So p-day was pretty sweet. We climbed mount Etna! Okay, not really because you can't really. But I was there :) But all things come in due time, therefore I will start with last week.
So last Wednesday we went to go see all the sites here in Catania and then we went and had granite with brioche at the Lindt store. Number one, I LOVE granita! It's delicious. They have it in other places in Italy but the Sicilian kind is way better. Especially the almond flavor. Delicious! Then we did the shopping because we were pretty much out of food. At that point I was dying of a head ache but we did not have time to go home and sleep so instead we went and did finding. We went to a zone above our house and went singing from door to door. Either the singing is more appreciated or the people in Sicily are nicer . . . I do not know which, but we meet a lot less rejection doing house this way. We just go and ask if we can sing a hymn and a lot of people say yes. We then sing "I am a Child of God" and then when we are done they have felt the spirit and we talk about our message and usually get their number. I like it :) We met some really cool people and we are planning on going back to see them again. The best part of the night was the last door. There was a man walking into his apartment so we stopped him and he said we were welcome to come in but we could not because he was the only one home. He then tried to convince us because he wanted to give us almond milk. I guess he saw the look on my face because then he told my companions that they had to come in so that I could have some almond milk. In the end he went and got the milk anyways with us at the door. It was weird though because one of the cartons was chunky and darker in color and we thought it was weird that he was mixing the two together, especially because we were afraid the first had gone bad. He handed me the glass and I tasted it and it was really good. But I knew it was not just almond milk and figured he had put some orzo (barley/coffee substitute that many Italians drink) and kept drinking it. The other two drank a bit of there's and I had finished mine and he gave me some more when he said that it is so good because he mixes it with frozen coffee . . . Sorella Askew about died and started to laugh hysterically. Then Sorella Buma started to laugh and the man at the door just looked at us like we were crazy. He asked what was wrong and we just said nothing but strategically stopped drinking what was in our cups. He did not ask again so who really knows if he was sabotaging us because he knew we were Mormon missionaries or not. Oh well. It made me laugh :)
Giovedì mattina we went to go see Lidia as we usually do because she is preparing for baptism and she was really down when we got there. She had made plans with Maira (her friend in the ward) but she had bailed at the last minute and she was really disappointed. She also strongly smelt of smoke. That worried us also because we had had concerns already that she had not quit completely. So Sorella Askew started out the lesson and asked her directly if she was still smoking. She said no, so Sorella Askew told her that we could all smell it. She then said she is not "smoking" but she had smoked one cigarette. We were really concerned so we set up an appointment with the bishop to talk with her because he knows her and we had need of his gift of discernment as well. We were then stuck at a bus stop close to her house and saw a bunch of teenagers that were on the verge of beating each other up for about an hour. No worries, it was only amongst themselves :) we were not involved at all. In fact, we went to the bakery across the street and bought fresh wheat bread and ate it for lunch while we witnessed the juvenile violence around us haha. In the afternoon we went to go see Giorgia Castorina who is also preparing for baptism. She is 11 years old and both her parents are members. Her mother is active though has to work a lot on Sundays but comes to church when she can. Her father wants nothing to do with the church so her parents have been liberal with her and her choice to be baptized. They have left it completely up to her and now she has decided to take the lessons from us and be baptized. Her baptism is on October 8th and we are really excited. We taught her the word of Wisdom, which was actually really weird to teach an 11 year old, but at the end we just focused on eating healthy because she NEVER eats fruits or vegetables according to her mom. They are a really cute family and we can't wait for this next Saturday! That night we went to go see the new convert, Lia Sciortino. We do not know why but she was in an incredibly good mood this time we visited. But this is a random little side note. The last time we were there she gave us water and there were little floaties in our cups because she had poured water from a water bottle she had drunken from. Gross. Especially since Sorella Buma had already drank from her cup by the time I had pointed it out to her. So this time we checked our cups and we saw it was a new water bottle so we thought we were safe. That was until Sorella Askew pushed her cup slyly towards me during the lesson and I saw there was a bug in hers. During the lesson, of which we talked about conference and that she needed to come, the bug crawled out and then walked along the rim. Reeeeeaaaaal appetizing! After that we headed home and we waited for an hour for the bus but EVENTUALLY got home. Thank goodness :)
Friday, as always, we did weekly planning and then in the afternoon we went to go visit Concettina Lo Presti who is a new investigator. She is this really cute old woman and we also talked a little bit about conference and tied it in with the Restoration. We do not think she really understood it, but when we explained the Book of Mormon she got really excited and it was obvious she felt the spirit. She told us she would have her niece read it to her (because she cannot see well enough to read it herself) and the dedica we wrote inside. We then went to see Giorgia, the 11 year old again, to teach her tithing. We used candy as the example by having her close her eyes and placing 10 pieces of candy in her hands. When she opened them we then asked her for one. Of course she gave us one because we gave her the candy without her having to do anything to earn it. We then had her close her eyes again and we then dumped the entire bag into her hand. She laughed and said we had given her TOO much. We then explained the law of the tithing, that it is a blessing to us so that we can enjoy the blessings of the temple, or church buildings .. . and that it is only right because it all comes from our Heavenly Father anyways. She liked it and then we read the scripture in 3 Nefi 24 about not having enough room to receive the blessings the Lord will give us if we pay our tithing and then I told a story that my MTC teacher shared with us. He had to make the decision of paying his tithing on time or paying for his school tuition. He chose to pay his tithing and ended up receiving a scholarship to pay for everything else. When I shared that story Giorgia's mom, Loredana, then shared with us that tithing is a really hard thing for her to do even though she knows she needs to do it. Maybe this lesson was for her and Giorgia can be the example her mom needs to start living that commandment? That would be great for the whole family :) At the end Giorgia sang us a song she is preparing to sing for her baptism, "Keep the Commandments" and then she did a pop dance for us that she has been practicing at her dance class. She is SO stinkin' cute! I just love her :) We then got picked up by the Anziani to go to correlation at the home of the Mirabella family. There son, Manuele, is our mission leader. But the coolest thing is that they have a brick, fire burning, oven. That's right! And that night they had invited us over to eat pizza with them. And boy was it good! I will admit, I ate more than I should have. But I mean . . . come one! Pizza after fresh delicious pizza? The best was nutella pizza. I could have died it was so good! In fact, I think I did die when the fullness hit afterward. Thank goodness I almost never eat like that haha.
Saturday morning we went to go see Lidia again and she was a little happier . . . up until she answered her cell phone right as I was about to explain the gift of the Holy Ghost. She was then so irritated with the person on the phone that the spirit left and we had to just close the lesson. This time at least she did not smell like smoke and she told us we could not tell her she had smoked or smelled like it, because she hadn't. After that we went to go see a couple of potential investigators. There last name is Crisafulli and there are two daughters, who each have their own daughters, and the mother. Just one of the adult daughters was there but she did not show a lot of interest. The mom seems to have more interest so we will try back again when we are in that area. That afternoon we had an appointment with Grazia and her daughter Maira. They are from the Dominican Republic and we met them on the bus. They are super nice and want to know more about the church so we talked with them a bit outside a catholic cathedral (ironic, I know) and gave them a Book of Mormon in Spanish. We then bought CANNOLLI! I had never tried them but they are DELICOUS! Just look them up on line. Yum. Fried outside with ricotta sugary filling. I know. Terrible for me. Non vi preocupate, I just have to try everything once and then I am good. Then the elders's were so nice to come and pick us up so that we were not late to go to the church for conference to see if we had investigators. Unfortunately we did not have any there so we went out across the street to do finding. We were going to a family's house the next day to see that session of conference in English so we decided to use our time wisely to find the elect of our Heavenly Father. We did our little singing tactic and did not have any success until we met Maria. We had called her through the citofono and she asked if we were Jehovah's Witness. When we said no she asked what song we wanted to sing. When we said "I am an Child of God" she opened the gate so that we could come up to her apartment. I had to really laugh because she let us in and right in the center of her living room floor is a giant statue of Maria, the mother of Jesus. It actually was quite similar to the Cristus statue, except Mary. So at that point we knew she was very catholic, but she was super nice. So we sat down and talked to her a bit about our church and then sang our song. She did not seem too interested in learning more but she really liked us and our song and told us to go talk to her niece who lived on the ground floor. So then Maria followed us down stairs and waited with us as we rang the door bell of her nieces apartment. She answered and right behind her was her son, 6 years old, wearing her shoes and shuffling down the hall. When he saw us he let out a scream and fake fainted face first into the marble floor. We all laughed and out came his older brother who did not have a shirt on. He came right up to the door, pounded his bare chest, and then went back into his room. The mom was rather embarrassed but invited us all in. She is SO nice! Her name is Elisabetta (Elisa) and she felt the spirit immediately. In the end we sang "Families Can be Together Forever" and explained the Plan of Salvation and left the pamphlet with her. We took her number and set up a return appointment in a week because she said she wanted her husband to be there. They are such a cute family and it's obvious she is looking for more even though she is really catholic too. At least she did not have a 4 foot statue della Madonna in the middle of the floor right? But Maria is great too and she stayed almost the whole time and only left because her sister needed her help. She was really drawn to us as well. It is interesting because as a missionary we think we are normal and we often forget the effect we have on people who are not used to the Spirit or the power and authority we have as servants of God. When we are aware of it it is fun to see the expressions on people's faces as they feel the difference. We really truly are set apart from the world and we have the authority to act in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ! I do not know why he trusts us to do this work, I just know that it is real.
Sunday was really sweet. The anziani came to get us at nine to take us to the Bay family's house. There dad is in the NCIS so they are living here in Italy. But because his work is a little different than those who live on the Navy Base (Sigonella) they cannot live on the base. Instead they live about 40 minutes away from Catania. They had invited us over for conference on nice American couches and to have cinnamon rolls before the first session and lunch between. It was SO great! I loved it all and it really was like being back in the United States. Conference was great, I especially liked the first talk from Elder Scott on the scriptures. President Uchtdorf's talk on the love of God and also the talk from . . . something Cook? Who told the story of meeting President Monson in the elevator and being told to always look up :) We then made lunch together which was mandarin almond salad and potato soup and then lemon blueberry pie for dessert! I love Italian food, but it was a nice change. During the second session we played conference bingo with skittles (oh how I missed those!) and then we played apples to apples together before we went to the church for the Sunday morning session at 6.00 pm. That too was really great. I loved the talk from President Eyring. He is so great and always speaks directly from his own heart. So it was a very prophet filled day!
Monday we had consiglio insieme and Sorella Askew gave the training. This is her last transfer so it was "Advice from a Dying Missionary" and she shared all her knowledge that she learned from her mission. We then walked home and spent lunch studying the language and the things we usually do. Then we took the bus for 2 hours to go find a potenzial investigator we had met a couple of days earlier. Her name is Alfia and she has a little girl but they live really far away in a zone that is not the . . . safest? And we had forgotten our cell phone so we went into a bar there and asked to use the cell phone of one of the employees there. She was actually really obliging and let us borrow her phone so that we could call the anziani and they called Alfia. We ended up having a lesson in a park near by and then caught the bus just in time to get home in time. Right after we got on the bus another woman got on and I started talking to her. She was so nice and we talked for 45 minutes on the bus until she had to get off. Her name is Mimma and I pretty much taught her the whole first lesson and introduced her to the second and left the pamphlet with her. She gave me her number and said she would really like to know more. She was great! After she got off I went to talk to this anciently old man who was yelling at everyone and he felt a lot better afterwards. Then we got off at our stop and did street as we walked to the bus stop that would take us home. It was fun :)
Yesterday we were on the bus in the morning because we had another lesson with Lidia and I met this really peppy woman on the bus who told me all about the fact that she is studying with the Jehovah's Witnesses because she is trying to find the truth. I then briefly explained briefly our message and that the whole purpose of our life here is to find the truth that only God can reveal to us. She would not give me her number but she gladly took both the Restoration pamphlet and the Plan of Salvation. I hope she reads them. At the lesson with Lidia we had a member, Sorella Laura Bellassai, come with us. We did not get a lot done because Lidia likes to fill in everyone who is new on her life story, but it is good because now she has another friend in the ward. We taught her tithing and we did the same example we had done for Giorgia. She liked it and said in her interview with the bishop on Sunday he had already explained that and the Law of Chastity to her. She said neither one would be a problem. So that's good! We were then walking to go see a less active when we ran into a woman carrying two huge bags of canned tomatoes. We asked if we could help her and she told us she would feel bad because she lived far away. Sorella Askew just grabbed a bag and started walking away so we all grabbed one and followed. Her name is Mary and she is from Nigeria. She is so sweet! She lived in Padova (northern Italy) for 10 years and has lived in Catania for 5. But when she lived in Padova she actually met with the elders there a couple of times and knew exactly who we were when she saw us. She offered to give US her number and said we need to come visit her to talk about God. She kept telling us that we were an answer to her prayer and that God sent His angels to help her. She's really cute :) After that we went to buy food at Auchan (french version of Walmart) with the Anziani for Zone Conference Thursday, and then we went directly to an appointment at 3. Unfortunately, she was not there . . . darn it, so we then got a ride from a very nice woman we met on the street to our next appointment who also was not there . . . I just love missionary work haha. So we took our lunch break at a bar and got granita (almond again YUM!) and asked the cashier questions about the language for our language study. We then did a little bit of finding while we waited for the bus, and then went to the church for Giorgia's baptismal interview. It went well and we had a mini lesson with Francesca (Franchy), who is a member from Gela who works here in Catania. After we had a lesson with a new investigator named Angelo. We then started English course and I taught intermediate. We spent most of the time talking about Utah which took a little while because I had a hard time trying to explain it in broken Italian which was probably harder for them to understand. The spiritual thought was then on the gift of Tongues because they asked why we missionaries can speak languages so well. They were very receptive and liked it a lot. After that we took off with the Anziani to eat a late dinner with Rex Keller, who is an American who is here in Catania for work. He is really lonely so he was excited to see the missionaries and spend some time with us.
Today we went and hiked MOUNT ETNA! It was super fun and it was just a bunch of volcanic rocks. It is the largest active volcano in Europe and erupts all the time. Thank goodness it's safe! But it was fun. We went with the Anziani here in Catania and the Sorella from Ragusa (Sorella Laws and Sorella Stebar). Thank goodness I did not die on the hike!
Anyways, the work is going well and I will talk to yah next week!
Muah!
Sorella LeCates
In July 2010 I was called to serve an 18 month mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in the Italy Rome mission. I've always wanted to see Italy and I can't believe I'm lucky enough to spread the gospel there!
