Reunions

Dear Family and Friends,

I'm sorry I can't write a lot because we are with the entire zone of missionaries heading to this cool castle in Napoli! Since we get our P-day on Tuesday this week because of the Zone Conference, things are actually open today since Monday is kind of like part of the weekend for Italians.  Anyway, this week was awesome!

One fun cultural thing I noticed is that Napoli is actually very unique in Italy. Anziano. Draghi talks about the differences in culture of all the places he has been to because while Italy is a united country, they are very divided in area and culture.  He says there are 3 general areas of Italy: the north, the south, and Napoli. One way I have seen that this city is unique is that people don't really follow the driving rules. I have seen motorcycles drive on the sidewalk usually twice a day!

Highlights of the week include seeing President Nelson and shaking his hand along with Elder Hallstrom and Elder Kearon, and seeing all my friends from the MTC.  It was super exciting to see everyone and find out about everyone's experience in the mission!  First off, I definitely gained a testimony of the power of the apostles and prophets.  President Nelson knew so much about the scriptures (he said he recently read every word of Bible, Book of Mormon, and the other standard works in 2 weeks!), and he testified of the prophecy and covenant we are fulfilling as missionaries of the latter days, fulfilling the promise God gave to Abraham. It was definitely encouraging!

We also had Zone Conference with President Pickerd which super cool as well!  We saw the great progress of our mission in achieving our mission goals and we were encouraged to find ways to do better to reach the goal of one baptism this transfer. I hope we can achieve but it sure will be hard, especially with the progress of this week!

We met with Mimmo and Patrizia again and it went very well.  The hardest part was just seeing no one come to the church in the end.  In the end we only really taught one lesson that entire week besides less actives but the future is very promising.  Yesterday, we saw the Hubbards Family, a less active family, after making an appointment 3 weeks in advance and it was great!  I continue to see a miracle every day. One day, we were walking to the train station after finding and a lesson with a less active family, and Sorella Cozzie pulls up with her husband in the car, and after small talk invites us over for pranzo!! She is definitely a saint for feeding the missionaries so much!  And the food is so good!

Overall, my testimony has been strengthened!  I believe this is all true and this is my time to give it all!  Really, I realized that I will probably have only 3 weeks left with Anziano Draghi and that this is the time to make the most of it.  And hey, maybe we will receive the miracle of a baptism this transfer! Thanks for your letters and support!

Vi voglio bene!

Anziano Price

 

"See You Around the World!"

Dear Family and Friends,

I need more adjectives to describe my weeks so I don't keep saying my week was awesome! Let's say my week was joyful!

First some fun things. I am officially addicted to the tiramisu! We had it twice this week and it's so good!! Anziano Draghi and I had this one tiramisu from Lina, a sweet less active member, but we didn't know it actually had coffee in it! She proved to us that is was decaffeinated so I guess it was technically not too bad, but i also learned that I really don't like the taste of coffee (gross!). Anziano Draghi's tiramisu is much better and you make it with orzo, this replacement for coffee for Italians (basically, roasted barley). I hope I can do this recipe when I come home.

We also went to a pretty cool zoo for P-day. You could actually see the animals outside since it wasn't a hundred degrees like it normally is in Arizona. The weather in Pozzuoli continues to get more cloudy and cooler. I have even started wearing my sweater which I love.

But a lot of awesome things happened! For one, our investigator, Patrizia Esposito, is progressing already super well! She came to church this week with her husband, Mimmo, and they are so awesome! This week I have really seen how I have improved in my Italian. It still takes a lot of effort to speak but I can actually participate in the conversation a lot more! We found a new person to teach from our area book who is excited to learn from us again! We even saw Vera and Elvis again and they expressed how they want to come to church, it is just really difficult with their situation right now, so we are going to do our best to testify of the blessings of church next time.

But my favorite part was right before church this Sunday. Just watching everyone walk in and talking with them made me realize that I do love these people! They are awesome! I love talking with Evans, an African from Nigeria, about his life now in Italy. Sorella Garofalo and Sorella D'onofrio commented today that my Italian is already getting much better so that was great! Even the family who lives in Ischia, the island, came to church today! It was just nice to see everyone gather together for one purpose and I am helping others to join this wonderful group of people in Pozzuoli.

To close, I share this experience. Walking out of the train station, this random British guy who walked past us said "Oh, it's the mormons! See you around the world." It was pretty much nothing but i took it to heart. We are going around the world, sharing our message! While not a lot of people want to talk to us, they always will see us. Every train and bus we get on, I can always find a few eyes staring at our tags or our dress. It's a nice confirmation to me that I know this church is true and soon maybe everyone will know who we are.

Vi vogliamo bene!

Anziano Price

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All in Good Time

Dear Friends and Family,

Today I am grateful for the miracles that God has provided, especially for helping me adjust to the life of a mission.

Fun things first. Anziano Draghi is a big fan of this old Italian band called Pooh so for language study, we like to sometimes translate a song into English. It's a lot of fun. Also, I am becoming more of an Italian by learning how to cook like them. I can make about 3 kinds of pasta really well now. Now I just need to learn how to make tiramisu (without coffee obviously). I am also addicted to this peach juice that is made in Italy.  It pretty much just tastes like straight peach juice from a jar like when mom cans peaches but it's in a bottle and sold in the supermarket. It's soo good!

After a lot of hard work, searching, and talking with people, we found 4 new people who want to hear our message!  This week we made it a goal to search for more people to teach because we weren't able to contact or meet with anyone like Vera or Raffaele.  While we have had many small miracles this week, one of the most obvious was meeting Pasquale.

Like in those typical missionary stories, we decided to go visit inactive members in the area around our apartment. While searching for one particular person who didn't answer, we decided to actually see if anyone in the building wanted to hear our message anyway. I didn't know why but we did it anyway. The elevator was broken so we climbed to the fourth floor and I remember thinking "Why are we doing this?  No one will listen to us."  And no one did for the first 2 doors like normal. Whenever we can't find a person, Anziano Draghi tries to make up for it by knocking on all the doors of the apartment to see if anyone is interested which they almost always aren't interested.  But we knocked on this one door on the 3rd piano (floor), and this older man answers the door. He begins to say he is busy but he notices that we are missionaries and he said, "I'm totally open to learning about this."  He and his wife were celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary which was crazy so we shared a short message on the family since he was busy, but he wants us to come again and share our full message. His wife was calling him to come in and he did his best to shut the door and listen to us talk but he soon had to leave. We still left him with a prayer though!

I am happy here in Italy.  Yesterday marked the end of our first transfer and it really struck me:  I am on a mission.  In Italy!!  Italy has become much more like home than I ever expected.  I love the metro trains covered in graffiti and just meeting random people, not just from Italy but all over the world!  So far, I've met people from Nigeria, Ghana, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, India, Romania, France, Germany, England, and more!  Overall, I learned this week how everything works on God's time. Sometimes, trials afflictions continue even as we continually pray for them to end.  Because they are for our good!  I always pray to be able to find one person to teach that is new and normally, nothing has come from it.  I've been frustrated with all the work that we do with little results.  But God knows us.  God knows what we need.  And despite my frustration, imagine how joyful I was when we found these people ready to hear the gospel.

I know God performs miracles today, that his words never cease.  I know he loves us all and that's why he sent His Son to die for us.  I love being a missionary every day! Thank you for your support!  I love you all and hope you have a great week.  Pray for blessings from the Lord and then have joy in your afflictions.

Vi voglio bene!

Anziano Price

Facts about Italy

Dear Friends and Family,

Since this week was not very eventful due to either people not answering our calls, not being able to visit people because they are sick, and a lot of door to door knocking/walking in Pozzuoli, I wish to expound on what I have learned in Italy.

First, pedestrians always have the right of way, no matter what. Of course, as missionaries, we obey the law of the land, but most people will cross the street wherever they want and sometimes whenever they want because cars have to stop. Basically, Italians don't fear cars hitting them since if the cars do hit them, it is always the fault of the person driving.

Also, Italians love their families. Often, when looking at the names of the apartment complex, half of them will be the same last name because the entire extended family has always lived there. They try to spend a lot of time with each other, probably more than we do in America. Italians also love to eat which I think I have elaborated on enough. They actually love to have us (the missionaries) eat I think more because they always say Manga, manga! (eat, eat!) right when it looks like we are full or have stopped eating.

Italians also especially love to talk!  This works out great when we proselyte in a park or the Lungomare because sometimes Italians just want to have a conversation. This also makes things easier for me because I don't have to worry so much about speaking a lot because they are 80 percent of the time speaking and so i just have to try really hard to listen to what they are saying because sometimes they speak super super super fast, especially here in southern Italy. Also each part of Italy (Rome, Naples, Sicily, etc.) has their own dialect separate from Italian, like where I am serving the dialect is Napolitano (mostly you just leave off the last syllable of normal Italian words).

One thing that was really exciting this week was that we got to watch General Conference! General Conference is semiannual conference where the prophet, apostles, and leaders of the church speak and give direction on whatever they think the members of the church need to do to follow Christ more and be converted. I loved this General Conference a lot! We watched the morning sessions in Italian in the Pozzuoli chapel at night because of the time difference and we will have to catch up on watching the rest throughout the week.

Overall, the message I got (at least from what I could understand in Italian) was I need to pray more fervently, study the Book of Mormon more diligently, and especially have faith and believe in Jesus Christ! The things the prophet and apostles have asked us to do seem so simple, and yet I know they will change our lives.

While some times this week and mission have been frustrating, I know this sacrifice for God and Jesus Christ is a righteous choice. I know I am here to serve and that all things, our joys and our trials, will be for our good. I want you all to first listen to the words of general conference and accept the invitation to read the Book of Mormon and pray to gain a testimony if it is true, and then work to build the kingdom of God. Even if you aren't a member, I want you to know the truth for yourself and experience the joy I have everyday of knowing I am a child of God, that I can feel peace and joy in this life because of the Atonement of Jesus Christ, that Christ's church is restored upon the earth, and that we can all received eternal life by following Him. 

I love you all and wish you the best!

Vi voglio bene!

Anziano Price