It has been a season of reunions. Last weekend we met up with the Harrells in Amsterdam. This week I got to hang out with the legendary Gabriele DeMatteis, my indomitable district leader from the halcyon missionary days in Genova. I hadn't seen the great Gabriele since I drove him to the airport at the end of his mission in November 2002. Our reunion Wednesday afternoon at the Frankfurt Hauptbanhof (central station) was a joyous one. Gabriele had come to town to visit his sister Emanuela, whose husband Francesco DiLillo (our zone leader in Genova, as it happens) works for the Church's European PR office in Frankfurt. Gabriele, by the way, lives in Rome, just secured a new job, and next March will marry the remarkable Lisa Cagnacci. He was in a predictably joyful mood throughout the week.
We spent Wednesday afternoon stadtbummeling in downtown Frankfurt, with me playing cicerone to my old friend in Italian--quite a linguistic liberation after a four-week battle with That Awful German Language (TAGL). We paid our devotions before Goethe's birth-house and strolled along the Main. When we got tired we sat in the shade on the banks of the river (romantically designated in TAGL as "das Ufer," or, less melodiously, in Italian, "la riva"). We swapped stories and philosophies, memories and testimony late into the afternoon.
When the hour of Eli's naptime was past, I took Gabriele home to meet my family. He was duly and immediately impressed by what he called Lia's "forza di carattere," telling me later that he immediately recognized her as "una donna tosta."
He was also duly charmed by the girls. At one point Lia sat holding Katharine, who for her part faced me, Gabriele, and Jini and laughed raucously while lapping up all our easy adoration. She perhaps thought she had been translated. Eli dutifully pranced about me, clinging to my arms, laughing merrily, and emitting periodic squeals of affection--all of this calculated to give my long-lost friend the enduring impression that my children really like me. We ate ice cream sticks and then Gabriele went back to his sister's place for dinner.
Last night (Friday) Lia and I, with Katharine in tow, took the train out to tiny Kelkheim, where we had been invited to have dinner with Francesco, Emanuela, their son Daniel (11 mos.), and of course Gabriele (Jini, Julia, and Eli stayed behind for a princess festival that involved Jini's first, rhapsodic screening of Enchanted). We may have had there our best meal since arriving in Europe--finocchi (fennel), maiale condizionato (pork chops with loads of sauce and seasoning), salsiccie (sausages), insalata con maionnese, etc., followed by gelato. It was all wonderful. It was also wonderful to see Francesco again, and at last to meet Emanuela, about whom Gabriele often spoke with great admiration as a missionary and since.
Daniel and Katharine's relationship got off to a rocky start. Daniel panicked when Katharine laughingly grabbed his wrist, and he was a little timid and shaken forever thereafter. But they still had fun together, and Katharine was grateful to have access to a wider array of toys (by far) than she finds in our Frankfurt apartment.
We probably overstayed our welcome. Daniel usually goes to bed at 8, but it was well past 9 when we left. Gabriele accompanied us to the train station. Lia pushed Katharine around in circles in a successful effort to put her to sleep while Gabriele and I relived our very funniest mission stories. We hardly noticed we were alone at the station. Kelkheim is a small and sleepy town, after all, and few of its inhabitants could be expected to ride into the city late on a Friday night.
But we started to get concerned when our train was already ten minutes late, a truency unheard of in Germany (in Italy we might have gone on waiting contentedly for hours more). We re-checked the schedules and learned to our dismay that the last train of the night had already come and gone.
So we retraced our steps to the DiLillo pad and bummed a ride off Francesco (Gabriele naturally came along for that too). We were embarrassed to have overstayed our welcome and then required a ride of some length (about 20 minutes) to boot. But we were very grateful for wonderful company and a spectacular meal.
Today Gabriele and I went to the temple in Friedrichsdorf together. I showed him around the temple grounds and regaled him with stories from Elder F. Enzio Busche's magnificent memoir Yearning for the Living God about the construction and dedication of the Frankfurt Temple. It was a rich and wonderful experience to participate in a temple session together. He listened in English, I in German. I suggested to Gabriele afterward that we do our next temple session together in Rome. Che Dio lo voglia cosi.
We spent Wednesday afternoon stadtbummeling in downtown Frankfurt, with me playing cicerone to my old friend in Italian--quite a linguistic liberation after a four-week battle with That Awful German Language (TAGL). We paid our devotions before Goethe's birth-house and strolled along the Main. When we got tired we sat in the shade on the banks of the river (romantically designated in TAGL as "das Ufer," or, less melodiously, in Italian, "la riva"). We swapped stories and philosophies, memories and testimony late into the afternoon.
When the hour of Eli's naptime was past, I took Gabriele home to meet my family. He was duly and immediately impressed by what he called Lia's "forza di carattere," telling me later that he immediately recognized her as "una donna tosta."
He was also duly charmed by the girls. At one point Lia sat holding Katharine, who for her part faced me, Gabriele, and Jini and laughed raucously while lapping up all our easy adoration. She perhaps thought she had been translated. Eli dutifully pranced about me, clinging to my arms, laughing merrily, and emitting periodic squeals of affection--all of this calculated to give my long-lost friend the enduring impression that my children really like me. We ate ice cream sticks and then Gabriele went back to his sister's place for dinner.
Last night (Friday) Lia and I, with Katharine in tow, took the train out to tiny Kelkheim, where we had been invited to have dinner with Francesco, Emanuela, their son Daniel (11 mos.), and of course Gabriele (Jini, Julia, and Eli stayed behind for a princess festival that involved Jini's first, rhapsodic screening of Enchanted). We may have had there our best meal since arriving in Europe--finocchi (fennel), maiale condizionato (pork chops with loads of sauce and seasoning), salsiccie (sausages), insalata con maionnese, etc., followed by gelato. It was all wonderful. It was also wonderful to see Francesco again, and at last to meet Emanuela, about whom Gabriele often spoke with great admiration as a missionary and since.
Daniel and Katharine's relationship got off to a rocky start. Daniel panicked when Katharine laughingly grabbed his wrist, and he was a little timid and shaken forever thereafter. But they still had fun together, and Katharine was grateful to have access to a wider array of toys (by far) than she finds in our Frankfurt apartment.
We probably overstayed our welcome. Daniel usually goes to bed at 8, but it was well past 9 when we left. Gabriele accompanied us to the train station. Lia pushed Katharine around in circles in a successful effort to put her to sleep while Gabriele and I relived our very funniest mission stories. We hardly noticed we were alone at the station. Kelkheim is a small and sleepy town, after all, and few of its inhabitants could be expected to ride into the city late on a Friday night.
But we started to get concerned when our train was already ten minutes late, a truency unheard of in Germany (in Italy we might have gone on waiting contentedly for hours more). We re-checked the schedules and learned to our dismay that the last train of the night had already come and gone.
So we retraced our steps to the DiLillo pad and bummed a ride off Francesco (Gabriele naturally came along for that too). We were embarrassed to have overstayed our welcome and then required a ride of some length (about 20 minutes) to boot. But we were very grateful for wonderful company and a spectacular meal.
Today Gabriele and I went to the temple in Friedrichsdorf together. I showed him around the temple grounds and regaled him with stories from Elder F. Enzio Busche's magnificent memoir Yearning for the Living God about the construction and dedication of the Frankfurt Temple. It was a rich and wonderful experience to participate in a temple session together. He listened in English, I in German. I suggested to Gabriele afterward that we do our next temple session together in Rome. Che Dio lo voglia cosi.
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4 comments:
Sounds like a wonderful visit! I can't speak to the melodious qualities of Italian (although I'm sure it has nothing on Hungarian), but surely German deserves a little more than you give it here--after all, some of Mozart's arias, even if in German, are pretty spectacular. :)
Oh, Andrew is going to die of envy when he reads this post. Truly there is no place in the world he would have rather been then with you for that visit. It is so great you could meet up!
I don't know what una donna tosta means but I'm sure it's a high compliment. Lia, I probably already told you this. But I'll repeat it just in case: Becky Richardson's dad taught Elder Busche on his mission in Germany. Small world, huh?
una donna tosta I think it's something that goes with eggs and ham Mindy.
I thought you were learning Italian over there. Seems to me you're looking to discover the language equivalent of the great German pizza the world is so longingly seeking. A meal that will talk you full.
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