6 Short Weeks

Well, my time in Florence is already up. It looks like I will be moving on to Livorno with Sorella Crandall (we were in the MTC together!). It was kind of an unexpected transfer. We thought that our area might be closed down, instead the Florence 1 sisters are being blown out and their area will be closed for a transfer. They have quite a bit of work, so it will be divided out among the Elders and a few will be taken over by Sorella Favero and Sorella Millis (I was in the MTC with her too.) who will remain in Florence 2. Sister Watson is going to the island, and guess who her new companion is? Sorella Hughes! She was Sorella Crandall’s companion when we were in the MTC, weird. I am pretty excited to work with Sorella Crandall, and I hear Livorno is beautiful, but I will let you know for sure next week once I have arrived.

Ok, so aside from transfers the other exciting parts of my week: Thursday there was a bus strike (that’s not uncommon) and we had an appointment with some members in the morning. We were going to walk from the train station nearest their home, but it ended up the train didn’t leave until later than we would have hoped and so we ended up walking from a different train station. It was quite the walk, and it took us about an hour! We were pretty pooped by the end of the day from all our walking.

Friday we had another wonderful lesson with Yvonne, as usual. Her sister-in-laws were there as well. We were able to do a more complete first lesson with them and again they shared experiences and testimony. It is so wonderful to see people who care about their religious beliefs enough to actually do something about it.

Saturday we had our open house at the church. We all put quite a bit of work into it. We had cleaned up the church and had pictures for all the rooms, and had been handing out flyers for 2 weeks. We had also been visiting with all the members and giving them the task of inviting their friends. In the end there were 6 people who showed up: 2 investigators from the Florence 1 sisters, 2 students from their English class and one of our members with a friend. I was a little sad that there weren’t more people there, but it still went really well for those who did show up. It is kind of sad that it has taken me this long to realize it, but member missionary work is so, so, so, so important! I think it was Elder Perry in his conference talk this past conference who mentioned the full time missionaries as under utilized teaching aids. I felt frustrated with the members but then I thought back to myself before the mission and it’s not like I was going out of my way to give the missionaries referrals. I feel now that I have such a greater understanding of our roll as members of the church. People are much more receptive to their own friends then they are to a perfect stranger who is walking up to them in a park or ringing their door. I hope I never forget this lesson that I have finally learned.

Hmm… Ok I don’t really know what else to say. I felt like I had so much to say and now I can’t organize my thoughts at all! As far as stories go… hmm… Yesterday while we were at the park (we teach Italian to a member of our branch and a few of her friends who are here with their husbands who are studying art) I was telling a story and out of my peripheral vision I saw this little bum poking out from behind a slide. I realized it was a little girl who decided that she needed to use the bathroom and because there weren’t any around (there are almost no public restrooms here) she just went behind the slide and squatted, ha ha it was so gross, but kinda funny. When she finished she just ran back over to her sister and started playing again while her grandfather sat obliviously on a park bench reading a newspaper.

I love you all so much and I love this gospel! Being a missionary is amazing and I really feel like I am learning and growing in so many different ways. Vi voglio bene.