Sorella Gisseman: Week 62 -- One and Done in Cagliari

Hello! Good morning! Good afternoon! I'm just going to go to questions and then we'll come back if I remember anything...

1. What happened with transfer calls????

I will be doing a one and done here in Cagliari and then I will be going to a city called Bari to be with someone who just finished their training, so with a really young companion. I'm super excited. Sorella N (my companion right now) -- Bari is her birth city, like where she started her mission, and she did four transfers there and she hyped it up so much for me so I'm really excited. Also, I'm just very lucky in the fact that i have had incredible cities. Like, people want to serve in Bari...people want to serve in all the cities I've served in. So I'm really fortunate. So that's happening. It's sad but also happy.

2. How was church? Do you still translate sometimes?

Church was good. I have never translated in this ward. I don't translate here.

3. Tell me about something that made you smile this week.

We laughed a lot this week over dumb things. OK, two things -- on the bus the other day...oh my gosh, the weather this week -- it was so bad, so rainy and so cold. It went literally from being nice and springy/summery even, a light sweater maybe -- to like torrential downpour for like four days straight and freezing cold. Like tights under pants cold, and maybe also a pair of leggings. We were on the bus the other day, and the buses here, they go -- they have schedule and they stick to it, so they take turns really fast, they take stops really fast, and we were sitting on the bus the other day going home after something and the bus took a sharp turn and I went from my seat to the floor and slid on the floor. It was funny. Also another fun bus story -- this morning we were going out to play zone soccer and I'm wearing the jacket I got with Sorella B -- it's like really, really thick. So I was going to take it off because the buses have heaters and I literally, like....my shirt completely came off my body. I think it was up to my shoulder and I was just sitting there...and my companion looked at me and is like, "No, no, no, no!" and pulled my shirt down. It was just really funny. We sat there for a minute and just laughed.

4. Who is your favorite person in the scriptures right now, and why?

Good question. Right now in the Book of Mormon I'm reading Words of Mormon. I just finished Words of Mormon so I'll be moving on to Mosiah. Literally all the prophets are really dope but I really like Jacob. I think Jacob is really underrated because he doesn't have that many chapters in the Book of Mormon, obviously, but just thinking about his circumstances and the fact that he was literally born in the wilderness and he was such a good leader and his sermons (are they called sermons? I don't know.) are really good.

5. What is your favorite Italian food so far?

That's a hard one! A Napoli pizza is top of the game but also a good lasagna, also any dolce (but I don't like cannoli -- I would choose a sfogliatello over cannoli, also gelato over cannoli).... Also I'm going to Bari and they're famous for ponzaroti which is a giant calzone but better and fried. So that might become my favorite food. A good Napoli pizza, though, is life changing. We had pizza this week as a district and I had my closest to a Napoli pizza texture-wise since I was in Napoli and I was like, "Wow -- I remember!".

6. What is something that stood out to you in your studies this week?

Sister T. gave me a talk to study called "Wrestling with Comparisons" and I've been studying that a lot and I'm coming to a lot of breakthroughs. Even she told me that -- that I'm doing really well and coming to a lot of breakthroughs. So I've been studying that talk a lot this week and one thing that I wrote down is the fact that God doesn't make horizontal comparisons. One of the stories that it talks about is Peter and John the Beloved and I think it's in Doctrine and Covenants 7 it talks about -- Joseph has asked what happened -- and it talks about how...obviously we can read that story and be like, yes, Peter chose to be exalted in my kingdom but John, he's chosen the better part. He's chosen something that's better, he's chosen to do more. And that's how I've kind of always thought of that story, like yeah, but John has done better, you know? But it's not like that. In verse 5 it says "But my beloved has desired that he might do more, or a greater work yet among men than what he has done before." It's not saying John is going to do a greater work than Peter, or John is better than you and has better desires than you. It's saying that John is doing this, he has chosen to do this -- greater than what HE has done before -- and God doesn't make horizontal comparisons. He doesn't compare us one to another. We all have individual circumstances and that was something that really stood out to me. I don't think it was something I understood before and I'm still praying to understand it and have it be incorporated in the way that I think. I think definitely I do have thoughts like, "I have to be better than this person so God will love me more", but that's not how God's love works.

7. Tell me about a lesson you taught this week.

We had our first face-to-face lesson this really cute woman named AM. She lives pretty far away so we usually do video calls with her, but we got to see her face-to-face because she had an appointment here in Cagliari. She was so cute. She gave us Christmas gifts, basically, little mugs filled with candy so that we wouldn't forget her and we talked about studying the scriptures with her. She is just really incredible...we just wish that she lived closer because she has a really pure heart, a very pure heart, and she wants to do good and she just has really hard circumstances.

8. What do you think is the key to member missionary work?

As a missionary it's loving the members. You've just got love them so much. As a member it's no fear and where your priorities are. I think that's a big key -- trusting in God that He'll give you what you need and trusting that if you're doing something to help Him, He will help you, you know?

9. Do you know how much I love you?

Always.

10. What miracles did you see/experience this week?

We've been talking about this recently -- what our miracles are. One night we were literally like, "well, I guess we're going finding for the next five hours" and it was raining outside and we were on the way and this woman we've been talking to calls us and she's like, "hey -- do you want to come see me?" and we were like, yes!, so we got to go teach her the restoration and kind of throw it in the scheme of her questions because she was talking a lot about why the world is like it is today, and so we were able to be like, "For you to understand why things are like this you need to understand how God works in the world, that there was an apostasy, that God always calls prophets and because of this we don't have to live in this confusion and in this evilness"... And then we went out and there was a guy who had told us he wasn't super interested -- there were two addresses that were like, "yeah, come back another time" so we went back and one of them was an older Catholic man and we talked to him for actually a long time and in the beginning he wanted to debate things, he wasn't really listening. And I was like, "OK, he needs to understand the apostasy at least at a basic level before we can even talk about the restoration" and so we were trying to do it and trying to do it and finally we pushed through and got to the restoration and he listened! He stopped talking and actually listened to us and we were able to give him a Book of Mormon and he said that he would read it and that we could come back and talk to him about it. And then after that (this isn't the miracle part), we went to the other house and they were like "Oh, he was just making fun of you" and we were like, ok....... So then we went and rang some houses in the rain. Also miracle -- my companion has been sick for a few days now and it's been bad -- she has problems with her sinuses and so on Saturday we had to come home early and she just needed to sleep and obviously that's hard for both of us. And then on Sunday same thing. She's not doing well. Dude, she slept like 12 hours Saturday night and she's not doing any better, obviously we need to do something. So we were like, yes, it's the Sabbath, but we believe that it is ok that we go and find medication so that she is able to do missionary work. So we went and we were like, "ok, this is our outing for the night". So we got and try to find this medication. She knows what medication she needs, and in most cities in Italy for pharmacies you just have to go tell them what medication you want, like antibiotics, almost any medication. So we went to one pharmacy and they wanted to know where her prescription was. And she was like, "we're not from here so I can't really go and get a prescription, but I know this is exactly what I need..." and they're like, "you need a prescription, sorry." And then the same thing happened again. And we're like, ok, let's call -- it was pouring rain and it's freezing and we're just walking to these different pharmacies, trying to find this medication, praying that someone will give it to us. And she's just like, you know, there's this place that you can go that's like an urgent care but not quite...one doctor. And we just went in and the doctor asked what we needed and Sorella N said, "I need this antibiotic" and the doctor was like, "Perfect -- here's the prescription" and that was it. It was a little longer than that, obviously, but our gracious capizona (?) came and drove us because it was pouring rain. But we were able to finally get the prescription and -- miracle -- literally just today she's doing so much better. After one day of antibiotics she feels 75% better -- she was at 0% yesterday. It was bad. So that's a miracle.

11. What gospel topic do you recommend I study?

I don't know...what do you need in your life? What are your problems? What do you feel inside? What questions do you have? Follow the example of Joseph Smith.

We did a scambio in one area and that was fun but I got a little sick. My stomach has been kind of wack recently but that's ok. One thing I'm excited about is that the stove actually works in Bari and we'll live really close to a market so I'll be able to eat again the way I nee to be eating and I hope that will help me. And now it's starting to rain -- from nothing to torrential downpour in 0.2 seconds....

Basically, it's been a good week, it's been a good transfer, I'm sad to leave but it's ok. I'm excited to go to Bari.

I love you all and I'll talk to you later!

Ciao, ciao!

Sandals in the rain......

Scambio...it was SO cold! I raided the sorella's death closet and got a pair of Uggs, a scarf, and a skirt....I was ashamed but at least it was a little warmer.