Email from July 31, 2013

So just so you know I had to buy a new bag because my side bag broke and we are not allowed to use book bags. 

So it is hot, but  I guess it really just does not bother me. And maybe I am used to it. I will thank Florida for all my years there. There is a little stream from the mountains and it is completely dry and has been for about the last month and a half. But I do not know, I like the sun. I am getting darker. I would say that it is about 32 degrees Celsius. But I am right by the ocean, so we get the ocean breeze and it is not that hot. They say that there are two weeks in august that are bad or unbearable but we will see when we get there. 

In Savona there is only the branch. There were the senior coppia with us, but they are closing that apartment and we are not getting another coppia. The branch most Sundays we are 25 to 30 people. But this Sunday there was a little more.

D came to church!!! And D is doing great. D accepted a baptism date. And is reading a lot. So there is a lot of progression. E came to church on Sunday and liked it. 

We taught for the first time Gospel Principles class. It is so different teaching in Italian. I did not realize how much I love talking until this week. Or more the last half of the week. I just feel this urge to continue to talk, even to myself. I remember my last companion telling how sometimes I would just talk to talk about nothing. 

I remember mom telling me that they were there and when they are leaving, but I like that part about the princess. Haha she is funny. 

I do not need anything. Do not worry. If I did I would tell you. But anything I can find I have that here. 

I want to tell you about this cool experience that happened the other day. We were going to an appointment and it was cancelled. So we sat in the park for a few minutes and then this lady passed by us and asked if she could sit by us. We said yes but she could not hear us and asked again and then we said us. She sat down and said would you like one (pointing to this bag of faccacia) . We said sure and it was good. She said oh you are not Italians and we were like no. We started talking about who we were and why we are here. She said the only reason I wanted to sit by you is because I could tell you were good people. You see all the young people smoking, but there was something different about you. I could tell by your eyes. It was nice. (I am not sure if I told you that story before).

Well I hope you guys have a wonderful day. Love you 

Ali 

Alison's zone with their new mission president.  President Dibb and his wife.

Email from July 24, 2013

Hello Family, 

So I am staying in Savona another transfer with sorella Pace and then in two weeks sorella Bringas will be back with us. So yeah transfers are this week, but nothing is happening so we are good. We ended up not going to Florence, but she went straight from Florence to Madrid.

So we still do not have a branch president and someone told us the we would not get one until October. I could be wrong but that is what I heard. It is a little hard because we have not had ward council ever and we have only had one meeting with our ward mission leader. But we can only go up. So when ever we do finding now we think that this man could be the next new president. Because we are in need of priesthood holders.

We have been having miracles like crazy! We met a man the other day. Let's call him D. He had met the missionaries a couple years ago and they had left him a book of Mormon. We met with him the other day and he was like I could not find my book of Mormon and he was saying how this was interesting to him. But he is going to read the book of Mormon and continue meeting with us. I will tell you how it goes. Now I will tell you about E she is awesome (a member referral from one of our awesome members, who does everything for us) and she is truly trying to find the truth. We have been seeing her for about a month now. She is reading and it is just amazing. Anyway, lately we have just been blessed with wonderful people to teach.

I forgot to answer a question from last week. You asked me if I hear from anyone that I baptized. And I hear from Jeremy. I do not have the right email address to Kevin and Vivian, so I am trying to work on getting their info. I have a girl who was less active that I was working with who now lives in America who was reactivated who write me. She went through the temple a couple weeks ago to do baptisms and now she is getting her patriarchal blessing.

Anyways I am trying to think of more, sorry I really am bad at remembering more. But I love you all and hope you all have a wonderful day. 

love 

Ali 

Email from July17, 2013

Hello Family, 

This week has been a little bit crazy. On Friday we got a call telling us that a new sister was coming into the mission and that she would be staying with us. Her name is sorella Bringas. She is from Firenze and she is original from Peru (Lima), but she has been living in Italy for the last 10 years. So her Italian is amazing. She was staying with us until she can get into the MTC in Madrid and we are going tomorrow to Florence to pick up some paper work and she can go to Madrid. But after 10 days in the MTC she will come back here to Savona with us. So I am in a triple at least until tomorrow and then for the next 10 days again in two and then in three again. So we went down to Milan on Saturday, it took about two hours and 45 minutes both ways on the train. Then tomorrow our train will get us to Florence in four hours I believe and then we will return again back to Savona in the same day. But my favorite part of taking trains is the view. I love it.

We were not able to see A because they have family in town. But next week for sure. So sad news about B. Our phone had a malfunction problem and we lost her number. So we are trying to do everything we can to find her. The family is doing great, we saw them and they are just awesome. We are teaching a son of a member. We went over to the members house yesterday and her son was there. All our plans had fallen through and we were thinking of something we could do and I thought we could pass by this member. It is a sister in law to A. In this ward almost everyone is related. I think that is how it is in Italy. Well we went over and the member her family are not members. She has three sons and her husband. She is really sweet so I feel bad for her. Anyways her son stayed and listened to the message. We found out that he is atheist, but he is willing to listen and said it would be important for him to know that God exists at the end. So I think we at least got to a good point and a way to help him.

I want to tell you about an experience that I am a little bit in shock of. On our phone we have a lot of numbers and I decided to give one a call. I call the lady up and she said of course we can meet. I did not know who she was if she was a member or not. But she knew that we were the missionaries. She gave us a call yesterday and asked me how we got her number. I said probably from the missionaries in the past. She said that she had been inactive for a long period of time and we had happened to call her at the right moment. She said on Sunday she went to church and found out that they had changed the time of church and they were a little late (her daughter and her (both inactive). Then I said where are you because our church was always at the same time. She said at Genova and than everything made sense. But she thanked me on the phone, for the call, because now she is on her way to being active again. It was a really neat experience. 

Well that has been our amazing week! 

Love you and hope your week goes well. 

Love, 

Ali 

Email from July 10, 2013

Hey family, 

The time for me, when I think about it, I am just in shock. Sometimes it feels like it has been longer than it has and other days shorter so I really think it is abnormal. 

A is going well. I like how you have named A, A. Haha well we taught her and it went well last time. We could not see her this week there was a little mix up and so we will see her next week. We had a BBQ last week with the family. Man I ate so much, but it was nice. They cook very well. They are doing good as well. We have not had time to take the bike, but we are going to do that soon. Because we need them to get around. Yesterday we had to run 20 minutes to catch our bus. We were on the complete other side of town and we were just sprinting. One lady as we were running was like "oh poverine." haha. She at least felt bad we were running in dresses. I feel like that is my life. Well that was like the first time here. Yesterday we had interviews with our new president and then after the Zone conference because it was an interview, zone conference in one. We had 15 minutes to catch our train. And we had our huge box full of books of Mormon and other things and I was carrying it and running. That was a site. The box was one of the heaviest boxes I have ever carried and I was sure I was going to pull my back in the process; but it turned out all right and we made it to our train. We found this other amazing woman in the park. She is awesome and already believes in the book of Mormon and Joseph Smith.  Almost all the people we are teaching are Italian except one or two. It is crazy!!  

Well that was my crazy week, I hope you have a wonderful day. I love you all. 

Love, 

Ali 

Email from July 3, 2013

Hey family,

So I feel like you guys just seem to be having different connections lately everywhere with my mission. News about the bike. My bike currently is out of working condition and I need to take it in. It has been having problems with the brakes and it will just randomly stop without touching the brakes. We will be taking in my bike. But I still think this bike is better than the bike I had in Verona. Can you guys believe it, in august it has been a year! 

Oh so lately everyone keeps thinking I am from Napoli. They say my color of my skin, hair and etc. People are starting to think I am Italian. HAHA kind of fun. 

We still are having miracles that come out of thin air. My companion and I are just shocked each and everyday. We met a woman in the park the other day and started a conversation with her and find out her mother in law is an active member in our church and she lives with her and she is not. So we taught her and set up another lesson and are extremely excited. We never thought to meet her. And we just have crazy awesome experiences all the time. 

We ended up seeing one, but the one city we saw of the cinque terre was gorgeous. Do not worry I will send you photos. It was like a paradise. I still in awe everyday with Italy. There are different things around the corner, new surprises. Well I am glad to see that your vacation went well. I know it does always seem there is need for a vacation from a vacation. Well I love you all and I hope that you all have the most wonderful day. 

love,

Ali 

We went (Alison's parents) to Palmyra, New York this past week.  At the visitor's center we met a senior missionary who told us that a Sister Mancuso from their Ward was serving in Milan.  We had the opportunity to meet her parents while we were in New York.  Here is a picture of us.

Conner (Alison's youngest brother) Brent, Maria, and brother and sister Mancuso