Bari Libertà Transfer 7 Week 6

Transfer call day! Who knows what's going to happen?!?!

Well what a week it's been, I feel like I finally got to catch my breath this last week for the first time this Transfer! (I don't know why my iPad capitalizes Transfer every time, I'm too lazy to change it) 

We were still pretty busy though, Monday night we met with Sam to do his first follow-up lesson after his baptism! He brought us some sad news that he had lost his job :( But on the bright side he can come to Church again so that's super good! The lesson went super well and he was telling us about some of the African traditions that he grew up with. It was super sad hearing some of the tribal bloodshed and things but he is so grateful for the way he grew up and how lucky he is to have found a better way. 

Tuesday was rainy and a Holiday like the Italian 4th of July so literally everything was closed, there was no one on the streets and it was a ghost town. We had a handful of people at English Course which was cool and this new family came! They are super nice and we hope to be able to teach them about the Gospel soon! Afterwards we drove to the other side of Bari and traded companions, I dropped off Anziano Bowers with Anziano Hinckley and picked up Anziano Whitaker for our exchange on Wednesday!

Anziano Whitaker had a great exchange, we started off by going to Trani and teaching a lesson to some recent converts. We talked about the temple with them and the importance of being prepared spiritually through an effective study of the scriptures. It was definitely a lesson of discerning their needs and working through the spirit. Anziano Whitaker is a stud missionary so it went really well and we spent most of the rest of the exchange finding. We walked down the board walk and decided that wasn't very effective now that it's getting warmer and turning into tourist season... I talked to people from about 30 different European countries and not a one of them was Italy! Tourism is in full swing down here for sure! 

Thursday we had District Meeting in the morning which was really good as always and then we went as a District to this sandwich shop which was super good! You can order your own sandwich or you can just say "You make it!" And he makes the whole thing, he chooses what to put on it and it's sooooo good! And they're only 2 dollars so it's super cheap! We had an appointment for our car to change some sensor and they said it was only going to take a few minutes and the Toyota dealership is kind of out there so we just decided to stay there. Well two hours later we finally got out of there! Just in time to head to English Course in Bitonto! We ended a few minutes early and headed back to PoggioFranco to teach a little class to the Young Single Adults on missionary work. We had them do role-plays and everything and it was super successful! Then we had invited all of PoggioFranco's English Course Young Single Adults to stay after and play foosball and ping pong and eat Panzerotti so the members could practice their newly learned skills! It went super well and all the members were talking to the English Course students and it was a huge success! We want to try to do these things more often! 

Friday was an absolutely special day, Francesco was baptized! It was so good to see him ready to enter the waters of baptism and make that covenant. The Baptism was really spiritual and there was a good turn out of non-members. Francesco is 10 years old and his Dad was able to baptize him which was really cool! He's a recent convert of 6 months and so it was super cool to see both of them dressed in white! 

Saturday we had Italian class with the member that lives above us, we played a game where you tell a story by each person tells a part of it and then it goes on to the next person, it was hysterical! Then that afternoon Anziano Bowers and I were out doing some finding and we walked downtown to find that they had blocked off the street and were racing these OLD cars, it was soooo cool! I took some pictures and videos! They were old Porsches and Fiats and Alpha Romeos and BMWs from the mid 1900's and after. So cool. So unsafe though, they would never be able to do something like that in America, someone would get sued. 

Sunday! 

Francesco received the gift of the Holy Ghost and his Dad blessed the Sacrament with me for the first time! It brought me back to my first time and being able to explain everything to him. He did a great job! After church we went to the Bellomo family's house for dinner! It was super good and they gave us a referral so we are pretty excited for that! 

That's pretty much the wrap of the week! Transfer Calls are tonight! I'm excited to see what happens, I think our Zone will be getting pretty shaken up so we'll see what happens with Anziano Bowers and I! 

I just want to share my testimony about the Atonement, it is something so individual and personal and I know that it is meant for each and every one of us. Jesus Christ suffered so that we don't have to, there is so much turmoil in the world and I am so grateful for the knowledge that I don't have to go through anything in this life alone. I know it to be true! I love you guys and I hope you have a great week!

Anziano Bellucci