31 March 2010
Hello family!
Well this week has been...funnnn...
Let's give the big news/disaster of the week first--Thursday night we went to use the computer in the church that we knew the password to so we could make publicity stuff for the concert we're doing to find new investigators (we're teaching the first lesson between songs). So, the Anziani were doing a lesson near the genealogy center and there was a member there talking to us and we didn't want to disturb the lesson by talking so we unfortunately took the computer with us to the kitchen and plugged it into an outlet with some weird currents or something, and that was the end of the computer. So we called people and told them what had happened, and they aren't happy. They didn't lose any files, the other computer is just too old for the new program or something, or else it's just not installed. Who knows. But the woman who gave us the password hates us, and would like to kill us. Va bene. The Anziani called us last night and suggested that we call the Branch President and just tell him what happened and ask what we should do about it, etc. So I did, and the Branch President just told me "Sorella, don't worry about it. Nobody's mad at you and if they are then they shouldn't be. There was a problem with the wiring, now we know and it won't happen again. So don't worry about it, it was nobody's fault." There are reasonable and good people in the world. I need to keep praying for charity. I happened to read 2 Corinthians 2 this morning and that helped. It's really hard to be Christlike sometimes though.
Thursday we also ran into an inactive from Los Angeles (at least he went to UCLA and claims LA). His name is John Hill and he's married to an Italian girl and has lived here for four years. Pretty interesting guy, we need to give him a Book of Mormon, he really doesn't know much about the church.
Friday we saw Tina, and she was quiet while we did a little demo of the apostasy with little cups with the apostles and a few principles of the gospel and Jesus on top. And she liked the Restoration film. And the thing she liked the most was that I turned the cord for the dvd player the right way so it worked and she saved money by not having to buy a new dvd player. She kind of just wants company and to feed us, and maybe to come to church some day. We'll see, but we probably won't go super often.
Then we finally saw Richa, the 18 year old daughter of an inactive. We've been trying to see her for a while without success. But we got to her, and she brought a friend to the lesson who wants to learn too. And when we showed Lucia the Book of Mormon and explained it and read from Moroni she said "so Moroni is one of the prophets from the ancient Americas." She is the first person I have met who has put that together. So we'll see them again tomorrow.
And then Angela and Salvo. Well, they kind of are just saying things because they think it will make us happy but it really doesn't...we'll see what happens with them but they come with all of these spiritual experiences they've had that they refuse to act on. Vediamo.
Saturday we saw Lillian, the wonderful woman from Nigeria who is so happy and just talks all the time about how much Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ love her and how many blessings she has received. These African immigrants are SO incredibly grateful for everything, it's really an amazing and humbling experience to be with them. She's awesome.
Sunday daylight savings time started. We went to bed a bit early to make up for it. Unfortunately the Anziani were not on the same page and called us to tell us we could sleep until 7:30 after we were already asleep, which made it incredibly difficult to get back to sleep... Church is always an adventure...we skipped some Easter film for a really weird gospel principles discussion. I hear the movie was beautiful, I think the investigators might have liked it too. Oh well.
We went to Sorella Bacchetti's for lunch and we told her about 500 times that we don't eat a lot and so we didn't! We were full when we left but normally at other people's houses I'm that full after the first. (primo piatto=pasta) And she said she'd come do missionary work with us because she's not scared to talk to people. She'd see them and say "hey you, your face is cute, talk to these girls!" Hahaha.
Sunday evening we met with the Smedila family. WAY CUTE. They have three little girls, one who's ten and way smart and kind of quieter. Two who are 7 and way smart and way talkative. So hilarious, and they do all the hand language stuff and they're just like little teeny grown ups. SO much personality. I love going to good families here, where you can tell they love each other and the parents are teaching good things. We introduced the plan--we go and teach them, then we go back and they teach us. And the whole time they pray to think of somebody to share the gospel with, and at the end of the month we figure out how to do it.
Monday we watched the Preach my Gospel videos on how to work with members. Well. We have no branch missionaries, I don't know if they do Branch Counsel but none of the missionaries go, etc etc etc. That was fun. We decided we need to work more with the branch and help them do this work.
We went to the famiglia Rizzo. They are so cute. The four kids are the smiliest people that I have ever seen, and they are just great. They're always working on ways to share the gospel with the rest of their family members. We're going to do the teaching/referral program with them too. I love people who have conversations, and don't just yell.
Yesterday we walked around a lot to do pubblicità for our concert. Hopefully people will come. We need new investigators, who actually want to do something and who actually want to see us and who will actually answer their phones!
There was that whole deal with the computers last night. Francesca, the member who was with it when it happened, has gotten some flack too. She said "don't worry, the church is true. If it wasn't I would have left six years ago. When I got baptized." She also said the same thing happened with her computer this week, it was fine and someone used it and now something's wrong, and the person apologized and she said "it's fine, it happened, what am I going to do, tell them we can't be friends anymore?" The nice people give me hope.
Our friend Stefania in English course doesn't believe that there is a man in the world who is faithful. At least not in Italy. I'm really grateful for good men, by the way. They do exist. And I get to marry one. And obviously you've got to have a lot of faith and trust but it's not impossible to find good, faithful people.
Today we went to the market, always fun. They have asparagus nowadays. And octopus, but we didn't buy that.
Well, anyway, I know the church is true. I know Heavenly Father answers prayers, through the Holy Ghost and through other people. We've met a couple of angels this week who have rescued us from bad situations or just brought a voice of reason and hope in mankind back to the earth. Heavenly Father really does love us. It's pretty amazing. I'm really excited for conference this weekend, it's going to be great, I'm excited to hear what the Prophet and the Apostles have to say because they always know, somehow, how to address the individual needs of every person in the church, and in the world, honestly.
Have a wonderful week! Happy Easter! Christ lives!!! How amazing is that?
Love you,
Eliza
Well this week has been...funnnn...
Let's give the big news/disaster of the week first--Thursday night we went to use the computer in the church that we knew the password to so we could make publicity stuff for the concert we're doing to find new investigators (we're teaching the first lesson between songs). So, the Anziani were doing a lesson near the genealogy center and there was a member there talking to us and we didn't want to disturb the lesson by talking so we unfortunately took the computer with us to the kitchen and plugged it into an outlet with some weird currents or something, and that was the end of the computer. So we called people and told them what had happened, and they aren't happy. They didn't lose any files, the other computer is just too old for the new program or something, or else it's just not installed. Who knows. But the woman who gave us the password hates us, and would like to kill us. Va bene. The Anziani called us last night and suggested that we call the Branch President and just tell him what happened and ask what we should do about it, etc. So I did, and the Branch President just told me "Sorella, don't worry about it. Nobody's mad at you and if they are then they shouldn't be. There was a problem with the wiring, now we know and it won't happen again. So don't worry about it, it was nobody's fault." There are reasonable and good people in the world. I need to keep praying for charity. I happened to read 2 Corinthians 2 this morning and that helped. It's really hard to be Christlike sometimes though.
Thursday we also ran into an inactive from Los Angeles (at least he went to UCLA and claims LA). His name is John Hill and he's married to an Italian girl and has lived here for four years. Pretty interesting guy, we need to give him a Book of Mormon, he really doesn't know much about the church.
Friday we saw Tina, and she was quiet while we did a little demo of the apostasy with little cups with the apostles and a few principles of the gospel and Jesus on top. And she liked the Restoration film. And the thing she liked the most was that I turned the cord for the dvd player the right way so it worked and she saved money by not having to buy a new dvd player. She kind of just wants company and to feed us, and maybe to come to church some day. We'll see, but we probably won't go super often.
Then we finally saw Richa, the 18 year old daughter of an inactive. We've been trying to see her for a while without success. But we got to her, and she brought a friend to the lesson who wants to learn too. And when we showed Lucia the Book of Mormon and explained it and read from Moroni she said "so Moroni is one of the prophets from the ancient Americas." She is the first person I have met who has put that together. So we'll see them again tomorrow.
And then Angela and Salvo. Well, they kind of are just saying things because they think it will make us happy but it really doesn't...we'll see what happens with them but they come with all of these spiritual experiences they've had that they refuse to act on. Vediamo.
Saturday we saw Lillian, the wonderful woman from Nigeria who is so happy and just talks all the time about how much Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ love her and how many blessings she has received. These African immigrants are SO incredibly grateful for everything, it's really an amazing and humbling experience to be with them. She's awesome.
Sunday daylight savings time started. We went to bed a bit early to make up for it. Unfortunately the Anziani were not on the same page and called us to tell us we could sleep until 7:30 after we were already asleep, which made it incredibly difficult to get back to sleep... Church is always an adventure...we skipped some Easter film for a really weird gospel principles discussion. I hear the movie was beautiful, I think the investigators might have liked it too. Oh well.
We went to Sorella Bacchetti's for lunch and we told her about 500 times that we don't eat a lot and so we didn't! We were full when we left but normally at other people's houses I'm that full after the first. (primo piatto=pasta) And she said she'd come do missionary work with us because she's not scared to talk to people. She'd see them and say "hey you, your face is cute, talk to these girls!" Hahaha.
Sunday evening we met with the Smedila family. WAY CUTE. They have three little girls, one who's ten and way smart and kind of quieter. Two who are 7 and way smart and way talkative. So hilarious, and they do all the hand language stuff and they're just like little teeny grown ups. SO much personality. I love going to good families here, where you can tell they love each other and the parents are teaching good things. We introduced the plan--we go and teach them, then we go back and they teach us. And the whole time they pray to think of somebody to share the gospel with, and at the end of the month we figure out how to do it.
Monday we watched the Preach my Gospel videos on how to work with members. Well. We have no branch missionaries, I don't know if they do Branch Counsel but none of the missionaries go, etc etc etc. That was fun. We decided we need to work more with the branch and help them do this work.
We went to the famiglia Rizzo. They are so cute. The four kids are the smiliest people that I have ever seen, and they are just great. They're always working on ways to share the gospel with the rest of their family members. We're going to do the teaching/referral program with them too. I love people who have conversations, and don't just yell.
Yesterday we walked around a lot to do pubblicità for our concert. Hopefully people will come. We need new investigators, who actually want to do something and who actually want to see us and who will actually answer their phones!
There was that whole deal with the computers last night. Francesca, the member who was with it when it happened, has gotten some flack too. She said "don't worry, the church is true. If it wasn't I would have left six years ago. When I got baptized." She also said the same thing happened with her computer this week, it was fine and someone used it and now something's wrong, and the person apologized and she said "it's fine, it happened, what am I going to do, tell them we can't be friends anymore?" The nice people give me hope.
Our friend Stefania in English course doesn't believe that there is a man in the world who is faithful. At least not in Italy. I'm really grateful for good men, by the way. They do exist. And I get to marry one. And obviously you've got to have a lot of faith and trust but it's not impossible to find good, faithful people.
Today we went to the market, always fun. They have asparagus nowadays. And octopus, but we didn't buy that.
Well, anyway, I know the church is true. I know Heavenly Father answers prayers, through the Holy Ghost and through other people. We've met a couple of angels this week who have rescued us from bad situations or just brought a voice of reason and hope in mankind back to the earth. Heavenly Father really does love us. It's pretty amazing. I'm really excited for conference this weekend, it's going to be great, I'm excited to hear what the Prophet and the Apostles have to say because they always know, somehow, how to address the individual needs of every person in the church, and in the world, honestly.
Have a wonderful week! Happy Easter! Christ lives!!! How amazing is that?
Love you,
Eliza
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