8 of 14: The 1st month

Our timeline for the 1st month:

September 29 – October 5 – stayed at an agriturismo for the first 7 nights; Titus & Angie left for 3 weeks in the U.S. on October 1, so they lent us their car to use; we acquired a cell phone, started trying to find our way around, were invited to Francesco & Lorenza’s home; went on a “picnic” in the mountains immediately following Italian church service (European idea of picnic is vastly different from American)

October 5-8 – stayed in “church apartment” – the second floor of the church that is used for classrooms, also has a kitchen and bathroom; the church is a store-front, 500-year-old, 3-story building located at the T of Corso Palladio, which is THE MAIN SHOPPING STREET (a Vicenza version of Fifth Avenue, New York) in the historic section of town.

Email from us on 10/-10/09 – More provision:

“A member of the church here has a one-bedroom apartment, but spends most of his time working/living in Venezuela, so he is sub-leasing it out to us at half-rent and utilities, while we look for a more permanent apartment to live in. God is being very gentle with us as we settle into life in Italy, as this situation allows us to have a place to live without commitment or need for visas, or having to go out and buy a WHOLE apartment’s worth of furnishings and supplies.”

This apartment was located 1 mile from the church on a sweet little street/neighborhood, and at the foot of Monte Berico with its 183 steps. We could climb the steps and look out over most of the city from this point, and it became our place to pray over the city.

Francesco told Randall that there is no reason for us to worry about a permesso (permit to stay that is required if you’re staying longer than 8 days, a visa is required to obtain this document, and once obtained it trumps the visa) at this time, so we're not. This seemed like such a blessing when it first happened, and we were relieved because it was one less piece of red tape we had to worry about. Not having a visa was going to make getting a permesso very tricky. But this turned out to be very detrimental. Francesco gave us that advice because he had settled us into Efram's apartment believing that we'd be able to stay there until we returned to the U.S. to get our visas.

What nobody predicted was that Efram unexpectedly returned to Italy on October 30 and didn't leave until right before we left. Francesco allowed us to stay in the "upper room" (our beloved term for the second floor of the church), but without the permesso there was no way to take language lessons, or for Andrew to try public school, or anything. I can actually put a date and hour to the exact time when the tide turned - approximately 12:30 on Sunday October 25 Randall announced to me that Francesco just told him that Efram was coming back and would need his apartment after all. At that point, things took a different turn.