Email from June 26, 2013

We have seen miracle after miracle. I do not even know where to begin.  How about yesterday. We found this amazing family that the missionaries had worked with over three years ago.  We taught them and the spirit was so strong.  They truly had the desire to know the truth.  Then for the past week we have been finding people to teach.  People have been pulling us aside asking if we are Mormons and if we could give them a Book of Mormon. Others when we talk, ask if we could come into their house or find a bench  and explain more. It has been a jammed packed week but awesome.

We got our bikes yesterday. And man is my companion and I sore. Haha we kind of laughed about it this morning. But we are grateful to have them because now we get all over Savona faster.

So today we are going to cinque terre with the senior couple in our ward. It is a collection of 5 cities, that we have is a beautiful scenery.  So we are going to have a lot of fun. I will send you pictures of that too.

Well I hope you are well, I love you.

Ali

Alison and Sorella Pace in Savona

Alison and Ylenia Caruso in Bergamo

Ylenia Caruso's baptism.  Sorella Gillette, Ylenia Caruso and Alison

Mikhail Moroni Botta (the bishop's son) baptized Ylenia

Alison said: Funny story about the green skirt. I made it.  It was just two different sheets of fabric and I did that. I am just a little amazed.

Alison said: It is like I am in Florida. The beach, palm trees, etc... 

Email from June 19, 2013

Hello Family, 

Savona is full of tourists. The majority that come here are from different parts of Italy.  We live a walking distance from the beach, takes like 10 minutes or less walking. These past couple of days have been so hot. I mean I have been sweating. It has been quite funny. We were supposed to have bikes, but the bike key we do not have. So we are trying to call people and figure out where our bike key went. I sure want the bike. We have been walking around Savona on foot. We went up a hill that was like a mountain. We were like so tired when we got to the top. Our area is the hilly, beach area. Quite nice! Here we have a branch and the members are wonderful.  My companion sorella Pace is from Idaho. We actually met a man yesterday and taught him a lesson and set a baptism date with him. It was such an amazing lesson! We have a few people that we are teaching.

I heard that story. He called after he found out and thought what a small world. 

Our branch is lucky to have even 30 people come to church. We have so many in-actives and less actives. We have been feeling that we need to work on reactivating people. Of course we are going to try and find new investigators. I have never worked in a small branch before so this past Sunday was a bit of a shock. Also these past couple days the people that we have been talking to have been mocking us and just being rude. We have  like 3 people we are teaching and trying to find more, but the people here are really closed. Even the members say that. But just so you know I am okay. 

I am glad that you guys are having so much fun in your activities. I miss you all and love you. 

Love , 

Ali

Alison with her companion Sorella Pace

EMail from June 12, 2013

Hey family,

Parker: I am doing good. I am not jealous that you are watching all those shows. But I am glad that you are going to EFY and sounds like you will have fun with the other trip. love you 

Conner: I love you and still miss you too. Bergamo is wonderful. My mission is going great and I am learning a lot.

I am being transferred to Savona. It is a city on the beach. It is a sister city. I am going to be white washing this city and back up training someone. Which is really weird because normally someone who is in their second transfer would stay in their city and continue doing their twelve week program there. So this shall be fun. My new companion will be sorella Pace. So during the summer this will be wonderful. The summer finally has arrived and the last few days has been a little bit warm. We could have bought bikes here but we did not, but I know that there they do.

Yeah we are still teaching her sister and our investigators seem to be doing well. The strike just happens for one day and it is just when they choose to happen; so sometimes we do not even know when it will be. We do not go to Verona each week for a conference it was only three times. So half of the time. Yeah and we had p-day there one time. It was sweet to be able to see everything again. I remembered a lot of places and streets and how to get around it was kind of cool. It takes about two hours to get there in train. One P-day we did a hike and another time we went with a member to Citt'alta was the first Rome. Or original Rome. 

I know sister Heupel and we were in the MTC together for three weeks. And I have seen her around here and there. But yeah that is a small world. I will eventually give you photos I am sorry, I just do not have my cord. I love you all and I hope that you will have a wonderful day.

Love,

Ali

Alison with her companion Sorella Gillette

Romeo and Juliet's Wall

Email from June 5, 2013

Alison went to a conference where the mission President told the missionaries to not give a lot of detail on their letters home.

Ali's E-mail

We had a conference with him last Thursday and he told us that. So I am not going to give you much detail. Sorry. But the reason is, now people can get on the internet and read the information or do translations or something and they do not what that information on the internet. 

We had a interesting week. We are teaching the sister of the girl who got baptized and it seems to be going well. We have a few other investigators and the work is good.  The other day there was a strike for the buses and we did not know and we were waiting and waiting for the bus to take us to one of our appointments, but it never came so we decided to walk it was only 25 minutes but it would have been 6 minutes on the bus. But someone that night told us that there was a strike and that was why the buses were not coming and it made perfect sense. 

Oh another funny story, we received a name and an address to do, a pass by of a lady and it was far out. We needed to go to centro and take a bus from centro. So we took the tram and then the bus so in total it took an hour or a little less to get there. And then we realized that the next bus to get home, we would need to take either the one that comes in 25 minutes or the one in 38 minutes. And those were the last ones of the day. So we find out the lady does not live there anymore and go to the bus stop and the bus does not pass. A SAB bus passed and we do not have tickets for that kind of bus. So we could not get on it. Then we sit and wait for the next bus that should pass in 13 or 14 minutes, but it did not. We realized we would have to walk from Sorisole which is about an hour and 45 minutes walk at least that is what it should be. And then we would have probably missed the tram to go home and we would have to walk home from Bergamo Centro. So we started our walk. Every so often when a bus stop would show up we would go and check if a different bus would pass, but there never was. So we continued our journey. We talked to random people along the way, there was this old lady and old man that were so sweet. And kept telling us how kind we were. Then about 45 minutes in a car honks at us. A member from the church steps out and waves for us to come over. His wife and him ask us why we were walking from there. And that we still had an hour left of walking and they gave us a ride home. It was an awesome miracle because we got home on time and did not have to walk for about 3 hours. But so we have had a crazy awesome week. 

I love you all and I hope all is well. I hope Conner is having fun and I know Parker is excited. 

Love, 

Ali