Yesterday I agreed to meet Visi in town this morning. He wanted me to get some pictures of him in his suit. Today was a celebration in Tirana for the Christian Church in Albania and he planned to attend the festivities with Pastor Alban. Visi has really risen over the past seven months to become Alban’s right hand in Fushekruje, which is a blessing both to him and to the Church. Alban is fortunate to have a man like Ervis Reka at his side and on the other end of the telephone line whenever he needs something.
I celebrated Thanksgiving dinner at the Plagenhoef’s house in Sanitorium. At the house were the Diaz family from Brazil, and the Wiersma family from Illinois. There were 13 of us in all. Pastor Kurt asked us each to say one thing that we were thankful for. The thing I gave thanks for was for my friendship with Visi. I tried to explain, as I will briefly try to explain here, that my friendship with Visi was not something I would have sought out on my own.
Visi and I were given the challenge of working together early on in my time here, and our differences became obvious before the first moment had lapsed. He has honored me from the beginning, showing me favor, friendship, care, concern, grace, and generosity. Today while we sat, talking over coffee near the center of Tirana, I found that we were genuinely laughing with each-other. Working side-by-side for seven months makes the language barrier a blessing to expression. We have grown to be able to interpret each-other’s eye language, moods, body language, tone of voice, even pace of speech. And isn’t that what we really need to be paying attention to anyway? Isn’t that how we were intended to be known?
albaniacalling 
Making friends through adversity seems to be a trend for you Joshua! Happy Thanksgiving! Miss you a ton.