Crotone! Transfer 4, Week 4!

I'm running out of ways to start my emails... so... if you have any ideas let me know!

Hello everyone and Merry Christmas! I can't believe we are less than two weeks away! It doesn't quite feel like Christmas here... it's been about 45 degrees all week which I hear is about as cold as it gets, and there's no snow but it's okay because the Christmas spirit, or rather the spirit of Christ is definitely here!

Like I said last week we headed over to Taranto on Monday for Zone Conference and it was a great time! The travel kind of blew but it was a lot of fun. We took a two hour train and then a bus for three hours to get to Taranto and the Zone Leaders had pizza waiting for us because they know how much the bus ride blows. I learned that I can ride in a tour bus just fine on the freeway (super strada) but when we drive through every little town and curvy roads I get real sick and the bus, on the way there was a curvy route 😳😷not so good but I made it!

Tuesday was the conference and so we get to see President and Sister Pickerd which is always so great, they are like a little piece of America that you don't get to see very often so it's always so nice to talk with them. It was nice to meet the missionaries from the Zone, there is a Sister from my group who is actually training! We had a really cool training about light and the different ways that we can all be a light to our companion, our members and our investigators. Anziano Friedman who is one of our Zone Leaders shared a really cool story, he grew up Jewish and so he shared the story behind Hanukkah and the lights in the temple, I got to learn some more about his conversion as we did an exchange the next day. Taranto is a huge city, its bigger than Cagliari but it definitely reminded me of Cagliari which was really nice. That night Anziano Friedman took me to this vending machine that has DR. PEPPER! For the first time in 6 months I got the sweet nectar haha the little can cost 2€ which is like $2.20 but it was worth every penny. They import it from England so I guess I can see why it costs so much but it seems a little excessive. Speaking of expensive things, I saw some Jiffy peanut butter the other day the little tiny one and it was 6€ crazy. They have PB from Holland that isn't too bad and its double the size and half the price so I buy that one.

Anyway Wednesday our exchange continued and we went to one of their investigators houses for Pranzo, she is a wonderful lady and so sweet, she is like an Italian Mom for the Anziani of Taranto. And man can she cook, she made my favorite, homemade ravioli! We all about ate ourselves sick! And then she made Tiramisu for dessert which was Heavenly. Funny story about this, he first time they went over there she asked if there was anything they didn't eat and they said no and so she made tiramisu with coffee and they couldn't eat it and she felt so bad so this time she made it with orzo and it was so good! She grew up Catholic but has never really studied the Bible and so she has a lot of questions. As she reads the Book of Mormon she doesn't always understand the references to the Bible or sometimes just the wording so she writes down the verse and then they go through it. She has such a desire to understand and a thirst for the knowledge it was so great to see her pour over the scriptures. And I learned a lot from Anziano Friedman's answers to her questions, things that I didn't fully understand before. The Gospel is cool because there is always more to learn!

Back on the bus and about 4 hours later we made it back to Crotone! Meno male it was a freeway bus this time! There is your Italian Phrase, meno male is like "Good thing..." "Fortunately..."

Parrucchieri (Hair salons) are almost all closed on Monday so we have to get hair cuts on not P-Day so we went Thursday and my companion likes this place it's called the "Gentlemen's Club" to me it's called "Over priced old men with cigars and alcohol" but he likes it so we went. It is kind of a cool place their water spray bottles were like old Jack-Daniels bottles which was interesting but they did a good enough job! We then went to the church and set up the baptismal font. The Sisters had a Baptism on Saturday and baptisms here usually happen in the ocean but it's too cold so they have this portable thing (It is a giant pain in the butt but totally worth the Baptism!) so we got it set up and ready!

Friday my companion was sooooo sick, he didn't get out of bed at all. I called a member and had them bring us some medicine, drugged him up, made him eat some soup and sent him back to bed. I cleaned the whole house, read two ensigns, watched Meet the Mormons in Italian (Way better in English) and read almost half the book of Alma, made some apple sauce, a ragù sauce and a carbonara for lunch. All while my companion slept... I don't know what I'm going to do when I go home and here isn't something planned for every hour of the day.

Saturday Baptism! We spent almost the whole day in the church, we moved the font into another bigger room, we taught seminary and made lunch for the one seminary student that came and then it was time to fill the font! I don't know if I said this before but our church is two apartments put together and so the bathrooms still have bathtubs because eventually they will move the church and this will turn into an apartment again. So the font gets filled with a hose from the bathtub and it takes FOREVER. But it all worked out and we were ready for the Baptism! The Sisters asked me to sing a duet with Sorella Taylor "Bisogno ho di te" which is "I need thee every hour" it went pretty well but public singing is so not my favorite thing to do. Anziano Redaelli was feeling well enough to baptize Xenia a cute little Filipino girl and it was amazing, so many members came out to support her and it was definitely a boost that both us missionaries and the members needed.

Church is almost always my favorite part of the week! After Sacrament Sister Zarfino came and started talking to me about all this homemade pasta she had bought and the sauce she had made before church and I was so hungry but she hadn't said anything about us coming over so I said "Sorella Zarfino, is this an invite?" And she's like "Well yeah, I wouldn't just be telling you about this if I wasn't going to invite you over!" So we had Pranzo together and it was just as good as she made it sound! We then went with a new convert to visit his Grandma in the hospital and she was in a room with 5 other people (We won't talk about Italian Hospitals) and we asked if we could sing a Christmas carol and all the old ladies said "Of Course!" So we started with "Nato è Gesù" which is Silent Night and then we sang  "Oh Come all he Faithful" or "Venite Fedeli" and by the end we had a handful of people come in and singing with us from several rooms down the hall, it was incredible! We had such a great time and the spirit was so strong, then all the Italians sang a hymn called "He came from the stars" or something like that and it was absolutely beautiful and you could see their faces light up as if they were imagining their childhood memories and their families. The spirit of Christmas really is the spirit of Christ, it can touch the hearts of those who are prepared to hear it and we can share the word through a simple smile, a song or a kind word to someone in need.

Christmas is quickly approaching and I just wanted to invite you all to remember Jesus Christ in everything you do this Holiday season. He is the reason for the season and when we focus on him we really can feel that Christmas joy. I love you all and I hope you have a wonderful week!

Anziano Jacob Bellucci