My sweet companion Sister Perkins. We have been together for Four weeks already.
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| All the Italian Sisters |
Ciao Mia famiglia!
Come
va? Sono molto bene! Wow one month of my mission down already! That
went by way fast! In exactly two weeks I will be in Italy!! Next week
I'll email you with travel plans. It's crazy how soon I am leaving. I am
so excited, but I dont' feel like I know the language well enough so
I'm also nervous. I'm still loving the MTC (especially the devotionals
and when we get to teach). I am kind of sick of the food here, but
there's no way I'm going to complain about that after China. I'm amazed
that a month has gone by already, I thought it would feel a lot longer
being locked up here, but it's not too bad!
So with only two weeks left, all the Italians are
definitely feeling the pressure to learn this language. At the beginning
everyone would goof off a lot, but now everyone is studying a lot
harder (which I am really grateful for). We've been trying SYL (Speak
Your Language) as much as possible and it's hard, but it is so good. SYL
is where you only speak Italian and that's how any of the concepts stay
in your head. I feel like I know a lot, but everyday I realize how much
more there is to know. But I LOVE this language! Everything sounds so
beautiful and I love complimenting people in Italian. Haha especially to
the cooks cafeteria: "Oh grazie! Bellissimo! Perfecto! Buono cibo!
Grazie!"--with lots of hand gestures and air kisses. The workers
probably all think I'm crazy, but it's fun (side note: I found out the
Rome mission is well known for having lots of crazy people so I know
this is meant to be).
I've gotten to leave a few times to go to physical
training for my companion and I actually really like it. We get to leave
the classroom for a bit, go exercise, and make new friends. The people
are so nice and we go around and bare our testimony in Italian for
everyone. Every week we also go to TRC (Teaching Resource Center) where
we teach Italian speakers a gospel message--they are just volunteers and
usually members. Oh I have to tell you about this one guy we met! His
name is Alessandro and he has been coming every week for many years; he
is probably the most interesting and funny person I have ever met. We
had a lesson with him yesterday and we could hardly get a word in,
because this guy talked so much! He said he was from NYC, his family is
Jewish (he went on this huge rant about how Hitler is Satana), and he
has seven cats (he called himself padre celeste (Heavenly father) of his
cats!). I shared 2 Nephi 23:3 which happened to be his favorite
scripture and on the report paper he wrote "They shared my favorite
Scripture. God told them." Also Sorella Perkins told him she was from
Australia and has eaten Kangaroo and he spent five minutes talking about
how crazy it is that she ate kangaroo. Ah he was so funny and I can't
stop laughing at how odd he was. What a gem.
Our schedule has kind of been messed up this week so we
didn't really get to meet with our investigators much--just once each.
Luigi is still a struggle, but I really think he is feeling it and we
got him to pray at least (huge step for this guy). Yesterday we got to
meet with Angela and it was a really great lesson! Last time she said
that she was already baptized so we had to explain about the authority
and I think it went really well! It's really fun teaching lessons and I
learn so much! Also, although sometimes I wish I was going English
speaking--the cool thing about speaking a language on a mission is that
you HAVE to COMPLETELY rely on the spirit to teach. There's no way the
people can understand us well enough, unless the spirit teaches them.
It's very humbling to be apart of.
Vi voglio bene!
Sorella Knudsen!
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