Well, this week has been a little crazy. The journal entires show most of it, so this email that I'm writing now will just be an add-on to after the entries I sent.
Journal Entries
26-8-11
Well, today while we were finishing up weekly planning, Pres. Wolfgramm called us. He told us that we were getting space transferred. COMPLETELY unexpected! I had just started to get along with Anz Mauldwin, AND we had just found an AMAZING couple (Cesere and Silvana) who we met just 6 days ago and had already came to church, and seen us twice (and a third visit tonight). They're going to be baptized. But yeah, apparently Anz Blaga (from Romania) isn't getting along too well with his companion, so Anz Blaga and I are switching spots. I'm to become senior companion(I've been in Italy twice as long as my new companion) and I'm going to Siena. Wow! I'm kind of excited to get a new companion, but not at all excited to leave Ravenna... AND I haven't even seen the mosaics yet!
27-8-11
Well, last night we had an awesome lesson with Cesere and Silvana! Cesere read all the way to 2 Nefi 9 (90 pages) and had prepared literally pages full of questions for us! But, the part that was even more awesome, is that he realized that all the questions he wrote down didn't really matter, and so he just asked us about the resurrection. It was way cool seeing him - someone who is so focused on facts and what not - start to feel purpose in the gospel. Silvana apologized to us for not having read as much - she only read ALL of 1 Nefi (60 pages) lol. But we had a great lesson aout the plan of salvation. She kind of freaked out about the fact that God has a body of flesh and bone, and that we have the possibility to become like our Father, but as we went on and explained our message, it really made sense to her, it was awesome!
I called Pres. Gresta to tell him I was being transferred, and he was not happy... He tried to pass by last night, but was visiting a family till late.
This morning Fratello Bissi took us to see the best mosaics in Ravenna, and they were awesome! And ancient! Like 400-500 A.D. I said goodbye to my beautiful new bike...sad day...
I met Anz. Lehnardt (my new companion), and he's such a stud! And it was funny, we've had a lot of similar experiences! Especially with our MTC companions, he had the exact same "situation" as me. But yeah, this is going to be a good transfer!
Siena is BEAUTIFUL!!!! Walking around the city I keep trying to think of some kind of movie, or some kind of photo that looks like the scenery around me, but they don't exist! The travelling we do is all by foot, so no biikes. But man, I just can't describe to you how awesome everything is here! One of the really cool things here is their unity. They have a bunch of contrade (17 neighborhoods) here, and they are all very proud of the contrada they are in, and have flags, costumes, and all kinds of stuff! This week even, one of the nearby contrade is throwing a week long party, where every night they have this huge dinner, and a music show, or some kind of performance, just in the middle of the street! It's crazy! One of the big things with the contrade, is they do this race every year. They call it palio, and it's a HUGE horse race. They take the biggest piazzo (town square type thing, basically a big paved clearing) and lay dirt all around the edges, and each contrada races a horse, and whoever wins has bragging rights for the year or something like that. I've only been here like 4 days, so I'm still learning!!!
Also! They have a dialect! Kind of. They don't pronounce the hard <<c>>s. So instead of saying chiesa catolica, they say hiesa hatolihah. It's crazy! And coca cola becomes <<hoha hola>> hahahahah
But everything here is awesome! Our apartment here is way awesome, we have a backyard!!!! And my comp, Anz Lehnardt, is way awesome!!! And right now we're even about to go off to Firenze (Florence) with Anz Scheurn and some of the other anziani in our zone!!!
Well, just to wrap it up real quick, I wanted to share a quick little spiritual experience that I thought was way awesome. We have an investigator here named Tina. My first impression of her (in church) wasn't the greatest. She seemed very uninterested, and just bored. Yet she was the one of our investigators that has a baptismal date. For next week! So, we had a lesson with her later on sunday, and found out that she didn't quite understand what the law of chastity was. She has a boyfriend, and here in italy, it's very normal for a boyfriend and girlfriend to be having relationships that are... a lot closer to those of a married couple. So when we explained to her that God does not want these relationships outside of marriage, she was upset. She thought that we were interpreting the bible wrong at first, then she moved to asking us if she could just get baptized in a different church and be fine, and she even went as far as to start saying that she didn't like our <<preachers>> in church hahah and said that they are not as exciting as her old one. But, we just calmy bore our testimony and asked her to pray about it, and that God would tell her what she needed to do. After a couple moments of silence, she explained to us her worries that her boyfriend would break up with her if she told him about the law of chastity, and she really really likes this guy. We again just encouraged her to pray about it, and ensured her that God would help her carry out whatever he commands her to do. Then, to my surprise, she asked us if we could talk to her boyfriend. If we could explain the law of chastity to him. She had already decided to keep it! She's willing to risk losing her boyfriend, she's willing to change her entire life for this gospel. And that's what this is all about. This gospel really is a gospel of change. And the story doesn't end there either! Yesterday she told us that she talked to her boyfriend (instead of wating or us to do it) and he was completely fine with it!!! He understood completely! Score! Miracle!!! I know that this church is true. I know that the Lord hears us when we pray, and if we pray with real intent, cioè the willingness to act on whatever it is God tell's us, we will be given the strength to do it.
You guys are awesome, I miss you all so much! Stay strong, and never stop praying!
-your favorite italian missionary,
Anziano Bushman
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| Some mosaic pictures from one of the churches in Ravenna (building and mosaics built 1500 years ago!) |
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| These are only a tiny bit of the views we have here in Siena. |
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| My new companion, Anz Lehnardt |
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| Some more of the cityscape, and it's surroundings. |
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| There are a lot of streets with decorations like this. Those flags are flags for the contrada giraffa, and they even paint the lamppost with their colors! It's crazy!!! |
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