Week 12--Sept 28 (Terni)

TRANSFER NUMBAA 1!

Hey everybody! It's so crazy to think that I have already finished my first transfer out in the mission. And to be honest it went by so fast. Sure there were some really hard and rough days but the amazing thing is is that God always blesses you with awesome and rewarding days too. So I am still staying in Terni which I already guessed because I still have to finish my training but my companion got assigned as a District Leader so that's pretty sick. And sadly Anziano Calvanga (my little Italian, Ginger, friend who is such a boss) got transferred to be an office elder:/ BUT the new missionary that is taking his place.. His name is Anziano Slayed.. I am just going to say that one more time cause that is the sickest last name I have probably ever heard Anziano Slayed... Goodness that's so sweet. And I heard he is super solid and is coming from the hardest city in the mission where he was a district leader, trainer, and zone leader all at the same time so I am pumped to have another missionary in the house that wants to work hard and he will probably push me  to try harder and be better like Anziano Calvanga did. 

So this week was honestly a really hard week. Not in a sense that people were really mean to us cause that's just a normal now haha but the fact that we got 10 bidones which means we had 10 appointments set up with hopefully potentials and new investigators and they all cancelled on us or just didn't show up. So that was really frustrating for me cause I am trying my best to work hard and help others but when they don't show up then that's on them. I was able to do a scambia this week with Anziano Palazzo (my Texas brothaa) and I honestly learned so much about goals, using my time effectively, and he gave me such great advice and told me to keep doing what I am doing which really helped me out a lot. He's awesome so I am super glad that he is staying in the same house for the next 6 weeks so that I can keep learning.

An amazing experience that I had this week was our lesson with our investigator, H. He has been working with us and I have mentioned him in my other emails. Anyway he called us on Monday and asked us if we could come over to his house that night to help him cause he was really upset. There are things going on in his life that are just awful and so he really needed help. He started talking to us and he took our hands and started crying and so a prompting came into my head (and later Anziano Ray had the same prompting, he told me after the lesson) to give him a priesthood blessing. We explained to him that this blessing is a very special thing that can help him have peace in his life which is what he needs. He asked me if I could give it to him and it was a really amazing experience for me to do that and then to talk to him after and see how he felt. When we left he was like "thank you, thank you I feel very happy!!" And then later in the week we taught him again and he told us that we have brought happiness into his life. He came to church this week too and is still reading the Book of Mormon and every time we go over he has really good questions. Aww I love H. so much. We have even talked to him about buying some African food and bringing it over to his house and we can all cook African food together so that would be soo cool! 

Another thing that happened this week was I gave a talk yesterday in church!! Probably one of the scariest things that I have done on my life not gonna lie. We got a call on Saturday that they needed someone to speak so I decided to do it cause I am trying to challenge and push myself with the language. I was super stressed for the talk though, but I was talking about missionary work so it wasn't too hard to prepare. It was just in a different language which was the difficult part. To show how nervous I was though, without realizing it I wore the wrong pants with my suit coat. (Noticed that after my talk lololol) Ohh managa!! Blue suit coat with black pants. It was awesome hahaha. But even though I felt like I didn't do that well, and I messed up a few times, people told me that they still understood me and that my talk went really well so I am really really grateful for all the support and prayers and for the spirit cause if it weren't for y'all I probably would have died up there in front of our big ward of 50 people haha. 

Well my thought for the week comes from one of the things that Anziano Palazzo told me when he was doing our review. He said that when you are at a very high point in your life (maybe personality, confidence, spiritually) and you are a companion or friends, with someone that is struggling with trials, following rules, things like that.. Bring them up to your point. Don't go down onto their level but help them reach their full potential that they can reach. I really like that a lot cause we can all help someone out there who might need it.

Alright well I love y'all! Thanks for the letters and the support!!

Love, Anziano Spencer

P. S so today we went to the Narni castle and it ended up being closed.. But we still got to see some sick views of our area, take some sweet pics, and get gelato so it has still been a good day! I guess I take it for granted sometimes that we were up in the mountains in Italy, walking through cobblestone streets, and seeing castles in the mountains. Awesome p-day today!! I LOVE Y'ALL!!

Shoutout to Benson you are going to kill it in the mission field dude I am sooo excited for you!! Can't wait for you to join me over in the European world! 

Week 11--Sept 21 (Terni)

[Hi all, Tristan sent us a bunch of pictures through the i-Cloud. Sadly, I did a computer update last night and apparently those pics disappeared into some hidden cloud. I will post them on the blog as soon as I figure out how to retrieve them.]

Here is this week’s letter with a PS at the end (since we were online chatting back and forth yesterday!!).

WHAT UP WHAT UP?! I hope everyone had a good week this week!! I heard that BYU is playing super well right now so that is so sick! This week was a really good week; obviously there are some highs and lows but I think I am finally adjusting to being out in the field. Hey, if you have any good advice for cooking, recipes, life hacks that make things easier, please let me know cause I would love to hear! I have realized I am not the most amazing chef out there and I really have to start figuring out how to cook things other than just pasta, eggs, and pancakes lol. And I would love to hear from you too so that would be great! 

The two biggest highlights of the week were Friday and Saturday. Friday was my first zone conference ever so we got to travel to Rome to all meet. I was able to see Anziano Brown (my MTC companion) and Anziano Chugg (buddy from the MTC). We were all the greenies there so that was fun haha. We also had the chance to go up and bear our testimonies and I was super nervous not going to lie, but I was helped so much during it! The gift of tongues is so real people I don't even know how to describe it! It was so cool cause when I started speaking I calmed down and we had a translator over on the right for the senior couples who only spoke English and as I was bearing my testimony in Italian, he was translating into English. It was super weird to hear the English translation and know that that was what I was trying to say! I am so happy that it went well. Anziano Calvanga talked to me after and he said that I spoke in perfect Italian so that was a huge blessing to me. GOD IS SO GOOD!!

The other really big highlight for me this week was we had an awesome lesson with our new investigator on Saturday night. The spirit was so strong and he was asking all of the perfect questions. He really has a strong desire to know if this church is the true church, and so we talked to him more and more about the Book of Mormon and the restoration and having faith and he accepted to be baptized IF he knows that the Book of Mormon is true which is exactly what we want. He told us that he has read some of it and it makes him feel happy. Anziano Ray and I were like YESS!! We were so happy. We don't want to force him to do anything; we just want to give him the same happiness, joy, peace, and hope that we feel from the Gospel. Before that lesson, we had another lesson with this super sweet old lady that asked us for a Book of Mormon in Romanian. We gave her one and then finally met with her and she is already up to 2 Nephi 7! She told us that she already knows the book is true and she started talking to us and Anziano Ray and I could understand her pretty well!! And she was speaking Romanian?! It was sooo cool as she was explaining to us about her family and things like that. Afterwards she asked if I could pray and so I prayed in Italian and she stopped me after and said that I had prayed in Romanian.. Ummm? I was definitely struggling in Italian but I guess she was blessed to hear it in her native language. Again, so sick.

Okay so my spiritual thought for this week is what we talked about at Zone Conference. The theme of it was about having No Fear. That is something that I am still working on cause not gonna lie I still get a little nervous going up and talking to people about something that means so much to me and then they normally just reject me hard core or try to embarrass me or swear in English. BUT I love this scripture in Doctrine and Covenants and it says- 

36 Look unto me in every thought; doubt not, fear not.

It's short but there is so much hope in that. If I am looking towards God, being obedient, then I don't need to Fear Anything. So that is something that I am working on!

Alright well I love you all, thanks for everything! 

P.S okay so a few weeks ago we met this really tiny lady and she started talking to us. She was so nice but every time this one guy would walk by she would be like droga lue faccia droga.. And so basically saying he was on drugs. Today in the grocery store he came in and started yelling at Anziano Ray and I and aww man it wasn't even that bad cause a lot of people are mean to us but this guy was saying some awful things. The whole store was watching but they felt bad for us so that was some nice support. It doesn't matter though cause I have no fear!! 

Nadia was baptized yesterday! The spirit was so strong and the guy that we have been working with was able to come, even though he wasn't able to make it to the church. It was such a special experience! 

Love you all!

Love, 

Anziano Spencer

PS A few days ago Anziano Palazzo made an agreement ( a bet but missionaries don't bet;)) that if he and Anziano Calvagna passed out 500 English course cards that I would have to go four days without socks. Which would have been unbearable. But he bet me his bed, and his bed is so comfortable and so I decided to agree. And I won!!!! I slept so well last night, it was so nice. 

So I just sent a few pictures about what was happening in Centro a few nights ago. There was a huge all night festa for like 2 days in a row and so there were fire dancers, all these shops, a huge concert, all this stuff. It was pretty cool, but of course we were missionaries so we loved it cause there was so many people we could talk to haha. So those are the pictures that you are getting right now. 

Week 10--Sept 14 (Terni)

MAAA PEOPLE!!

I hope everyone had a good week and every one of my friends are making good choices as they are going back to school;) I love y'all so much and thanks again for your support. I know that I say that every week but it's true; every time someone gets mad at me for trying to talk to them I just think of y'all and it helps me. 

So I don't have that much time to write cause I am about to go play (American) football out in the rain with some buddies and some priests/GANS (young adults) from the ward. My goal: to crush everyone in this game. In a loving missionary way I guess HAHAHAHA. But really though, I am excited. It will be fun.

Alright so this week was good, I am not gonna lie it was really hard at some parts because we have been doing a lot of finding to get some solid investigators. But, I am getting better at the language so that has been awesome! I try to think of how far I have come instead of how far I have to go haha:) And our work has paid off!! We received a referral from the sisters in Catania about this man who has had a super rough past. He hasn't made good choices at all but his wife is a member of the church and he wants to get back together with her. To do that she said he has to learn more about the church (shout out to member missionary work!! It really is the best way. I invite all of y'all to try it!) so he has the motivation to change his life. We met with him on Saturday night and he actually is a really solid guy. We had a good lesson and he came to church with us the next day for the full 3 hours!! And on top of that when we walked into church with him, there was S. (guy with the crazy wife) sitting in the church 30 minutes early with a white shirt and tie on! Ohh it made me so happy!! With this new investigator and someone sitting in the church I was so happy. Church made this whole week so worth it, I was so happy!! The church is so true!!

Also something else that is really exciting is the other elders have a baptism this week!! I am so happy for them because they have been working with this girl for a while but because her dad is Muslim he doesn't want her to join. She turned 18 today actually so we are going to her birthday party ('cause it's a good missionary opportunity) and we get to sing at her baptism. I am so happy for her; she's so cool! She wants to go on a mission so hopefully her dad will let her. 

I am so sorry I can't add more details! Here is my spiritual thought this week though. So I am in my scriptures right now reading about the stripling warriors. And I came across a scripture that I love so much- 25 And it came to pass that there were two hundred, out of my two thousand and sixty, who had fainted because of the loss of blood; nevertheless, according to the goodness of God, and to our great astonishment, and also the joy of our whole army, there was not one soul of them who did perish; yea, and neither was there one soul among them who had not received many wounds.

So the reason that I love it so much is these warriors were protected against all odds. Because of their faith, obedience, and powerful testimonies. Because of this not one of them perished and yet they received many wounds. Just because we are doing everything that we should doesn't mean that we are not going to have hard times and fall down. But, God will always be there to pick us right back up. I love that so much! 

I love y'all!!!

Love Anziano Spencer

P.S I learned a sick handshake that people from Nigeria do to each other; it's so subtle and awesome. I felt so white when someone tried to do it to me and I had no idea what was going on. Probably cause I am white but now I know what's up when it happens. I love his church and my mission!!

PSS This week, I (Mom) asked Tristan some specific questions:

How often do you get invited over to eat with people?
What do you cook for yourselves the rest of the time?
Is your apartment nice? Do you have hot water to shower?
How long does it take you to get to church?
Do you ride the bus around? Is there a metro?
Have you been able to keep up with your exercise plan?
Is the language coming more and more each week?

I thought you would also enjoy seeing his responses (also note that he never called me Momma in his life until he arrived in Italy—it kind of cracks me up!):

Hi momma!! I have made it back on! Okay so here is the answer to some
of your questions..
We don't get invited over to people's houses at all to eat.. If we
want to go we must invite ourselves over which makes it difficult
because a lot of people live far away from Terni. But we are meeting
with 3 families this week who are members!
Pasta, a bunch of stuff.. I am starting to cook and I even cooked some
zucchini pasta yesterday with meat. It was so good!!
It's pretty nice, we do have hot water and it's pretty big too. It's
been kinda disgusting though but we cleaned it. Last night my mattress
broke though like the springs so luckily I can switch it out..
3 minutes probably we live super close to the church which makes it
super nice!!!
We take the bus to go to some investigators'  houses but most of the
time we take the train when we go to Rome for district meetings.. Or
to the places outside of Terni. Like two days ago I traveled to
Perugia which was a 2 hour train ride to see some people. It was a
veryyyy long day.
Yeah I actually have been keeping up with my plan! It's been really
nice and I am getting stronger.
Yeah it is.. I know I don't think that it really is but I can stop
people now and kinda talk to them.. If they are patient with me haha.
But most of them know English too so I can talk to them like that.
Okay sorry that those were so brief!! But that's just a little
information for you!

"Sorry that the lighting isn't great."

"My shrine in my area."

"My study area...here for 4 hours a day."

"Terni. It's literally a region."

Week 9-- Sept. 7 (Terni, Italy)

WAZZUPPP!!! How is everyone doing? As always thank you so much for your prayers and support; it really means a lot to me and I do feel blessed from everyone. Especially because there are a lot of people here that are not nice at at all so it is good to know that people still love you. Even though they are on like the other side of the world haha.

So this week was a pretty good week. The language is coming along okay. I still have a lot to learn but I am being more patient with myself and just laugh now when I make a mistake. And most people are pretty kind about it. MOST. Haha a few days ago I started to talk to these old guys that were sitting around cause here that's all people generally do. Sit around, but when you ask them if you can talk to them "they are really busy lol" I don't understand haha. Anyway I was told with the old people to just smile and nod cause they will just go on and on and love you. And so I started talking to these gents and they were nice at first but when I started to talk to them about the Book of Mormon they just went off and started to tell me to go away (but in my head I was just like smile and nod Tristan they love you) and I didn't get the hint until he said it for about the 5th time and got in my face. HAHAHA it was awesome! 

Anyway, we are still struggling to find some good solid people to teach. We have been doing a lot of finding and we still have to do a lot more. The hard part is is when we got here all the people that were super solid were already being worked with were with the other missionaries in our apartment so we are kinda starting completely fresh. But we have had some super interesting experiences this week. One when we were doing some finding we met this guy from Napoli who reminded me so much of my buddy Blase back at home. Super chill, and a cool guy and so we started talking to him. He wanted us to smoke with him, and we told him no we don't do that so he offered to buy us some beer; we denied that too so he offered us some fruit. We were like yeah that's awesome, so he took his cigarette out of his mouth and gave it to Anziano Ray to hold on to while he went to get us some fruit. Super funny to see Anziano Ray standing there in missionary atire, a whiteboard in his hand that says "what makes you the most happy," and then a cigarette in his hand. Ohhh man haha! Anyway then he starts talking to me about this second job that he does and it sounded like he was in the mafia like no joke if was really weird. Really cool guy though. I hope we can meet with him someday lolol. 

We also met this really cool guy that wanted a Book of Mormon in French, so we told him we could give it to him on Thursday at 1:00. Thursday came and it was pouring rain but he still ended up coming to the park and meeting us so I really hope that he becomes a solid investigator cause we really need some. C. and L. though are doing awesome. I love them so much; their faith is so amazing. We see them twice a week and it's so nice to go and teach them cause we just always have such a good discussion; he just need to find work in order to be baptized. So we keep praying for him and keeping our fingers crossed!

Another family that we are working with is this guy named ... He is the one that gives us pepperocini (Super hot peppers, life tip: don't rub your eye after cutting one that was like the worst mistake of my life) anyway he believes in science, his wife is atheist, catholic and a JW and his daughter.. Well I don't know what she is. So our discussions have been pretty interesting cause so,writes they back us up and then start yelling at each other in Italian which backs us up [Editor's note: not sure what he means by this!]. From our discussion last night they committed to read 3 pages from the Book of Mormon and I think the daughter is coming to English course so I think she has really big potential there.

Well something that really helped me this week is in Alma 38 when Alma is giving instructions to his son Shiblon and he says:

5 And now my son, Shiblon, I would that ye should remember, that as much as ye shall put your trust in God even so much ye shall be delivered out of your trials, and your troubles, and your afflictions, and ye shall be lifted up at the last day.

And then continues on..

15 And may the Lord bless your soul, and receive you at the last day into his kingdom, to sit down in peace. Now go, my son, and teach the word unto this people. Be sober. My son, farewell.

I like this a lot because Shiblon isn't really talked about a lot in the Book of Mormon. But, he is a righteous missionary, does what he is supposed to do, and this is one of the last things that my mom read to me before I left for the MTC. So it really means a lot to me. I am grateful for my mission, I know I still have a ton to learn and even though it's really hard I feel myself growing so much. 

Another talk that I really liked is called "Man down" from Elder Eyring from April 2009 general conference. I like it a lot because sometimes I have a hard time feeling like a successful missionary if all I am doing is finding and people reject me. But, I am here to search and find people that need help. It's a really good talk so if you need something to read, check it out. And this was my first priesthood session when turned 12 so I was actually able to see this talk in the conference center with my dad. Makes it even more special for me.

Well I love you all! Thanks again for everything!! 

Love, Anziano Spencer

Tonight we might get to teach this guy from Afghanistan so that will be super cool. I have met so many people from all around the world here!! BEING A MISSIONARY IS AWESOME!!

Tristan says: "These are some cookies we made for some investigators.
They were awesome!" (Was he being serious?!)

Italian gelato is ice cream on steroids. Yum!!!! 

With Anziano Ray.

Far right corner is Baci (chocolate hazelnut)--Mom's favorite!

Chocolate jalapeno...not recommended. Tristan was dying.

Tristan said, "This is another thing we do when finding.
This is Anziano Palazzo next to me." [From Southlake!]

Narni, which is part of Tristan's region of Terni. Tristan said: "This is a place called Narni.
And the Narnia books were actually based off this city, super cool.
We had to go and teach this guy named D. up here on Saturday.
There is a Narni castle also but we haven't seen that yet."

Week 8: August 31, First Week in the Field! (Terni, Italy)

First Week In The Field!!

Ayyyye my fav people!! I hope that everyone had a good week and for those that started school that it was a good first week. So this week had a lot of ups and downs but I am just trying to keep my head up and trying to work my hardest! It's still weird for me to think that it's like 6:00 there in Texas in the morning but eh va bene.. So last Pday we were planning on going up into the Pintails but the ward mission leader (the crumper dude, I saw one of his videos and he is an absolute beast) couldn't take us so we ended up hanging out in Terni. We went to the park and ended up playing football with the 4 of us (one of the guys in our apartment lives in Southlake, Texas!!) so random! Anyway, went with 2 young adults from our ward, Matteo and Bruno, and they are awesome. Hahaha it was probably the funniest game that I have ever played cause these two Italian bros have never seen or played football before so it was a very new experience teaching it and playing all together. It was a good p-day and nice to just de-stress.

One thing that happened this week is when Anziano Ray and I traveled up to Rieti to visit someone who was interested in hearing about the church. It is a city high up in the mountains so we took a 40 min bus ride to get there. It was really cool and scary though cause these roads up the mountain were so small and there were tight turns where you could just look right over the side of this huge cliff. When we got there is was pretty disappointing though cause the guy called us and he had actually been kicked out of his house last night because his wife was mad at him. So we couldn't meet with him cause he was on the other side of town. Instead we did some finding and found a guy who actually wanted to talk to us and told us that he was sad cause so many people were racist to him (he was from Nigeria) and we talked to him about how in 3 Nephi 17:7-9 when Jesus Christ comes and heals the people that he healed ALL not just some. He took a Book of Mormon so hopefully it will help him. 

Other than that we have been teaching Stefano (the one guy whose wife hates us). When we got there she was sitting on the couch watching tv and barely wearing clothing and then started yelling/growling at us for being there. I just did my normal smile and nod thing cause I didn't understand half of what she was saying anyway haha.  Stefano is doing really well and wants to receive the Melchezidek priesthood soon so hopefully he will be able to. We are also teaching this one guy who is actually crazy. He is a member of the church but doesn't come at all so we are teaching him again. Anyway, the first lesson he brought us into his room and sat us on his bed as we talked about Jesus Christ and he sat across from us. It was very strange, but I felt the spirit there so that's what matters haha! Our last lesson with him I had the brilliant idea to show him a picture of my family and he thinks my mom is beautiful (which is totally true) but now I have 50 year old stefano hitting on my mom. Awesome lolol. But, he did buy me a European book about the culture and history of Europe so I thought that was really nice. He has a really good heart, he is just hmmm.. Slightly insane. 

For a lot of the time this week we have been doing a lot of finding. It's frustrating cause I really want to teach more people but to do that we need to find people that want to listen so I am working on being patient. Patient that we will be able to find people, and patient with myself and the language. Something that really helped me this week was when I was reading in Alma 14: 26 :

And Alma cried, saying: How long shall we suffer these great afflictions, O Lord? O Lord, give us strength according to our faith which is in Christ, even unto deliverance. And they broke the cords with which they were bound; and when the people saw this, they began to flee, for the fear of destruction had come upon them.

I really liked it a lot and it really helped me because Alma didn't pray just to be released from his affliction so the Lord does everything but he prayed for strength to overcome this affliction himself. I love that a lot and have been praying more for strength with the language. 

Well I love you all so much!! One more thing that was really awesome this week is that Charles and Linda came to church!! It made me so happy. Anziano Calvagna sat with them and translated and I sat with this guy named Moroko who is a professional soccer player and suchhhh a cool and solid guy! I asked him for some advice that I could give to my brother especially cause he made the high school team so shout out to you little man!! I am so proud of you!! 

Thanks again for all of your support and prayers! The mission is the hardest yet the most rewarding thing that I have done! I can't wait to see what these next two years bring!

Love, Anziano Spencer

P.S sorry for the late email we played a zone soccer game in Rome so I couldn't write until now, on the train haha. I will talk to y'all next week! THE CHURCH IS TRUE!!

P.P.S Jen I hope you have an awesome wedding I am so excited for you!!

P.P.P.S I don't know if I said this last week but our neighbor in our apartment put salt outside of her doorway in a large pile. Obviously because we are vampires and need to be warded off hahaha. I love it so much! It's so sweet and I just laugh at those things like that cause that's so funny to me.

Terrifying bus ride up to Rieti.

Tristan's region of Terni actually includes other towns too,
like Rieti  (pictured here) and Narni (in next week's post).

Also Rieti.

The subway

Missionaries waiting to get on the subway.

P-days are awesome! Especially when they include soccer.

Tristan's zone.