2016-06-22 Catch Up on All Investigators

Sorry I haven't written much the last two weeks! It's been absolutely
insane I will never fully be able to catch you guys up! But I love my
new companion, we're getting so much done. I'm creating friendships
and relationships deeper than I expected and with more people than I
expected. There's my companion but also tons of people from the ward
I've gotten to know as normal people, like I can tell when they're
stressed or I check up on their life situation. I know who will help
us out always and who's harder to get ahold of. I know some of
people's most sacred, personal stories. Especially meeting immigrants,
their stories will change your life. You wouldn't believe how normal
stuff is that in America we think only happens to heroes that we hear
about on the news. No, people surviving insurmountable obstacles
happens all the time and the people I've met ancora they have faith in
Jesus Christ because He's helped them before and He will help them
again.
Joy and Edward - a couple from Nigeria - just found out the baby their
expecting is a boy! Joy is super excited because she said now when her
son grows up to be a man and goes off to find a wife, the wife will
pretty much leave her family and only visit her husbands family unless
it happens to be convenient sometime to see her family too. This whole
conversation made me very happy to live in a much more egalitarian
society (America). Even if it's not perfect, at least there's no
cultural expectations to abandon my family when I get married.
Anyways, they're happy. They're gonna name him Desmond because it
means "great friend of God."
We have had so many people in the last couple days at activities
either point out non-members (for whom we set up appointments) or
straight-up ask if we can come teach ____________ person that they
know (for whom we will shortly be setting up appointments). I gotta
say though, there's not a lot more disappointing than having a crazy
full week and then in the end only having 7 lessons because everyone
cancels on you. But we can't control what other people do so well just
keep teaching the people who will make time for us.
There's a less-active we've been meaning to meet with for several
weeks that we finally made it over to her house yesterday. It was good
and it was bad haha. It was good because we had a lesson with her and
created a new friendship with somebody. It was bad because we stayed
there forever....technically one hour was our lunch and another hour
was lingua but we were still like 😬😬 by the time we finally got out
haha. She's super cool though and has an awesome life story. When she
moved to Italy she came to church and people didn't know her super
well. Apparently one of the few conversations she had with someone (a
leader, bishop maybe idk) was him telling her that she needs to pay
tithing because God has need of her money and it offended her so bad
she never went back. Well, whoever that guy is, he wasn't very
sensitive. But it's a shame she won't come back over something small
like that, too.
President Dibb is leaving in a few short days! Soon we will have a new
president! We'll see what he's like. I love you all! A dopo!

2016-06-15 New Companion

Oooh my gosh I miss my trainer SO much and I LOOOVE my new companion
so much!!  We're seeing so many miracles we seriously walk home at
night and we'll look at each other and be like, "what are we doing to
earn this." I love this city and I never want to leave!

Jill and Sis Lau

With Elder Kearon

Mmm Lindor!

Mole Antonelliana - was built as a Jewish Synagogue in 1860's, but architect and community had falling out.  Now it is a cinema museum.  It is the tallest unreinforced brick building in the world.  (No steel girder system)

Beauties

Sis Lau, Sis Smedley, and Jill

Torino

Jill at top of Mole Antonelliana

Moped!

Touristy Sisters

2016-06-08

New comp! She's fire and were getting along great!

(Jill was too busy to write any more :) )

2016-06-01 Slle Harris Going Home

This week was insane. Leslie cancelled her baptism. Dang, girl. We
can't say anything because it's not our decision. We just want her to
be happy. Even Slle Harris is chill, after getting a chance at this
miracle and then having it not go through. We just want her to be
happy. She said she received her answer and how she had. But she said
now she's worked out a deal with her parents. But then she didn't come
to church last Sunday ☹️☹️☹️ Idk. Idk. She's really spiritual, she'll
get baptized eventually. But this paragraph does nothing to express
the emotional roller coaster we've been on this week.

Anyways, it was also Slle Harris's last week. Holy cow the MTC seemed
to last forever. Then it was over and it seemed like being a greenie
would last forever! Now I'm going into my third (mission) transfer. An
anziano in our zone is getting a greenie tomorrow and I was like "wow
yea it will be so cool to get a little greenie!" That's when I
realized that time is definitely moving and that, like my trainer who
I love, one day my mission will end. So "don't count the days, make
the days count" and all that jazz. My new comp is Slle Lau, we'll pick
her up from the train tonight. She's from Arizona I think, also pretty
young in the mission actually she'll only be in her 5th transfer so
we'll both be a couple of newbs running around, trying to take care of
all these children of God in like, the third largest city in Italy,
with me being the only one of two of us who really know the city
hahahahaha it will be easy

Well we went shopping in centro for her last real p-day, talked to
tons of people it was cool. People have a lot of respect for what we
do without actually wanting to see why we do it haha. Va beh, it's
good to talk to people anyways.

Mostly this week we met with our members because Slle Harris is
leaving, and with our investigators. So basically, a normal week with
a few more members than usual. I also had my first full pizza in
Italy, right after Leslie texted us to cancel her baptism (two days
after she said she was going to do it). We didn't eat quite as much
gelato as we had planned but after you've had one grown-in-Italy,
Torino-only, gourmet nocciola (hazelnut) gelato flavor, you've had
them all. That doesn't mean they stop being good though...

So miracles we've seen this week! Okay so we've been teaching this
couple from Nigeria. Sometimes language and sometimes culture has been
a big barrier for us in the past. They were really offended by a
conversation they had over phone several months back (that were sure
was a miscommunication because it didn't make any sense what they
said) but the wife, joy, who is pregnant, has an amazing testimony.
After several months of refusing to come to church because she feels
unclean (her and Edward aren't married - but are having a kid) she
finally asked US on Sunday if she could come to church. YES JOY YES
YOU CAN PLEASE COME TO CHURCH JOY WE WOULD LOVE TO SEE YOU THERE. I'm
so excited for her! This is such a big deal! I hope I stay long enough
for their baby to be born and for their big African wedding. They're
hilarious, I'll have to write down some of the things they say
sometime.

We also had a surprise member-present lesson with a really volatile
lady also from Nigeria but she was actually very calm through the
whole lesson while we taught the plan of salvation to her and her
friend, who liked it very much. As we were planning to see her again,
two other Nigerian women came out from the cathedral we were in front
of. One of them saw me and my name tag and asked "how can I join your
ministry" as in, she wanted to be a missionary too haha. I love people
from Africa. So we have three new potential investigators.

I just got my new comp, Slle Lau. She seems pretty laid-back and cool,
I'm excited to work with her. We've got a whole huge city in our hands
so we'll see what we can do with it.

A park where members took them for an afternoon.
Note the light poles and the pet between them :)

Freakin' Delicious!  According to Jill.

Neat bridge they found on way to bus station.

Transfers again.  I (mom) am not sure if this represents the transfers left in a mission, or how many people they have dated in the past :)

Members who were returning to Peru gave the Sorellas gifts.

Check out the beautiful paintings on the outside of the building.

They gave a presentation at a high school, flanked by Italian members.

On the steps of the Italian high school.

Go deep!  Cartoon sent by Jill.

Cat!  Jill claims almost no one has cats in Italy.

2016-05-25 First Baptism

This week was one of those weird weeks where we worked really hard and
everything fell through. So we did what we could to feel like we were
accomplishing our purpose even if tons of our appointments cancelled.
My trainer, Sorella Harris, is finishing her mission next week
(😥😥😥) so we are kind of getting her ready to leave but also were
keeping super busy and she's not tiring out on me at all.

The biggest news this week is that we had a baptism. A baptism!! It
was Elena's baptism!! She's been being taught for three years, about
since her son and his wife were baptized. Their story is crazy enough
as it is (he was atheist, started believing in God after studying
space science, after they had been investigating the church for a
while they decided to be baptized and the missionaries set up
baptismal interviews for them that week before they even told them
because they knew they were finally gonna get baptized), but Elena's
is a whole other story. Two full sisters missions have been done
teaching this lady, a LOT of sisters have come and gone...and Sorella
Harris and I were lucky enough to be the ones to see the fruit.
The baptism was beautiful, the family was really stressed when they
showed up at the church and just really hurrying and it was a big day
so we were all like "whoa ah!" But people started showing up and it
was so great because Elena's been going to church for so long that the
ward really knows her and are friends with her and love and care about
her. When Fratello Mazzolari started the meeting, he started off by
saying: this day is for you Elena, we are all here to celebrate you.
And at that point until the service was over she proprio just cried,
she was like a fountain. I had the privilege of sitting right next to
her during the service before and after she was baptized and she was
just a steady flow of Spirit-filled tears. When she came up from below
the water she started to cough because she's older and had just been
dunked but then she was embraced by her son in the sweetest hug I've
ever seen in my life. Sorry I didn't take a picture, it was too
special to try to ruin by whipping out my iPad and rushing to get the
shot. But I'll never forget that moment.
It was interesting because I'd only met with Elena about 7-8 times
before that, so I was here when she decided to get baptized, but I
didn't see her whole 3 years of progress obviously. It's interesting
because she always seemed ready to be baptized in my opinion. But we
had a scambio yesterday and my STL actually served here for her first
city like i am, but she served here a year ago. Obviously she wanted
to go visit Elena so we did that and it was really nice. After we met
with her though, my STL told me how much of a difference there was in
her. She said when she taught her, it was up and down like one lesson
she's ready to be baptized and the next lesson she'd be like "I had a
doubt I can't be baptized." Whereas Sorella Harris and I both saw how
sure Elena was to be baptized and then my STL got to see it, too. She
said she's so tranquil now, really sure, and is more peaceful. I was
glad to get her perspective because I only saw a small part of her
life changing into this tranquil, sure, peaceful person. But I know
that even though I only did a small part, Elena's life really is
changed for the good because when she came up from that water she was
clean and had promised help from the Lord and I think that's really
really a blessing.

Anyways, we also had a less-active who can't read very well FINALLY
find the faith and desire to read the ONE verse we left her! She said
she read it every day! I was beaming! As a missionary, and in life I
think, there's nothing that hurts worse than seeing people you love
develop bad habits. And there's nothing more rewarding than seeing
those same people make changes for good in their life! Our last lesson
we sort of were disappointed with her, not because we don't love her,
but because we DO. We're like, Helen, you can't expect God to help you
with the problems you're having if you're not willing to read just ONE
VERSE this week. But after ssevverall lessons on this, we finally were
able to find what we needed to say to help her realize that this is
important and she found the faith she needed and now hopefully we can
help her continue to read.

I seriously love the people out here so much, it's not even hard.
Maybe in my next city or something haha but not right now.

We also had a good second lesson with Lucy where we really found out
what her problems are. In a few words, she believes in God, knows He
loves her, but has never really seen that love with all the
difficulties she's faced. And, in my mind, I think she's probably
searching for that love since she's very much alone right now. I asked
her to consider that maybe this gospel is the answer to her prayer
that she's been looking for and then she said that she would read the
Book of Mormon we gave her.

I don't preach to anyone because I want to baptize tons of people or
look like a good missionary or increase numbers in the church. I
preach to people because the gospel improves my life and I want to
improve other people's lives because I love them.

Anyways, we had other appointments and stuff but we also spent a lunch
hour at HyperCoop which is like the Walmart of Italy, it was amazing.
You all think little markets are cute and fun and better, no. Not when
you've been living without good makeup remover for months because your
little market does not carry it and never will carry it, so you either
live without it or you live without it because you don't have freaking
time to shop or the knowledge of which store is hiding the things you
need. So that was really fun, idk if my mom can post videos but
Sorella Harris took a video of the pasta aisle here that was pretty
hilarious cuz it's an eternity long. We don't just have more pasta
here, we also have tons of shapes you guys don't have in America. The
Italy/pasta stereotype is so true.

And we went to another castle for p-day. Went with a member, she's the
best. The castle has a little village attached to it that we didn't
have time to see but we saw its gardens which it's famous for.
B-e-a-u-t-i-f-u-l. Si chiama Veneria Reale. Also I learned after 1.5+
months that the thing that I thought was a sink/urinal in my bathroom
is actually a bidet that I'm scared to use. Like, how do you use it?
Also bidets get their own nasty towels for drying your hands after or
your bum idk which? All I know is that at this point there's a small
chance I've accidentally dried my hands on a bidet towel at somebody's
house and that's not an idea I want to entertain any longer.

At district meeting, we have two missionaries who are going home next
week (including my trainerr) so our district leader asked them both to
tell a funny and a spiritual story. Anziano Blazzard's story involved
a typical 'someone going to the bathroom on the street' situation and
Sorella Harris's included getting trapped in an awkward beauty party
where her and her comp were the only ones and obviously didn't have
any money to buy anything. So quote for the week from our district
leader:
"Missions are full of awkward beauty parties and people relieving
themselves on the street."

Amen to that.

This week will be crazy. We don't even have time to eat because we
have so many appointments, but it's okay because we know they'll feed
us haha. But Sorella Harris is leaving so we're going to see a lot of
people and then she's gonna LEAVE ME and I'm gonna have to TEACH THIS
CITY TO SOMEBODY ELSE. AH. 10 weeks seemed so long 9 weeks ago but now
we're running out of time to eat a whole pizza together and watch The
Testaments at night together and eat gelato every day, time really
flies on the mission (says the girl who has 14 months left).

So next week I'll have a new companion! I hope we get along! Either
way you just do your best and trust that the lord is happy with you
even if it seems really hard. We can do hard things. And life rolls
on. Love you all at home and think of you every day.


LESLIE TEXTED US A FEW MINUTES AGO AND SAID SHE HAS TO TELL US
SOMETHING AND WERE AND THEN A WARD MEMBER WHO WERE ALL CLOSE WITH
TEXTED JUST NOW AND SAID THAT LESLIE TOLD HER SHE WANTS TO GET
BAPTIZED BUT NOT TO TELL LESLIE THAT WE KNOW AAAAAAAHHHH!!!!! THIS IS
CRAZY WE HAVE TEARS IN OUR EYES MAYBE SOMETHING CRAZY WILL HAPPEN AND
SHELL BE BAPTIZED NEXT WEDNESDAY ON HARRISS LAST DAY HONESTLY THIS IS
SUCH A HUGE MIRACLE THAT ANYTHING COULD HAPPEN. I CANT BELIEVE THIS IS
HAPPENING, PRAYERS ARE BEING ANSWERED.

Jill's Comfort Fashion

Elena's Baptism, Men

Elena's Baptism, Women

Jill, Elena, Sis Harris

Alessio (her son), and Elena

Butcher's Market

Italian Footwear

Jill checking out shoes

I would post videos, but I cannot figure out how to move them from her photo sharing to a place where I can access them for this blog.  Maybe I will figure that out before Jill comes home.

2016-05-18 Senior Week

This week was great! I finished up my senior week (means I had to call
everyone and set up appointments and fill 7 days with things to do it
was scary) and then handed the phone back to Harris after Sunday's
last appointment, it was such a relief haha. I don't envy all she does
as a trainer. I have a newfound respect.

Anyways, we got spoiled to breakfast by the son and daughter-in-law of
Elena (the lady who's getting baptized this week!) and we've been
upping our member work because it's hard to find people willing to
talk to us just on the street or bus.

BUT it does happen and this week we also set up an appointment with a
lady we found on the bus named Lucy a couple weeks ago. She's Peruvian
and is already living the standards of our church. When she told me
it's hard to find friends out here because Peruvians love to drink
when they get together and she doesn't drink I just couldn't hold it
in anymore and I was like "Lucy you know you'd love our church!" So
she just handed me over her number even thought she just told me she
doesn't really like church, it was awesome haha. She seemed doubtful
about some things during our first lesson this week but she wanted to
see us again so yeah, we'll see 🙃

We also had Elena's last appointment before her baptism, it was pretty
sweet. We talked about the sacrament and then just like, asked her
what her baptism means to her and let her talk about how the gospel
has affected her life. Her husband, they were so in love, he's passed
away. She believes her husband has been a big part of her experience
she had when she felt really strongly that after 3 years she finally
wants to get baptized. Then she fed us dolce afterwards like always,
we love her to death.

Also we had another unbelievably good lesson with Xiao. She has a lot
of questions about Jesus Christ and we honestly figured that we can't
just teach about Jesus Christ without missing a TON of stuff, so we
gave her a Chinese bible and Chinese Book of Mormon, kind of like
"read this!" She was all like "wow this is a very good gift wow thank
you so much" and we were like "haha nah" and she told us that this
book can help you in your life, that it's filled with wisdom, and you
could read it over and over again and always find new things. Xiao are
you secretly a hardcore Christian already and this is just some
elaborate trick?? She literally says stuff that we have never even
suggested but is totally true, she's the best. One of our bishop
counsellors told us the next day at ward council "I knew she would be
baptized as soon as she walked in to church her first day" and me and
Harris just looked at each other like "okay" haha but seriously, she's
an old soul. She totally gets it. She's prayed on her own since last
time we saw her too. She took a lesson on tithing during church in
stride! We love her so much!

Also we made pizza with the ward and brought one of our investigators
with us (she's one of the many who just isn't baptized yet because
she's not legal so she can't get married to the man who she lives and
has children with, it's frustrating). It was so much fun, I doubt I've
laughed harder than I did that night and also now I know how to make
pizza dough.

More members fed us, we're trying really hard to meet Leslie's parents
so her mom isn't so against Mormons, and we had a cool experience on
the bus where this guy started talking to us after a few minutes and
apparently he's totally has been to our church before and has a Book
of Mormon but then went back to Nigeria and hasn't been able to find
our church since. So we got his number right there to give to the
anziani and he was like "yeah give me your address I'll come to church
this Sunday." So cool!

It's not all satisfying and miracles out here though, for example one
of our long-time simps we are worried her daughter can't hear. The
ward has talked about it in ward council but nothing has been done
yet. The daughter makes animal noises, she never speaks. If she gets
much older and hasn't learned how to speak yet, even if she gets a
hearing aid she may never learn how to speak perfectly. We also had a
new convert who had us worried because apparently doctors from Nigeria
told her her father needs surgery on his appendix or he'll die and
this girl can't pay, she can't even pay for her own rent yet (he's
fine for now). And we had to do a drop lesson with a lady from Nigeria
who just talks and talks and absolutely refuses to accept anything we
teach or invite her to do and it was really hard. Anyways, the point
is that NOBODY in the MTC or before the mission tells you that you
might be trying to help a less-active member, only to find out they
can't read, so they can't read the Book of Mormon, and you're having
to decide what on EARTH you can do to help them. Like, do we teach her
to read? What do we do? So you have to make a lot of decisions out
here that nobody teaches you how to make. But we're doing it. And we
do see miracles. Missions are crazy but they teach you so much and
people finding more happiness in their lives because Jesus Christ is a
really touching thing to see.

Bought from the happiest old guy in a little shop on way home

Jill's apartment, opened up with nice weather

People from ward having fun making pizza dough

Caught in a downpour

BOM for investigator Xiao

La Reggia di Veneria

Sis Harris, CJ, and Jill

Italian Mac and Cheese so rich it almost made Jill sick