Trieste & Gorizia

We are now inspecting more apartments  I think we have about 40 of them to do now (once per quarter).  So this week we decided to go on Wednesday to Genova to inspect three apartment there.  Genoa is a beautiful city right on the coast.  But it is a horrible city to own a car.  Easy to get lost and no place to park.

When we got to the elders apartment they were parking three cars on one side of the street and one car on the other side of the street.  I was very fortunate to find the only open space (that is me in the dark blue Opel in the middle spot).

While up in the Elders apartment I looked down to the street and saw some Italian paring right behind my car.  Oh well, they will be gone in 30 minutes when we leave.  No! they were still there.  I banged on the top of the car to make some noise and alert someone that I needed to get out.  After several minutes a guy screams at us from the coffee shop that he will be out.  Wait another 5 minutes and two guys come out grumbling and very upset that they need to move their car.  They get in their car but it doesn't move.  Peg talks to them and they say the car is too hot and they need to wait 30 minutes for it to cool down.  They say it does this all the time.  15 minutes later they try to start the car and it wont start.  After several more it attempts they finally get the car to start.  The whole time they are grumbling and cussing at us that we are making them move. Italian drivers - got to love them.

We have been working with the Elders in Trieste for a month to get an old apartment that we are closing cleaned out.  The landlord claim that everything in the apartment is ours.  It is all old and junk that we would never buy. The Elders have been asking in church for help to move everything to the dump. But no help.  We We tell them that we will drive the 4.5 hours there with the van on Saturday to get the junk hauled out.  Then on Thursday, Sister Dibb announced that she will be using the van.  I attempt to change her mind, but no luck.  I then call the Keeffers who only live 1.5 hours from Trieste to see if they would be willing to help.  Maybe with two hatch back cars we can get the job done.

We get up at 4 am to get there on time, and luckily find the only open parking spot for blocks only 2 buildings up from the front door.  When we get up toe the 4th floor apartment and open the door, it is horrible.  At least 4 times the stuff that I expected.  There are large wardrobes, beds, couches, tables, chairs, shelves, cupboards, refrigerators, washing machine and even a kitchen sink. It is impossible to get all of this done in one day.  I get the elders going and we start to haul broken down shelves to our car.  With the back seats down we load it up to the roof, and then head off to the dump..The 1st dump wont take wood so we go to the next dump and unload it.  By the time we get back to the apartment it has been 1 hour just going to the dump and back and we have at least 12 loads to go!  Mean time Peggy and Sister Keeffer are standing up on the balcony wondering how this job will ever get done.  They notice that across the street is a junk dealer.  They walk over they and ask him if he wants any of the stuff we are getting rid of.  He came over and offers to take the so-so stuff away for 150 euros.  Great, then he asks what we are doing with all of the other junk.  He offers to take care of everything for 200 euros.  Sold!  He had 4 guys there immediately and in under an hour the place was complexly cleaned out, while the elders swept and cleaned.  We were done a little after noon!  This was a miracle!  We then took the Elders to lunch.  Trieste was a nice city.

After lunch we drove with the Keeffers to Gorizia, a city that is right on the Italy / Slovenia boarder.  Here is the church.

The organist was practicing while we were walking around the church, it was really neat.

On our walk up to an old castle I saw this private drive way.  Very nice place to park!

Nice door

There was a vegetarian festival going on at the castle.  The grounds had sea pines - very nice.

Looking across into Slovenia

Here is the church we went through.

In the castle was an armory with lots of medieval weapons.  This helmet must have been used by a guy with a very large nose - or he would head but his enemies.  Not sure which.

They even had a music room room with lots of old instruments.  Here is tiny portable organ.

Nice views

They even had a cannon!

Here is the castle as seen from the church building. 

We then drove north several kilometers to a piazza where the Slovenian train station is on one side of the border and the hotel is on the other side.  There is this large medallion in the center of the piazza marking the border.  We all stood on the medallion and took our picture.  Elder Keeffer said we had one saint, a sinner and two fence sitters. I was the sinner on the Slovenian side. (missionaries are not to leave their mission).

Here is Peggy standing on the boarder.  We were in Slovenia!  WOW

We then drove to Roverado and spent the night at the Keeffer's.  It is a super nice small quite town.  The tallest building is only two stories, lots of singles family homes and no graffiti!  Sunday we went to church with the Keeffers in Pordenone at the military ward.  Wow, the building was fabulous.  New construction, carpet, pews and no folding chairs and loads of classrooms.  No doubt this is the nicest church building in Italy! And everyone spoke English.  It was great to be able to understand the discussion in the classes. They even had sandwich bread for the sacrament!