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 

E-mail from May 29, 2013

Hello Family,

Her baptism went so well. She was so excited. It was just awesome. I forgot to bring the cord to plug into the computer. Sorry next time I will give you the photos. I know that I say that all the time, but I mean it :). The thing that was cool on Sunday when she received the Holy Ghost we had a good number of investigators in Church to watch it. Her mom and her sister came.

 I am glad that she found you. Yes I told her to find you. (Alison gave her new convert our Facebook name and she found us and now we are friends on Facebook)

These last few days have been kind of crazy. Oh I want to tell you about this funny story. Okay more of a scary dramatic story. Well the other day we were coming out of a lesson and I swatted away a bug. Oh a fly as I thought. Then a minuted later I fill something in my shirt. I look down and a bee had fallen down my shirt. I try as quickly as possible to get it out without being stung. But the bee stung me right in my chest(where my sternum is) and I turn to my companion and was like we need to get to the hospital now. The pain was excruciating and I believed that I got the stinger out. But we call someone to find out where the nearest hospital was and no one would answer!!! Finally someone answered and said where is was. But we would have to walk 30 minutes to get there. So yeah, but it turns out I think my allergy might have died away. Because I was okay. The next three days it was still hurting and I was completely confused why. Then on the third day we took a flashlight to it and found out the the stinger was still in my chest and that was what was causing all the pain. So eventually we got it, with a needle. It hurt. But that was my near death not really but scary moment. Now I am okay.

Love,

ali

Email from May 22, 2013

Hello Family, 

Yeah everything is going well. The sisters who live in my apartment are Sister Gjika, Sister Nelson and then my companion and me. It is different because at the end of the day we get excited about each others work. 

So Ylenia is getting baptized this Saturday!! And we talked about the temple the other day and she got excited to go to the temple one day. We have not been able to see Sara, but we will see her this Friday. I would like to tell you about this awesome experience that we had the other day. Sorella Gillette and I had to wait for one hour at a bus stop and this teenage couple came up. For me it has always been hard talking to the teenagers. No offense Parker,  it is hard when talking about the gospel with them. But we did and we just started talking and for half an hour taught the plan of salvation at this bus stop. And the bus was even late which gave us enough time to get their numbers. But when we talked about the plan of salvation that was what got them interested. And then 20 minutes after that there was another teenager Valeria who we talked to and she was interested. These days the work seems to be going up and we are finding people. 

  I am glad to hear that your recitals went well. Oh so I guess my piano skills are getting used in this ward. I play sometimes in Sacrament. Well this week has been really good and I love you all and I hope that you all are doing well. 

Love, 

Ali 

E-mail from May 15, 2013

Hey Family, 

Well I loved having the chance to speak with you on Sunday as well. And I had a wonderful birthday yesterday. Our week has started out good. I want to tell you of a wonderful miracle that happened the other and I know you will probably think that it is a strange on but I thought it was cool. So after we skyped we went and took the tram home and it turns out that we took the tram at the point when the last tram comes; which I had no idea when the tram would stop. The thing is that the tram only took us one stop and then we had to get off and walk home. We walked for 40 minutes home or so; which was not to bad, but the only way we knew how to get home was because one of the other sisters (oh I never said that I live in four, so we have the other sister missionaries with us; maybe I did say that oh well) knew the way. So Yesterday after our lesson we realized that we had missed the last tram and had to walk home because we had taken the route before we knew exactly how to get home and it was a blessing that we missed it the other day. 

  I want to tell you about other miracle. We have this wonderful lady that we are teaching and her name is Sara. Sister Gillette met her, her first week and had one appointment with her then she disappeared; stopped answering etc. We saw her in passing the other day because we took the wrong bus and a old man had to help us get back to the tram station. I said hi to the random lady which turned out not to be for Sorella Gillette  it was Sara, and we set up a time to met her and then she could not, but she was calling us and texting us telling us she still wanted to meet us. Then on Monday we were heading to another one of our appointments and she starts calling us from across the street. And we go over to her and she was so excited to see us and we had our appointment with her yesterday. She is so amazing. I have never heard someone pray like her. She said thank you in her pray for Joseph Smith. It was absolutely astounding. 

Ylenia, who is getting baptized next week on the 25th. We had the word of wisdom lesson with her and we knew that she had a problem with drinking tea, but she just said she would substitute orange juice instead, like it was not even a big deal. We were so excited!!!!! 

Tell Conner thank you for all the prayers. Tell him that I love him and he is just awesome. And Parker I love you too. 

Well I love you all and I hope that your week is going well. Oh you probably know this but my companion Gillette is a convert and her mom has a baptism date for the 15th of June so we are really excited for her mom. Well I thought that would be cool for you guys to know. 

Love 

Ali