Last Week!!!!!!!!!!

Ciao di nuovo!

I just can't believe I am in my very last week in Italia. It's kind of hard to think about sometimes, but at the same time I am so excited to see all of you!!!! I'm just trying to live every moment to the fullest and be prepared to embrace the future with open arms! I am so happy to be here in Genova, Italy, and I will be so happy to be at home too! Espcially right in time for conference! Best welcome home party I could ever think of!! 

Well, let's talk about the week, shall we? Genova is just lovely. I feel like this is the first time in my mission that I've had a never-ending pool of work to do. It's probably a combination of the fact of me having learned how to use my resources and also that Genova is just booming with potential! We had a really fun experience this past Monday night. I don't remember if I told you all the story of when we were out searching for a less active and weren't able to find the address. We started going around asking people on the street how to get there, and finally one lady suggested that we go into a bar to ask for directions there. We went in, and there was a cute lady from Santo Domingo sitting at one of the tables. When she saw that we were lost she offered to help and went outside with us to try and point out the street. She ended up going all around the mulberry bush with us for about half an hour until we finally found the address, only to discover that the family didn't live there anymore. She was so concerned and asked if there was a number we could call or anything- she was so determined to help us! We ended up having a pretty good conversation with her as we walked back to where we had met up before. Before we parted ways she told us that she was so happy to have met us telling us how we were so friendly and cute, etc, and she basically insisted that we come to her house one day to talk more and share our message. She even pointed out where she lived to us! So anyway, we finally were able to get around to seeing her this past Monday. She has the funniest little Italian husband who makes great facial expressions and hand gestures, we got pizza together, talked about the restoration, and she told us to come back on Saturday when her daughter will be there along with her husband. She is set on coming to church on Sunday (when we invited them the husband said "Si, andiamo- tu! or, yes, we'll come, you! indicating his wife) using the excuse that he had to stay home to guard the house. hahaha, oh how I love Italians. As we were leaving she said she would love for us to come back with our parents some day to spend the whole day together to pray! Che brava! 

We were pretty excited this past Sunday because we had about four less active families in church, along with our investigator from Poland who came for the first time! She only stayed for sacrament meeting, but at least she came! This week is really just going super well. We have a lot of appointments lined up and have a super cool activity on Saturday where there's apparantly going to be about 90 non-members there! Wow! Genova's great, basically. As I've started to say to myself, it's like the cherry on top of my mission. What a great way to end- with a bang!

Vi voglio un sacco di bene... un baccione a tutti! 

Love,

Sorella Lyman

Pictures from Nervi- the shore of Genova. Me and my MTC comp, sorella Harward, and then sorella McCann!

Gelato and Sorella McCann, Genova!

Chocolates at 18 Months

Buongiorno a tutti!!

Crazy things have been happening in Genova this week. Sorella McCann and I have certainly had some fun and interesting experiences! 

Let me just start with Monday. So last week Sorella McCann and Seare were doing a scambio and got two new investigators from Equador who are devout Evangelists. They were actually trying to find a less active member who didn't live at the address anymore, and instead this young evangelist couple who now lives there let them in. We were a little nervous that all they wanted to do was bible bash with us and so we were definitely planning for our next lesson on Monday to explain our purpose to them. Well when we came into their house we found four other people all sitting around the room who were obviously expecting us (sidenote, they didn't tell us these people were going to be there). We weren't exactly sure what to do so we just sat down and started talking to all of them. It turns out that they're all from the same Evangelist church and had come to hear our message/share their message with us. Let me just say, they're part of the evening took about the entire time and involved lots and lots of prayers, praising the Lord, singing hymns (all standing up), and a very dramatic sermon. They asked us if we sang hymns in our church and so we sang "I am a child of God" for them. I was getting kind of nervous by the end because we weren't going to have any time to even have a little lesson. But then at the very end they asked us if we had a message to share. We decided to read a little scripture in 2 Nephi 31 which talks about the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost being one and they really like it. In fact, it was probably thanks to that verse that we were able to find some common ground and spark their interest in our message. So, we have a return appointment for the following monday and four new investigators! It was interesting because they were all genuinely interested in our message but it took an entire evangelist church service basically to gain their trust. I've definitely never had a more informative and cultural experience about another religious faith and it ended up turning out pretty well in the end. 

We didn't think that the night could get any weirder, but THEN on the way home from that appointment (we were already running late) we ran into one of our less actives from Russia who is a little interesting, we'll say. We had about 15 minute conversation/lesson with her and at the end she gave us two huge bouquets of flowers that she had picked from the ground to give to someone in our ward on Sunday. It was perfect cherry on top of a very weird evening to begin with. 

If there's one thing I've learned from this experience as well as from countless others on my mission, it's that you NEVER know what to expect!!! You ALWAYS have to be on your toes and ready to accept and embrace anything that comes your way. It's just like Forrest Gump would say- "Life is like a box of chocolates- you never know what you're gonna get." It is so true, ragazzi. I am so grateful for ALL of the experiences I've had on my mission, good and bad, and the best part is IT'S NOT EVEN OVER YET! I still have three more weeks to go, and they are going to be glorious!!! 

Non posso descrivere quanto che vi voglio bene... alla prossima!

Love,

Sorella Lyman

P.S. Today is my 18 month mark!!!!! WHAT?!!?!! Here's a picture with me and Sorella Harward to celebrate. :)

Mission Prep

Buongiorno!!

Well, here we are, almost two weeks in Genova down. So much has been happening! The highlight of the week actually probably happened while I was gone on a scambio in Savona. Sorella McCann was here with Sorella Hatch and they were planning to go see a potential investigator that we had been trying to see for ages. They were finally able to see her this past Friday. It turns out that since the time the the sisters gave her a book of mormon on the street a while back that she had already read the entire thing!! I have been able to meet her since then and she has such good questions and understands everything we say. She has been keeping all of the commitments, reading the things we assign, the next one we're committing her to is coming to church- she really wants to come!

On Sunday we were able to meet another lady from Brasil who lives way out in the mountains in a beautiful area by this huge bridge. We were able to take one of the young single adults with us who right now is thinking about serving a mission. She was so brava in the lesson! It had actually been a while that I'd had a lesson like that- cioè a mom, dad, little girl, in their home, teaching the restoration with a member. It felt so good to be in that situation again! It was a good thing we had the member with us because she is familiar with the are and we probably wouldn't have been able to find their house without her! 

Thus far in Genova we've had a pretty equal mix of rain and sun. The bad thing about the rain here though is that it is super fat and comes down in torrents. Not the same as Verona! At least we're not on bikes! :p But we actually had kind of an adventure on Monday getting to an FHE with one of our less actives. The family's palazzo was up a HUGE flight of stairs going of this big hill (that's one thing about Genova- there's palazzi basically like staircases going up the hills there isn't really much flat ground to work with!). So anyway, it took us about 15 minutes to get up the staircase with our less active who was just huffing and puffing and saying "non ce lo faccio!" but we managed to get to the top finally. This particular lady is quite a character- I don't think there was one instance where her mouth wasn't running a mile a minute about topics that I could barely keep track of. Una donna propria italiana! 

I'm just having a blast right now, especially with Sorella McCann! she is so funny. We especially like to talk in accents together- british, southern, filipino, african, indian, australian- Right now I'm working to perfect my filipino and she is trying to perfect her australian. Anyway, we just have so much fun together and I'm learning so much and loving every moment! 

Abbiate un sacco di divertente questa settimana... vi voglio bene!

Love,

Sorella Lyman

Two pictures of Sorella Lyman with chocolate foccacia, which she bought just a block away from her apartment: