Monday, July 8, 2019
Time flies by so incredibly fast here. We will have been here 10 days tomorrow. It seems like we just arrived yesterday. I knew we would be busy, but never imagined we would be this busy. Right now we are trying to fit a six week schedule into four weeks because we missed the first two weeks of the transfer cycle. We have eight zones and we have covered three of those zones already. We flew to Sicily this morning. Dad is doing interviews this afternoon and we have a Mission Leadership Council tonight. (That's the new council that includes the sisters. My limited experience is that they are very effective.)
We feel like we are being baptized by fire. A few days before we got here, we had one of our missionaries return home because he was in deep depression. We never even had an opportunity to work with him. We now have another missionary who is threatening to leave. He has only been here three weeks. He's having a terrible time adjusting, but it appears the real problem is that he doesn't want to adjust. He has everything planned out and what he wants, but he's left The Lord out of the equation. We really are doing the Lord's work, and he will direct us if we let him. The medical doctors in Frankfurt call this condition the Three's. It usually occurs between three weeks and three months. If we can just keep this young elder here, he has the potential to be a great missionary. Right now he has everything going for him except faith.
We have another missionary who is having problems with his knees. They are so painful he can't even walk up steps and in Italy there are lots of steps. He and his companion are staying with a senior couple who have an extra bedroom and an elevator in their apartment.
Every little while someone calls me about something. Two elders are suffering with ingrown toenails which seems to be a common malady in the mission field.
Two nights ago some of the sisters in Rome got broadsided, the senior couple in Battipaglia had their car backed into, and in the middle of writing this letter, the sisters here in Catania just got rear ended when they stopped suddenly to avoid hitting a woman who stepped out into the street.
Tuesday, July 9
I spent all afternoon at the hospital with the 3 sisters in the car wreck. Remind me to never go to an Italian hospital. It was a nightmare. I was grateful one of the elders that went with us was native Italian and understood the system and spoke the language. Two of the sisters were pretty shaken up. The other one was stiff but doing better than the others. At the hospital they put the two worst sisters in wheel chairs and left them sitting in a dirty hall for a long time. One of the wheelchairs only had one foot rest and the other one didn't have any. If we trust the xrays, nothing was broken and they put neck braces on them and told them to come back for a checkup. I think not. No way are they going in there again. We are arranging for an orthopedic doctor in one of the neighboring wards to do the follow up with them. In spite of it all, some good came out of the situation. First, the car didn't even have a dent. It should have been smashed. Second, the one sister who was the least injured managed to pass out 4 pass-a-long cards and give out a video on the restoration and a Book of Mormon. Standing for long periods of time paid off spiritually. One of the gentlemen in the hallway kept watching us and then finally walked down and started listening to our conversation. Finally we figured out he had been an investigator 3 years ago and still keeps in touch with the sisters who were teaching him then. We were quite excited when he walked out the door with a new Book of Mormon and an appointment to meet with the missionaries again. As we were waiting to get the sisters in the car to go, they were giving the hospital attendant a pass-a-long card. Today the sisters are stiff, but they wore their neck braces and attended all of zone conference. I am grateful to the elders who were here and immediately gave them priesthood blessings.
Now that everything is fine and we're back to normal, there is one funny thing that happened. The elders were doing a baptism in the sea. One of the elder's who was also in the sea acting as a witness, stepped on an anemone. I guess that's pretty painful. He was laid up for a few days. We were told a blast of calcium immediately goes into your foot and there's no way to get rid of it. You can't pull it out like you can a stinger or something. It just has to work it's way out.
I walked down the street to the market to buy some milk the other day. It's only about a 5 minute walk. People in Italy don't stock up on food like we do. They go to the market everyday. It's certainly a different way of life. It was a strange sensation to walk down the street in Rome and know that this is the place I now call home.
The villa is huge. It has it's pluses and minuses. It's a big empty building because we aren't there very often. (There's a little lizzard that sometimes lives under the planter on the front step. I've named him Speedy because he's so fast I can never get his picture.) On July 24 we get 22 new missionaries from the MTC in Provo. They all spend the night at the villa before leaving for their assigned destinations the next day. We will have to rearrange sleeping conditions because so many are coming. Since we only have two sisters in that group, we will put them downstairs and take the extra mattresses upstairs and put them on the floor in the laundry room so I can keep the boys and girls separated. Having never been through this before, I can only imagine the chaos. We have two dining rooms and it will take every chair in the villa to accommodate them for dinner.
Sunday We went to Battipaglia to church. It's nearly a four hour drive. The senior couple who call Afton, Wyoming home, invited us to dinner after church. We have heard so much about the buffalo mozzarella cheese that is made there. Everyone raves about how good it is. It is made from the milk of water buffalo. We bought some at the market in Rome and it was good, but it was no comparison to the fresh cheese that comes right from the source. They served the cheese as an appetizer. I thought I had died and gone to heaven. If I never eat anything again, it's okay because I had some of that cheese.
Speaking of food, we have hardly eaten while we've been here. We don't have time. One day we grabbedd a slice of pizza on the way to the mission office. We always walk there because there's no place to park. It's a 15-20 minute walk. There a lots of small little shops along the way. You'll love it when you come. There is a street market about a 5 minute walk from the villa. It's filled with fresh fruits and vegetables and weird little odds and ends.
We have removed the word sleep from our vocabulary. It doesn't play a part in our current existence. We're considering doing away with the word eat, too. We are so busy this week. Last time I looked at the calendar we were going to spend 2 hours at the villa this week. That time will be spent taking a shower and repacking our suitcase before leaving again.
We had someone come for a recommend interview at 5:30 am because that's the only time dad could see him. We left at 6:00 am for Battipaglia and got home that night about 10:00 pm. Monday morning we flew to Sicily where we are now. We will fly back to Rome in the morning and arrive just in time to shower and pack. Then we are off to Naples for the next zone conference. I'm not complaining. It's the most remarkable experience I've ever had and we've been here less than two weeks.
We met 40 new missionaries here in Sicily. You have no idea how wonderful it is to meet them and feel their testimonies. Zone conference went very well. I made a bingo game with questions from Preach My Gospel and the Book of Mormon. As we watched which missionaries knew the answers to the questions and which ones didn't, it was pretty enlightening. It gave us a good idea what areas we need to teach them about.
I wish you could see your dad. The mantle of a mission president has truly settled down on him. He was concerned because his patriarchal blessing told him that the Lord would answer his prayers in his own due time. He has always been slow to get answers, but he is also slow to judge because he is still waiting for answers. Once he has gotten his answer, he has made the quick decision to do what is right and then never looked back. That's how he ran his business and presided over the senate. President Eyring told him that The Lord would change the timetable and he would get inspiration and answers when he needed them. Daily I see inspiration flowing. One day he told me he is constantly amazed as things he needs to do and say just flow into his mind.
Wednesday, July 10
I'm currently on a plane headed back to Rome, but only for two hours before we leave again. Let me tell you about one of our missionaries. He is originally from Italy but lived in the northern part. He is serving his mission in the Rome mission which is in the south. He's a little older--23. He is the most remarkable cook I've ever seen. I walked into the kitchen of the church in Catania to get a drink and he was in there slicing ham for a pasta dish he was making for all the missionaries. After introducing myself, I asked him if he was a chef. He isn't yet, but his dream is to open his own restaurant some day. When it comes to food, he is super knowledgable. The best part is that it tastes really good. I realize dad is my companion for this entire mission, but I keep asking him if it would be possible for me to have an assistant at the villa. I would definitely choose that elder. Maybe I could just do scambi (or exchanges) with him occasionally. I'm dying to have a minute at the villa to try his recipe. Not only is he a good cook, but he is a dedicated, excellent missionary. He joined the church just a couple of years ago. His girlfriend who was instrumental in his conversion is serving a mission in Australia.
Last night I went with the sister missionaries. It was a night when they teach English classes at the church. English classes are an excellent way to find investigators. They are free classes which is a plus. The classes are held at the church so people become acquainted with the church by attending. Each class starts and ends with a prayer. At the end of the class, one of the teachers reads a scripture and gives a spiritual thought. In my former life, I might have been offended by it, but not anymore. The one nonmember lady who was in the class volunteered to say the closing prayer. It's just things like that all the time. I love it.
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We just got aback to the villa and I just have a few minutes before we have to leave again. Here's my final bit of information:
When it comes to driving in Italy, rules are only suggestions that nobody listens to!!!
Ciao! Ti amo! (Goodbye! I love you!)
--Mom
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