke(far left), and Rocky(middle).) they are all new converts and I
really miss that city! Him and Iyke just received the Melchizedek
priesthood.