;)

Wow, I feel like I was just here (at the internet point). This week went by so quickly! I've realized that my life is always like that. I completely love my mission, but I also completely loved college, I completely loved high school, and everything before that I don't even remember that well because it was so long ago! haha.

Time just keeps on flying.

This week I was really happy because we taught a lady named Letizia (her name means the same thing as felicità - happiness!) She is really elect. I met her awhile ago when we did a "Helping Hands" project and she came to help us. She told us to come by her work, but one time when we passed by she wasn't there, another time we could see that she was crazy busy, and another time they were closed. Finally, after months of not being able to get into contact with her, we finally went and saw her and she was really excited to see us. She's like a super-woman. I'm really excited to teach her the gospel.
I'm don't completely understand what her job is, but I know that she does a lot of volunteer work and helps people. She also feels like the church is true, she's read the Book of Mormon but didn't really understand it, and she knows that we're servants of Jesus Christ. She is a little afraid to change, but I think she's excited to start meeting with us (she's never actually been an investigator).

I think I forgot to tell you about another really great success! haha. So, we taught Elisa and Ishan about fasting, and we decided to fast so that she could give up smoking. She smoked about 10 or 20 cigarettes a day. So we all fasted. She fasted from Friday night until Monday morning!! We told her on Sunday that she had already been fasting too long and that she didn't need to keep fasting, but she wanted to do it! She also didn't smoke the whole time she was fasting. After she finished, she smoked again, but she only smokes like one cigarette every day or two. We're helping her stop completely, but I think it's a total miracle that she has gotten to this point because she has been smoking since she was about 8 years old!! Here is a picture of most of their family.
I really like the way things are going. It's weird that I'm staying here longer than any other city, but I like it here, so that's good.

We recently bought a new pan. It's ceramic. It's nice and makes good food, but not as good as these pizzas! Or this lunch we had with our district. Somehow food is always better when you don’t have to make it yourself. haha.

On Sunday we celebrated the 150th anniversary of Italy. I kind of wish I was in a bigger city right now, but I heard that tonight there are going to be fireworks here. I gave a talk in church about supporting the government. I shared my experience at BYU-Hawaii when I had to take the bus all the way to another city to vote. That was crazy, but I did it because I know it's important to vote.

This week I also bought a sweet new Bible. They came out with a new, economic Bible here so I decided to buy one. It's pretty cool. I was looking through it, and I realized that it has some books from the Apocrypha. haha. Anyway, it's a lot easier to read than the one the church uses here in Italy. I'm so glad that in English we have the King James version. Here in Italy everyone has a different translation of the Bible. My companion likes to use the Evangelist version, because he says it's more accurate than the Catholic version.

Anyway, I guess that's about it for today. I hope that you're doing great and that you're happy and healthy. It's sounds like you are by your e-mails.

Love,
Anziano Banks