Week 11

(Week 5 Caserta)

"Be cheerful in all that you do. Live joyfully. Live happily. Live enthusiastically, knowing that God does not dwell in gloom and melancholy, but in light and love." ️

-President Ezra Taft Benson

"Together" we found hunger games berries

Cool aqueduct

This week had a lot of failed appointments and lots of finding. Towards the middle of the week I was feeling kinda bummed because I didn't feel like we were doing much work, BUT.... On our way to visit a less active, Maria Russo, there was a massive catholic ceremony going on in the street. We were just passing through and a woman (her name is Vincenza but she goes by Vini) comes literally running up to us and gives us the baccio. She starts explaining how she is so happy the Sorelle missionaries have returned to Caserta! She told us where she lived and when we went back to visit her I was blown away... This woman and her husband had been taking the missionary lessons and were literally so close to being baptized in 2002. Then for whatever reason, the mission president took the Sorelle out of the area. They were taught by a couple of Anziani but they haven't seen the missionaries for over 10 years. This woman pulled out her Book of Mormon when we arrived and and was so excited to "pray" with us! In Italy they call our lessons "prayers" like what nuns do. She told us that every time she has a hard time in her life, missionaries show up and she knows that it is God sending us to her. This woman is seriously amazing and we hope we can help her feel ready for baptism again.

First Zone Conference with Sorella Hamilton!

Beginning Testimony

Zone Conference in Napoli! Gave my "birth" testimony in Italian, Presidente Waddoups gave us an awesome lesson on overcoming FEAR of man or anything. The sister training leaders and zone leaders had an awesome addestramento (training) on boldness and the three hours of preparation in the morning. Super grateful for awesome leaders who are huge examples to me. As a surprise to Presidente and Sorella Waddoups we all sang the EFY medley and we ended the conference with... NAPOLI PIZZA!!! It was also Sorella Hamilton's one year mark!!! 

Quote from Zone Conference: "When people feel your love, you can never be too bold"

Update on Felix, our African investigator! Super awesome and loves learning about the gospel. Sadly we had to move his baptism date, either the 3rd or 10th of October, depending on general conference schedules... But it's OKAY! He is stellar and keeping all the commandments and our awesome ward mission leader even bought him a white shirt and tie. Literally wanted to cry, it was the sweetest thing!

Crazy/cool story: As we were walking to the train station one day we saw a man (Rafaele) giving bread to pigeons and he stopped us and asked who we were. We explained and he took us to his garden and we ate figs and found out his wife had died and we left him with a plan of salvation pamphlet! Couple days later he was outside so we went to just say hello again and invite him to church. Well Sunday comes around and we are in a meeting after church and our friend Daniel pops his head in and goes "Sorelle Sorelle, quick there is a man here to see you" so we hurry out and it's Rafaele!!! He had walked all the way and purposely came after church just to say hello! Super cool man!

The Lord really has prepared people here in Caserta! Sorella Hamilton and I are just trying to find them all! 

Today for Pday Daniel made us pasta

And Felix came too!!!!

Pranzo, best salad EVER with tomato and tuna pasta!

Too much pasta....

Week 10

(Week 4 Caserta)

Our Africans! (Met them on the street. They were sitting on stairs and we say hello in English to every African we see and then it starts conversation.) They are so awesome and progressing super well! Felix and Evans are super knowledgeable about Jesus Christ and just gospel stuff. During the plan of salvation lesson Felix explained the whole fall of Adam and Eve to us and Evans is always talking about how important baptism is. My favorite phrase Felix says when we extend invitations is, "yes, I am ready to serve my God." These lessons with them go super well and we always have our Italian friend Daniel there, he also speaks English. He is a super great friend to Evans and Felix and just recently got the priesthood so it would be cool if he was able to baptize them. 

The Simone family! (Antonio, Antonella, and their two children) We brought Alicia, a brand new convert, to our lesson on Wednesday. Soooo glad we did! We had given the family a Book of Mormon on our first visit and when we arrived they had soooo many questions! Alicia was a HUGE help with answering questions, relating to them by being a convert herself and also with translating when we needed it. The father Antonio is very interested but when we called to make a return appointment the wife said she isn't interested anymore so we are hoping somehow to get back to teach even just Antonio.

More Ragazzi (boys)

Lovely things we see.......

Pizza at district meeting in Napoli

I love Sorella Hamilton!

Us with Alicia

Little Italian boys (taught them
how to sing I Am a Child of God)

We did a scambio (exchange) with the Sorelle in Battipaglia on Friday to Saturday and I was with Sorella Barona, she's awesome. We did casa a casa for a while with no success and then went to a main piazza for bench finding. Fun fact: Italians just stick their head over their balcony to see who is buzzing their bell. We have to yell to these old ladies so here we are yelling, "possiamo condividere un piccolo messagio di Gesù Cristo?" Hahaha love it! No success until one lady. I know that because we showed the Lord we were willing to work and open our mouths and talk to people that He put someone in our path. We also did a "gesso" where we went to a big piazza and drew the plan of salvation with chalk on a sheet. People would gather around to see what we were drawing and then we would start a conversation! Super fun and made some friends with little Italian boys.

Pozzuoli pictures from the
 balcony of the church.

Stake Conference! Saturday session in Pozzuoli and Sunday session in Caserta! Highlight: our Stake president gave an awesome talk to the members about the temple. He said that if you are waiting for the Rome temple to be finished to go to the temple, you won't be ready for it. He really believes that when the members show Heavenly Father we are ready for the temple, the Rome Temple will be finished. 

Once again a stellar week! Love my companion! Love my area! Love the language and the gospel!!

Love, Sorella Nelson

Mystery meat that is soooo delicious!

Week 9

(Week Three Caserta)

MONDAY: Awesome miracle for the day... A man in our ward needed open heart surgery and the doctors wouldn't do it unless blood was donated so get this... Bishop announced it in church on Sunday and apparently so many people showed up to donate from the ward that they had to start turning people away! And our ward is SMALL!  Super awesome support system.

TUESDAY: started off awful with apartment problems and then... Felix our African friend called us, in short, Felix and Evans committed to baptism for the 26th of September!!! This was literally the one thing that helped us keep going until we had a good laugh when five old men on the street called us over to tell us that Sorella Hamilton looks like Barbara Streisand and I am a cross between Sandra bullock and Meryl Streep... Hahaha love Italians...

More pizza.....because it's that good!!!

WEDNESDAY: district meeting in Napoli means un'altra pizza Napoletana! Seriously nothing like them... Fun fact: to eat an Italian pizza you cut it into fourths, and then to keep all the cheese and stuff in place, you fold the fourth in half and then eat. We went back to see how Maria Russo was doing and this time she was naked when we walked in... Hahahaha I seriously don't know how to handle this woman! Anywho, she LOVES to talk and complain about how sad her life is. She went on FOREVER and when Sorella Hamilton tried to share the spiritual thought, Maria wouldn't be quiet! I basically just cut the woman off in my slow Italian and told her that we don't have to be sad and complain because we have the Atonement, she finally listened but then continued giving us reasons why she is still unhappy...We left her with the thought that it's up to us to put the Atonement to use or we can sit there in unhappiness.

THURSDAY: we found the family of Antonio and Antonella!!! We have spent over seven hours of walking trying to find this referral and I wanted to cry when we finally met them! The family consists of the mom and dad with an 11 year old daughter and 5 year old boy. We taught them about the Book of Mormon and they were soooo interested! Antonio had a bad fall and has been on bed rest (still is). He had received a blessing from the elders months ago and had felt the spirit so we talked a lot about that and he is super excited to learn more. I can't wait to go back to their home.

FRIDAY: MEET THE MORMONS COMES TO CASERTA! Yes. Italian is the first language for it to be translated into and shown outside of the U.S. and United Kingdom so we have been advertising like CRAZY this past week!! Huge honor that Caserta got to host it! So many potentials showed up and the entire Napoli zone of missionaries, members, and investigators came! So so awesome! Really cool to see how technology is being used to spread the gospel.

These are our favorite Italian boys, Daniel is driving, he is 21 and is going to be going to BYUI soon! 

Denis is in the middle, he is 19 and wants to go on a mission!

Antonio is the crazy on the back, he is a hairdresser and ALWAYS making us laugh. 

They were all baptized a little over a year ago.

SATURDAY: visited a less active couple, they have a cat :)... Really cute couple that just needed a push to get back to church. They fed us gelato and in return we fed them a wonderful message about how members need to be missionaries as well. Bel' giorno.

SUNDAY: Fast Sunday! A less active African woman named Joy fasted with us so that she could change work schedules so that she could come to church. She was so full of faith when we called to remind her on Saturday, which really strengthened my faith. It's really hard doing missionary work and finding every day and having people not interested, but Joy's voice and excitement about the fast made me realize how important faith is. Why would Heavenly Father want to give or help us with something if we don't even believe ourselves that it will happen?

What a week it's been!! Time is flying and the work is progressing!!   Love Sorella Nelson

More of Caserta

All the back roads look like these two pictures.

Found the pastry shop Dad told me to go look up.

Week 8

(Week 2 Caserta)

MONDAY: P-Day! We went to a BELLISIMO castle!!!! We literally walk by it every day here! I'll attach a couple pics. This is where Napolean ruled and a bunch of other kings and queens! So awesome and it is so so so massive! Later, we had a dinner appointment with a member family who have a nonactive daughter. They live on the American base so we ate tacos and said prayers in English. Weird... We learned a lot about how many hardships this family has gone through and how it's hard for them to come to church because it's more than half Italian. I admire them so much for still pushing to the end even though life has never been easy for them. I've discovered our biggest project here is going to be not only finding people to teach, but also really finding a way to bring the ward together.

TUESDAY: We went to a leadership conference in Battipaglia. (Sorella Hamilton is also a sister training leader). So I did an exchange with the other Sorella who is also a greenie, Sorella Hidalgo Guzman, and speaks absolutely no English! Those two hours were the longest SYL experience I've had so far! We had pranzo at the Sorelle home in Battipaglia, then headed back to Caserta! We worked on my permesso so I could stay in Italy and ended the night with English course! We had a bunch of newbies and afterwards two men came right up to us and asked me about our religion and what we do. Awesome awesome, we got to teach the restoration (in 5 minutes) finally! Then we met the cutest Italian teenager named Silvia. She is adorable and insisted that she walk Sorella Hamilton and I home! When we got home, Sorella Hamilton asked me if I was disappointed that we have no work and if I was feeling upset. I told her no because I was expecting this, but that I know if we work hard we will see blessings she then told me her whole mission has been all work and just all finding and she said, "as a representative of Jesus Christ I can tell you that when we see the rewards and fruit of our labors it will be like nothing you've ever experienced." So grateful for her and the example she is to me.

Check off on the bucket list -
Napoli Pizza!!!

WEDNESDAY: District meeting day! We went to Napoli! Something to understand how excited I was... Napoli pizza is one of the mission bucket list things for all Italy Rome missionaries. Sooooo good!!!! We took the train to Napoli and had a wonderful and uplifting meeting! Afterwards we went to visit a less active woman. We ended up not finding her home! So frustrating because there are lots of different provinces in Caserta and they all have the same street names! So that was really sad...

Friend Silvia

THURSDAY: MIRACLE DAY!!! We went to try to hunt down another less active member and it was about an hour walk and about halfway to the home Sorella Hamilton tells me that a man in an Audi has been following us. Of course I'm so scared and don't know what to do and I'm just praying and praying!!! He pulls right up in front of us and just waits for us to keep walking so we will pass him. Once we do, he starts asking what we are doing. Normally we get asked out by Italian men but this man was serious and different. Basically this man was so curious why two Americans were in Italy and started asking about the church! Another miracle: we have this neighbor we call (Inio) he lives two floors below and we met him because we needed a screwdriver. Anyway, we have invited him to church and we are just good pals. Today his niece was over with him and his mom and we told them about English course tonight. HE ACTUALLY CAME!!! And then we found out that two students of ours are members!!!! Like what!? The Anziani didn't even know! Anywho, their names are Vincenzo and Anastasia and they are fantastic. Silvia was also there again and wouldn't stop kissing my face... Weird... but that's how it's done.

FRIDAY: finally met Africans!!! They are super cool and actually really hard to understand... Their names are Evan and Felix. Super fantastic and we invited them to church. On our way to a lesson on the American base we had some free time for more finding. We passed this lady and then we were trying to decide where to go. I decided we should go back and talk to the lady and man I'm glad we did!!! Her name is Tonya and she is from Bulgaria. She has no work or anything, her parents are dead, she has a child, and one of her eyes was burned so she can't see well. Sad sad, but we didn't have a lot of time so we invited her to church but she was super duper awesome.

SATURDAY: BAPTISM DAY. The Vernazzani family has been taking the lessons for over three months from the Anziani and were baptized today! It's was a beautiful day, but also a sweaty day, soooooo caldo!!! The baptism was done in Campania. So so beautiful! Since we don't have a baptismal font, baptisms are in the ocean or in swimming pools! Kinda cool! They chose to be baptized in a BEAUTIFUL place! Legit Italian home with this random modern pool. This fam who was baptized is AWESOME!!! It's the parents and a son Jonathan (14) and a daughter Isabella (12). The baptism was wonderful and the Spirit was definitely there. After the baptism... OH MY GOSH. My stomach has NEVER hurt sooo much! It is not a myth that Italians don't let you say no to food. Every single Italian woman made sure I had tried EVERYTHING at the lunch after the baptism. Sorella Hamilton and I were seriously about to burst... The ladies are just the cutest but they give you the saddest look and insist you eat everything and then on your way out they hand you a cupful of gelato because they think you apparently have 15 stomachs... Later this day we went and taught a lesson to Vincenzo (English course student and also a member) and his nonmember mother. Lesson was okay, the mom basically wanted to talk the whole time and I still can't understand everything they say here but I felt that we helped her maybe feel the Spirit so that's good. FUNNIEST STORY... Vincenzo was walking us back to the train station and we were going to be late so we are running and we pass a park where a tree is literally on FIRE!!!  No lie!!! We couldn't just leave the tree and we don't know a "911" number so we hop the fence and are throwing dirt on it until we find a bag to fill with water... I definitely felt like a super hero! Haha and then we were sprinting to our train and Heavenly Father blessed us since we put the fire out because we didn't miss the train!

SUNDAY: church was fantastic! Two of our African friends came to church and that was the happiest!! Evan and Felix said they want to keep coming so that is super super awesome! After church we went to find the lost Maria Russo. We had tried twice to find her home but we finally found it! Background... She is a member and about 65, has 6 cats and she is very large. She had been boiling pasta and went to drain the pasta but something happened and she ended up pouring the water all over herself! She has had over 18 surgeries these past years and She has been in a lot of pain so we were glad to finally find her. We walk into her home and she starts bawling when she sees us! She just keeps saying "Sorelle Sorelle Sorelle" as she is crying and kissing us. Then... She wants to show us her burns... We will just say that I got to know Maria Russo on a more personal level... Haha we left her with a great message about having faith in the priesthood because the Anziani came later to give her a blessing. Great Domenica!

Lord is blessing us here in Caserta, it's not always easy to see it but HE STILL IS!

Something familiar...

Con amore!

Caserta at Night