La Fine

Well, this is it! The last e-mail you're going to be getting from me on the mission. There's not too much to say. I've really loved my mission, and I still have a lot of things to do. Tomorrow we have breakfast, lunch and dinner meal appointments, so I'm staying pretty busy.

In a couple of hours we're going to go play calcio!

Pretty much, things don't get much better than this.

The other day I was walking around talking to people on the street, and I was thinking about how I am a representative of Jesus Christ. It's fantastic! I just walk around, preaching the gospel, making people happy, while enjoying myself. It's really awesome. It's like, how do you get any better than that?

Last week we were going to do family home evening with a South American family from the ward, and on our way to their house there was a lady and a guy moving a washing machine. I offered to help. Usually, it's hard to get people to accept offers to help. Most of the time you see an old Italian woman carrying a fridge on her back, and you offer to help and she says "no no, I can do it". You keep insisting and she says, "no, no, it's okay, I have help", then you see her 80 yr old husband, hunched over coming over to help. Hahaha. Anyway, this lady actually accepted the help! So I take the other side of the washing machine and me and this guy started carrying it down the stairs. We went down three flights of stairs! Then we walked around to another palazzo, took a couple more flights of stairs and put her washing machine in her house.

Was it pretty tiring? Yes.

Was it pretty awesome? Yes.

She's from Peru. She asked us about who we were, and said she would want to meet with us to talk about religion. We told her about how we have a sister missionary from Peru and she was excited to meet her.

Okay, I need to go because I have a lot to do to get ready to go.

^That half of the email was written yesterday. The rest is from today:

Hey!

So this morning we went and had breakfast with ex-Anziano Scotchi and Sorella Misseri. It was great. In a couple hours I have to go eat lunch with the Iaconianni family, and then tonight we have to eat dinner at six!!

Let's just say, I'm going to be coming home very full.

We also played calcio yesterday. It was a total blast. I got some pretty good photos. I'll just tell you more about it when I get home.

I'm really glad that we're going to be coming back here in May. We have to eat with quite a few people. I hope you like Italian food!

I should go finish up a bunch of things that I need to get taken care of.

I love you tons! I know that the church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is true. I'm really excited for the temple here in Rome!!

Lots to do. There are tons of people that are joining the church here and will be able to go to the temple all the time! (There are also soccer fields right below the temple!!)

Love,

Anziano Banks

Wow

It's crazy how much there is to do. I think I should probably extend another week or two. Haha. I wish.

There are seriously a ridiculous number of things that I need to get done in the next few days. Tomorrow I'm on splits with Roma 3, Monday morning we're booked, Monday evening we have three appointments, Tuesday is zone leader council, Wednesday we need to do some other things besides playing soccer that afternoon, and then Thursday we have breakfast, lunch, and dinner meal appointments. Hahaha. It's really nuts. haha. Basically, what I'm trying to say is that I can't promise that I'll be e-mailing you again before I’m back, sorry.

Sardegna was incredible. Besides our preparation day it was really incredible too. I love going on splits. Miracles always happen. We met some really awesome people in Oristano, Sassari, and Olbia. Especially in Olbia though.

I love it so much here! Walking around sharing the gospel with everyone is the best thing in the world. While I was in Olbia we talked with a lot of people, and really connected with them even though they chose not to accept our message. I thought it was kind of weird that things were going so well, yet so poorly, but I was still really enjoying it. Anziano Lacey is great. Then when the evening came we started meeting person after person who was interested in meeting with us and we saw a lot of success that night. I think that sometimes the Lord just likes to make us wait before he blesses us.

 

I’m able to send you a bunch of photos this time because I’m kind of multitasking. President and Sister Kelly asked us to help them put together a slideshow for Christmas. It's going to be pretty awesome. I'll bring a copy home to show you, but it probably won't be as cool for you because you don't know all the missionaries like I do.

 

 

Anyway, I'm happy that you're doing well. I'm doing really well myself. I should probably catch up on a little sleep, but besides that everything is going good. I've been going out of my way to not be "trunky" at all, so don't be surprised if I experience quite a bit of culture shock when I first get home. Haha. Anyway, the work here is going really well and we're really happy about that.

I love you all a bunch. See ya soon.

Love,

Anziano Banks

Eccomi!

Sorry. Things have been really hectic. We had the biggest craziest transfer last week that we've had since I've been here. I don't think it was the most people moved around, but it was definitely the most interesting moves going on. For example we had three companionships that got blown into cities. We also had a couple of hiccups because of delays and things that made it really interesting. I didn't take any photos when the missionaries finished because I figure they'll be on facebook before me, so they can just take the photos with their cameras, which we took quite a few.

So I need to tell you about the new missionaries that came in! There were six sisters and only one anziano!! It was pretty crazy. They are AWESOME. The mission is so lucky. We had a really great time welcoming them into the mission. Me and Anziano Garvin took them all in the furgone (van) and drove them back to the office from the airport. We drove them right by the colosseum.

I think one thing that makes someone a great missionary is how happy and outgoing they are. Which, this was a pretty happy and outgoing group. You could really tell that they loved each other and they were excited to be serving here in Italy. Of course, who wouldn't be excited? It's the best mission in the world!

They also all really loved the pizza that we brought them at the airport. A couple of them were like .. this is the best pizza I have ever eaten! And I was thinking to myself...yikes. Rome pizza is some of the worst pizza I've had in the mission! hahahaha. Wait until they get down south...especially if they make it to Napoli. I guess the only one that really could is Anziano Jones since there aren't any sisters in the Napoli Zone. I know that Sorella Ivory really wants to get down there though. When we were at the train station there were a couple of ladies from Napoli that came over and talked to us.

It was pretty funny because I would look over at Sorella Ivory to see if she was understanding, and it was hilarious because half the time they were speaking Napoletano. hahaha. I could hardly even understand it. It seems kind of similar to Siciliano though. Let's see. One of the sisters in that group that seemed really cool was also Sorella Miles. She played soccer in High School and I think she's going to come play with us not this wednesday, but the next.

Anyway, this is where we have our furgoni parked right now.

On top of all that, I got sick. : ( I think that might actually be a good thing though because if I would've come home two days ago I would've come and gotten all of you sick! Instead, by staying here, I'm already almost totally recovered, and when I come home I'll be doing fine! Isn't that great!?

Anyway, what are some great things that happened this last week? Well, I think that one great thing is that we met another great family! There's Angelica who just lost her husband a few weeks ago, her four daughters (17, 19, 21, 23), and the grandma. They're really great. We had a really incredible lesson with them in the park. We had to do it there because there weren't any men in the house. We couldn't find more than one bench near each other, so we just sat down on the ground with a couple of them on the bench and on the ground. I wish I had taken a photo. One thing that was really cool is how well they understood everything. We talked to them about the plan of salvation, and they totally got it. One of us asked them (when talking about Paradise and the Spirit World), what would it be like to have a life full of peace and happiness where you can relax. One of the daughters responded that if life were like that, we wouldn't really learn anything. Yes!! So true. What a great response.

Hey, I should probably tell you who the new assistant is: Anziano Gatchell. He's actually from St. George! Cool, huh? So for now there are four of us. I have a bad feeling these last couple weeks are going to fly by though.

Listen, I just want you to know that I love you, I'm grateful for all you do for me, and I hope that you still have the futon because I'm going to be beat when I come home because I'm going to work so hard these last couple of weeks (not to imply that I'm not totally beat right at this very moment. hahaha).

Love,

Anziano Banks

 

 

P.S. I've always loved cannoli siciliani. I’ve also always been told they were the best in Sicily. My problem is that I realized that I had never had them outside of Sicily!!!  So I decided I should eat one here in Rome just to check it out... They're way better in Sicily.