Back in early November was the first time we met the Strecovitch family. One of the Elders in the ward recognized the father of the family, when he slipped into sacrament meeting by himself two weeks in a row, from the time he had met him earlier elsewhere. In talking to Alecio, the Elder found out that he was a member, and had 7 children at home, 4 of whom had not been baptized yet. If you ever want to make a missionary drool, just tell him that! Their problem was that they live a good 30 minutes out of town, and transportation was the issue. The Elders got out to their place one time, but found that they live in an enclave of illegal, ramshackle, pasted together hovels, where the kids run wild and they were unable to corral them long enough for any kind of lesson because of their undisciplined behavior.
The Elders begged for help from us, not only to drive them there, but to help teach them if possible. Our first look at their place was quite a shock, it had rained and the ground was muddy and strewn with hoses stretched across the width of their yard as we drove in. The people there tap into the city's water supply that way, and also know how to string electricity to their places too. We hear that the police raid this complex of several streets of shacks periodically, tearing out all their lines and hoses, but before long things are back in place and 'normal' for them once more.
Alecio is Italian by birth, and found the church when he was a young man. His wife is a Bosnian gypsy, born to that nomadic culture and way of life, and when they married she persuaded him to join in it also. His family were so upset by this that they disowned him. Somewhere along the line though, Rosa gained a testimony of the gospel and was baptized, to the dismay and chagrin of her own family with their traditional Catholic background. Some of their children were born in Italy, some in Germany, and now some in France, and they all have language issues and speak quite the mixture of Italian/German/French. The kids are struggling in school, where they stand out because of their slightly shabby used clothing; their language problems have some insensitive teachers telling them to 'go back to where you came from, we don't want you here'. They don't go to school regularly, so keeping up is hard, but two of them are especially smart and determined, so there is hope for them.
Their house is an amazing conglomeration of cast-off pieces of building materials, such as french doors with glass squares, which make up the front wall, and Rosa's cooking area is a room off one side of their long front porch. Alecio is industrious to the max and has created a huge living room space for them with wooden floors and a roaring fire in a make-shift stove made from a metal barrel complete with a fat pipe that leads straight up through the ceiling. I was impressed by how shipshape the room was, with paintings on the walls, and couches and cupboards and a large round table and plenty of chairs. He probably is a collector (with his large, white panel truck, with no seats), a scavenger of discarded items that people put out on the sidewalks and within minutes just disappear as if into thin air. Rosa is a sweet-faced earth-mother type with a lovely serene smile and laid back manner with the chaos all around her.....'Oh, these children', she would say to me over and over as they raced madly around, showing off to their four foreign visitors. But then Jack took control, and before long had them seated, and mesmerized as he taught them about Joseph Smith's first vision. The 8 year old, shy Indira, 10 year old wise-eyed Kelly, the deceptively quiet 12 year old Sara, and 14 year old Sofia who is just budding into young womanhood all listened intently, but the younger three listened best. Sofia was easily distracted and hard to reengage, but we loved being with these kids, they are good kids, just clueless at how to comport themselves in an accepted manner. There is also 6 year old Daniel, the instigator of all havoc in the house - literally bouncing off the walls and off his sisters with karate chops to the backs of their legs or boxing and hitting them whenever they weren't looking; wow what a kid! Jack even corralled him for awhile. The other children are 3 year old Kristina, with deep dimples and a crush on one of the Elders which she showed by pummeling his face constantly, and 1 year old Samata Amela, big eyed with amazing dimples also, who was still nursing and was very insistant about it! What a family...we went home happy, but exhausted, and hoped that they had learned what they needed to know about the prophet and what an important event the first vision was; and we left wanting to return again to see them again soon.Well, I had to set the stage, so if you are interested in the rest of the story you will have to wait for chapter 2. ;)
Love to you all.........Mom (Joanne)
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