Ciao Famiglia!

Ciao, famiglia!

Before I start, I just want to say that I'm sorry I'm not gonna get to all of the questions you both had, but I'll get a letter going this week (hopefully). Today's busy. But I just want to let you know that I got the card you sent! Thank you so much! It came on Monday, so now you get timing, I guess.

Anyway, highlights of the week: yesterday, we went to Reggio Calabria, which is the other city that has missionaries in our zone, for district meeting. They usually come to us, but they had someone who needed a baptismal interview, and my companion is the district leader. But anyway, we took a boat, which was cool, cause I felt like such a rebel missionary, what with D&C 61 or whatever it is, haha! But Reggio is nice! I would have loved to see more of it, but I ended up getting a "whirlwind tour". One of the Elders forgot the keys to their church (an appartment), so I ran back with him. Then my companion and I had to run back to the boat to be able to get to a lesson on time. I was tired after running in a suit for half the day! But luckily, Anz. Davis, the Zone leader, had brought packages that were sent to the mission office (he went to Rome last week for a conference), and Kalyn had sent me some German chocolate, which I used as "victory chocolate" on the boat. We made it on as it was leaving, what a blessing!

Last Friday, my companion got pretty sick. He's all better now, but we were stuck in the apartment all day. He was sleeping a lot, so I had an opportunity to study a lot. Man, I was so ready to go out and tell people what I knew! And then I realized, I had to do that in Italian. Dang. Oh well, I'm steadily learning. But it's tiring! Anyway, one thing I really studied was my patriarchial blessing, and I can say now for sure that those blessings are inspired! It really helped me see some things in a new way, it was great!

You know that group of Sri Lankans we're teaching? Well, they're DANG AMAZING. I don't remember if I told you, but they have a baptismal date for the 22nd. So we're meeting with them 3x a week, and trying to help them understand everything as best we can. We were especially worried about tithing, since the mom doesn't have a job anymore, and they're all having a hard time. But after we explained it, she told us (through our interpreter) that she's been doing something similar just about all her life! Whenever she got paid, she went to the church down the street and put in some Euro, or in Sri Lanka, she saved some rice to give to others who needed it. That was just so awesome to us! And they're soaking in the Gospel like sponges, really studying the Book of Mormon, asking the best questions, gosh, I love teaching them! And not just because we speak to them in English, haha!

But I was super excited about them accepting tithing, because we have this one Professor who we meet with who refuses to be baptized until the prophet says it's voluntary. We're trying to work with him, but he's really stubborn, because he thinks about things a lot, whereas this family just accepted the idea readily. It really proves the many scriptures where it says stuff like "when they are learned, they think they are wise"!

That reminds me, on the way to their lesson yesterday, actually (the lesson after the boat), we met this one lady on the tram (which we usually only take to get to the more northern parts of the city, since the city is really long, but skinny). Anyway, she recognized us and said she was baptized something like 25 years ago in Catania, and asked to see if she could start coming to church again, and where and when it was. We'll see if she follows through, but that'd be a cool little blessing!

But that's the main points of my week in a nutshell. I wanted to ask you: how much are you gonna put in my account for Christmas? We take out money from ATM's, since no one here really accepts cards, and I want to know. I'm thinking of buying a few ties and maybe a nice suit (which here get dang cheap with sales, I've heard of some going down to like 30, and ties 2!). But then there's also these amazing cookies which are literally made to be put in milk (they are shaped like teardrops, so you have a little handle), which I would be perfectly fine with as a Christmas present, haha!

I love you all, and am glad to hear from Mom and Dad that everything's going great! See you in a few years!

Ci Vediamo!

Anziano Walker