How is everything going? I hope wonderful! Life is all going really well! Last Tuesday we had our plans all thrown off because we were supposed to pick up that new Sorella at the Villa at 3:00 but the assistants called several times and the time kept getting pushed back. So finally we just decided we needed to go do grocery shopping then instead of after we picked her up because otherwise the store would be closed. This also meant we would be late picking up Sorella Giordano, but it was that or not have any groceries for the next week. So needless to say, we were about an hour late picking her up but she just got a longer time to interview with Presidente Kelly. Sorella Giordano is great, she has only been a member of the church for a year and a half and is the only member in her family and here she is serving a mission! She is from a small town called Cunio near Milano and got to spent a a day and a half with her. We took herwith us to go visit a member named Claire Fergusen who recently had surgery. I made her Moms roll recipe and she about died when she tasted them. I have made her cake twice and I think I have made a friend :D the lesson went really well with her also and we sang "He is Risen" before leaving. Sorella Giordano got really excited too because for a first lesson, it was not too bad!
Wednesday we had an appointment with Sorella Gigante out in the country near Bocchignano. We had never visited her before because it is so far away but she is a really strong member that loves to be involved in missionary work so we decided to go see her. We went there for lunch and her daughter, Alessandra was there as well. Because Sorella Pickett is a vegetarian, everything Sorella Gigante made was vegetarian. She made a pasta with broccoli and olive oil. As anyone who is familiar with my eating habits, they can tell you broccoli is about the last thing I would ever choose to eat out of my own free will. Sorella Pickett just looked at me and grinned and then I said a very earnest prayer. Seriously, I did. I prayed that I would not taste a thing as I ate that and you know what? I did not! It was the craziest thing, but that pasta actually tasted like nothing! I was able to eat the whole thing! The next course was various vegetables cooked in different ways, including mushrooms, artichokes . . . and I ate them all. Mom, Dad, I hope you are appreciating this, because you know how I was as a child. You could not have paid me to do that haha! But I actually kind of enjoyed those ones. My dislike for those was not quite as strong as the broccoli so we were okay there. But the lesson with her went really well. She was really excited to have Sorella Giordano there because it has been a while since they have had a native Italian Sister in the ward. Another cool thing from the day was that, due to the fact that Sorella Giordano does not speak English, I spoke Italian all day and actually did alright! I even understood most things as long is they did not get too excited and talk too fast for me to understand :) After that we had to get her back to the Villa with the rest of the new missionaries who had flown in that afternoon. I stopped and talked to one of the new Sorelle who actually had mine and Sorella Pickett's teacher in the MTC. She also had a ton of questions about the field, which I could answer even though I still am very much a greenie haha.
Thursday morning we had to go pick up Sorella Hashey, a sister who is coming to serve in Roma 3 for her last transfer. Her new companion, Sorella Urban, could not come up to Roma until Saturday because she had a finger printing appointment for her permesso so we had another part time roommate. Sorella Hashey was in the MTC with my companion, Sorella Pickett, so they had a lot of fun catching up on each others missions. At correlation I realized again that my Italian really has been picking up! I understood just about everything the assistant ward mission leader said during our meeting and I was even able to answer questions! For me, that has really boosted my self confidence. I am in NO way fluent HA! That would be a joke, but it is nice to have conversations around me be more than just background noise. English course also went really well, especially the spiritual thought at the end. We asked them all why they celebrate Easter and they all said it was more a tradition than anything. We then bore witness of what Easter means to us individually and as a church. The Spirit was very strong and it touched everyone in that room. Usually they all get squirmy at the end as we give our thought, but today they did not. Instead they were all smiling and who knows? Maybe something will come of it!
Friday began the day of this new transfer! In the afternoon we went and had lunch with Candy, our new investigator from Messico. She is so nice, especially to us, and still really interested in our message. We taught her the overview of the Plan of Salvation and the usual questions and comments came up. Many people have figured out Gods plan in their hearts, they know He loves us and that there is something more than the usual Heaven and Hell. We knew Him before we came to Earth and that we will remember that when the veil is removed. Because of this, they often times believe that their own religion teaches these truths. So while we were teaching Cany she would say things like "Oh yeah, my church teaches that too!" How do you tell someone they do not know what they are talking about? Not so easy, which is why it poses a problem trying to explain to people that it is the fact that their church does NOT have the full truth that makes our church special, why a restoration was needed and why it is the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints alone that has the fullness of Gods plan. Either way she enjoyed what we taught and she has agreed to meet with us again. She is curious and has a lot of questions. As long as she prays and reads the Book of Mormon on her own she will find the truth for herself! That afternoon we called Susan to see if we could come and visit her and the first thing she says is "I am having my matrimonio tomorrow! You need to come!" As far as we knew, she had been married to her husband Ramaskey but I guess their marriage was not legal in Italy so the were getting married Saturday morning! She asked us to come over Friday night to visit with her so we went over and peeled and cut carrots, green beans, and this African root that is often used in Uganda. It took an hour with four of us, I do not want to think about how long it would have taken her to do that alone! Yikes!
So Saturday morning we trekked out to Circo Massimo because they were getting married in a really old Roman Temple up the street. It was so special :) Susan is the sweetest lady ever and she was so happy! Her and Ramaskey were both dressed in traditional African clothes and she looked BEAUTIFUL! Emanuele was not there, but that is alright. His mother said he only would have caused problems, which is probably true haha! That afternoon we went to BELLA E LA BESTIA! It has been showing in Roma since October and we got permission from President to go and see it during our lunch/dinner break on Saturday. It was SO good! Sure it was in Italian and I did not really understand it but i loved it! Other part of this story that will continue into a later part of this letter is Antonio. On the way to the theater, which we were running really late, we were stopped by this Italian man asking where the Colosseo was. First off, we are obviously Americans, why on earth would an Italian ask us that? But we stopped and explained then he asked about who we were so we gave him our number and pass along card, not really thinking about it. After the play we saw he had called three times. We called back and made an appointment for the next day at Termini (nice and big and public) assuming there would be no problems there. Ha. We were wrong, but I wont get ahead of myself.
Sunday was great! We had fast and testimony meeting and all of the little kids got up and said "So che Gesu Cristo è vero!" which was too cute and we got an appointment with Beth for that afternoon. Also, a ton of less actives came to church! Sorella Duran, Sorella Rosario, Sorella Furcas, Lhouisa . . . We were so happy to see that our efforts with them have been working! Our lesson with Beth also went great! She has really warmed up to us and has started to trust us again because after everything with Perry she knows now that we really do care and that people/investigators are not just numbers to us. We left feeling really good and made our way to Termini to meet up with Antonio. But we saw him on the bus we had gotten on and as soon as we saw him, neither of us felt good about it. We did not wave or anything and got off at the metro station to head home but that is when he saw us. We did not think it was a bad enough situation to weasel our way out then so we then went to Piazza Bologna to talk with him. I will say one thing, he was NOT interested in the gospel. I did not understand everything he was saying to Sorella Pickett, but she filled me in later. What I did observe was him continually trying to hold her hand and stared at her with complete adoration. She would pull away and kept talking about Christ and Joseph Smith. I later found out he had said "You served a mission in Italy to find me" "You have beautiful hands" "Do you have a boyfriend? . . . Well that does present a problem" "You could convert me to be a priest with those eyes" "I can wait six months for my greatest dream" and my favorite "I can tell you have a beautiful soul. I saw it from the moment I first laid eyes on you." So as soon as an opportunity presented itself we high tailed it out of there. We took quite a different way home and kept checking behind us to make sure he was not following us. We are 100% sure he has no idea where on earth we live, thank goodness. But that has not stopped him from texting and calling us. Yay.
Monday morning we had Consiglio with our new District Leader, Anziano Mercado. He is much different than Anziano Pesci but that is not a bad thing. He is a good mission and very responsible. He will do a lot of good here in Roma. Because Antonio knows the address of the church we took a different bus home from the church that morning and it was taking forever! Sorella Pickett finally said " This is the slowest 36 bus ever." I looked over at the bus driver and responded "that would be because he is reading the newspaper." Very typical of the dependable public transportation system! Whoot! That evening we met with Martina Aquaro, one of our former investigators who moved to Paris. She is here for Easter and we had a great lesson with her studying from il Libro di Mormon. Normally we push her during the lessons to find out what is keeping her from being baptized since she has been investigating the church since 2004, but today we just chose to read with her where she is at in the Book of Mormon. We read 2 Nephi 7 and 8. You know Isaiah, he does not mince words and we could all feel that. Martina really enjoyed it and I think that will be the most effective plan for her, getting her more involved in the Book of Mormon. There is no better way to overcome your fears than gain a firmer trust and faith in Jesus Christ! That night we had a lesson with the Lopez family. They are really strong members of the church and their daughter, Donatella, is getting baptized soon so her dad asked if we would give her a couple of the lessons in preparation. We played the Apostasy game and talked about prophets with her. She is too cute and said that she never realized how blessed we all are :)
Tuesday morning we went to Sorella Pezzettis to help her clean her house. We worked on the same window for two hours. Italian apartments have these blinders that cover the windows on the outside and Rome has dark slime that covers everything on the outside. Her blinders are white and we scrubbed that forever! Then cleaned the windows and everything around it. By the end Sorella Pezzetti made us lunch. She is proprio Italiana so pasta was on the menu. And Italians think olive oil is sufficient as the only topping and she gave us each about 200 grams of it. I thought I would die and I just looked at Sorella Pickett with pleading eyes, so when Sorella Pezzetti left the room she let me put half of my pasta on her plate. You are correct, Sorella Pickett loves me enough to eat 300 grams of pasta. Disgusting . . . After that we went to Rosa Rivera's for a lesson. We watched Elder Hollands talk from conference in Spanish and she fell asleep :) she works so hard and it is hard for her to stay away in the afternoons. But she really liked the parts she heard! That night we had another appointment with Angela Pastor and we watched "Finding Faith in Christ". Afterwards she told us she had made us pasta . . . oh boy. Sorella Pickett sadly told her she could not eat it, otherwise she would be sick. Luckily for her, Angela just laughed.
So this week included a lot of food and the joys in serving the Lord. I love this work and seeing the gospel change lives, especially mine :) Love you all! MUAH!
Vi Amo!
Sorella LeCates
