Sorella Hawkey and her mission president, Brother and Sister Acerson.
Friday, December 26, 2008
December 24, 2008
Buone Feste, tutti!
Tomorrow's Christmas!!! I'm so excited! We'll be spending all day at the Gianelli's house in the country, playing games, playing soccer, eating lots of delicious food. We also get to sleep in tomorrow, which will be wonderful!Tonight we're going over to the Manucci family's house for a big American Christmas Eve dinner. We're making a big turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, green beans, an American style salad (complete with ranch dressing, which they have never tried before!), pumpkin pie, apple crisp, and brownies. Italians LOVE brownies! I think Oscar is coming with us. He's an 18 year old recent convert, originally from Brazil. He's an awesome kid! He loves spending time with the missionaries, and usually goes with us wherever we go on PDay. He's also the reason we started playing basketball or soccer on Saturdays. He wants so much to do the right thing, but sometimes he falls back into old addictions. And his parents are very against the church, and they are horrible to him about it. They tell him that he must be gay since he's not out breaking the law of chastity. And they wanted him to stop going to church, so they bought him $1000 worth of cocaine. There have been a lot of ups and downs with him lately, but the last week he's been great! Oscar's amazing, and I hope he can come with us tonight.Last week for PDay, we went to 2 of the Cinque Terre- Riomaggiore and Manarola. They are beautiful! We're getting pictures printed today to send you.Last night was our branch Christmas party, and it turned out great! Not a ton of people showed up, but it was good. We were supposed to have zone conference Monday, so we planned the party for Tuesday night. Sunday night we got a call saying they had to change zone conference to Tuesday, so it was a little crazy! Last zone conference we didn't even get home from Florence until 7:30 or 8, and the party was supposed to start at 7, so we had to hurry and figure something out. And everyone that was supposed to bring food ended up calling us saying that they couldn't come anymore. It ended up going really well, though! The elders even had a couple investigators there.Zone conference yesterday was so good! The Acerson's are amazing! They gave us great lessons, and we had a catered lunch to celebrate Christmas. We also had a talent show, which was hilarious! One district did a skit where the sisters acted like elders, and the elders acted like sisters, and they acted out Christmas Eve, phone calls home, and Christmas morning. It was hilarious! The Acerson's gave us fun little gifts, too.This last week has been a little slow. Everyone seems to be really busy around the holidays, so we only had a couple of appointments, but our investigators are doing well. We still can't get ahold of Jennifer, but we know she's busy, so hopefully we can get ahold of her soon.These past couple weeks I've been thinking a lot about our Savior. I'm so grateful for the Christmas season, and the opportunity it provides for us to remember Him and the sacrifice He made for us. It definitely is different celebrating Christmas as a missionary. The APs included a couple quotes in our mission newsletter about the Atonement, which I love and wanted to share with you all.Andrew Skinner said, "Our finite mortal minds cannot grasp the tremendous load borne by the Savior in Gethsemane. But we begin to comprehend what this means in practical terms by remembering that this earth along has had some 60 to 70 billion people live upon it during its temporal history (not counting those spirits yet to come). Multiply the sins, sorrows, heartaches, and injustices of these 60 to 70 billion souls by the millions of earths that the Savior has created and redeemed, and we may begin to view the term infinite atonement in a different light."The Atonement truly is incomprehensible to us, but we need to always remember how truly personal our relationship is with our Savior. He suffered for each one of us personally. He has felt your pain, your sorrow, your heartaches. He knows exactly how you feel, because He has experienced it.CS Lewis said, "God has infinite attention to spare for each one of us. He does not have to deal with us in the mass. You are as much alone with Him as if you were the only being He had ever created. When Christ died, He died for you individually just as if you had been the only man or woman in the world."Christ suffered and died for all of us, but He would have done it if it was just for you. The Atonement is so real and so powerful. It is so personal. He truly knows you and loves you.I hope you all have a fantastic Christmas and remember the true reason that we celebrate.
Vi voglio bene!Sorella Hawkey
Tomorrow's Christmas!!! I'm so excited! We'll be spending all day at the Gianelli's house in the country, playing games, playing soccer, eating lots of delicious food. We also get to sleep in tomorrow, which will be wonderful!Tonight we're going over to the Manucci family's house for a big American Christmas Eve dinner. We're making a big turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, green beans, an American style salad (complete with ranch dressing, which they have never tried before!), pumpkin pie, apple crisp, and brownies. Italians LOVE brownies! I think Oscar is coming with us. He's an 18 year old recent convert, originally from Brazil. He's an awesome kid! He loves spending time with the missionaries, and usually goes with us wherever we go on PDay. He's also the reason we started playing basketball or soccer on Saturdays. He wants so much to do the right thing, but sometimes he falls back into old addictions. And his parents are very against the church, and they are horrible to him about it. They tell him that he must be gay since he's not out breaking the law of chastity. And they wanted him to stop going to church, so they bought him $1000 worth of cocaine. There have been a lot of ups and downs with him lately, but the last week he's been great! Oscar's amazing, and I hope he can come with us tonight.Last week for PDay, we went to 2 of the Cinque Terre- Riomaggiore and Manarola. They are beautiful! We're getting pictures printed today to send you.Last night was our branch Christmas party, and it turned out great! Not a ton of people showed up, but it was good. We were supposed to have zone conference Monday, so we planned the party for Tuesday night. Sunday night we got a call saying they had to change zone conference to Tuesday, so it was a little crazy! Last zone conference we didn't even get home from Florence until 7:30 or 8, and the party was supposed to start at 7, so we had to hurry and figure something out. And everyone that was supposed to bring food ended up calling us saying that they couldn't come anymore. It ended up going really well, though! The elders even had a couple investigators there.Zone conference yesterday was so good! The Acerson's are amazing! They gave us great lessons, and we had a catered lunch to celebrate Christmas. We also had a talent show, which was hilarious! One district did a skit where the sisters acted like elders, and the elders acted like sisters, and they acted out Christmas Eve, phone calls home, and Christmas morning. It was hilarious! The Acerson's gave us fun little gifts, too.This last week has been a little slow. Everyone seems to be really busy around the holidays, so we only had a couple of appointments, but our investigators are doing well. We still can't get ahold of Jennifer, but we know she's busy, so hopefully we can get ahold of her soon.These past couple weeks I've been thinking a lot about our Savior. I'm so grateful for the Christmas season, and the opportunity it provides for us to remember Him and the sacrifice He made for us. It definitely is different celebrating Christmas as a missionary. The APs included a couple quotes in our mission newsletter about the Atonement, which I love and wanted to share with you all.Andrew Skinner said, "Our finite mortal minds cannot grasp the tremendous load borne by the Savior in Gethsemane. But we begin to comprehend what this means in practical terms by remembering that this earth along has had some 60 to 70 billion people live upon it during its temporal history (not counting those spirits yet to come). Multiply the sins, sorrows, heartaches, and injustices of these 60 to 70 billion souls by the millions of earths that the Savior has created and redeemed, and we may begin to view the term infinite atonement in a different light."The Atonement truly is incomprehensible to us, but we need to always remember how truly personal our relationship is with our Savior. He suffered for each one of us personally. He has felt your pain, your sorrow, your heartaches. He knows exactly how you feel, because He has experienced it.CS Lewis said, "God has infinite attention to spare for each one of us. He does not have to deal with us in the mass. You are as much alone with Him as if you were the only being He had ever created. When Christ died, He died for you individually just as if you had been the only man or woman in the world."Christ suffered and died for all of us, but He would have done it if it was just for you. The Atonement is so real and so powerful. It is so personal. He truly knows you and loves you.I hope you all have a fantastic Christmas and remember the true reason that we celebrate.
Vi voglio bene!Sorella Hawkey
December 17, 2008
Hi everyone-
How are you all doing? Bryce, be careful around fire, please! Mom, did you ever have the chance to get a DVD of Priesthood session of this past conference? I want to see all the elders sing! Also, do you print my letters? There are some things I don't write in my journal, because I know I'll write to you guys, so I just want to make sure they're being kept somehow. Thanks! Also, no one has yet answered my question about giving away a Book of Mormon. Do you guys even read my letters???This week is transfer week, and our whole district is staying the same. Transfers are tomorrow. They're on Thursdays every six weeks. We get the call Monday morning during DDM, our district meetings. We're excited that everyone is staying here. All 6 of us got invited over for Christmas with the Gianelli family. I don't know exactly where their house in the country is, but I'll let you know when I find out. We're really excited!Christmas Eve we're all going over to the Manucci family's house. They're the ones who picked us up from the train station our first night here. They're a great family! Every year they have the missionaries over for Christmas Eve, and they have us make a list of what we want to eat (something American), and they go shopping and we all cook it together. It will be fun! I think the Margheritti's will be there, too.Last Sunday we had lunch at the Antognetti's. She's an awesome older sister in the ward, and the grandma of the crazy sisters. It was fun. All 6 of us missionaries were invited and a lot of family was there, too. The whole family lives in the same building, with different apartments for the different families. It's really cool. The crazy sisters have a huge music room. It's sound proof, and they have tons of instruments and recording equipment. They took us up there and played a couple songs for us, and they're really good! They play a lot around here. One of the crazy sisters also informed us that she prays to cats, because they're more approachable. She's hilarious. They're both very free spirited and fun!Also this Sunday, the whole sacrament meeting was done by the youth. There are only a few youth here, so instead of one speaking every week, they do a youth program once a year. The youth here are amazing! All of them are great speakers and are such great examples to their friends. The young women did a musical number and asked me and my companion to sing with them. They wanted one of the verses to be a duet with my companion and I, which was interesting. Neither of us are singers. But the branch loved it. At least that's what they said, so that's what we choose to believe. The elders made fun of us, though.So I don't know exactly what Italians think about American food, but all of the brands of frozen pizzas here have an "American style" pizza. It always includes every somewhat American food they can think of, all in one pizza. They usually have hot dogs, corn, chunks of meat (not even sausage or anything, just fat chunks of meat), and lots of other gross stuff. I don't think any of them have actually been to America.Have I mentioned how beautiful La Spezia is? I love it here! The Alps run just outside of the city, and are gorgeous! Also, part of the branch is in Tuscany. We visited some members on Friday, and got to go to Tuscany! Today we're going to Via dell'Amore. Last week was raining way too hard, and we didn't end up going. But today is actually a little bit sunny! We were talking to the elders about going to Cinque Terre, and I asked them if they wanted to go on the walk of love with us, and it totally ended up sounding like I was flirting with them! They all just stared at me for awhile, until I explained that I was inviting them with us for a missionary appropriate activity. Things always manage to come out wrong!There's an older man in the branch who is amazing! His name is Brother Carli. He was the branch president for years and years. His wife passed away a few years ago, but he comes to every single activity by himself. He's not very talkative, and seems a little rough around the edges, but he's so sweet! Anyways, they have candies here called Kisses, which are way better than American kisses, by the way! And everyone greets each other here by kissing each other's cheeks, but the men can't kiss the sister missionaries, so every week Fratello Carli brings us a candy kiss. It's really sweet!Last Saturday we met with Joanna again. She's wonderful! Her family is great, too. Carla, the step-daughter, met with us this time. She's 16 and so adorable! She read from the Book of Mormon last week and kept telling us we need to come back more often to talk to her. We talked about the Restoration, and she loved it! She kept saying things like "that's so cool!" She's really cute. Joanna still hasn't recognized an answer to her prayers about whether or not the Church is true, but she's still trying, which is good. She recognizes that it may take time.We haven't been able to get ahold of Jennifer since our first appointment last week. We're really worried about her. She seemed to be doing so great, but now she won't answer our calls. Some extra prayers for her would be wonderful!We have been meeting a lot with inactive members of the branch. They're great! Especially Judy. She loves us! She's having such a hard time right now, and I just wish she could see that living the Gospel will help her.The work is going great and I'm loving it! We have zone conference next week, so we get to go to Florence again, which I'm excited about.
Thanks for all your love and support.Vi voglio bene!Sorella Hawkey
How are you all doing? Bryce, be careful around fire, please! Mom, did you ever have the chance to get a DVD of Priesthood session of this past conference? I want to see all the elders sing! Also, do you print my letters? There are some things I don't write in my journal, because I know I'll write to you guys, so I just want to make sure they're being kept somehow. Thanks! Also, no one has yet answered my question about giving away a Book of Mormon. Do you guys even read my letters???This week is transfer week, and our whole district is staying the same. Transfers are tomorrow. They're on Thursdays every six weeks. We get the call Monday morning during DDM, our district meetings. We're excited that everyone is staying here. All 6 of us got invited over for Christmas with the Gianelli family. I don't know exactly where their house in the country is, but I'll let you know when I find out. We're really excited!Christmas Eve we're all going over to the Manucci family's house. They're the ones who picked us up from the train station our first night here. They're a great family! Every year they have the missionaries over for Christmas Eve, and they have us make a list of what we want to eat (something American), and they go shopping and we all cook it together. It will be fun! I think the Margheritti's will be there, too.Last Sunday we had lunch at the Antognetti's. She's an awesome older sister in the ward, and the grandma of the crazy sisters. It was fun. All 6 of us missionaries were invited and a lot of family was there, too. The whole family lives in the same building, with different apartments for the different families. It's really cool. The crazy sisters have a huge music room. It's sound proof, and they have tons of instruments and recording equipment. They took us up there and played a couple songs for us, and they're really good! They play a lot around here. One of the crazy sisters also informed us that she prays to cats, because they're more approachable. She's hilarious. They're both very free spirited and fun!Also this Sunday, the whole sacrament meeting was done by the youth. There are only a few youth here, so instead of one speaking every week, they do a youth program once a year. The youth here are amazing! All of them are great speakers and are such great examples to their friends. The young women did a musical number and asked me and my companion to sing with them. They wanted one of the verses to be a duet with my companion and I, which was interesting. Neither of us are singers. But the branch loved it. At least that's what they said, so that's what we choose to believe. The elders made fun of us, though.So I don't know exactly what Italians think about American food, but all of the brands of frozen pizzas here have an "American style" pizza. It always includes every somewhat American food they can think of, all in one pizza. They usually have hot dogs, corn, chunks of meat (not even sausage or anything, just fat chunks of meat), and lots of other gross stuff. I don't think any of them have actually been to America.Have I mentioned how beautiful La Spezia is? I love it here! The Alps run just outside of the city, and are gorgeous! Also, part of the branch is in Tuscany. We visited some members on Friday, and got to go to Tuscany! Today we're going to Via dell'Amore. Last week was raining way too hard, and we didn't end up going. But today is actually a little bit sunny! We were talking to the elders about going to Cinque Terre, and I asked them if they wanted to go on the walk of love with us, and it totally ended up sounding like I was flirting with them! They all just stared at me for awhile, until I explained that I was inviting them with us for a missionary appropriate activity. Things always manage to come out wrong!There's an older man in the branch who is amazing! His name is Brother Carli. He was the branch president for years and years. His wife passed away a few years ago, but he comes to every single activity by himself. He's not very talkative, and seems a little rough around the edges, but he's so sweet! Anyways, they have candies here called Kisses, which are way better than American kisses, by the way! And everyone greets each other here by kissing each other's cheeks, but the men can't kiss the sister missionaries, so every week Fratello Carli brings us a candy kiss. It's really sweet!Last Saturday we met with Joanna again. She's wonderful! Her family is great, too. Carla, the step-daughter, met with us this time. She's 16 and so adorable! She read from the Book of Mormon last week and kept telling us we need to come back more often to talk to her. We talked about the Restoration, and she loved it! She kept saying things like "that's so cool!" She's really cute. Joanna still hasn't recognized an answer to her prayers about whether or not the Church is true, but she's still trying, which is good. She recognizes that it may take time.We haven't been able to get ahold of Jennifer since our first appointment last week. We're really worried about her. She seemed to be doing so great, but now she won't answer our calls. Some extra prayers for her would be wonderful!We have been meeting a lot with inactive members of the branch. They're great! Especially Judy. She loves us! She's having such a hard time right now, and I just wish she could see that living the Gospel will help her.The work is going great and I'm loving it! We have zone conference next week, so we get to go to Florence again, which I'm excited about.
Thanks for all your love and support.Vi voglio bene!Sorella Hawkey
Wednesday, December 10, 2008
December 10, 2008
Hi everyone!
How are you all doing? Things are great here in Italia. Everything's all decorated for Christmas. We live right by Centro (downtown) so there are tons of lights everywhere! I love it! Also, I found out I live really close to a castle! We were looking for one of our contacts the other day, and we turned a corner, and all the sudden there was a huge castle in front of us! There's a museum there, so I think we're going to try to go some P-day.
So I was thinking about when I come back after my mission. I know you had talked about coming for the Temple dedication, but I have a proposal. When I come back for the Temple, I will probably just be staying in the Rome area doing Temple stuff. So what if I just went when the Temple is dedicated, and the family comes back a different time? I think it would be more fun to have a more relaxed trip and be able to visit the cities other than Rome and meet the people I worked with. Let me know what you think.
This week has been great! We had 2 meal appointments with members of the branch. (That reminds me, are you guys going to do the Book of Mormon challenge I asked you about last week?) Anyways, one was with the Margheritti family, who reminds me so much of mom and dad. You would love them! Sister Margheritti is super bubbly and loving. She always gives us free stuff at her store when we go there, and she always knows all the branch gossip. Yesterday we went visiting teaching with her, and she took us out to lunch after at a delicious focacceria! President Margheritti has a sense of humor a lot like dad's. He's really funny and loves to tease me. They have a 17 year old daughter, who Bryce would think is super cute. And Gizmo would love their puppy!
The other appointment was with the Gianelli family, who is also amazing! They have 3 kids, 2 girls ages 16 and 8, and a 14 year old boy. They are tons of fun! The 16 year old girl is going to start helping us teach english class. They invited us over for Christmas to their house in the country. I'm so excited! At lunch, the 14 year old boy spilled the bottle of olive oil all over my skirt. It came out, so it was no problem, but he was so worried! I've seen him a couple times since then at the church, and he has apologized about 100 times. He's a cute kid.
I got "fired" as the branch pianist. The guy who's normally the pianist came back from out of town, and guess what? He's completely blind! He knows all of the hymns by heart, including the introduction and how many verses each hymn has. He's so cool!
Last week we once again had a bunch of appointments fall through one night. So we decided to do house in this one area and ended up getting some amazing contacts! We were on a street that goes up a hill, and an older lady walked by and we said hi to her. She stopped walking and asked if she knew us. Then she saw our name tags, and recognized us as missionaries. She said that her son is taking the lessons from the elders. We talked to her for a while, and helped her walk home. She had a really hard time walking up the hill, and we found out later from the elders that she has collapsed a couple times walking home, and she was really worried about how she was going to make it home that night. She kept telling us that we were angels sent from Jesus, and we're all she'll talk about with the elders. It's so amazing how the Lord's hand is always in our lives. We had no real reason to be in that area at that time, but Heavenly Father knows His children. He knew that this woman needed someone to help her walk home, and we were blessed enough to be there. There have been so many little miracles like that, when one thing doesn't work out, but Heavenly Father gets us exactly where we need to be to see the people that need us.
We had an appointment with Joanna this week, but a friend was in town and she forgot to call us to reschedule. So we showed up to her house, and she wasn't home, but her 16 year old step-daughter was. She invited us in and asked us a tons of questions and was super interested in the Restoration and Joseph Smith! She asked if she can start coming when we teach Joanna, and asked if we can start coming by more often. It was a great experience!
Monday morning we met with Jennifer, who is also incredible! I don't remember if I told you about her last week, but she took the lessons 2 years ago but didn't feel ready to commit. She recognized that if she was going to join the church, it was a lifelong commitment, and she didn't feel ready at the time. But she has a friend who comes to english class, so she got our number and called us out of the blue! When we met with her Monday, she said that she feels ready this time and wants to pursue this. She said that she wants to have an eternal family someday and raise her kids in the church. We showed her the baptismal font, and she stared at it for a long time, and said, "I need to read the Book of Mormon again and pray before I do this, but I think this is right." It was such an amazing experience! And Kyle, I feel like it happened at least in part because of when you prayed that I would be able to find a golden investigator. So thank you!
I love you all so much! Thanks for all the love, support and prayers. They mean a lot to me. So do the letters and packages! :)
Vi voglio bene! Buone Feste!
Sorella Hawkey
How are you all doing? Things are great here in Italia. Everything's all decorated for Christmas. We live right by Centro (downtown) so there are tons of lights everywhere! I love it! Also, I found out I live really close to a castle! We were looking for one of our contacts the other day, and we turned a corner, and all the sudden there was a huge castle in front of us! There's a museum there, so I think we're going to try to go some P-day.
So I was thinking about when I come back after my mission. I know you had talked about coming for the Temple dedication, but I have a proposal. When I come back for the Temple, I will probably just be staying in the Rome area doing Temple stuff. So what if I just went when the Temple is dedicated, and the family comes back a different time? I think it would be more fun to have a more relaxed trip and be able to visit the cities other than Rome and meet the people I worked with. Let me know what you think.
This week has been great! We had 2 meal appointments with members of the branch. (That reminds me, are you guys going to do the Book of Mormon challenge I asked you about last week?) Anyways, one was with the Margheritti family, who reminds me so much of mom and dad. You would love them! Sister Margheritti is super bubbly and loving. She always gives us free stuff at her store when we go there, and she always knows all the branch gossip. Yesterday we went visiting teaching with her, and she took us out to lunch after at a delicious focacceria! President Margheritti has a sense of humor a lot like dad's. He's really funny and loves to tease me. They have a 17 year old daughter, who Bryce would think is super cute. And Gizmo would love their puppy!
The other appointment was with the Gianelli family, who is also amazing! They have 3 kids, 2 girls ages 16 and 8, and a 14 year old boy. They are tons of fun! The 16 year old girl is going to start helping us teach english class. They invited us over for Christmas to their house in the country. I'm so excited! At lunch, the 14 year old boy spilled the bottle of olive oil all over my skirt. It came out, so it was no problem, but he was so worried! I've seen him a couple times since then at the church, and he has apologized about 100 times. He's a cute kid.
I got "fired" as the branch pianist. The guy who's normally the pianist came back from out of town, and guess what? He's completely blind! He knows all of the hymns by heart, including the introduction and how many verses each hymn has. He's so cool!
Last week we once again had a bunch of appointments fall through one night. So we decided to do house in this one area and ended up getting some amazing contacts! We were on a street that goes up a hill, and an older lady walked by and we said hi to her. She stopped walking and asked if she knew us. Then she saw our name tags, and recognized us as missionaries. She said that her son is taking the lessons from the elders. We talked to her for a while, and helped her walk home. She had a really hard time walking up the hill, and we found out later from the elders that she has collapsed a couple times walking home, and she was really worried about how she was going to make it home that night. She kept telling us that we were angels sent from Jesus, and we're all she'll talk about with the elders. It's so amazing how the Lord's hand is always in our lives. We had no real reason to be in that area at that time, but Heavenly Father knows His children. He knew that this woman needed someone to help her walk home, and we were blessed enough to be there. There have been so many little miracles like that, when one thing doesn't work out, but Heavenly Father gets us exactly where we need to be to see the people that need us.
We had an appointment with Joanna this week, but a friend was in town and she forgot to call us to reschedule. So we showed up to her house, and she wasn't home, but her 16 year old step-daughter was. She invited us in and asked us a tons of questions and was super interested in the Restoration and Joseph Smith! She asked if she can start coming when we teach Joanna, and asked if we can start coming by more often. It was a great experience!
Monday morning we met with Jennifer, who is also incredible! I don't remember if I told you about her last week, but she took the lessons 2 years ago but didn't feel ready to commit. She recognized that if she was going to join the church, it was a lifelong commitment, and she didn't feel ready at the time. But she has a friend who comes to english class, so she got our number and called us out of the blue! When we met with her Monday, she said that she feels ready this time and wants to pursue this. She said that she wants to have an eternal family someday and raise her kids in the church. We showed her the baptismal font, and she stared at it for a long time, and said, "I need to read the Book of Mormon again and pray before I do this, but I think this is right." It was such an amazing experience! And Kyle, I feel like it happened at least in part because of when you prayed that I would be able to find a golden investigator. So thank you!
I love you all so much! Thanks for all the love, support and prayers. They mean a lot to me. So do the letters and packages! :)
Vi voglio bene! Buone Feste!
Sorella Hawkey
Wednesday, December 3, 2008
December 3, 2008
Hello!
How are you all doing? How was Thanksgiving? Ours was really good! We ate dinner as a district at the church. The elders cooked, and it actually turned out pretty well. Except that they bought chicken, thinking it was turkey. We informed them that it was in fact chicken, and they had no idea! We were in charge of dessert. We made apple cobbler, pumpkin chocolate chip cookies, and pumpkin pie from scratch. And when I say from scratch, I mean we had to cut up pieces of pumpkin and boil it, then put it into a blender. It was a fun adventure! And our oven doesn't have a temperature guage on it, you just have to kind of guess and hope it doesn't burn.Today for pday we are just running around town trying to get stuff done. We went shopping this morning and bought some warm clothes, which I'm really excited about! It's getting cold here! We also printed pictures, which I'll send you today. After this we're grocery shopping, and then hanging out at home to get some rest. Grocery shopping here is so fun! At the store we go to, they have these little things that look kind of like remote controls, but they scan all the items. You scan everything as you go throughout the store, and then when you're done, you just take the machine up to the cash register and pay. It's super fast and really fun to scan stuff!When Kyle did baptisms the other day, did he do grandpa White's name? Also, my trainer is in the conference ensign on page 6, which you should look at! It's pretty cool!The work here continues to go well! The branch is awesome. We're starting a family home evening at the church every Wednesday night for investigators and families to come to. We're going to have a lesson and treats and play games. It will be really fun and a lot of investigators have expressed interest in coming. We're also planning a Christmas party! Our branch is doing a challenge in the month of December, and I would like to challenge my family to do it also. It is to give a Book of Mormon to someone this month. We came up with 5 steps to do. First, come up with an objective, or why you want to give away a Book of Mormon. Then prayerfully brainstorm who you would like to give it to. Then prayerfully select one person, and come up with a specific plan on how you would like to give it to them. Like if you want to invite them over for dinner with the missionaries, family home evening, or whatever. Then give it to them! The missionaries are going around to all the active families in the branch (which is about 8) and giving them a copy of the Book of Mormon and The Nativity DVD to give out. So I would like to challenge you to do that also.Last week we went to visit with Judy, a less active member in our branch. We visited her a couple weeks ago, and she's wonderful! She went on a mission, but then married a non member and stopped going to church. She came last week, though! And she told us that after we came last time, she has been praying and reading the Book of Mormon again. She's so great and I'm so happy for her!We also met an "investigator" family, who are more like friends of the missionaries than actually investigators, but they are awesome! They're from Napoli, and I have never seen a more animated, loud family in my life! It's like the family on My Big Fat Greek Wedding times 10, and it's only 5 people creating that much chaos! They are so wonderful! The people from Napoli are very welcoming and friendly, and they kept offering us food and drinks, and things to take home with us. I love them!Saturday night was a crazy night. It was pouring down rain! And when it rains here, it really rains! The streets turn into rivers and the wind gets blowing so hard that your umbrella doesn't even work that well, because rain is coming at you from all directions. So we were trying to find this house, but the map was way wrong! It had the street we were trying to find on a completely wrong section of town, but we didn't know that, so we were wandering through this neighborhood trying to find the house. And then my companion's umbrella broke. All the wires were pointing in different directions. We were both trying to fit under mine, but ended up getting drenched. Then we got lost again, and ended up wandering through this muddy road. It was so much fun, though! It really is true that the more I forget myself and get lost in the work, the happier I am. It could have been such a miserable experience for both of us, but instead we chose to laugh about it and enjoy it. We made some nice warm hot chocolate when we got home that night. By the way, the hot chocolate in Italy is amazing!The other day we were doing house, and 2 little old ladies were watching us at the citofono (the intercom type thing at the front of each palazzo). They kept poking their heads out the window, and were obviously wondering what we were doing. As soon as we would look in their direction, they would duck behind the window, and slowly poke their heads back up again. They watched us for a good 20 minutes before we were done. It was really funny.Also doing house in the same area, I saw a cocker spaniel with a mullet! It was gross. He had long ears, which were cute, but then the top of his head was spiky and it seriously looked like a mullet. Never cut Gizmo's hair like that!We met with Joanna yesterday. She's still progressing and doing great! Sister Margheritti, the branch president's wife came with us. She's a convert herself, and I think it really helped Joanna to hear her conversion story. It was a really great experience! Joanna is amazing! We're meeting with her again this weekend. She still hasn't received an answer, but she keeps trying and hasn't given up. The Margheritti family is also amazing. We're going over to their house for dinner on Friday, and I'm excited. They have one daughter, who's 17 and super cute, and a cute puppy! I don't remember if I already told you this, but they don't have a car, because instead they save up money to be able to go to the temple once a year. Such an amazing sacrifice. The temple in Rome will be such a blessing to them.We got a call from this girl the other day, who wants to meet with us! She called us from out of the blue. She has a friend who comes to english class and got our number from them. It was so cool to actually have someone call us for a change! Then we were looking through the area book that night, and found out that this same girl took the lessons 2 years ago, but wasn't ready at the time. But now she's the one calling us, so we're really excited to meet with her!Another cool story. We were on our way to an appointment, and when we got there, the investigator was confused about what time the appointment was. We thought it was in the morning, but she thought it was in the afternoon, so she asked if we could come back that afternoon. We were on the bus back home, and we met a wonderful lady! We talked to her for a little while and she asked if we could talk more later. She gave us her number, and we're meeting with her this week. It's so amazing how the Lord puts us exactly where we need to be!I love you all so much! I hope you're all doing well. You're always in my prayers and hope you feel my love for you. I know I feel your love for me and your prayers.
Vi voglio bene!
Sorella Hawkey
How are you all doing? How was Thanksgiving? Ours was really good! We ate dinner as a district at the church. The elders cooked, and it actually turned out pretty well. Except that they bought chicken, thinking it was turkey. We informed them that it was in fact chicken, and they had no idea! We were in charge of dessert. We made apple cobbler, pumpkin chocolate chip cookies, and pumpkin pie from scratch. And when I say from scratch, I mean we had to cut up pieces of pumpkin and boil it, then put it into a blender. It was a fun adventure! And our oven doesn't have a temperature guage on it, you just have to kind of guess and hope it doesn't burn.Today for pday we are just running around town trying to get stuff done. We went shopping this morning and bought some warm clothes, which I'm really excited about! It's getting cold here! We also printed pictures, which I'll send you today. After this we're grocery shopping, and then hanging out at home to get some rest. Grocery shopping here is so fun! At the store we go to, they have these little things that look kind of like remote controls, but they scan all the items. You scan everything as you go throughout the store, and then when you're done, you just take the machine up to the cash register and pay. It's super fast and really fun to scan stuff!When Kyle did baptisms the other day, did he do grandpa White's name? Also, my trainer is in the conference ensign on page 6, which you should look at! It's pretty cool!The work here continues to go well! The branch is awesome. We're starting a family home evening at the church every Wednesday night for investigators and families to come to. We're going to have a lesson and treats and play games. It will be really fun and a lot of investigators have expressed interest in coming. We're also planning a Christmas party! Our branch is doing a challenge in the month of December, and I would like to challenge my family to do it also. It is to give a Book of Mormon to someone this month. We came up with 5 steps to do. First, come up with an objective, or why you want to give away a Book of Mormon. Then prayerfully brainstorm who you would like to give it to. Then prayerfully select one person, and come up with a specific plan on how you would like to give it to them. Like if you want to invite them over for dinner with the missionaries, family home evening, or whatever. Then give it to them! The missionaries are going around to all the active families in the branch (which is about 8) and giving them a copy of the Book of Mormon and The Nativity DVD to give out. So I would like to challenge you to do that also.Last week we went to visit with Judy, a less active member in our branch. We visited her a couple weeks ago, and she's wonderful! She went on a mission, but then married a non member and stopped going to church. She came last week, though! And she told us that after we came last time, she has been praying and reading the Book of Mormon again. She's so great and I'm so happy for her!We also met an "investigator" family, who are more like friends of the missionaries than actually investigators, but they are awesome! They're from Napoli, and I have never seen a more animated, loud family in my life! It's like the family on My Big Fat Greek Wedding times 10, and it's only 5 people creating that much chaos! They are so wonderful! The people from Napoli are very welcoming and friendly, and they kept offering us food and drinks, and things to take home with us. I love them!Saturday night was a crazy night. It was pouring down rain! And when it rains here, it really rains! The streets turn into rivers and the wind gets blowing so hard that your umbrella doesn't even work that well, because rain is coming at you from all directions. So we were trying to find this house, but the map was way wrong! It had the street we were trying to find on a completely wrong section of town, but we didn't know that, so we were wandering through this neighborhood trying to find the house. And then my companion's umbrella broke. All the wires were pointing in different directions. We were both trying to fit under mine, but ended up getting drenched. Then we got lost again, and ended up wandering through this muddy road. It was so much fun, though! It really is true that the more I forget myself and get lost in the work, the happier I am. It could have been such a miserable experience for both of us, but instead we chose to laugh about it and enjoy it. We made some nice warm hot chocolate when we got home that night. By the way, the hot chocolate in Italy is amazing!The other day we were doing house, and 2 little old ladies were watching us at the citofono (the intercom type thing at the front of each palazzo). They kept poking their heads out the window, and were obviously wondering what we were doing. As soon as we would look in their direction, they would duck behind the window, and slowly poke their heads back up again. They watched us for a good 20 minutes before we were done. It was really funny.Also doing house in the same area, I saw a cocker spaniel with a mullet! It was gross. He had long ears, which were cute, but then the top of his head was spiky and it seriously looked like a mullet. Never cut Gizmo's hair like that!We met with Joanna yesterday. She's still progressing and doing great! Sister Margheritti, the branch president's wife came with us. She's a convert herself, and I think it really helped Joanna to hear her conversion story. It was a really great experience! Joanna is amazing! We're meeting with her again this weekend. She still hasn't received an answer, but she keeps trying and hasn't given up. The Margheritti family is also amazing. We're going over to their house for dinner on Friday, and I'm excited. They have one daughter, who's 17 and super cute, and a cute puppy! I don't remember if I already told you this, but they don't have a car, because instead they save up money to be able to go to the temple once a year. Such an amazing sacrifice. The temple in Rome will be such a blessing to them.We got a call from this girl the other day, who wants to meet with us! She called us from out of the blue. She has a friend who comes to english class and got our number from them. It was so cool to actually have someone call us for a change! Then we were looking through the area book that night, and found out that this same girl took the lessons 2 years ago, but wasn't ready at the time. But now she's the one calling us, so we're really excited to meet with her!Another cool story. We were on our way to an appointment, and when we got there, the investigator was confused about what time the appointment was. We thought it was in the morning, but she thought it was in the afternoon, so she asked if we could come back that afternoon. We were on the bus back home, and we met a wonderful lady! We talked to her for a little while and she asked if we could talk more later. She gave us her number, and we're meeting with her this week. It's so amazing how the Lord puts us exactly where we need to be!I love you all so much! I hope you're all doing well. You're always in my prayers and hope you feel my love for you. I know I feel your love for me and your prayers.
Vi voglio bene!
Sorella Hawkey
Wednesday, November 26, 2008
November 26, 2008
Ciao!
How are you all doing? It sounds like you're all good. Keep the letters coming. They mean a lot! Happy Thanksgiving! I've changed my mind and decided that you all can in fact have fun without me, as long as you all realize the hole left by my absence. We are having a Thanksgiving lunch as a district. The elders are cooking, so it could be interesting. But I hope you all have a great time!!!First of all, I've received lots of questions from people, so I'll try to answer them all. For Pday, we can travel in our zone, which is pretty big, so there's tons of cool things to see. Pisa is too far, but we drive through there to get to Florence, so I've seen the tower very briefly. We didn't go to Cinque Terre last week. We were waiting for the elders, who took forever, and missed the train. So this week we're going with or without them. Last week we went to the naval museum, though, which was cool. Dad would love it!The train ride from Rome to La Spezia was just a normal train ride. A family in the branch picked us up and took us to our apartment. There were several missionaries coming up north from Rome, but Sister Jones and I went the farthest. We buy groceries weekly. Things are about the same price as in America. You can get really good pizza for 2 euro. We go every Monday after our district devotional. I love the pizza margherita, and nutella pizza for dessert!Other answers to questions: it's kinda cold here. It's about 9 or 10 degrees every day, celsius, and I have no idea what that is in farenheit. The markets are really cute and have fresh fish that they catch every morning and lots of fresh fruits and veggies. The bread and pasta is amazing! Liguria, the region La Spezia is in, is known for focaccia, which is incredible! The city is overall very clean and nice. I had a little trouble with jet lag, but not too bad. The people are so friendly! And everyone says this is one of the least friendly regions in Italy, so I can only imagine what people other places are like. Most of them have little desire to hear our message, but right after rejecting us, they invite us in and ask if we want food or anything. We go to the park a lot to talk to people, and everyone loves to talk to us! By the end of the conversation, we know their whole life story. The people are wonderful!The portion sizes for food are huge!!! We've eaten at a members homes, and before you even finish 3 bites, they've loaded your plate with more. They also have usually at least 2 courses, each of which is a huge meal in and of itself. We definitely do not go hungry here. Most people get around on busses or walking. Everyone greets each other by kissing each other's cheeks. Everyone has cell phones. We use euro here, but I don't know what the exchange rate is. I think that's all the questions I've receive. Sorry if I missed any!This week has been great! I don't remember if I told you this already, but we go to Tai Chi every week. A nonmember uses the church building to teach a class, so the branch president asked if a set of missionaries would come every time. So we go every Tuesday night, and sometimes have investigators there. It's really fun! I'm pretty sure the instructor thinks I'm retarded, though. He speaks really fast and uses a bunch of words I don't know. He comes around and gives everyone individual feedback, and I just give him a blank stare, because I have no idea what he's telling me. Poor guy!I absolutely love La Spezia! The more I get to know the city, the more I love it! You would all love it too! I can't wait to bring you back someday. Dad, you would love the naval base and the cargo ships. I can also picture you liking the bus system here, and within 30 minutes figuring out where every bus goes and where all the stops are. You would also love the pizza margherita! We get some every Monday, and I want to take you to the little pizza shop we go to someday. They love missionaries! Mom, you would love how quaint the city is. You would also love the focaccia, which is amazing, and the little pastry shop by our house, which is also amazing! Kyle, you would love how the old people dress. All the old men wear nice slacks, a button up shirt, and a little hat and a trench coat. All the little old ladies always wear skirts and a nice blouse and pumps. They're really fashionable old people here! I love it! Most of the ladies dress cuter than me! (which I guess isn't too hard in sister missionary clothes) You would also love that I've only seen 2 obese people here. And you can talk about people right in front of them and they have no idea, cuz they don't speak english. It's kinda fun! Bryce, you would love the elevators here. And by that, I mean you would hate them, but I always think of you when I use them! They're kinda scary, so you would probably have a heart attack in them. The elevator shaft is a little cage, and you have to manually open the doors. They're really ghetto. You would also love this one corner in town. It's right in downtown, and there's an outhouse just chillin on the corner. It's a nicer one that has a flushing toilet, but still...It's a toilet on the corner like it's no big deal. It's kinda funny. Gizmo and Bella, you would love that everyone has dogs here. Everyone takes their dogs with them everywhere. You would make lots of friends here. Most of them have little doggy rain coats, too, for when it rains.The work is going well. Geni decided that she prayed and got an answer to stay Catholic. But she said she would still let us visit sometimes. We've had tons of appointments cancel on us, so we've been doing lots of finding work. Last night doing house, someone yelled at us, and said "I'm communist! I don't want to hear about religion!" It was funny! We've met some awesome people, though. We met a guy named Clement at Sandra's store. He came in and immediately asked us who we were. We ended up giving him a first lesson, and he kept saying that he really really wants a Book of Mormon. He's from Nigeria, and speaks english, and unfortunately we only had an Italian one with us, but the elders are meeting with him tonight. He's so cool!Joanna is doing great! She wasn't able to come to church last week, but she loves meeting with us and does all her reading. She loved the Plan of Salvation so much! She was so excited about it! She said she hasn't gotten an answer to her prayers yet, though, but she's still praying. We would love extra prayers for her to get an answer, if you want to!Last week we went to visit an older lady in the branch named Sister Nardi. She's pretty much the cutest lady ever! She lives in San Terenzo, which is gorgeous! Look up pictures online. Her mom was there, who is 99 years old. I don't think she's completely there. During our lesson, she kept yelling out things like "I'm 99 years old!" "Did you know I'm 99 years old?" "I'm 99 years old, and I've never been sick in my life." It was really funny.I love you all so much and hope you know you're in my prayers.
Love,Sorella Hawkey
How are you all doing? It sounds like you're all good. Keep the letters coming. They mean a lot! Happy Thanksgiving! I've changed my mind and decided that you all can in fact have fun without me, as long as you all realize the hole left by my absence. We are having a Thanksgiving lunch as a district. The elders are cooking, so it could be interesting. But I hope you all have a great time!!!First of all, I've received lots of questions from people, so I'll try to answer them all. For Pday, we can travel in our zone, which is pretty big, so there's tons of cool things to see. Pisa is too far, but we drive through there to get to Florence, so I've seen the tower very briefly. We didn't go to Cinque Terre last week. We were waiting for the elders, who took forever, and missed the train. So this week we're going with or without them. Last week we went to the naval museum, though, which was cool. Dad would love it!The train ride from Rome to La Spezia was just a normal train ride. A family in the branch picked us up and took us to our apartment. There were several missionaries coming up north from Rome, but Sister Jones and I went the farthest. We buy groceries weekly. Things are about the same price as in America. You can get really good pizza for 2 euro. We go every Monday after our district devotional. I love the pizza margherita, and nutella pizza for dessert!Other answers to questions: it's kinda cold here. It's about 9 or 10 degrees every day, celsius, and I have no idea what that is in farenheit. The markets are really cute and have fresh fish that they catch every morning and lots of fresh fruits and veggies. The bread and pasta is amazing! Liguria, the region La Spezia is in, is known for focaccia, which is incredible! The city is overall very clean and nice. I had a little trouble with jet lag, but not too bad. The people are so friendly! And everyone says this is one of the least friendly regions in Italy, so I can only imagine what people other places are like. Most of them have little desire to hear our message, but right after rejecting us, they invite us in and ask if we want food or anything. We go to the park a lot to talk to people, and everyone loves to talk to us! By the end of the conversation, we know their whole life story. The people are wonderful!The portion sizes for food are huge!!! We've eaten at a members homes, and before you even finish 3 bites, they've loaded your plate with more. They also have usually at least 2 courses, each of which is a huge meal in and of itself. We definitely do not go hungry here. Most people get around on busses or walking. Everyone greets each other by kissing each other's cheeks. Everyone has cell phones. We use euro here, but I don't know what the exchange rate is. I think that's all the questions I've receive. Sorry if I missed any!This week has been great! I don't remember if I told you this already, but we go to Tai Chi every week. A nonmember uses the church building to teach a class, so the branch president asked if a set of missionaries would come every time. So we go every Tuesday night, and sometimes have investigators there. It's really fun! I'm pretty sure the instructor thinks I'm retarded, though. He speaks really fast and uses a bunch of words I don't know. He comes around and gives everyone individual feedback, and I just give him a blank stare, because I have no idea what he's telling me. Poor guy!I absolutely love La Spezia! The more I get to know the city, the more I love it! You would all love it too! I can't wait to bring you back someday. Dad, you would love the naval base and the cargo ships. I can also picture you liking the bus system here, and within 30 minutes figuring out where every bus goes and where all the stops are. You would also love the pizza margherita! We get some every Monday, and I want to take you to the little pizza shop we go to someday. They love missionaries! Mom, you would love how quaint the city is. You would also love the focaccia, which is amazing, and the little pastry shop by our house, which is also amazing! Kyle, you would love how the old people dress. All the old men wear nice slacks, a button up shirt, and a little hat and a trench coat. All the little old ladies always wear skirts and a nice blouse and pumps. They're really fashionable old people here! I love it! Most of the ladies dress cuter than me! (which I guess isn't too hard in sister missionary clothes) You would also love that I've only seen 2 obese people here. And you can talk about people right in front of them and they have no idea, cuz they don't speak english. It's kinda fun! Bryce, you would love the elevators here. And by that, I mean you would hate them, but I always think of you when I use them! They're kinda scary, so you would probably have a heart attack in them. The elevator shaft is a little cage, and you have to manually open the doors. They're really ghetto. You would also love this one corner in town. It's right in downtown, and there's an outhouse just chillin on the corner. It's a nicer one that has a flushing toilet, but still...It's a toilet on the corner like it's no big deal. It's kinda funny. Gizmo and Bella, you would love that everyone has dogs here. Everyone takes their dogs with them everywhere. You would make lots of friends here. Most of them have little doggy rain coats, too, for when it rains.The work is going well. Geni decided that she prayed and got an answer to stay Catholic. But she said she would still let us visit sometimes. We've had tons of appointments cancel on us, so we've been doing lots of finding work. Last night doing house, someone yelled at us, and said "I'm communist! I don't want to hear about religion!" It was funny! We've met some awesome people, though. We met a guy named Clement at Sandra's store. He came in and immediately asked us who we were. We ended up giving him a first lesson, and he kept saying that he really really wants a Book of Mormon. He's from Nigeria, and speaks english, and unfortunately we only had an Italian one with us, but the elders are meeting with him tonight. He's so cool!Joanna is doing great! She wasn't able to come to church last week, but she loves meeting with us and does all her reading. She loved the Plan of Salvation so much! She was so excited about it! She said she hasn't gotten an answer to her prayers yet, though, but she's still praying. We would love extra prayers for her to get an answer, if you want to!Last week we went to visit an older lady in the branch named Sister Nardi. She's pretty much the cutest lady ever! She lives in San Terenzo, which is gorgeous! Look up pictures online. Her mom was there, who is 99 years old. I don't think she's completely there. During our lesson, she kept yelling out things like "I'm 99 years old!" "Did you know I'm 99 years old?" "I'm 99 years old, and I've never been sick in my life." It was really funny.I love you all so much and hope you know you're in my prayers.
Love,Sorella Hawkey
Thursday, November 20, 2008
November 20, 2008
Hi,
So I just wrote a really long email, and it got lost, so I'll try again, but this will probably be shorter because I'm almost out of time. Sorry! This week we have pday on Thursday because we had zone conference yesterday, with Elders Robert C. Oaks and Gerald Causse. They are in the area presidency and are touring our mission right now. It was really good!Mom, how was your birthday? How was yours, Gizmo? How's Rosie handling Obama being president?We had our first Sunday in the branch last week. Everyone is wonderful! We have about 50 active members who are great! Last week was the primary program. There are 5 kids in the primary, and all of them speak better than me! Oh well!We teach english class on Thursday nights. Sister Jones and I teach the beginners class and have about 15 students who are awesome! We also go to tai chi every week, and play basketball every week. A bunch of nonmembers do both of those activities at the church building, and the branch president asked the missionaries to go to talk to them. It's pretty fun!I only have a few minutes left, so I'll just share one quick experience. Friday night we had tons of appointments scheduled, and every single one of them fell through. It was super frustrating, because we had so many people we wanted to teach. All of our back up plans didn't go through either. So we were standing there trying to figure out what to do, and all of the sudden my companion said that we needed to go to this certain part of town and do house. So we get up there, and no one wants to talk to us! It was kinda frustrating, because it was cold, and we were going on 6 hours of working hard with absolutely no success. We had one house left on the street before it was time to go home. We knocked on the door, and a wonderful woman named Joanna answered. She had a little boy with her, and we shared a message about the family and gave her the Proclamation. Before we had the chance to ask if we could come back, she asked us! We came back the next day and taught her a lesson, and she again asked us if we could come back, before we had the chance. It was awesome!I'm out of time, but I love you all. I'll write more next week that hopefully doesn't get lost.
Sorella Hawkey
So I just wrote a really long email, and it got lost, so I'll try again, but this will probably be shorter because I'm almost out of time. Sorry! This week we have pday on Thursday because we had zone conference yesterday, with Elders Robert C. Oaks and Gerald Causse. They are in the area presidency and are touring our mission right now. It was really good!Mom, how was your birthday? How was yours, Gizmo? How's Rosie handling Obama being president?We had our first Sunday in the branch last week. Everyone is wonderful! We have about 50 active members who are great! Last week was the primary program. There are 5 kids in the primary, and all of them speak better than me! Oh well!We teach english class on Thursday nights. Sister Jones and I teach the beginners class and have about 15 students who are awesome! We also go to tai chi every week, and play basketball every week. A bunch of nonmembers do both of those activities at the church building, and the branch president asked the missionaries to go to talk to them. It's pretty fun!I only have a few minutes left, so I'll just share one quick experience. Friday night we had tons of appointments scheduled, and every single one of them fell through. It was super frustrating, because we had so many people we wanted to teach. All of our back up plans didn't go through either. So we were standing there trying to figure out what to do, and all of the sudden my companion said that we needed to go to this certain part of town and do house. So we get up there, and no one wants to talk to us! It was kinda frustrating, because it was cold, and we were going on 6 hours of working hard with absolutely no success. We had one house left on the street before it was time to go home. We knocked on the door, and a wonderful woman named Joanna answered. She had a little boy with her, and we shared a message about the family and gave her the Proclamation. Before we had the chance to ask if we could come back, she asked us! We came back the next day and taught her a lesson, and she again asked us if we could come back, before we had the chance. It was awesome!I'm out of time, but I love you all. I'll write more next week that hopefully doesn't get lost.
Sorella Hawkey
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
November 12, 2008
Hello family,
So my pday is on Wednesday, so I'm sorry I haven't had the chance to write sooner! But La Spezia is amazing!!!! It's a gorgeous little city! President Acerson said it's his favorite in the mission. We live about a block away from the pier, where we go running every morning. It's a beautiful view of the ocean, and the mountains are only a couple blocks away in the other direction. There are tons of little fishing boats, where little old men go fishing every morning and then sell their fish at the market, which is also by our house. There's also an older man who sits a couple blocks away and plays the accordian throughout the day. It's amazing here!So here's what I've done so far. We had 26 hours of travel from Provo to Rome, which was pretty uneventful. But as soon as we got to Roma, it got exciting! The Acersons and the APs picked us up and we went straight to get pizza! Yummy! Then we went to St. Pauls, which was gorgeous! We stopped really quick at the Colosseum on the way to the mission home, then we had interviews and dinner and finally got to sleep. The next morning we had some training meetings, then got to see the Temple sight. It's gorgeous! It's 15 acres, and will have a stake center, the Temple, and a hotel type building for people to stay at. It can be seen from the main highways, too. It's so amazing because in Italy you're not allowed to build anything if there are artifacts or ruins under the ground. In the whole 15 acres, there's not a single artifact, but only 100 feet away there are tons of ruins. Amazing!After that, we had lunch at the mission home with all of our trainers, but no one except the President knew who was training who. After lunch the trainers had a meeting, and us greenies had a meeting, then we had golden transfers. We took turns going up front, and opening our envelope that would tell us who was our trainer and where we were going, then our trainer came up and we took pictures pointing on the map to our city. It was so fun! We then took a 5 hour train ride up here, and I taught my first real lesson! We talked to a guy about the Book of Mormon, and gave him one. It was a great experience to actually understand most of the conversation and to be actually talking to real people instead of the pretend situations at the MTC.We got blown into La Spezia, which means that neither of us had ever served here before, so Sorella Jones and I have gotten lost numerous times, but we're getting to know the city pretty well and have met most of our investigators already.My first encounter with anyone from La Spezia was with our neighbor, who very clearly hates the missionaries! We were walking out of our apartment the first morning, and she stopped us and started yelling at us. That was one time when I was grateful that I didn't understand the conversation. Needless to say, between that and a few other experiences, I've already learned all the bad words in Italian by having them yelled at me. The joys of being a missionary! Also, on Monday all the busses were on strike, and we had appointments all over the city, so we walked, and walked, and walked....And it was raining!This past weekend, we actually had district conference instead of regular church. We are in the Florence district, so we had the opportunity to go to Florence this weekend! It is gorgeous!!! That's where our zone conferences are, too, so we get to go back next week. Today we're going to try to go to Cinque Terre if it's not raining. I don't think we'll ever get bored on Pdays here! Cinque Terre is one of the places I ALWAYS have wanted to go to, and I was so excited when I found out it is in the Roma mission! And even more excited when I found out it is 15 minutes away from where I live!So, onto the best part, the people we're working with. Our first appointment was in Spanish, which I understand even less than I do Italian. It's been an eventful first week needless to say! But she's the sister of one of the elder's investigators, so the elders came with us. (There are 4 elders here, and us 2 sisters) Her name is Mary, and her brother is Gustavo. They are a hilarious family! Theres about 8 of them I think. They kept walking in and out, so I don't actually know exactly how many people there are. But it was a hilarious lesson. We taught an entire lesson, but no one actually stayed for more than about 2 minutes at a time, and there was usually only 1 or 2 people there listening at a time. They just kind of come in and out as they feel like it. We're trying to think of ways to keep their attention, but haven't yet thought of anything. The elders said that's how it always is. Mary is awesome, though, and taught me a few new Italian phrases!Another amazing experience! We were doing casa (tracting) the other night, which is an interesting experience. There aren't really any houses, just apartment complexes here. So you have to try to get in by using the citofono (intercom thing). Then on the off chance that someone actually lets us in, we then have to go knock on their door. So anyways, we're doing casa, and a lady, Antonina, let us in the main palazzo entrance because she thought it was her son that rang that citofono. So we get at her door, and she's surprised to see that we're missionaries and not her son. But she said "Oh! You're the Mormon missionaries! Come in! I knew a missionary about 20 years ago, and he impressed me, so you two have to be great!" She let us in and let us teach her a lesson just because of the impression that one elder made 20 years ago. As we were talking, she remembered that she had a Book of Mormon, and she found it and brought it out. There was also a card from that missionary in it. She told us that recently she's been thinking about life and she really wants to find answers. She was really excited about the Book of Mormon and promised to read parts from it and pray about it. It was such an incredible experience!Which reminds me. We want to find that missionary. Kyle, is there any way you can try to find him? His last name is Bernardi and his first name starts with a J. He served here about 23 years ago. We really want to find him if at all possible. I know there are some mission websites, I think mission.net that have names and contact info for people who have served missions.We also met our branch president this week, who is incredible! He owns a little book and office supply shop, and is wonderful! He is so loving and kind, and so involved in missionary work! I'm excited to be able to work with him and get to know him more. The elders told us an awesome story about him. They said that he doesn't have a car, because he and his family decided to save their money instead so that they can go to the Temple every year. What an amazing sacrifice that is! And what a blessing it will be to have a Temple in Roma soon.Another investigator is Sandra, who is amazing! She owns a little market in downtown La Spezia. She is from Nigeria, and is so incredibly passionate about life and so loving! We went to visit her at her shop last night, and she sang about 10 gospel songs from Nigeria. She's awesome! I'm excited to work with her more.Another investigator is Geni. She has had a very hard life. She's in her early 60s and is so blunt. Yesterday we taught her a lesson, and she was amazed with everything we taught her. She kept saying that the things we taught answered so many questions she's had, and she was so excited to pray to know the truth. She's very opinionated and not afraid to share her opinion! As most Italians are, I'm finding. In the middle of our lesson, she just got up and said that it was time for us to go and asked me to say the prayer. It was hilarious. I love how the Italians are not afraid to say what's on their mind.That leads me to my favorite investigator, Rita. She's 18 and amazing! She's the daughter of one of the elder's investigators. The elders have been working with the dad for awhile, andl ately she's shown interest, so the elders took us over last night to meet her. Her and her dad have also had an incredibly difficult life. They opened up to us so much last night, and had so many questions that they want us to come back to answer for them. They are amazing! I think Rita and I are going to become great friends. She's so wonderful. She wants to help me with my Italian, and she is so encouraging when I try to speak.I love you all so much! Thanks for your prayers and your emails. I'm loving it here. It's very difficult, especially not understanding alot of the language, and the rain, but I know that the Lord is with me always. He has already helped me so much! I'm so grateful to be here!!!!!
Love you all!Sorella Hawkey
So my pday is on Wednesday, so I'm sorry I haven't had the chance to write sooner! But La Spezia is amazing!!!! It's a gorgeous little city! President Acerson said it's his favorite in the mission. We live about a block away from the pier, where we go running every morning. It's a beautiful view of the ocean, and the mountains are only a couple blocks away in the other direction. There are tons of little fishing boats, where little old men go fishing every morning and then sell their fish at the market, which is also by our house. There's also an older man who sits a couple blocks away and plays the accordian throughout the day. It's amazing here!So here's what I've done so far. We had 26 hours of travel from Provo to Rome, which was pretty uneventful. But as soon as we got to Roma, it got exciting! The Acersons and the APs picked us up and we went straight to get pizza! Yummy! Then we went to St. Pauls, which was gorgeous! We stopped really quick at the Colosseum on the way to the mission home, then we had interviews and dinner and finally got to sleep. The next morning we had some training meetings, then got to see the Temple sight. It's gorgeous! It's 15 acres, and will have a stake center, the Temple, and a hotel type building for people to stay at. It can be seen from the main highways, too. It's so amazing because in Italy you're not allowed to build anything if there are artifacts or ruins under the ground. In the whole 15 acres, there's not a single artifact, but only 100 feet away there are tons of ruins. Amazing!After that, we had lunch at the mission home with all of our trainers, but no one except the President knew who was training who. After lunch the trainers had a meeting, and us greenies had a meeting, then we had golden transfers. We took turns going up front, and opening our envelope that would tell us who was our trainer and where we were going, then our trainer came up and we took pictures pointing on the map to our city. It was so fun! We then took a 5 hour train ride up here, and I taught my first real lesson! We talked to a guy about the Book of Mormon, and gave him one. It was a great experience to actually understand most of the conversation and to be actually talking to real people instead of the pretend situations at the MTC.We got blown into La Spezia, which means that neither of us had ever served here before, so Sorella Jones and I have gotten lost numerous times, but we're getting to know the city pretty well and have met most of our investigators already.My first encounter with anyone from La Spezia was with our neighbor, who very clearly hates the missionaries! We were walking out of our apartment the first morning, and she stopped us and started yelling at us. That was one time when I was grateful that I didn't understand the conversation. Needless to say, between that and a few other experiences, I've already learned all the bad words in Italian by having them yelled at me. The joys of being a missionary! Also, on Monday all the busses were on strike, and we had appointments all over the city, so we walked, and walked, and walked....And it was raining!This past weekend, we actually had district conference instead of regular church. We are in the Florence district, so we had the opportunity to go to Florence this weekend! It is gorgeous!!! That's where our zone conferences are, too, so we get to go back next week. Today we're going to try to go to Cinque Terre if it's not raining. I don't think we'll ever get bored on Pdays here! Cinque Terre is one of the places I ALWAYS have wanted to go to, and I was so excited when I found out it is in the Roma mission! And even more excited when I found out it is 15 minutes away from where I live!So, onto the best part, the people we're working with. Our first appointment was in Spanish, which I understand even less than I do Italian. It's been an eventful first week needless to say! But she's the sister of one of the elder's investigators, so the elders came with us. (There are 4 elders here, and us 2 sisters) Her name is Mary, and her brother is Gustavo. They are a hilarious family! Theres about 8 of them I think. They kept walking in and out, so I don't actually know exactly how many people there are. But it was a hilarious lesson. We taught an entire lesson, but no one actually stayed for more than about 2 minutes at a time, and there was usually only 1 or 2 people there listening at a time. They just kind of come in and out as they feel like it. We're trying to think of ways to keep their attention, but haven't yet thought of anything. The elders said that's how it always is. Mary is awesome, though, and taught me a few new Italian phrases!Another amazing experience! We were doing casa (tracting) the other night, which is an interesting experience. There aren't really any houses, just apartment complexes here. So you have to try to get in by using the citofono (intercom thing). Then on the off chance that someone actually lets us in, we then have to go knock on their door. So anyways, we're doing casa, and a lady, Antonina, let us in the main palazzo entrance because she thought it was her son that rang that citofono. So we get at her door, and she's surprised to see that we're missionaries and not her son. But she said "Oh! You're the Mormon missionaries! Come in! I knew a missionary about 20 years ago, and he impressed me, so you two have to be great!" She let us in and let us teach her a lesson just because of the impression that one elder made 20 years ago. As we were talking, she remembered that she had a Book of Mormon, and she found it and brought it out. There was also a card from that missionary in it. She told us that recently she's been thinking about life and she really wants to find answers. She was really excited about the Book of Mormon and promised to read parts from it and pray about it. It was such an incredible experience!Which reminds me. We want to find that missionary. Kyle, is there any way you can try to find him? His last name is Bernardi and his first name starts with a J. He served here about 23 years ago. We really want to find him if at all possible. I know there are some mission websites, I think mission.net that have names and contact info for people who have served missions.We also met our branch president this week, who is incredible! He owns a little book and office supply shop, and is wonderful! He is so loving and kind, and so involved in missionary work! I'm excited to be able to work with him and get to know him more. The elders told us an awesome story about him. They said that he doesn't have a car, because he and his family decided to save their money instead so that they can go to the Temple every year. What an amazing sacrifice that is! And what a blessing it will be to have a Temple in Roma soon.Another investigator is Sandra, who is amazing! She owns a little market in downtown La Spezia. She is from Nigeria, and is so incredibly passionate about life and so loving! We went to visit her at her shop last night, and she sang about 10 gospel songs from Nigeria. She's awesome! I'm excited to work with her more.Another investigator is Geni. She has had a very hard life. She's in her early 60s and is so blunt. Yesterday we taught her a lesson, and she was amazed with everything we taught her. She kept saying that the things we taught answered so many questions she's had, and she was so excited to pray to know the truth. She's very opinionated and not afraid to share her opinion! As most Italians are, I'm finding. In the middle of our lesson, she just got up and said that it was time for us to go and asked me to say the prayer. It was hilarious. I love how the Italians are not afraid to say what's on their mind.That leads me to my favorite investigator, Rita. She's 18 and amazing! She's the daughter of one of the elder's investigators. The elders have been working with the dad for awhile, andl ately she's shown interest, so the elders took us over last night to meet her. Her and her dad have also had an incredibly difficult life. They opened up to us so much last night, and had so many questions that they want us to come back to answer for them. They are amazing! I think Rita and I are going to become great friends. She's so wonderful. She wants to help me with my Italian, and she is so encouraging when I try to speak.I love you all so much! Thanks for your prayers and your emails. I'm loving it here. It's very difficult, especially not understanding alot of the language, and the rain, but I know that the Lord is with me always. He has already helped me so much! I'm so grateful to be here!!!!!
Love you all!Sorella Hawkey
Thursday, October 30, 2008
October 28, 2008
Ciao, tutti!
Only 1 week til Italia!!!!!!! To answer your questions, the skirt is a size 6. My flight leaves SLC at 7:20 am next Tuesday, and I'll be in Chicago from 11:40 am to 5:05 pm Chicago time. So if you could all decide which time you want me to call and what number you want me to call, just message me on dearelder.com and let me know. The address I gave you is to the mission home, so you can send all my mail/packages there.Anyways, it's been another fantastic week at the MTC! Funny story (you don't have to put this on the blog- only my family will really truly understand this)- all of the anziani in my district pretty much think I'm their big sister, so they harass me like crazy. They tease me all the time about my supposed evil-eye and say that it "pierces their soul with intensity." So they dubbed me Angela from The Office. Any time I give them what they call "the look," they call me Angela. It's kinda funny.Another funny story- my district went to a workshop the other day. It was only my district there with a teacher. My companion and I were taking notes and participating, and we looked around at our anziani. 3 of them were sleeping, 2 were sitting on the opposite side of the room as each other and throwing a pen back and forth any time the teacher turned his back, another 2 were playing tic-tac-toe, one was drawing pictures, and 2 were doing "sign language" across the room at each other. The things we sisters put up with all day!Anyways, I'm just about ready to go! I've had my departure interview, I have my official flight plans, and we've had all our departure meetings. I can't believe it's so soon! Sunday at our fireside, the director of the missionary department spoke. He is a ward mission leader in his ward, and he brought a man who got baptized about 10 months ago, Edward. Edward got up and bore his testimony to us all, and thanked us for serving missions. Watching him speak, missionary work became all that more real to me. The MTC is great and I love it here, but I can't wait to go to Italy and talk to real people, with real problems. I can't wait to be able to teach them that we have a prophet on earth today, that Christ's gospel has been restored. I can't wait to help people come unto Christ, the master healer. I'm so excited!Our speaker also spoke about the process of getting mission calls, as did our devotional speaker last Tuesday. Both of them told a couple stories of observing the call process with one of the Twelve. They said a picture would come up, and the Apostle would read a couple lines in the application, then he would say something like "I see who his companion needs to be, now where is he?" and then quickly narrow it down to continent, then country, then mission. Another time the Apostle said something like "That missionary needs to be with this mission president," or "That missionary has a family to teach in this mission." It was really neat to hear those stories, and to be reminded that my call comes from a Prophet of God, who represents the Lord Himself. I know I'm going to Italy for a reason. I know that there are specific people and families that I need to find. I can't wait to go and find them!I love you all! Thanks for your prayers. Mom, I hope you're feeling better. Know that I love you and you're in my prayers. You all are in my prayers always.
Vi voglio bene!Sorella Hawkey
Only 1 week til Italia!!!!!!! To answer your questions, the skirt is a size 6. My flight leaves SLC at 7:20 am next Tuesday, and I'll be in Chicago from 11:40 am to 5:05 pm Chicago time. So if you could all decide which time you want me to call and what number you want me to call, just message me on dearelder.com and let me know. The address I gave you is to the mission home, so you can send all my mail/packages there.Anyways, it's been another fantastic week at the MTC! Funny story (you don't have to put this on the blog- only my family will really truly understand this)- all of the anziani in my district pretty much think I'm their big sister, so they harass me like crazy. They tease me all the time about my supposed evil-eye and say that it "pierces their soul with intensity." So they dubbed me Angela from The Office. Any time I give them what they call "the look," they call me Angela. It's kinda funny.Another funny story- my district went to a workshop the other day. It was only my district there with a teacher. My companion and I were taking notes and participating, and we looked around at our anziani. 3 of them were sleeping, 2 were sitting on the opposite side of the room as each other and throwing a pen back and forth any time the teacher turned his back, another 2 were playing tic-tac-toe, one was drawing pictures, and 2 were doing "sign language" across the room at each other. The things we sisters put up with all day!Anyways, I'm just about ready to go! I've had my departure interview, I have my official flight plans, and we've had all our departure meetings. I can't believe it's so soon! Sunday at our fireside, the director of the missionary department spoke. He is a ward mission leader in his ward, and he brought a man who got baptized about 10 months ago, Edward. Edward got up and bore his testimony to us all, and thanked us for serving missions. Watching him speak, missionary work became all that more real to me. The MTC is great and I love it here, but I can't wait to go to Italy and talk to real people, with real problems. I can't wait to be able to teach them that we have a prophet on earth today, that Christ's gospel has been restored. I can't wait to help people come unto Christ, the master healer. I'm so excited!Our speaker also spoke about the process of getting mission calls, as did our devotional speaker last Tuesday. Both of them told a couple stories of observing the call process with one of the Twelve. They said a picture would come up, and the Apostle would read a couple lines in the application, then he would say something like "I see who his companion needs to be, now where is he?" and then quickly narrow it down to continent, then country, then mission. Another time the Apostle said something like "That missionary needs to be with this mission president," or "That missionary has a family to teach in this mission." It was really neat to hear those stories, and to be reminded that my call comes from a Prophet of God, who represents the Lord Himself. I know I'm going to Italy for a reason. I know that there are specific people and families that I need to find. I can't wait to go and find them!I love you all! Thanks for your prayers. Mom, I hope you're feeling better. Know that I love you and you're in my prayers. You all are in my prayers always.
Vi voglio bene!Sorella Hawkey
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
October 21, 2008
Ciao, Tutti!
Come va? Life here is still great! I'm getting super excited to get to Italy! And a little nervous. But mostly excited. To answer your question about Pday, we do laundry in the morning, which is when we have time to write letters and email. Then we have personal study, then lunch, then the Temple, then companionship study, then we have about half an hour left of pday to get whatever done that we need to, then dinner, then our General Authority devotional. So we don't have a lot of time to get things done.Speaking of General Authority devotionals, last week was amazing! Elder Richard G. Scott came. He taught us things that he had learned from the Spirit. It was incredible! To listen to an Apostle of our Savior Jesus Christ teach us what he's learned from the Holy Ghost. Wow! He was really funny and personable, too. One of my favorite things he taught us was when he said, "Faith, prayer, love and humility hold no great significance and produce no miracles until they become a living part of the individual." Those are all abstract terms and can be hard to define, but we need to make them real in our lives. They need to become a very real part of us, and I know that as that happens, miracles will occur. It's amazing the miracles I've witnessed as a missionary, and I'm not even in Italy yet! At the end of his talk, he bore a very powerful testimony. He then said that he would like to give everyone the opportunity to shake his hand. So after the devotional, he stood there for hours shaking every single missionary's hand. It was so powerful! I couldn't help but think of Jesus Christ, who let all of the Nephites touch his hands and his sides. When he shook my hand, he looked me in the eyes and said, "What a sweet, lovely sister." It was an amazing experience that I'll forever treasure.Yesterday in the TRC (the place where we practice teach) I had a great experience. We completely didn't teach anything we had prepared, but let ourselves be led by the Spirit, and I felt like we really met the needs of our investigator. It was a great feeling! During the lesson, when my companion was talking, I pictured myself teaching a real family in Italy, and I got so excited! I can't believe in only 2 weeks I'll be teaching real people with real problems. Elder Scott also told us about missionary work, and what a privilege it is to help people. He said that we will meet people who need the healing power of the Atonement, and I'll be able to bring them the Master Physician. What a sacred opportunity this is.During one of our meetings last week, the speaker talked about making the most of every single moment of our missions. He told us the story of an elder who was waiting for his departure interview at the mission home his last day of his mission, and decided to go out tracting instead of just sitting around. He and one of the assistants to the president went out, and he later found out that one person they met ended up getting baptized. So Sorella Leckie and I made a committment to each other that on our last day while we're waiting to meet with the mission president, instead of sitting around the mission home visiting with others, we will go out tracting. I don't know if we'll end up meeting someone who will get baptized, but I want to honestly be able to say that I worked every minute of my mission and never missed an opportunity to share this message with someone who might need it.We got a new Italian district last week! We got 6 new sisters who are all coming to Rome, and 8 elders, all going to Milan except one. They're awesome! I got to give the sisters their orientation. Our Italian zone now has 41 missionaries in it! It's great! They all decided that I'm the zone mom. Apparently I'm bossy. Who knew? They also said that they can tell I was a teacher. But they also said that I take care of everyone, so that's good. It's really funny- any time the elders get a letter from someone, or have a story to tell, they always come find me to tell me. They say that it makes it easier to be away from their moms with me around.Thanks for all your love and prayers! I love you all so much. I know this Church is true with all of my heart, and I'm so grateful to have the fulness of the restored gospel. I'm so blessed to know our Heavenly Father's plan for us, and I can't wait to help others find the same joy.
Vi voglio bene, tutti!
Sorella Hawkey
Come va? Life here is still great! I'm getting super excited to get to Italy! And a little nervous. But mostly excited. To answer your question about Pday, we do laundry in the morning, which is when we have time to write letters and email. Then we have personal study, then lunch, then the Temple, then companionship study, then we have about half an hour left of pday to get whatever done that we need to, then dinner, then our General Authority devotional. So we don't have a lot of time to get things done.Speaking of General Authority devotionals, last week was amazing! Elder Richard G. Scott came. He taught us things that he had learned from the Spirit. It was incredible! To listen to an Apostle of our Savior Jesus Christ teach us what he's learned from the Holy Ghost. Wow! He was really funny and personable, too. One of my favorite things he taught us was when he said, "Faith, prayer, love and humility hold no great significance and produce no miracles until they become a living part of the individual." Those are all abstract terms and can be hard to define, but we need to make them real in our lives. They need to become a very real part of us, and I know that as that happens, miracles will occur. It's amazing the miracles I've witnessed as a missionary, and I'm not even in Italy yet! At the end of his talk, he bore a very powerful testimony. He then said that he would like to give everyone the opportunity to shake his hand. So after the devotional, he stood there for hours shaking every single missionary's hand. It was so powerful! I couldn't help but think of Jesus Christ, who let all of the Nephites touch his hands and his sides. When he shook my hand, he looked me in the eyes and said, "What a sweet, lovely sister." It was an amazing experience that I'll forever treasure.Yesterday in the TRC (the place where we practice teach) I had a great experience. We completely didn't teach anything we had prepared, but let ourselves be led by the Spirit, and I felt like we really met the needs of our investigator. It was a great feeling! During the lesson, when my companion was talking, I pictured myself teaching a real family in Italy, and I got so excited! I can't believe in only 2 weeks I'll be teaching real people with real problems. Elder Scott also told us about missionary work, and what a privilege it is to help people. He said that we will meet people who need the healing power of the Atonement, and I'll be able to bring them the Master Physician. What a sacred opportunity this is.During one of our meetings last week, the speaker talked about making the most of every single moment of our missions. He told us the story of an elder who was waiting for his departure interview at the mission home his last day of his mission, and decided to go out tracting instead of just sitting around. He and one of the assistants to the president went out, and he later found out that one person they met ended up getting baptized. So Sorella Leckie and I made a committment to each other that on our last day while we're waiting to meet with the mission president, instead of sitting around the mission home visiting with others, we will go out tracting. I don't know if we'll end up meeting someone who will get baptized, but I want to honestly be able to say that I worked every minute of my mission and never missed an opportunity to share this message with someone who might need it.We got a new Italian district last week! We got 6 new sisters who are all coming to Rome, and 8 elders, all going to Milan except one. They're awesome! I got to give the sisters their orientation. Our Italian zone now has 41 missionaries in it! It's great! They all decided that I'm the zone mom. Apparently I'm bossy. Who knew? They also said that they can tell I was a teacher. But they also said that I take care of everyone, so that's good. It's really funny- any time the elders get a letter from someone, or have a story to tell, they always come find me to tell me. They say that it makes it easier to be away from their moms with me around.Thanks for all your love and prayers! I love you all so much. I know this Church is true with all of my heart, and I'm so grateful to have the fulness of the restored gospel. I'm so blessed to know our Heavenly Father's plan for us, and I can't wait to help others find the same joy.
Vi voglio bene, tutti!
Sorella Hawkey
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
October 14, 2008
Ciao!
How are you all doing? First of all, you're still all slacking off in the letter department. Boys, you can use dearelder.com and write me every day! Just something to think about. Mom, could you do me a favor? Could you buy a copy of the DVD for the Priesthood session of conference when it comes out? All the elders in my district sang at it, and I got to hear one of the songs, but I want to hear the rest and see them sing!
Thanks for the package! I love the blazer and the goodies. The elders especially love the goodies, though they were disappointed there wasn't a dog treat this time. This week we have a new district coming in! We get 6 new sisters, all going to Rome!!! We're super excited. I get to do the orientation for the sisters since I'm the Relief Society leader. We also have 2 birthdays in our zone this week. We had one yesterday, and one Saturday. My companion and I are having a lot of fun planning little surprises for them and making their birthdays special.
Every Friday night we have gym last thing, so we have an extra half hour to get ready for bed. So all of the sisters in my district have an ice cream party (with ice cream from the vending machines) and sing musicals in the showers at the top of our lungs. It's a pretty exciting Friday night!So embarassing story of the week....we got the elder who had a birthday yesterday a book that he wanted. We put it in the room across the hall from our classroom and had the elders go over there a few at a time to sign it. There was only one elder who hadn't signed it, and so I was trying to subtly tell him that he should go across the hall with 2 other elders who "needed his help." But it didn't quite come out that way! I accidentally said, "Elder, you wanna go in the other room?" and it totally sounded like I was inviting him to go with me! Everyone in my district got super quiet and just stared at me!!! So I had to hurry and clarify that I was not in fact flirting with the elders. To make matters worse, my branch presidency heard it all!Another funny story- my companion and I were saying prayer to start off our planning session, and during the prayer I accidentally said something totally wrong in Italian. So I kind of started giggling, which made my companion laugh, which made me laugh harder, and so on... Then all the elders were talking about us and wondering why we were laughing uncontrollably during prayer, which made us laugh harder. Then one of the elders said, "Maybe the Spirit told them a joke!" It was hilarious!
On Mondays we do our practice lessons in the "living room" settings. We're getting much better at teaching in Italian! We can actually get through a lesson without too many grammar mistakes, and for the most part I think our pretend investigators understand us.For Relief Society, we usually get members of the general Relief Society, Primary our Young Women's board to speak to us. Last week we got to hear Sister Johnson from the RS Board. She gave an amazing lesson on giving our all during our missions, and how we will be sustained by angels. I have a strong testimony of angels and I know they attend us far more than we will ever know. The Lord especially looks out for His missionaries, since none of the things we do are for ourselves. I love the story in 2 Kings 6, when Elisha and his servant see that their city is surrounded by their enemy. But Elisha tells his servant not to worry, because they have more on their side than they do against them. The servant was probably thinking something along the lines of, "It's me and you here against an entire army of our enemies!" But then Elisha prays that his servant's eyes will be opened, and he was able to see chariots of angels surrounding them. I know angels are always with us. I loved President Holland's talk about angels, both the heavenly and the earthly kind. I know that when I give my all and feel like I have no more energy to give, I am sustained and uplifted. I wish all of you could experience the miracles that come during a mission- words don't do it justice at all! I'm so grateful to be here and to serve my Savior.
I'm getting so excited to go to Italy, 3 weeks from today!!!!!!I love you all so much!
Sorella Hawkey
How are you all doing? First of all, you're still all slacking off in the letter department. Boys, you can use dearelder.com and write me every day! Just something to think about. Mom, could you do me a favor? Could you buy a copy of the DVD for the Priesthood session of conference when it comes out? All the elders in my district sang at it, and I got to hear one of the songs, but I want to hear the rest and see them sing!
Thanks for the package! I love the blazer and the goodies. The elders especially love the goodies, though they were disappointed there wasn't a dog treat this time. This week we have a new district coming in! We get 6 new sisters, all going to Rome!!! We're super excited. I get to do the orientation for the sisters since I'm the Relief Society leader. We also have 2 birthdays in our zone this week. We had one yesterday, and one Saturday. My companion and I are having a lot of fun planning little surprises for them and making their birthdays special.
Every Friday night we have gym last thing, so we have an extra half hour to get ready for bed. So all of the sisters in my district have an ice cream party (with ice cream from the vending machines) and sing musicals in the showers at the top of our lungs. It's a pretty exciting Friday night!So embarassing story of the week....we got the elder who had a birthday yesterday a book that he wanted. We put it in the room across the hall from our classroom and had the elders go over there a few at a time to sign it. There was only one elder who hadn't signed it, and so I was trying to subtly tell him that he should go across the hall with 2 other elders who "needed his help." But it didn't quite come out that way! I accidentally said, "Elder, you wanna go in the other room?" and it totally sounded like I was inviting him to go with me! Everyone in my district got super quiet and just stared at me!!! So I had to hurry and clarify that I was not in fact flirting with the elders. To make matters worse, my branch presidency heard it all!Another funny story- my companion and I were saying prayer to start off our planning session, and during the prayer I accidentally said something totally wrong in Italian. So I kind of started giggling, which made my companion laugh, which made me laugh harder, and so on... Then all the elders were talking about us and wondering why we were laughing uncontrollably during prayer, which made us laugh harder. Then one of the elders said, "Maybe the Spirit told them a joke!" It was hilarious!
On Mondays we do our practice lessons in the "living room" settings. We're getting much better at teaching in Italian! We can actually get through a lesson without too many grammar mistakes, and for the most part I think our pretend investigators understand us.For Relief Society, we usually get members of the general Relief Society, Primary our Young Women's board to speak to us. Last week we got to hear Sister Johnson from the RS Board. She gave an amazing lesson on giving our all during our missions, and how we will be sustained by angels. I have a strong testimony of angels and I know they attend us far more than we will ever know. The Lord especially looks out for His missionaries, since none of the things we do are for ourselves. I love the story in 2 Kings 6, when Elisha and his servant see that their city is surrounded by their enemy. But Elisha tells his servant not to worry, because they have more on their side than they do against them. The servant was probably thinking something along the lines of, "It's me and you here against an entire army of our enemies!" But then Elisha prays that his servant's eyes will be opened, and he was able to see chariots of angels surrounding them. I know angels are always with us. I loved President Holland's talk about angels, both the heavenly and the earthly kind. I know that when I give my all and feel like I have no more energy to give, I am sustained and uplifted. I wish all of you could experience the miracles that come during a mission- words don't do it justice at all! I'm so grateful to be here and to serve my Savior.
I'm getting so excited to go to Italy, 3 weeks from today!!!!!!I love you all so much!
Sorella Hawkey
Saturday, October 11, 2008
October 7, 2008
October 7, 2008
Ciao, Tutti!First things first, We're getting a Temple!!!! I don't think I've ever been so excited in my life! When President Monson announced that, all the Italian missionaries were sitting together, and all the sisters squealed in excitement! Ever since then, people have commented on the excitement the Italian missionaries showed when the Temple was announced. I am SO excited! It will be such a blessing to the people of Italy to have a Temple in their own country. It will be a great opportunity for us as missionaries to teach about the new building being built. I'm sure there will be even more opposition in Rome, but that only means the blessings will be greater. I've been crying for 3 days straight now because I'm so happy for the people of Italy. All us sisters are planning on going back to work at the open house and be there for the dedication. And how amazing would it be to see people I taught be able to go through the Temple for themselves!!!In addition to the announcement of the Temple, the rest of Conference was incredible! It's so great to listen to it as a missionary- it seemed like every talk was applicable to missionary work. My favorite was Sister Allred's comment that you all should send your missionary more letters! :) We talked in our class Friday night about Conference, and our teacher gave us time to pray about 3 questions we have, and she promised us that during Conference, all of those questions would be answered. All of the questions I had were answered multiple times! It's so amazing to have a Prophet on the earth today to lead and guide us as a Church, and us as individuals.So I liked your idea about a recorder. I bought one at the bookstore and will send you a tape later this morning, so you can hear my voice. I was thinking it might be easier if we both have a tape recorder and just send the tapes back and forth. Pretty much the whole tape talks about how excited I am for a Temple in Roma, but it's all I can think about!(you don't have to post this story on my blog- I think you 4 will be the only ones who appreciate this story) So the anziani in my district seem to think that I'm their big sister, and they torture me like they would a big sister. They told me the other day that I have an evil eye. They said it in Italian, but I can't remember the word for it. They said that when they're doing something annoying, I look at them with my evil eye, and they're scared so they stop! I know this story is probably shocking to you, since you can't even imagine that I would have an evil eye, or what you might call a hairy eyeball. I thought it was pretty funny.Yesterday we taught our first lesson completely in Italiano! Mamma mia- e molto difficile! But it was a great experience. It's amazing how, even when we completely butcher the language and have horrible grammar, as long as we have the Spirit with us when we teach, the message gets across and touches the heart of our investigator. I love Ezekiel chapter 4 when Moses is saying that he doesn't feel like he's a good speaker, and he doesn't know how he can teach effectively. I know I'm not a good speaker of Italian yet! But the Lord says that He's the one who made Moses' mouth, and if he trusts in the Lord, he'll be able to speak just fine. I know that the more I trust in my Savior, the better I'm able to speak. It's when I think I can do it on my own that it's non bene.The other day one of our teachers gave a spiritual thought on Matthew chapter 14, when Peter walks on water. He talked about the storms in life that each of us face. Learning Italian and being a missionary, though an amazing blessing, is somewhat of a storm because of how difficult it is. But the Lord always, always comes to us in our trials. He invites us to come to Him amongst the storm. When Peter was focused on the Savior, and the miracle of walking on water, he was able to walk. But when he focused on the storm, or the realities of life, he sunk. When I focus on the miracle of the gift of tongues and the power of the Savior, I am able to speak the language. But when I focus on reality, or how difficult it is, and start doubting the power of the Lord, I sink. I know it's the same with any trial in life. Focus on the Savior and the miraculous power of the Atonement, and miracles will happen.Sunday we had a musical fireside, which was amazing! But my favorite part was the closing hymn- Hark All Ye Nations. For the first 2 verses, they had the elders who sung in the Priesthood session of conference stand and sing. As I looked around at all these elders, I could help but cry. All the missionaries are a bunch of young people who don't know a whole lot or have a lot of life's experiences. But each of us has given up a significant portion of our lives and dedicated ourselves fully to the preaching of the Lord's gospel to His children. As I listened to the elders sing, I thought of the dedication and enthusiasm they have for sharing the gospel. Then all the audience stood to sing the 3rd verse, but I couldn't sing a single word because I was bawling. But I love the words, and I love being a part of this great missionary work! The word are:Hark all ye nations! Hear heaven's voiceThrough every land, that all may rejoiceAngels of glory shout the refrain:Truth is restored againSearching in darkness, nations have weptWatching for dawn, their vigil they've keptAll now rejoice, the long is overTrust in on earth once moreChosen by God to serve Him below,To every land and people we'll goStanding for truth with fervent accordPreaching His holy wordOh how glorious from the throne aboveShines the gospel light of truth and loveBright as the sun this heavenly rayLights every land todayI'm so honored to be part of this work, to be chosen by God to serve His children and preach His gospel. I'm so excited to be among the ones representing our Savior Jesus Christ. I'm so excited that the Italians will be getting a Temple! It will be such a blessing for them to be sealed with their families for eternity.I love you all so much! Thanks for your prayers and your love.Vi voglio bene!Sorella HawkeyPS Send me more letters!
Ciao, Tutti!First things first, We're getting a Temple!!!! I don't think I've ever been so excited in my life! When President Monson announced that, all the Italian missionaries were sitting together, and all the sisters squealed in excitement! Ever since then, people have commented on the excitement the Italian missionaries showed when the Temple was announced. I am SO excited! It will be such a blessing to the people of Italy to have a Temple in their own country. It will be a great opportunity for us as missionaries to teach about the new building being built. I'm sure there will be even more opposition in Rome, but that only means the blessings will be greater. I've been crying for 3 days straight now because I'm so happy for the people of Italy. All us sisters are planning on going back to work at the open house and be there for the dedication. And how amazing would it be to see people I taught be able to go through the Temple for themselves!!!In addition to the announcement of the Temple, the rest of Conference was incredible! It's so great to listen to it as a missionary- it seemed like every talk was applicable to missionary work. My favorite was Sister Allred's comment that you all should send your missionary more letters! :) We talked in our class Friday night about Conference, and our teacher gave us time to pray about 3 questions we have, and she promised us that during Conference, all of those questions would be answered. All of the questions I had were answered multiple times! It's so amazing to have a Prophet on the earth today to lead and guide us as a Church, and us as individuals.So I liked your idea about a recorder. I bought one at the bookstore and will send you a tape later this morning, so you can hear my voice. I was thinking it might be easier if we both have a tape recorder and just send the tapes back and forth. Pretty much the whole tape talks about how excited I am for a Temple in Roma, but it's all I can think about!(you don't have to post this story on my blog- I think you 4 will be the only ones who appreciate this story) So the anziani in my district seem to think that I'm their big sister, and they torture me like they would a big sister. They told me the other day that I have an evil eye. They said it in Italian, but I can't remember the word for it. They said that when they're doing something annoying, I look at them with my evil eye, and they're scared so they stop! I know this story is probably shocking to you, since you can't even imagine that I would have an evil eye, or what you might call a hairy eyeball. I thought it was pretty funny.Yesterday we taught our first lesson completely in Italiano! Mamma mia- e molto difficile! But it was a great experience. It's amazing how, even when we completely butcher the language and have horrible grammar, as long as we have the Spirit with us when we teach, the message gets across and touches the heart of our investigator. I love Ezekiel chapter 4 when Moses is saying that he doesn't feel like he's a good speaker, and he doesn't know how he can teach effectively. I know I'm not a good speaker of Italian yet! But the Lord says that He's the one who made Moses' mouth, and if he trusts in the Lord, he'll be able to speak just fine. I know that the more I trust in my Savior, the better I'm able to speak. It's when I think I can do it on my own that it's non bene.The other day one of our teachers gave a spiritual thought on Matthew chapter 14, when Peter walks on water. He talked about the storms in life that each of us face. Learning Italian and being a missionary, though an amazing blessing, is somewhat of a storm because of how difficult it is. But the Lord always, always comes to us in our trials. He invites us to come to Him amongst the storm. When Peter was focused on the Savior, and the miracle of walking on water, he was able to walk. But when he focused on the storm, or the realities of life, he sunk. When I focus on the miracle of the gift of tongues and the power of the Savior, I am able to speak the language. But when I focus on reality, or how difficult it is, and start doubting the power of the Lord, I sink. I know it's the same with any trial in life. Focus on the Savior and the miraculous power of the Atonement, and miracles will happen.Sunday we had a musical fireside, which was amazing! But my favorite part was the closing hymn- Hark All Ye Nations. For the first 2 verses, they had the elders who sung in the Priesthood session of conference stand and sing. As I looked around at all these elders, I could help but cry. All the missionaries are a bunch of young people who don't know a whole lot or have a lot of life's experiences. But each of us has given up a significant portion of our lives and dedicated ourselves fully to the preaching of the Lord's gospel to His children. As I listened to the elders sing, I thought of the dedication and enthusiasm they have for sharing the gospel. Then all the audience stood to sing the 3rd verse, but I couldn't sing a single word because I was bawling. But I love the words, and I love being a part of this great missionary work! The word are:Hark all ye nations! Hear heaven's voiceThrough every land, that all may rejoiceAngels of glory shout the refrain:Truth is restored againSearching in darkness, nations have weptWatching for dawn, their vigil they've keptAll now rejoice, the long is overTrust in on earth once moreChosen by God to serve Him below,To every land and people we'll goStanding for truth with fervent accordPreaching His holy wordOh how glorious from the throne aboveShines the gospel light of truth and loveBright as the sun this heavenly rayLights every land todayI'm so honored to be part of this work, to be chosen by God to serve His children and preach His gospel. I'm so excited to be among the ones representing our Savior Jesus Christ. I'm so excited that the Italians will be getting a Temple! It will be such a blessing for them to be sealed with their families for eternity.I love you all so much! Thanks for your prayers and your love.Vi voglio bene!Sorella HawkeyPS Send me more letters!
Saturday, October 4, 2008
September 30, 2008
Ciao, tutti!Come va? Everything's still going well at the MTC. This week is incredibly difficult, though. We're not allowed to speak english anymore!! It's been a very difficult and humbling experience, to say the least.To answer everyone's questions, all my shots are done. I haven't seen Z.O., luckily. For Halloween my companion and I are switching name tags. The food here isn't bad. Not great, but not bad, either. My companion in wonderful! We're together the whole MTC. My official leave date is Nov 4 at 11:40 am. We fly to Chicago, then London, then Roma. We'll get to Rome November 5th at 1:55 pm. It's going to be a long day!Could you tell Allison thank you SO much for the package and letters!!!Did you get my debit card yet? I haven't receieved it.Also, I went 4 days without a letter from anyone. Granted, Sunday wasn't really your fault, since they don't deliver mail on Sundays, but still. With dearelder.com, I should be getting more letters! It gets very lonely when your only means of contact with the outside world is through letters, and then I don't even get any!Thanks for the package with all the candy and scriptures! Funny story- the elders usually help me eat the treats I get, but when I got that package, they were all intrigued with the dog bone. None of them wanted any candy, but they all passed around the dog bone and tasted it. They're so weird!Another funny/embarassing story for the week. We spend about 13 hours a day in the same classroom, so when we get to leave we're full of energy. So Saturday, my companion challenged me to a race down the stairs. We started running down the stairs, and I said "You're going down!" Just as I finished saying that, I went down- literally. I fell right on my backside and slid down a few stairs, and my shoes somehow fell off in the process and went flying down 2 flights of stairs. And to make matters worse, my entire district was right behind me and an entire Spanish district was in front of me, so about 25 elders saw this! I was laughing so hard, I couldn't get up, so they all thought I was hurt and rushed over to help me!This week I got called as our branch's relief society coordinator. All of the sisters in the MTC are in one relief society, so each branch has it's own sister who takes care of the relief society for their branch, and now it's me. I don't really have a whole lot to do for now, except branch council meetings. But in 2 weeks we get a new district, so I'll help give the sisters their orientation.I'm really excited for conference! The elders get to go sing at the priesthood session, which I'm jealous of. My companion and I went to choir practice because we heard the rumor that they were sending an MTC choir to a session of conference. But when we got there, they kindly invited the sisters to leave. Our whole district of elders is singing. We get to watch the relief society broadcast while the elders watch priesthood session.I have so many wonderful experiences to share with you all, but not enough time! When I get back, you won't be able to get me to shut up for months! That is, if I can remember how to speak english again. It gets worse by the day!This week has been very challenging, and I came across a quote by Elder Holland. Even though it's specifically talking about missionary work, I think it applies to anyone. He said,"Anyone who does any kind of missionary work will have occassion to ask, Why is this so hard? Why doesn't it go better? Why can't our success be more rapid? Why aren't there more people joining the Church? It's the truth that we believe in angels. We trust in miracles. Why don't people flock to the font? Why isn't' the only risk in missionary work that of pneumonia from being soaking wet all day and all night in the baptismal font? You will have occassion to ask these questions. I have thought about this a great deal. I offer this as my personal feeling. I am convinced that missionary work is not easy because salvation is not a cheap experience. Salvation never was easy. We are the Church of Jesus Christ, this is the truth, and He is our great Eternal Head. How could we believe that it would be easy for us when it was never, ever easy for Him? When you struggle, when you are rejected, when you are spit upon and cast out and made a hiss and a byword, you are standing with the best life this world has ever known, the only pure and perfect life ever lived. YOu have reason to stand tall and be grateful that the living Son of the living God knows all about your sorrows and afflictions."Life is hard, but it's supposed to be hard, or it wouldn't be a test. Missions especially are hard. But the Lord promised His missionaries, in D&C 88:84 that He will be with us. He will go before us and beside us and His angels will be with us. I have felt those angels lift me up when I felt like I couldn't go any further. I have felt His strength when I have none left. And I know that He will be there for each one of you, regardless of your personal mission.I am so grateful for this wonderful privilege of being a representative of my Savior, Jesus Christ. It's such an honor to wear His name beside mine of my nametag each day. It's a privilege to prepare to stand in His stead to preach His gospel to His children.I love you all so much! My prayers are always with you.Vi voglio bene!Sorella Hawkey
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
Letter--September 23, 2008
This week has been wonderful! I seriously wish I had more time to tell you all my wonderful experiences, but I'll have tons of stories for you once I get back! That is, if I can remember english. It's already fading. Last week's devotional was Elder and Sister Hinckley, President Hinckley's son. It was amazing! He gave us 9 Be's for missionary work and told some stories about his dad. It's so wonderful to learn from the general authorities!Our teachers told us that a few years ago, they invited some people from the FBI and CIA who were learning languages to participate in the MTC language training with the missionaries. The people from the FBI and CIA only lasted a few weeks, and then gave up. They said that this language training program was too intense and they didn't have the motivation that the missionaries do. I have a lot of motivation to work 16 hours a day, with no breaks, because I'm not doing this for me. I'm doing it for the Lord. And He does His part, too. The gift of tongues is amazing!One of our teachers was talking about why we all are on missions. He asked each of us why we were here, and then said that there is another reason we're here that none of us mentioned. He said that what if, in the pre-existance, Heavenly Father pulled me aside and said that He was going to send me to a family that had the Gospel. But my best friends in the pre-existance wouldn't have that blessing, and they'd be send to Rome. In return for all of the blessings I would be given on earth, I promised Heavenly Father that I would go on a mission to Rome to find my friends. These truly are my best friends that I'm preparing to serve, we just don't know each other on this earth yet! I'm so excited to find them and reunite our friendship!This weekend we had Zone Conference, and a few of the teachers from our zone gave talks. Fratello McDonald (my teacher) gave a great talk about missions being hard. It's ok that it's hard- it's supposed to be hard so that it stretches me and helps me realize my dependance on my Savior. It's because it's hard that I can expect miracles! I've come to learn so much about miracles. I've learned that when I make promises to investigators, as long as I do so with the Spirit, the Lord will honor those promises. It's kind of scary, but I'm working on being more bold and having the faith that the Lord will do His part. Sorella Jones, a teacher in the other district, talked about how this is an individual gospel. Instead of planning lessons, plan how to meet the needs of the individual that we are teaching. She talked about when Christ leaves His 99 sheep to find the one. I am leaving my 99 (my home, friends, family, hobbies) to find the one that I promised my Heavenly Father I would find.On Sunday 12 of us from our Zone did a musical number- an arrangement of I Stand All Amazed that a sister in our zone arranged. It was incredible! She has such a great talent! We sang (and I played) at the fireside, in front of about 3000 people! (By the way, they record the musicals, and when I leave the MTC they'll send you a DVD of all the musicals I've done while I'm here) Afterwards, so many people came and asked us if the song was published and if they could buy a copy. I've been getting compliments ever since on the musical number. Sister Boone (the MTC President's wife) came up to us afterwards and said that the angels of heaven were singing with us. It's such a beautiful song and such a beautiful message- Jesus Christ died for me, and for each one of you. He suffered and paid the price for me! He loves me! I've gained such a greater understanding of my Savior and a greater appreciation for Him.I love you all so much! I'm so grateful for the support you give me. Sono grate per mio Salvatore e la Sua Espiazione. Io so che Padre Celeste risponde alle nostre preghiere. Io so che il Libro di Mormon e la parola di Dio.Vi voglio bene!Sorella Hawkey
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
Letter--August 16
Here is a letter from Breanna. She is NOT allowed to check her blog--so don't leave her a message there. She is NOT allowed to email friends--only family. She appreciates the letters she receives from you. You can send a letter yourself or go to www.dearelder.com and they can send it for you-free!
Here is the letter from today:
Could you tell Allison thank you so much for the card and gift!!So I'm going to apologize in advance- studying Italian 12 hours a day is completely screwing up my english! I'm having trouble spelling in english, so forgive me if I sound retarded.Thank you for the letters and card! I love hearing from you all. Also, there's one person who hasn't yet written me. I won't mention any names, but you know who you are!! Pictures are coming soon- I'll send them today.So funny story- one of the elders in my district said, "Sorella Hawkey, you're kind of like our big sister. You're bossy and kinda crazy, but we're always glad when we listen to you because you're always right." Then another one said, "Yeah, we don't even need our moms here, we have Sorella Hawkey!" Apparently I'm bossy. Who knew? :)So to the good stuff- the gift of tongues is AMAZING!!! I never really thought it was real, but it is! It's amazing how much I've learned and retained in such a short period of time, and I know there's no way I could do it without Christ's help.Me and a few people from my zone are doing a musical number next Sunday at our Sunday night fireside. It's a gorgeous arrangement of I Stand All Amazed that one of the sisters in our zone wrote. Sister Boone, the MTC President's wife, said that she'll probably be using my piano skills more often. My branch also found out I play, so I've been accompanying quite a few musical numbers lately.Every Tuesday night we have a General Authority devotional. Last Tuesday President and Sister Uchtdorf came! It was incredible! Sister Uchtdorf is adorable. She doesn't speak great english, but she isn't shy to try to speak. She said, "Anyone learning a language in the MTC remember me. I make a lot of mistakes but still I brave to try to speak!" President Uchtdorf's talk was amazing. He talked about the power of our call as missionaries and literal representatives of our Savior Jesus Christ. He said that every morning, the First Presidency prays for each of us and our families. What a blessing to know that our Prophet prays for me! And a huge sense of responsibility. He also said that our Prophet promises each missionary more happiness than we could ever know as we serve our missions faithfully. He said that missionary work is the responsibility of the Quorum of the Twelve, but 12 people can't do it by themselves. So they call missionaries to be an extended arm of the Twelve Apostles. Wow! It was such a wonderful experience to hear from an Apostle of the Lord, to hear his testimony, and for him to promise us beautiful blessings as we serve faithfully.Another highlight of my week was going to the RC, which is where people call in when they get pass-along cards to order copies of the Book of Mormon or the Church videos. We were doing follow-up calls this week, to make sure people who ordered things receieved them. I called a lady who ordered a Bible, but hadn't yet receieved it. We were talking about the Church, and she started telling me about how she's suffering from schizophrenia, and can't find anything that helps her relieve her suffering. She seemed completely overwhelmed, which I probably would be too in that situation. She said, "I just want to find Jesus and know He loves me." I was able to bear testimony that Christ does in fact love her and know her and her trials. He is ready and waiting to help her and give her strength. After I bore my testimony, I asked if she would like the missionaries to come over to tell her more about our Savior. She was crying, and said that she would love to hear more of this message. What a blessing to know that Christ lives and loves me! And to be able to share that knowledge with others. I can't wait to go to Italy to share these truths with the people there.I love you all so much! I'm so grateful for this opportunity I have to be here and to dedicate myself to the Lord. I'm working on letting go of myself and letting Heavenly Father take over. I've never been more exhausted and had more humbling experiences, but I've also never been closer to my Savior. I know that He knows me as an individual, and knows each and every one of you. He truly does care about each of us. I know that prayer is real.Vi voglio bene!Sorella Hawkey
Here is the letter from today:
Could you tell Allison thank you so much for the card and gift!!So I'm going to apologize in advance- studying Italian 12 hours a day is completely screwing up my english! I'm having trouble spelling in english, so forgive me if I sound retarded.Thank you for the letters and card! I love hearing from you all. Also, there's one person who hasn't yet written me. I won't mention any names, but you know who you are!! Pictures are coming soon- I'll send them today.So funny story- one of the elders in my district said, "Sorella Hawkey, you're kind of like our big sister. You're bossy and kinda crazy, but we're always glad when we listen to you because you're always right." Then another one said, "Yeah, we don't even need our moms here, we have Sorella Hawkey!" Apparently I'm bossy. Who knew? :)So to the good stuff- the gift of tongues is AMAZING!!! I never really thought it was real, but it is! It's amazing how much I've learned and retained in such a short period of time, and I know there's no way I could do it without Christ's help.Me and a few people from my zone are doing a musical number next Sunday at our Sunday night fireside. It's a gorgeous arrangement of I Stand All Amazed that one of the sisters in our zone wrote. Sister Boone, the MTC President's wife, said that she'll probably be using my piano skills more often. My branch also found out I play, so I've been accompanying quite a few musical numbers lately.Every Tuesday night we have a General Authority devotional. Last Tuesday President and Sister Uchtdorf came! It was incredible! Sister Uchtdorf is adorable. She doesn't speak great english, but she isn't shy to try to speak. She said, "Anyone learning a language in the MTC remember me. I make a lot of mistakes but still I brave to try to speak!" President Uchtdorf's talk was amazing. He talked about the power of our call as missionaries and literal representatives of our Savior Jesus Christ. He said that every morning, the First Presidency prays for each of us and our families. What a blessing to know that our Prophet prays for me! And a huge sense of responsibility. He also said that our Prophet promises each missionary more happiness than we could ever know as we serve our missions faithfully. He said that missionary work is the responsibility of the Quorum of the Twelve, but 12 people can't do it by themselves. So they call missionaries to be an extended arm of the Twelve Apostles. Wow! It was such a wonderful experience to hear from an Apostle of the Lord, to hear his testimony, and for him to promise us beautiful blessings as we serve faithfully.Another highlight of my week was going to the RC, which is where people call in when they get pass-along cards to order copies of the Book of Mormon or the Church videos. We were doing follow-up calls this week, to make sure people who ordered things receieved them. I called a lady who ordered a Bible, but hadn't yet receieved it. We were talking about the Church, and she started telling me about how she's suffering from schizophrenia, and can't find anything that helps her relieve her suffering. She seemed completely overwhelmed, which I probably would be too in that situation. She said, "I just want to find Jesus and know He loves me." I was able to bear testimony that Christ does in fact love her and know her and her trials. He is ready and waiting to help her and give her strength. After I bore my testimony, I asked if she would like the missionaries to come over to tell her more about our Savior. She was crying, and said that she would love to hear more of this message. What a blessing to know that Christ lives and loves me! And to be able to share that knowledge with others. I can't wait to go to Italy to share these truths with the people there.I love you all so much! I'm so grateful for this opportunity I have to be here and to dedicate myself to the Lord. I'm working on letting go of myself and letting Heavenly Father take over. I've never been more exhausted and had more humbling experiences, but I've also never been closer to my Savior. I know that He knows me as an individual, and knows each and every one of you. He truly does care about each of us. I know that prayer is real.Vi voglio bene!Sorella Hawkey
Saturday, September 13, 2008
August 9, 2008
9-9-08
Buon giorno tutti!
I’m seriously having a great time here! I’ve never been so exhausted and never learned so much in a short period of time. But, I’ve also never had to depend on my Savior so much and never been so close to Him. All of Church was in Italian. I bore my testimony in Italian on Sunday. I can also pray and have a decent conversation in the language.
Yesterday we taught our first lesson. There’s a building full of mini “living-rooms”. We have to go “tracting”; then talk to our pretend investigator for 15 minutes in Italian. We have to tell him or her who we are, what message we have, get to know him, and then set up an appointment to teach him the 1st lesson—all it Italian. And if that’s not intimidating enough, there are cameras in our room so our teachers and other missionaries can observe us in another room! Then a few minutes alter, we come back for our “appointment” and teach a 40 minute lesson. My companion, Sorella Leckie, and I were super nervous, but before we went in we knelt to pray. As we prayed for the Spirit to be with us, a calm feeling came over us and we were able to speak clearly and give our lesson.
Our district is 10 Anziani (Elders) and my companion and me. The Anziani are amazing though! The whole Italian zone – the 31 of us – eat together at the tables that the Italians have sat at for 8 years! Any time one of the Sorelle come to sit down, all the Elders stand and wait for us to be seated. They always clear our trays and open our doors, too. They take great care of us.
I’ve had so many amazing experiences here already. I could write a whole book to you. All of the firesides, meetings, and classes are incredible. I’ve gained such a deeper love for prayer. I think we pray here more in one day than I used to in a week. What am amazing gift to be able to literally talk to Heavenly Father and know He listens. I know He hears us. I know He cares about each of us individually as his children. Lo so che il libro di Mormon e la parola di Dio. Lo so che Padre Celeste risonde alle nostre pragniere.
Vi voglio bene!
Sorella Hawkey
Buon giorno tutti!
I’m seriously having a great time here! I’ve never been so exhausted and never learned so much in a short period of time. But, I’ve also never had to depend on my Savior so much and never been so close to Him. All of Church was in Italian. I bore my testimony in Italian on Sunday. I can also pray and have a decent conversation in the language.
Yesterday we taught our first lesson. There’s a building full of mini “living-rooms”. We have to go “tracting”; then talk to our pretend investigator for 15 minutes in Italian. We have to tell him or her who we are, what message we have, get to know him, and then set up an appointment to teach him the 1st lesson—all it Italian. And if that’s not intimidating enough, there are cameras in our room so our teachers and other missionaries can observe us in another room! Then a few minutes alter, we come back for our “appointment” and teach a 40 minute lesson. My companion, Sorella Leckie, and I were super nervous, but before we went in we knelt to pray. As we prayed for the Spirit to be with us, a calm feeling came over us and we were able to speak clearly and give our lesson.
Our district is 10 Anziani (Elders) and my companion and me. The Anziani are amazing though! The whole Italian zone – the 31 of us – eat together at the tables that the Italians have sat at for 8 years! Any time one of the Sorelle come to sit down, all the Elders stand and wait for us to be seated. They always clear our trays and open our doors, too. They take great care of us.
I’ve had so many amazing experiences here already. I could write a whole book to you. All of the firesides, meetings, and classes are incredible. I’ve gained such a deeper love for prayer. I think we pray here more in one day than I used to in a week. What am amazing gift to be able to literally talk to Heavenly Father and know He listens. I know He hears us. I know He cares about each of us individually as his children. Lo so che il libro di Mormon e la parola di Dio. Lo so che Padre Celeste risonde alle nostre pragniere.
Vi voglio bene!
Sorella Hawkey
Our first email!!!
9-9-2008
Hello Mia Famiglia-How are you? Sorry it's taken me so long to get to the computer today. But I didn't know if I'd have time to email, so I also handwrote a letter this morning. It will be longer than this letter.We just got back from the Temple a little while ago. It was great! I'm absolutely loving it here! The Spirit is so incredibly strong, it's amazing. Tonight we have a devotional, which I'm really excited about. The MTC President and his wife have spoken to us a few times, and they're incredible people.Italian is coming along pretty well. I have a much stronger testimony of the gift of tongues. Before it was something that I kind of took for granted but never really thought was real. But I can tell you that it is! It's amazing how much I've already learned, and that I retain it all! I've only been here 6 days, and I've already learned almost as much as I learned in one year at BYU. It's pretty awesome!Also, our MTC President told us that starting our first day in the MTC, millions of people were praying for me and for all of the missionaries. What a blessing to be the recipient of millions of prayers around the world! I feel so honored to be a representative of my Savior and wear His name on my nametag along with mine. I feel a great responsibility to work hard every second of my mission, to live up to what the millions of members around the world expect the missionaries to be and to represent Christ as He would want.Anyways, I love you all so, so, so much!!! My other letter is longer, and tells you pretty much everything I have to say. You are all in my prayers every day and night.Vi voglio bene!Sorella Hawkey
Hello Mia Famiglia-How are you? Sorry it's taken me so long to get to the computer today. But I didn't know if I'd have time to email, so I also handwrote a letter this morning. It will be longer than this letter.We just got back from the Temple a little while ago. It was great! I'm absolutely loving it here! The Spirit is so incredibly strong, it's amazing. Tonight we have a devotional, which I'm really excited about. The MTC President and his wife have spoken to us a few times, and they're incredible people.Italian is coming along pretty well. I have a much stronger testimony of the gift of tongues. Before it was something that I kind of took for granted but never really thought was real. But I can tell you that it is! It's amazing how much I've already learned, and that I retain it all! I've only been here 6 days, and I've already learned almost as much as I learned in one year at BYU. It's pretty awesome!Also, our MTC President told us that starting our first day in the MTC, millions of people were praying for me and for all of the missionaries. What a blessing to be the recipient of millions of prayers around the world! I feel so honored to be a representative of my Savior and wear His name on my nametag along with mine. I feel a great responsibility to work hard every second of my mission, to live up to what the millions of members around the world expect the missionaries to be and to represent Christ as He would want.Anyways, I love you all so, so, so much!!! My other letter is longer, and tells you pretty much everything I have to say. You are all in my prayers every day and night.Vi voglio bene!Sorella Hawkey
Saturday, September 6, 2008
Letter from Breanna
Here is the first letter that my mom got from Breanna. She was so excited that she typed it up for all to read.
September 3, 2008
I got to take my dork dot off tonight!
Caro Mia Famiglia--
The MTC is AMAZING! After you left, I got all my books and a huge bag full of stuff I'm supposed to learn…like I am here to learn to speak Italian or something J . Then I went to my room to unpack. Three of us girls going to Italy checked in at the same time. The other 3 came a few hours later. All 6 of us share a room. The 4 Italian Sorelle that came 6 weeks ago live next door. They made us a big welcome sign and left us treats. Mom--the girl we saw in the temple yesterday, who you said you bet she's going on a mission, is in fact going to Italy! Small world, huh? My companion is amazing. Her name is Sorella Leckie. She's from South Carolina. I already love her!
After unpacking we had an orientation with the MTC presidency. 74 sisters reported today of 503 missionaries total from 18 countries. The talks were so inspiring. Then we ate dinner-yum J Then we met with our Branch Presidency. Our branch is all Italian missionaries--26 who reported today and 5 who reported 6 weeks ago. We had an orientation and then each had interviews with the Branch President. I was made Senior Companion. Starting this Sunday, we have to be prepared to be called on to give talks in Italian in Sacrament Meeting. Whoever is conducting announces 2 speakers who then have to speak. Crazy!
I won't be able to write until next Tuesday. We normally only get to write on P-day but the first day is an exception.
I love you all so much! I am so excited to be here. There's nowhere else I'd rather be right now. The Spirit is so strong here-I love it! You boys be good and send me letters!
Vi Voglio behe!
Sorella Hawkey
PS--Bryce--Happy 16th Birthday!!!
PSS-Give Gizmo hugs from me.
The Missionary Training Center
Here are pictures of Breanna both at the MTC and at the Salt Lake Temple.
Sunday, August 31, 2008
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