Napoli! Transfer 9 Week 2!

Does Napoli rhyme with miracles? Well good thing it does in Italian! 

This place is incredible, it's hotter than Hades, it's more humid than anything I've ever seen but we are seeing the blessings of hard work and obedience!

We had a great night planned on Monday but unfortunately our plans fell through and our appointments didn't show but as we were walking out of the Church we saw one of the youth of the Church walking with her friend. They are both about 16 and the member is the only member of her family. This was the second time we saw them just walking around and so we asked if we could meet with them and explain to her friend what we believe in and who we are. We set it up and she said she would call us. About an hour later she called and said "Anziani, 5 o'clock on Friday, don't be late!" We were super excited! 

Tuesday morning we tried to find some new shoes for me while talking to the people in the shoe stores. It was a lot of fun and we talked to a ton of people. We didn't end up finding anything I liked but it was a good morning. In the afternoon we went to find Vincenzo one of our investigators at his sandwich shop, we had a good chat with him. He's evangelist and knows the Bible super well, he is really curious though and he really likes us. He always says "There's something different about you guys" so we talked to him for a few minutes and set up an appointment to meet him outside of work so we could have a more focused lesson. 

That evening we had my first English Course here in Napoli and it was pretty good. We need to get some more students but it was fun. We teach the Advanced Course so we got to know each other and taught them some weird American sayings. I think we confused them more than anything but it was fun! Then we all sang the Children's hymn "Families can be Together Forever" and testified about the temple and the happiness that comes from eternal families. 

Wednesday we had correlation with Sam! So Sam is from New Zealand but has lived all over the US and is married to an American. His wife works for the US Birder Protection and she oversees the things that leaves the port here in Napoli and go to America. They have lived here for a few years and have about another year or two before heading back. Anyway he is our Branch mission leader and he is incredible, he has a lot of years of experience and he works really hard to help us out even if he doesn't speak the language. So we met at his house which overlooks the beautiful Margellina beach here in Napoli and had correlation while I stared at all the boats... then he fed us lunch, we made big old American sandwiches with a ton of food from the American base! He hooked us up with three huge boxes of goldfish too! 

Wednesday night we had a great lesson with Fabiola, she is one of our investigators that is progressing super well. She is super receptive to our message and she asks a lot of questions! We brought the Senior Couple with us and the lesson went really well. We watched the Restoration video and gave her a copy of the Book of Mormon. She said the closing prayer and the spirit was so strong! 

Thursday we had our first District Meeting all together, Anziano Pesci is our District Leader and he led a great discussion on pride and humility. Pride is such an easy sin to fall into and it was a good reminder to humble ourselves in this work! That afternoon we went to go and teach Vincenzo's cousin, it went really well and she became another new investigator!

We had English Course and then Mario, a homie from English Course bought us pizza and had us over to his house. I've eaten so many pizzas this week! 

Friday was weekly planning and then we spent a good part of the evening doing white boarding for English Course, finished off with a  gelato! While we were out we saw two Mormon American Families! The first one was super cool, it was an older couple who had been mission Presidents in Belgium and their daughter and son in law. They were super nice and Anziano Fryer and I took a selfie with one of them to send to our Moms, I hope you got it Mom! They bought us all dinner as well! 

Saturday I still hadn't had any luck finding any shoes and the mission nurse said I really needed to get some new ones. So we went to a couple more shoe stores downtown and I found some real Italian leather shoes for 40€, not too bad! We also had some really cool conversations with the shoe store people! 

There was an activity on Saturday, it was so much fun! It was called a "Serata Napoletana" which is just a Napoli night and it highlighted the dialect of Napoli with singing of songs in Napoletano and poems, dances and of course Food! There was a big turn out and three of our investigators came and one of them performed! It was for sure a success! 

Sunday was great as always! So they don't have translator headsets in this Branch so we usually sit behind the people that speak English and translate for them... it's a pain in the butt so they ordered some headsets. Well they came in but without batteries so we stayed old school this week and I translated Sacrament. Sam (Branch Mission Leader) teaches all the African members because he speaks English and we talked about the Sabbath Day. It brought me back to some of my favorite days back home, Sunday afternoons with Family, backyard BBQs and enjoying time together! 

We had a super cool experience yesterday afternoon. So the Herways are a Senior Missionary couple that live in Rome and are Humanitarian missionaries so they work with LDS charities to develop programs to help refugees. They work with other charities to help them and organize local projects and stuff. So we have two recent converts who are refugees and they live in the camps here in Napoli. So we organized for them to get a bunch of their friends together to come and talk with the Herways at the Church and discuss some of their needs so they can work on developing a program to help refugees here in Napoli. It was a really humbling experience to see these 20 or so guys from different areas all over Africa come in and tell their story. Unfortunately many of them escape Africa for reasons of violence, war, persecution and they come here to Italy and they don't find much of a better life. Many of them have been through brutal experiences and it's really hard for them to reflect on the things that they've gone through. The Church has some great ideas to try and help them even with things such as organizing soccer games to help them have a little fun and get their minds off their situation as well as providing medical care and food. We're excited to work with them! 

This was a great week! I have really enjoyed Napoli! Today we are headed to the Military Base to go shopping at the American store... apparently it's super cheap so I'm stocking up because Sam is going to take us! 

I just want you all to know if you didn't already that I know that Jesus Christ lives, that he's our Savior and that he knows each and every one of us personally. If you're not sure about this I invite you to try it out and pray to our Heavenly Father, with real intent and I know he will respond, we just have to listen! Have a great week! 

Anziano Jacob Bellucci

Napoli! Transfer 9 Week 1!

Coming at you from Napoli, home of the pizza, the second biggest city

in the mission and home of the nicest people!

What a great week! I'm super excited to tell you about it! It went by

super fast but a lot happened for sure! As always I'll give you the

week from the top, Monday night we had a Family Home Evening/Birthday

Party with Fabrizia our Italian Teacher that lives upstairs. I made a

homemade chocolate cake with cream cheese frosting! Betty Crocker

doesn't exist over here but I found a homemade recipe, who knew you

could make cakes without a box!?!? So we had our spiritual thought,

ate cake, and then played taboo while we waited for the transfer

Calls. I was pretty relaxed because I had only been in Bari for two

transfers so I thought I was safe! The phone rang I was expecting to

be told I was staying another 6 weeks in Bari! Well... obviously that

was far from the truth! I was told I would be coming to Napoli to

continue being a Zone Leader and I would be working with Anziano

John-Paul Perfili! (So you can stalk him on Facebook Mom) I kind of

had some mixed emotions, I didn't feel super ready to leave Bari

especially because I've done 3 transfers in all of my other cities but

I know Napoli is where the Lord needs me!

That was pretty much the end of Monday night... I started doing

laundry and getting ready to pack! Then on Tuesday morning I went with

Anziano Osmond to go get our hair cut. We went to some Chinese

place... they did an okay job! Then it was off to DDM. Anziano

Whitaker was somewhere over the Atlantic Ocean on his way back to Utah

so we didn't have a District Leader so we had Anziano Wilkey run

District Meeting and he did a really good job! It was his first time

and we had a great discussion on The Who, how, and why we serve...

what it comes down to is love. We love the people we serve, and if we

don't love them we serve them anyway so we can develop that love. It

was a very well done training! Afterwards I got everything pretty much

packed and then we went to English Course and we got to bare our final

testimonies at the end before we left. It was bittersweet, there are

some awesome people that come! Afterwards I had the opportunity to do

a baptismal interview for a lady who is going to be baptized on the

24th. I don't think I've talked about baptismal interviews before so

for those of you who don't know a baptismal interview is really an

opportunity for an investigator to bare their testimony of the things

that they've learned from the missionaries. We make sure that they

understand the doctrine and it's a really spiritual experience. At the

end I asked her what the strongest part of her testimony is or if

there is a principle that the Sisters taught her that really struck

home with her and she started to bare beautiful testimony of the Plan

of Salvation in relation to her mother. She is so excited that she now

had the knowledge that she can be reunited with her family and they

are excited to go to the temple a year after their baptism! It was a

great experience for me and the spirit was really strong!

Wednesday morning we went to Trani to say goodbye to the Musicco

Family. I will miss them so much! Instead of a spiritual thought I

asked each one of them to kind of do the same thing that I had the

lady in the baptismal interview do. All four of them bore testimony of

a different and unique principle about the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Again the spirit was so strong as I heard about all the things that

they have learned in the last year. I got a little teary sharing my

testimony about the importance of the Gospel in our lives. The

missionaries are great and it's easy to get attached to us but it's

the Gospel that is important and it was really great to hear that

their testimonies don't lie with us, they lie in Jesus Christ.

Afterwards Vittoria told me that she is planning on being sealed in

the Rome Temple next Spring (if it's done) about the time that I go

home and she wants me and my family to come and be a part of it. I

really hope it's done in time!

We had an awesome activity on Wednesday night! It was in the 90's and

so crazy humid but we had planned an activity to play volleyball with

a bunch of English Course Students and members so we went to the

Church and just standing there waiting for people to show up we were

dripping with sweat but we had so much fun! No one had any energy and

we all played terribly but we all had a lot of fun! Afterwards one of

the English Course Students invited us over to her Brother's hamburger

place, it was super nice and legit American style burgers! They were

super good and they gave us a super good deal and they threw in all

these American appetizers that you can't really get in Italy like

jalapeño poppers, onion rings, mozzarella sticks, it was really good!

We had to make up for all the pounds we lost playing volleyball ;) it

was a great last night in Bari! Great People, great fun, and great

food!

Thursday Transfers started bright and early but we had quite a few

breaks between transfers so it was pretty nice and we live like a 5

minute walk from the train station. We got people on and off trains

all morning and then had a good break, I finished packing, made lunch

and then we went to the train station to pick up the new greenies

coming in straight from Rome. We took them to go get a Kebab and I was

sitting next to one of the new Anziani and I was talking to Sister

Bellomo and Sister Cibi who are both Italian and so I was speaking to

them in Italian and he just had this big deer in the headlights look,

it was so funny! I love seeing when they come into the mission and

then seeing how much they learn in their first two transfers.

Then it was time for me to head out to Nap town! The Fitzners met us

at the train station and Sister Fitzner gave me a big bag of homemade

chocolate chip cookies for the train ride and Anziano Andersen who

came to Napoli with me from Brindisi and I got on the train! Our train

was late getting to Caserta which is where the American Military base

is about 40 minutes outside of Napoli so we missed our connecting

train but there was another one and we made it to Napoli Centrale a

few minutes after 9. Napoli is huge! I met Anziano Perfili and all the

other missionaries and we came home, I unpacked a little and we hit

the hay, I was super tired!

So Napoli is known to be pretty dangerous, pickpockets, people getting

jumped and all that stuff (don't worry Mom, we're safe) and so there

are no Sister missionaries here despite how big the city is. So

instead there are three companionships of Elders here! So we live in a

four man house and there is another companionship that lives about a

10 minute walk away. So we live with Anziano Fryar and Anziano

Andersen who just came from Bari with me and then the other Anziani

are Anziano Pesci from my MTC group and his Greenie!

We spent Friday morning weekly planning and then went and grabbed some

groceries and a pizza for lunch. Napoli is Home of the pizza! You've

never tasted a pizza like a Nap-town pizza, and according to popular

belief "Polones" is the best place to get one! Unfortunately it's like

a 5 minute or less walk to get there from our apartment so I have a

feeling Napoli is not where I'll be losing any weight! This pizza was

soooo good! It's super heavy, it's really wet and there's probably 5

lbs of cheese on it. Happiness.

We had a few appointments lined up for Friday but one after another

they all fell through! BUT that meant I got to see how open and

friendly the Napolitano people are! We went "Whiteboarding" which

means we hopped the metro and went to Centro where all the shopping is

and walked around with a whiteboard that said "Inglese Gratis" (Free

English) and the people just flocked to us! I've never had an easier

time giving out pass-along cards! We had so many people talk to us and

ask for information, we had a few Gospel conversations and it was a

super good night! Finished it off with a gelato in a homemade waffle

cone. It was a good day! Saturday we Skyped in to Rome for the Mission

Leadership Conference and it was really good! Usually I feel like the

ones we do over skype are less productive but we got a lot

accomplished! We finished off the meeting with another Polones

pizza... when in Napoli right???

Sunday was great! So there is a Branch here in Napoli but it's big

enough to become a ward they just need the Priesthood numbers so it

should be becoming a ward soon. There were about 70 people in Church

on Sunday and they said they have about 90 active members which is the

biggest Church unit I've served in even though it's a Branch! We got

there and started talking to a couple of the members and then the

Primary President gave me a piece of paper with a puzzle printed on it

and said "Anziano, nice to meet you I need your help! Can you cut this

out?" She put me right to work! The members are so nice here and very

welcoming. The Stake Presidency was here and they reorganized the

Branch Presidency. So Sardegna is in the same Stake as Napoli so I saw

a bunch of the Stake leaders that I saw last summer when I was in

Cagliari! It was one of those "We've seen each other before" moments!

We taught Primary and taught the Word of Wisdom for them, it was a lot

of fun and I made them do jumping jacks to make sure they were

healthy!

We all met at our house to eat lunch together after Church and it was

really cool to catch up with Anziano Pesci and see where he's been in

the last year since we came to Italy! Its so crazy to look at our two

different paths and see everything that's happened!

We spent the afternoon teaching some great new converts, they have

incredible faith and we had a great lesson reading the Book of Mormon

together. I sometimes read and don't understand or pay attention and

so we were reading with this new Convert and as we went along I was

explaining what was happening and it was really interesting, sometimes

we have to slow down and pick the scriptures apart and we can get so

much more out of them!

Ok, this has been a really long email and I just want to finish by

telling you about my companion! So Anziano Perfili is just a few

transfers ahead of me so he is almost at a year and a half in the

mission. He is from Orange County California, a little city called

Yorba Linda! He is a super energetic kid, he gets excited about

everything and I love it! We are getting along super well and I'm

excited to work with him this Transfer!

Today we're waiting for some guys to put in some air conditioners in

our apartment so we have to stay here for a little while and then if

they're done in time we're headed to the museums today!

I love you guys, I love Napoli, I'm loving the mission and I hope you

guys are all doing super well!

Anziano Jacob Bellucci

Bari Libertà Transfer 8 Week 6

Good Morning! 

I for sure had a much better week this week, I still had to stay home at the beginning of the week but the second half went really well! I can't believe that transfer Calls are already here! We get the call tonight and we'll see if I'm fortunate to stay another 6 weeks here in Bari or if they are shipping me out! I really hope to stay and I've only been here for two transfers so I'm pretty hopeful but you never know! 

Monday was great, we went to the market and everything and had a relaxing P-Day while everyone else went to Matera. It was actually really nice to just chill and write some emails. For dinner we went to the Musicco family's house and ate way too much! We had a great Family Home Evening and it was really fun! 

Tuesday we had the pancake breakfast before DDM because Anziano Whitaker wouldn't be here this week as he has finished his mission and we put him on the train to Rome this morning. The pancake breakfast was amazing as usual! Then we had DDM focusing on Christlike Attributes, we were all assigned one to study and give a two minute Little talk on what we learned. It was great! 

Wednesday was... well right now I can't remember what we did Wednesday but I'm sure it was good! 

Thursday we had my follow-up appointment after my toe surgery and it went really well. They had me keep the same bandage on it since the surgery which was more than a week which I thought was kind of gross but apparently it worked! She cut it off and everything looks good! She said she hopes to never see me again! I told her the same... so now I'm good! I waited until yesterday to put a shoe on for the first time and it was amazing, I walked without pain for the first time in 8 months! I was pretty happy... Our English Course is pretty small in Bitonto so we decided to do a game night and teach them the vocabulary for Uno which was really fun! 

Friday we planned in the morning and got a bunch of stuff set up for this next week and then in the afternoon we had an activity at the Poggio Franco Church to play soccer and basketball with a bunch of contacts and English Course students... it was a lot of fun and quite a few people came. I just kind of shot hoops while they played basketball but it was still fun! 

Saturday was so awesome! The Fitzners (The Senior Couple) called us and said that they would pick us up and take us to Molfetta to go eat lunch and teach Samuel on the beach! We were definitely in! So we went with them and ate lunch on the beach and started wit Samuel's post-baptismal lessons. It was a great lesson as we talked about the blessings that come from the knowledge of the restoration. Sam bore testimony of the personal peace that he has felt since his baptism which is so cool to hear! It was a little tender as the Fitzners are leaving at the end of this month and so it will be hard for them to leave Sam! 

Sunday was great as always, I love taking the sacrament and being surrounded by the Italian Saints! I got to go to the Ward in Bari Libertà for the second time since I've been here. It's a great ward but we don't get to spend much time here because there is already another companionship that works here. We did an exchange and I got to come with Anziano Wilkey. The Bishop's daughter just got back from doing her senior year of High School in American Fork Utah which was really cool, she has been so immersed in English that she has taken on an American accent when she speaks Italian and there are even some words that she didn't remember in Italian. But the best part was she bore her testimony talking about how Christ's church is the same no matter where it is. It doesn't matter how big it is or who is there, the church is the same and we can find comfort in knowing that our Savior is with us no matter where we find ourselves. 

We were invited to lunch at the Petroni family's house which is the same family that had us over last time I came to Libertà. They're awesome, they're getting ready to leave for Switzerland 🇨🇭 to go to the temple and work as ordinance workers for two months. Sister Petroni reminds me of my Mom a has a lot of the same mannerisms as my Mom which was way cool, I took a picture! 

We ended Sunday with a Gesso (The sheet thing with the chalk) and it was a lot of fun, we did it on Genealogy and people were actually really receptive, we were able to talk to a lot of people and we had a lot of fun. The PoggioFranco Anziani stayed over because we had to take Anziano Whitaker to the train station early this morning to catch his train  to Rome as he flies home to America 🇺🇸 tomorrow morning! It was really weird to see a "dying" missionary... it was sad too! I'm gonna miss him for sure! 

Today has been pretty chill, we went grocery shopping and made a birthday cake for Fabrizia, our Italian teacher... she's awesome and we're having a little birthday party for her! 

Anyway, this email is shortish and you are probably really grateful for that! I love you all and I hope you have a great week! 

Anziano Bellucci

Bari Libertà Transfer 8 Week 5

Year mark, Toe surgery, and Mexican Food!

What a week! Haha are you all tired of me saying that??? Well this week has actually been really long and I don't have much to write about. Some of you know I've had some problems since my third Transfer with in-grown toe nails that just wouldn't give up! So I told President would just cut off my toe and he said "Well we better try to get it fixed first..." so I had to get it fixed!

So Monday and Tuesday were normal, we had P-Day I sent you all pictures of the beautiful beach in Polignano and everything was good and then that night we went to Francesco and Angela's house out in Bitonto! So Francesco is a returned missionary and him and his wife are newly weds of less than a year. They're bravissimi and Francesco loves Mexican food. So we organized a Family Home Evening to kind of show them that even though they don't have kids yet they can still have family night! So I made some picco di gallo and we made tacos Italian style... they were really good and we all are way too much! They were nice and spicy just the way my Mom likes them! We had a great time and then for our spiritual thought we discussed these three verses

9 Believe in God; believe that he is, and that he created all things, both in heaven and in earth; believe that he has all wisdom, and all power, both in heaven and in earth; believe that man doth not comprehend all the things which the Lord can comprehend.

10 And again, believe that ye must repent of your sins and forsake them, and humble yourselves before God; and ask in sincerity of heart that he would forgive you; and now, if you believe all these things see that ye do them.

11 And again I say unto you as I have said before, that as ye have come to the knowledge of the glory of God, or if ye have known of his goodness and have tasted of his love, and have received a remission of your sins, which causeth such exceedingly great joy in your souls, even so I would that ye should remember, and always retain in remembrance, the greatness of God, and your own nothingness, and his goodness and long-suffering towards you, unworthy creatures, and humble yourselves even in the depths of humility, calling on the name of the Lord daily, and standing steadfastly in the faith of that which is to come, which was spoken by the mouth of the angel.

I really enjoyed it and I really like the first part verse 9, it's so simple and so straight forward. Believe in God. It all starts with a belief, a hope, and little faith! 

We ran out of time for a game but we really did have a good time with them and I think they did too! That night we started an exchange with the PoggioFranco Elders... we met at our house and then Anziano Osmond and I went to PF for the night to start our scambio. 

So Tuesday morning we got up and did our studies and everything, Anziano Osmond is learning how to cook slowly but surely! He says "What do you want for breakfast?" In response to my indifferent answer he says "Lets make eggs" and he opens the fridge and grabs the eggs and a package of bacon too and says "Lets make both!" So bacon in Italy isn't in strips like in America, it's cut up into chunks like little tiny pieces and we usually make like an omelet thing and then mix the bacon and the eggs together. He mixes the eggs up and puts them in the pan and then you can see the confusion as he tries to decide how to cook the bacon because they only have one pan. I said "Do you think we should have cooked the bacon first and then added the eggs?" His response "On second thought lets just have eggs!" Haha it was a lot funnier in the moment! 

We had District Meeting that morning and we talked actually about the movie "Remember the Titans." Shout out to Zack for making me watch that movie so I actually knew what we were talking about. For those of you who don't know it's a movie about a black football team and a white football team, they get put together to play as one and first they stay very segregated, there is a team captain from each side they don't work together and they aren't very good at Football playing like this. Well the coach is incredible and in the end he integrates both teams and through various means and communication they become an incredible team, they work together and win the championship but more important than that they put aside their differences. We as missionaries are all so very different, we came from different places, different backgrounds and not a one of us is identical to the other. But we have a goal in mind and we have some common ground in Jesus Christ and we have to work together! We have one purpose and it takes communication, love, patience and so many other things to work together and be successful, but we can do it! At the end of the movie one of the black players gets I think hit by a car and taken to the hospital. The players all go to the hospital and the nurse says "I'm sorry, you can't see your friend right now" and the white player says "He's not my friend, we're brothers." And then pushes past the nurse. It was a really cool comparison to missionary relationships and I definitely learned a lot! Just because we're different doesn't mean we can't develop a great relationship!

Back to our scambio... we had a great language study and we're able to learn a lot together. Anziano Osmond is a stud and learning fast. He's in his third Transfer and is doing great! We then planned to go to the park and it was kind of a mess... we walked out of the house and I saw someone and said hi to him and realized I left all the lass-a-long cards at home so we turned around and got them. We were carrying a Football to do some finding with it and we dropped off our bags at the Church and walked to the park. We got to the park and I asked Anziano Osmond where the Football was and he thought I had it and I thought he had it. We both could have sworn we took it from the Church and then I remembered where I left it but Anziano Osmond was sure that we had it when we left. We made a bet that if it was in the Church he had to buy me gelato and if it wasn't I had to buy him gelato and a new Football. Good thing it was in the Church! Haha I bought him gelato anyway, we found a really good place and got "Frutti di bosco" which is like Forrest fruit which are just berries and then I got coconut too, another one of my mom's favorites! 

Then we were off to English Course and it was a lot of fun! That was the end of our day... now I had to write a lot about those two days because the rest not much interesting happened! 

Wednesday was the day of the surgery, so what they decided to do was take out my whole toenail but leave the nail bed so it will regrow. So the surgery was at10:30 and we go and take a number to go through the insurance. It's a little different here because most people don't have insurance because there's universal health care and so they were taking forever and never called us and so I go up and ask and she says that there's problems with the insurance so like an hour later after translating for the mission nurse and everything they get me in there and 10-15 minutes later it's all done! She wrapped it all up and sent me on my way. I didn't feel a thing but in the car ride home the anesthesia wore off and I was ready for some drugs... I got home, all drugged up and made a mountain of blankets to elevate my foot and went to sleep for most of the day. We also got an email on Tuesday that my companion's Visa was ready to be picked up in Taranto on Thursday morning so he took Anziano Wilkey with him to Taranto and I stayed here with Anziano Velardi who played nurse for me... 

Thursday was my year mark in the mission! I can't believe its been a year! So much has happened, I have met so many people and fell in love with a culture that I will never be able to forget. I have learned a beautiful language, studied so much but most importantly I have grown in my love for my Savior Jesus Christ. My testimony in Jesus Christ has doubled, tripled, quadrupled who knows how many times and I will always be grateful for that! The Sisters made me muffins and the Anziani brought me home a pizza. I stayed home all day because I wasn't supposed to put weight on my foot, all day with my foot in the air... if there was ceiling tiles in our apartment I could probably tell you how many there are. I'm not very good at letting people take care of me, I got my desk chair and scooted around the house in that trying to be self-sufficient while Anziano Velardi yelled at me to get back in bed. Oops... 

Friday I was going crazy! I made lunch for everyone, I used Sister Pappagallo's recipe from a few weeks ago to make the baked chicken with the eggplant, zucchini, and bell peppers and the breadcrumbs. It was super good, I got a picture before I put it in the oven but afterwards the Anziani ate it too fast to get one of the finished product. It was good though! That's pretty much all I didFriday...

Saturday I had to leave the house, I was going to go crazy if I didn't. We had Italian class at noon and then afterwards we all went downstairs to this Chinese place across the street to get lunch. It wasn't much of an outing but I definitely needed it! I hobbled my way across the street and ate some fried rice and sweet and sour chicken! 

Sunday was great, I got to go to Church in Bitonto, all the members were so nice and wanted to help me. All the Sisters wanted to give me Mom hugs since my Mom wasn't here to give me one ;) Anziano Bates who I flew to Sardegna with when I first got here was here with his family to visit the Bitonto Branch. He's been home for about 6 months and they came to visit. We got invited to Pranzo by Francesco and Angela and it was a great and simple Pranzo! They're great and again we had a lot of fun! After lunch though my foot was pretty swollen and we had to go home so I could put it back up again... 

This week I've had a lot of time to study, I think I've read about half of the Book of Mormon or at least it feels like that! I've watched Meet the Mormons as well as How Rare a possession and I've studied a ton of Italian. But more than anything I've had a lot of time to reflect and think about what has happened in this last year and what is going to happen in the year to come. I'm excited more than anything to change some things, to work harder and to make the most of the time I have left! 

This next week unfortunately will not be the most exciting, I'm still not supposed to walk too much and so I'll be home quite a bit but I have a Post-op appointment Thursday and they will take the bandage off and the stitches and we'll see what the doctor says! 

If you would like to share with me your favorite talks from General Conference I would love to know which ones they are and study them in the coming days. I hope you all have a great week and enjoy the warm weather that is bringing in these summer months! 

Un abbraccio fraterno,

Anziano Bellucci