Pistachio Flavored Coffee House

Tonight we hosted our monthly coffee house and it went well. Twenty Italians participated with us Americans. (Not sure about the grammatical structure of that sentence.) We have been having live music lately which gives it a different feel, but this time we just had music playing and we sat around and talked, played games and drank milk-shakes. Our friend Francesco brought a DVD with his new short film (see post below) and we showed it three times throughout the evening. He had invited friends and brought several people he had just met off the street to come watch. We had purchased pistachios and pistachio-flavored gelato to give the evening a green theme as well (see previous post about his film). There was lots of good conversation. I really enjoy sharing with people our idea of church or community and challenging them to look at it from a different angle. I was also really sharpened by some of Francesco's thoughts tonight on what we call in our churchy circles 'integrity'. He, in his own, poetic way, talked about the need to say what you mean and do what you say and about his passion to learn from people. I also met a new guy, Nicolas, who works in a pizzeria downtown and he told us to come by and try their specialty from Taranto, the puccia, which incidentally, in my native Chile, means 'darn it'. Also, not to be forgotten, one of Francesco's friends, Lorenzo, showed up for just a little bit. When I introduced myself I knew I had met him before but he was sure we hadn't. I kept talking to him and figured it out, even if he didn't remember it. In the summer of 2002, he and his friend Alessandro (both scratchers), invited me and two short-termers from a CIY group to try a kebab. Long story short, our team owes this young man a HUGE debt of gratitude. Lorenzo, this kebab's for you!