Bologna, Italy

Wow, another incredible trip for me. I just feel so lucky to be doing all the things I am doing now. Kyle had a conference in Bologna, Italy, on the evening of Friday, Feb. 16, so we flew out of Brussels that morning. Even though the two plane rides made the day feel long, we actually arrived in Bologna by 1pm. We stayed in a very modern-feeling hotel. It was fun to stay in a place for a few nights that I would never want to live in. All of these modern features reminded me of how my mind does not work anything like a designer’s. I could barely open the closet doors because the knob was so small and didn’t have a groove for your fingers to hold on to. Kyle and I couldn’t figure out how to turn on or off any of the lights we actually wanted on or off, so we ended up just hitting all 12 buttons in the room and crossing our fingers. There was one switch that we kept thinking was the light switch for the bathroom, but instead it turned on the speakers in the bathroom, which were hooked up to the TV in the bedroom. So while you were hoping for light, instead you got Italian TV blaring in your ear.

On Friday we had a nice lunch before Kyle headed off to the conference. He spoke on a panel about economic freedom in Italy (his topic was how the EU affects Italy’s economic freedom) and then was lucky enough to be able to have dinner with a few others at a local Italian’s ‘in town’ apartment (versus his ‘outskirts of the city’ house). Kyle said he ate the best lasagna he has ever had in his life. The man had artwork everywhere, including three paintings from the 1500s.

While Kyle was dining on homemade lasagna and talking EU politics, I was doing what I do best -- wandering. One of my favorite buttons that my mom found for me says, “Not all who wander are lost.” I sometimes feel like I should have that saying tattooed on my forehead. I just love to wander around a city and feel like I am discovering so many new things. This situation works out perfectly for Kyle and me, because when we hit a new city (and he is working) I go scout out the cool things and then the next day I take him back to see the highlights. By then I have found the opening hours of places and a few cute restaurants to try, and am pretty familiar with the streets. So by having me tagging along on his business trips, he gets a personal tour guide!

Friday night I wandered down to the main plaza and saw a neat fire-baton display. I wandered the streets for awhile longer and happened onto the nicest mall I have ever seen. It wasn’t so much a mall as it was a row of incredible nice stores. I have never seen Bvlgari, Fendi, Yves Saint Laurent, Burberry, Cartier, Gucci, Louis Vuitton, Dolce Gabanna, and Hermes stores all in the same place. Needless to say, I was in heaven window shopping!

God was really working in my life Friday night. Keep in mind that I was raised Catholic and even group prayer out loud makes me a little uncomfortable, so talking like this is not something I ever do. However, I was so moved that night that I feel the need to share. After touring the plaza I wandered down a quaint little side street. I happened upon a church, so I decided to go in. I don’t know what came over me, but as I was standing there looking at the beautiful church I just started thinking of how lucky I was. I thought of how much I love Kyle and how many family and friends we have who love us, and how we are having such incredible adventures while we are here and we are doing them all together. I just got so overwhelmed with how blessed I am that I started crying tears of happiness. I didn’t know what else to do with my thanksgiving except praise God for blessing my life so much, so I fell to my knees in the church and just starting praying. I had only been there for a minute or two and was just drying my eyes when the church bells started ringing and all of the sudden I realized that I was there at the beginning of the 6pm Friday mass. I thought about leaving because I knew I sure wasn’t going to understand a word, but then I realized that I had nowhere I needed to go and no one I needed to meet, and that I hadn’t been to mass in a long time. So there I was at mass on a Friday night in this little church in Bologna, Italy.

I went to Catholic school from kindergarten through twelfth grade, which meant that I attended mass on every first Friday of the month and every Holy Day for 13 years. That is a lot of masses. However, I fell away from the Catholic Church during college and, since Kyle is Methodist, we have been going to a variety of other churches instead. I figure that I hadn’t been to a mass in six years. But it was amazing that as I stood there in church and didn’t understand a word that was going on, I could still feel the rhythm of the words and pick up on what I should be saying. Sadly I didn’t remember every word or part of the mass, but every so often the words would come back to me and there I was, regardless of the language or country, celebrating mass with others.

The question has been raised before as to why I don’t convert to a different denomination if I haven’t gone to mass in so long. Although I don’t agree with everything the Catholic Church says, I do like many parts of it. I am still searching, and who knows where I will end up, but for right now I love the fact that I can travel the world and still know that there is a place where things won’t change and where, no matter what the language or location, I can still feel at home in the church.

After mass I headed off to dinner alone and really thought about my experience. I was really worried that because I had had such a strong experience that something bad must have happened at home. But I saw Kyle later that night and nothing bad had happened to him or any of my family. I guess God doesn’t always need to be speaking to you about some important topic to just give you a strong reminder that He is still in your life.

Saturday Kyle and I toured around Bologna a bit more. We had a wonderful dinner that night in true Italian style – a plate of antipasti, a pasta dish, then a meat dish and an espresso shot to finish it off. I honestly don’t know how they all stay so fit if they eat like that all the time!

All in all, it was a wonderful three-day weekend! Click here for photos of our trip.