Chapter 7- What NOT to do on your first day in Italy

Yep that's right- I'm finally in Italy!! Super heartbreaking to say goodbye to the Roman district... And the teachers... And of course my amazing Sorellanza district... And America... Buttttt it's okay because ITALY!!!!!!! And what a fantastical, psychotic, indescribable journey it's been thus far... (Sorry in advance for the lengthy email
but I have lots of awkward experiences lol so it's worth it!)

Ok first of all, traveling was CRAZY! I was able to sleep quite a bit and call the family which was nice, but I was tired and nervous and was just so not ready to leave 'Murica lol... Plus our plane landed late in London... And we already only had an hour layover anyway...And then they made us go all the way through security AGAIN... so our group got split up, with 5 of us on the 1st plane, and the other 3 left waiting.... And I'm sitting there on the plane with S. Lo Russo thinking "okeeey what hecking thing have I gotten myself into?!?” Like forreals, maybe I should just go back home to my beautiful comfort zone (after all, there's Netflix there!) And then guess what
happened?! I look out the window and I saw the Appalachian mountains!! We were finally coming over Italy... And wowzers it was love at first sight!!!!! I sat there glued to the window and then we finally landed! I legit did a high school musical jump off the plane onto my beautiful new homeland!

Ok remember in tangled when rapunzel keeps going back and forth between "yay I'm so glad I left my tower" to "I never should've left” to "Best. Day. EVER!" Yeah this is basically me the first 24 hours before meeting my trainer... Like yay for Italy but also what the fetch am I doing??? Plus my brain was tired so it just made everything
worse... Pres. Dibb and his wife picked us up and we dropped our stuff off at the mission office, and then we were off to the duomo to start proselyting. We get on the metro and I see a lady and I'm like "hey I like your scarf!" And she totally just glares at me and moves away (I even checked later on to make sure I hadn't accidentally said something wrong or offensive in Italian... Nope, this lady just hated me haha) Luckily the next lady we talked to was nicer and even wanted a B of M (whoot whoot!) lol but remember in the movie "The Best Two Years" when the greenie first gets to the mission and he's like "Elder, what language are they speaking?" And his trainer is like "That's Dutch..." And then the greenie is like "That's not the language they taught me at the MTC!" Cuz yeah that was me… We finally get off the metro and walk up some stairs to see the beautiful, massive duomo! And I was rather fascinated by this beautiful, massive duomo! And you know what happens sometimes when you're fascinated by a beautiful, massive duomo? You tend to stop focusing on your footing, and typically end up falling down dramatically... Yup, day 1 in Italy and I'd already tripped lol…      It's gonna be a long 17 months...

We had dinner with the mission pres and his wife, and then went to the hotel. Jet lag has been kinda killing me so I don't remember much other than that there was a huge spider in the bathroom and that I totes passed out on top of my bed... The next day we had more training, and then we got to meet our trainers! I got the amazing
Sorella Smith (who I adore cuz she's nice and funny and she loves all my movies and books!) and we are living in Collegno, a city inside Torino. So I get to see the mountains (which I love!) and we're right by the French border. Our apartment is super nice, plus it has 2 balconies. It's close by a gelato shop and a lil comic book/nerd shop like on Big Bang Theory (tons of marvel and Star Wars stuff!!).There's also a street market right outside our door every Saturday! Like for reals, I just love my new home!

A bit about Collegno... It's not a super successful city honestly. It's a poorer area and there's hardly any progressing investigators, and rarely any baptisms. A lot of people say it's one of the lesser-pretty areas in Italy. Aaand I absolutely love it! It's a pretty huge area, so although we walk a lot we also take the bus, metro, and train (which I love cuz Italy is just beautiful). The ward here is amazing! They were super excited to meet me cuz there hasn’t been a greenie Sorella here in almost 2 years! My comp and the anziani here have really been working on strengthening the ward here and working with the non-active members, so I'm super excited to continue
working with them and finding potential investigators through them. It's kinda crazy, cuz our last pday in the MTC, we went to the temple for the last time😪 while there, I just felt such a love for this country of people I hadn't even met, and a desire for them all to experience the love of Christ and the blessings of the temple. And I
remember having like a mental conversation with God, where I kinda just promised Him "okay Heavenly Father, I promise I'll do whatever I can to help the people in whatever area I'm in. I'll do my best to put Your will above my own. If You put me in the area You need me in, and promise not to leave me alone, I'll focus on all the people- not just worrying about baptisms or statistics, but putting my focus on helping the needs of non-members, members, and inactives equally." And lemme
tell you, the minute I stepped foot in Collegno, I knew this was where God needed me. And boy, am I excited to figure out what things He wants me to accomplish here!

As with all missions, life is busy and tiring but good! We have studies and planning like always. We teach English class Wednesdays and Fridays (yay cuz I actually know English). It's fun cuz we teach it with the Collegno anziani, Anziano Rogers and Anziano Yee. I just love them- they're awesome, obedient missionaries and are just super fun! Sundays are crazy and fun- our ward has close to 100 people which is awesome! The bishop had me introduce myself and bear testimony and
whatnot in church this week which was definitely an experience lol😂 my comp and the anziani all said my Italian was better than theirs at 2 transfers (I'm thinking they're lying but they're adorable nonetheless lol). And the members are all super patient with my lack of language skills haha so it's all good! During the week, we meet
with members a lot (a few of them have other family members and friends we get to teach next week!) they always feed us a ton! It’s hard to get a lot of lessons in during the day, because travel time can take up to an hour each way, and they typically keep us for like 2-5 hours haha! They just love talking about the gospel and life lol! I love these people! The youth we have are darling- we're planning an activity for the them that they can invite friends to so that'sexciting!

A couple fun things about Italy I've learned during my first week:
- There are dogs EVERYWHERE! S. Smith said she never saw dogs here until I showed up, so evidently God loves me lol🐶 I always speak Italian to them which is basically my winning method for talking to strangers about the gospel haha!
- Fizzante is my new fav. Basically it's carbonated water and its weird but awesome. Also Fanta is way better here- like it's legit orange juice with bubbles lol
- There are lizards everywhere! And also pigeons.
- Remember how I have an irrational fear of escalators? Yeah same…   And we ride them constantly...
- The food is okay I guess... Just kidding like wow I love it! The members feed us so much (like there's no such thing as a meal with less than 3 courses) and it's all just great. And don't get me started on the gelato cuz dang I could eat that stuff for every meal😉🍦

P day today, we went to Stupinigi, a palace that was used as a hunting retreat for royalty. It was huge and gorgeous, plus we got to go with the Torino Sorelle: s. Ardnt (who I met at the MTC and is one transfer ahead of me) and s. Harris (she's on her last transfer!)

I love this country. And this city. And these missionaries. And this food. AND of course I adore these crazy Italians! Sorry mom and dad-
I'm never coming home!!!

xoxo
Sorella Smedley

1. Goodbye America-hello Italy!  2.Contacting on the Metro  3.The Duomo where we proselyted 

4. President and sister Dibb & I   5. My trainer, Sis. Smith, & I at the train station   6. Sis. Smith and I on our apartment balcony

5. GELATO!! Yum!!  6. Little mint green cars everywhere-I need one!  7. Sis. Smith & I taking a break on the swings  8. Lunch appt. & chilling with Francesco (& his adorable dogs!)

9. The rest of the pictures are from Stupingi Palace- it was beautiful!!                                        

                    

     

    

Chapter 6: I'm basically Dumbledore (aka all my dreams are coming true)

Guess what guys?!?!? My dream of being a wizard is becoming a reality sort of! Cuz guess what?!? Italy is kinda a magical place (I say even though I'm not there yet... but our teachers' pictures kill me) and also we get to wear wool socks in the winter... and all Dumbledore wants for Christmas is wool socks... so basically I'm a wizard and that is all. Also did you know the Naboo scenes for Star Wars were filmed in my mission?!? Yeah so I may get to be a jedi AND a wizard AND a missionary and seriously what more can you ask for?!

This week was also a dream come true because I got to wear outfits that reflected some of my favorite things!!!!!!!!!!!! Sorella Lo Russo and I wore our "Minnie Mouse" outfits and it made me feel like I was in Disneyland which is basically the best thing ever! And then for gym, Anziano Hansen and I wore our Star Wars shirts and it may or may not have been the bestest day ever! And of course I always wear Avenger shirts on the daily (like to bed and gym) so seriously, I'm living the dream! Plus I get my nametag too so it really doesn't get better than this!

Also sleeping feels so awesome because the days are long. However sleeping is not so fun when you have a dream that dinosaurs are going after your home ward's relief society and you're trying to save them all and the Anziani are just sitting on the sideline providing unnecessary commentary and a dinosaur takes a bite out of your leg and then you wake up with a new irrational fear of dinosaurs and a totally sore calf muscle (from the dino bite obviously) so there's that.

Teaching has been going great! We skyped with Italians again. They're darling. We also have continued teaching our investigators for our final few lessons. We got them all committed to baptism which was quite the accomplishment given how difficult some of them were... On that topic, I'm gonna miss our teachers so fetching much!!!! I seriously love them and wish they could just come with us!!!!!! It's seriously so dang heartbreaking!

Funny story, in addition to being a wizard and a jedi and a missionary, I'm evidently also a llama (#yay!) We had a devotional this week that was AMAZING and they were talking about how we can't be "hirelings", but that we must be "shepherds". We need to love the people and bring them back to Christ's fold. Lol Anziano Boscan said "Well we can't actually be shepherds because there's only one perfect shepherd, but we can't only be sheep. Therefore, we must be llamas, because when wolves come, llamas don't run away. They CHARGE!!!!" lol love my life here at the MTC!

I'll be honest, I'm kind of dying knowing at this time next week, I'll be with my trainer in FETCHING ITALY!!!!! Lol what is life?!? Lol I don't think I'm qualified for any of this lololol but that's okay because the Lord will take care of everything! Our teacher Sorella Bucco told us the other day to replace thoughts of fear with thoughts of love. I think that's gonna be what saves my butt. Cuz I'm terrified of what's gonna be happening, but I can love the people! I see how our teachers light up anytime they talk about Italy- the food, the places, and most especially the people! It's seriously indescribable how much they love it!!!!! I already feel so much love for the Italian people!  Like they're just darling!!!!!! I'm super heartbroken about leaving my district and zone, because they are seriously my family now (we burst into disney music, talk about awkward stories, have mini food fights #BananaSlap, ! And I figure, it's only been six weeks! I'm gonna be in Italy for 17 months! And if I can love the Italian people even 1/10 of the amount I love these amazing people here at the MTC, we're gonna be totally set! ;)

Guess what?! The Gospel is true- like isn't that the best news ever?!? And thinking about the people in Italy who DON'T know that truly breaks my heart! I think about all the things that bring me joy (you people, books, camping, movies, food, netflix, disneyland, etc. just to name a few) and the gospel of Jesus Christ tops them all! Nothing brings me more joy, except for the idea of sharing it with the people of Italy! Yes, I'm terrified for what's about to happen and I literally have no idea what I'm doing. But the idea of bringing one soul unto Christ- not necessarily having a ton of baptisms or anything like that, but bringing even ONE person closer to the Savior- that brings me so much joy idk what to even do with myself!!!!!!!!!

Well, it'll probs be 2ish weeks before you guys hear from me (most of you are probs so grateful to get a Kaylee-free week lol) so lemme just say I love ya'll and I love this gospel! And if our plane crashes in the middle of the atlantic, I'll just continue preaching to the mermaids in the bermuda triangle or something hahaha!

XOXO
Sorella Smedley

P.S. Wrote you all a little parody to go with last weeks letter- you’re welcome! :)

When Will My Mission Begin

By Kaylee Smedley (to the tune of "when will my life begin" from Tangled)

6:30 am the usual morning lineup,

Brush all my teeth and make sure my face is clean!

Pick out a skirt and sweater and put on makeup.

Grab a pen, and by then, it's like 7:15!

And so I'll read a verse, or maybe two or three.

I'll add a few new verbs to my vocabulary.

I'll exercize and teach and pray and basically

Just wonder when will my mission begin?!

Then after lunch it's prep work and class and teaching.

Thousands of lessons (and millions of bathroom breaks)

Tenses and conjugations and too much laughing.

And we'll focus (no matter how long it may take!)

And then I'll write some letters if I have time to spare.

I'll mark my scriptures some more, I'm sure there's room somewhere!

And then I'll climb and climb and climb and climb the stairs

Day after day at the MTC...

And I'll keep wondering and wondering and wondering and wondering

WHEN WILL MY MISSION BEGIN?!?

1. Guess who got their flight plans?!?! We fly out Tuesday morning & arrive in Italy Wednesday afternoon!!!

2. Sorella LoRusso & I taking on the MTC Disney style!!

3. Anziano Hansen & I paying tribute to Star Wars- Sorella Stevens “presenting” us?!

4. Sorella Anderson & I that one time when the temple was closed :(

5./6. Class time again

7./8. What Sorella Anderson & I do for fun :)

9-11. Our Romans!! (Aka the Rome Elders)

 

  

   

 

  

Chapter 5: My Life as a Disney Princess (part 1)

Hi hi hi family/friends!!!!!! How is life?! Mine is great by the way! How the heck has it already been a month?! Ugh it's going by too fast! 

Lol I've decided I'm basically a disney princess rn. Like I'm literally Rapunzel sitting here and I love my tower but at the same time I'm running around with my long magic hair singing "When Will My Life Begin?!?" cuz I just wanna see the floating lanterns gleam aka go to Italy! But there's a lot of mixed feelings cuz like I adore my district and teachers and don't want to think about leaving them cuz they're my family rn!!!! And the MTC is AMAZING!!! Buuuuuutttttttttt Italy.... *heart eyes emoji x12* Our teachers have been talking to us about Italy a lot and it's getting me so excited! Plus anytime they talk about Italy or the Italian people, their eyes just totally light up and it's amazing!!!!! ahhhhh 2 more weeks!

So we've been teaching a TON lately, and I feel like it's going a lot better! We were teaching "Rafaella" (Sorella Russell) and she is by far our hardest MTC investigator. She's very apathetic towards the truths we teach, and doesn't keep commitments. We were going in to teach her about the plan of salvation on Sunday, and once we walked in, the lesson kind of changed... I open my notebook thing and 5 pics of Christ (the cool ones from the new bible videos) Sestra Rollins had sent me came falling out. And I was like "ok let's do this thing!" And so I took each picture one by one and showed them to Rafaella and we talked about Jesus Christ- how he taught, healed, comforted, and performed miracles! (Lol- except she wanted to know about the story of Him feeding the multitudes with only the loaves of bread and the fishes and I realized I didn't know how to say any of those words except for bread. And I was like "hmmm idk how to say 'basket'" so instead I just said '"bucket" like as in a bucket of fish and bread lol. And I couldn't for the life of me remember how to say "fish" so I just drew a picture of my baskets/buckets of fish and bread lolololol this is why I'm not an artist!) She was really engaged! And then we talked about the Atonement and how He suffered and died for us. She got super sad at first, asking why they would want to kill such an amazing man and whatnot. It was the best lesson I'd been part of. Later on in our one-on-one coaching, I was with Sorella Russell, and she went on and on about how great the lesson had been, and how we'd identified "Rafaella"'s needs so well! It's just so nice to feel like my teaching skills and language skills are improving.

We got selected to teach for "People and your Purpose" this week. Like the first day you get to the MTC, you go to this workshop and watch missionaries teach an investigator, and then the whole group of new missionaries have to teach the last half of the lesson thing. So they asked us to be the missionaries teaching in front of everyone. We were nervous at first but then we got out there and wow teaching in English is so much easier now since we're used to have to mentally translate into Italian lolololol. But it's also hard because they opened the door and I had to stop myself from being like "Ciao! Come sta?" and whatnot lol! Can you imagine how confused those poor new missionaries would be if I came out and started speaking mad fast Italian lolololol (I too would be confused bc I can't speak mad fast Italian)

This week for TRC, we got to skype with Daniele, a member in Southern Italy! Haha we were way nervous but SHE WAS ADORABLE!!!!! Like wow, we only taught her for like 30 minutes and I just instantly loved her!!! Ahhhh yay for Italian people!!!

Lol it's become a nightly routine for Sorella Perkins and I to, whilst washing off our makeup, be like the matchmaker lady on Mulan and say "You are a disgrace! You may look like a bride but you will never bring your family honor!!!!" and it is my most favorite thing!

Alright that's pretty much it for this week! Love you all x12

xoxo

Sorella Smedley

PS: No new MAJOR language mistakes this week, although guess what?!? I was like "Hey Sorella Bucco how do you say 'sleepover' in Italian?" don't ask me why lol. And she didn't know so she went and looked it up and started dying laughing and was like "oh my heck I love Italian people! 'Sleepover' is literally 'pajama party' in Italian!" lolololol so funny!!!!!!!!

1. I got to sign my name/mission on a beam that went up in the new MTC Bldg

2. The pics we used when we taught Rafaella   3. Our Zone!

4. Me, teaching in the classroom 5. Me, when I've spent too long in the classroom 6.I may have fallen asleep in the classroom

7.Sis. Fife & I getting some Vit.D 8. Sis. LoRusso & I at the temple 9. Sis. Fife, LoRusso & I...we should've been models!

10. Temple time with the Anzianos 11.Pondering and being funny & sassy 12. With our new comp. Sorella Stevens

13. Being let out free on the temple grounds 14.Sis. Fife & I-2 fuzzy haired,glasses wearing gals 15.Another #missionbadgeselfie for you!

     

      

      

      

      

Chapter 4: How I Got Kicked out of the MTC

Ok first of all, don't worry- I was not kicked out of the MTC lolololol I'll get to the reasons for my title later...

Did you guys just love love LOVE conference?!?!? I literally died! It was all just so good, I couldn't write fast enough!!!! I always love choosing questions or topics to think about during conference, and we decided to do that as a district. We left first session and went outside and we all had already had ALL of our questions answered! Yay! It was just too good, and so fun to experience it at the MTC! The missionaries treated it like a concert or something- cheering when their fav. speakers went on, and waiting outside the auditorium like 2 hours before it started, it was seriously great!

We've still been teaching our 2 investigators (our teachers) and our TRC appointments. It's a lot harder now, because we got a new missionary in our district. Her name is Sorella Stevens. She’s lived in Italy for 5 years so she is just joining us now (the milano mission only accepts new missionaries every transfer, so there's no way to leave early) sadly, they put her with S. Lo Russo since they're at similar language levels. It's for the best though, because it forces S. Fife and I to use the language more on our own in lessons and whatnot. So it's been hard but ultimately for the best! This week in trc we taught an actual native Italian, Max, who knows zero english which was scary but afterward he said the spirit was there and we spoke beautifully (thank goodness the lang. of the spirit overpowers my broken italian lololol). When we were teaching “ afaella" she kept refusing to pray and so we took time to talk to her about it and explain the process to her and show her examples and finally the other day she agreed to do so! Her prayer was so cute "Dio, e mi Rafaella" (Hi God, it's me Rafaella) my heart literally broke.

Ok now for the title... No I wasn't kicked out, nor will I be. But this week has been rather hilarious, and I've realized that if I WERE to get kicked out, it'd be for one of these reasons:

1- Pranking

Ok, so we don't prank each other or anything. Butttttttt it waaaaass April Fools Day last Friday, so we HAD to do something to the Roman district... They always make a big deal about how freaky bananas are. And anytime a guy talks to a girl, they say "33" or "flirty-three" (referring to page 33 of the handbook which talks about the relations between guys and girls during mission stuff) so we took the awkward couples pictures from the chastity pamphlet and taped them up in a "33" on their wall, and put bananas everywhere! It was sooooo funny! And we wrote "mi piace" all over their board (that will make sense when you read reason number 3)

2- Footloose

Ok so the MTC has a rule about no dancing during exercise time (the fact that they had to officially make this a rule kinda concerns me lololol). S. Anderson and I, however, are the world's best awkward dancers... So like sometimes it just happens like back in the residence, or like sometimes others in our district play the piano and we just awkward dance like crazy. So we're convinced that the plot of Footloose is going to occur at the MTC and WE will be the causes of it lololol...

3- Very Much Wrong Italian

Um so you know how you always hear stories about missionaries saying the WRONG words when speaking another language? Yeah same. Lol first of all, in TRC we taught about forgiveness... However, the verb "to forgive" is "perdonare", and the verb "to stalk" is "perdinare". I don't think I mixed them up during the lesson... but I totally stressed out the entire time. Because saying "God forgives us" is very very VERY different from "God stalks us"... Also, the elders have been struggling with mixing up "mi dispiace" (I'm sorry) with "mi piace" (I like)... kinda awkward to run into someone and mean to say "I'm sorry" but really end up gazing into their eyes and saying "I like!" lol. Also, for our last three investigators, at some point I've said "Jesus Christ suffered and died for our sins". tbh it's one of the few phrases I have totally memorized... Yeah... for the last three weeks I've been saying "Gesu Cristo soffrito e morto per nostri peccati" um turns out soffrito and sofferto are also different words... "sofferto" (the word I have NOT USED ONCE!) means "suffered"... "soffrito" (the word I've used in multiple lessons) means "deep fried"... I have literally been saying that Jesus Christ deep fried and died for us! Holy awkward what even is my life?!? I even rhymed lololol... scomedo (awkward).

Also funny, Sorella Anderson and I were joking about doing a dance number instead of a talk on Sunday, and quiet Sorella McCormick started laughing way hard and said "Do it! I wanna see if they'd kick you out!" lol so funny!

Sorry for the random crazy letter. But life is random and crazy so all is well! Until next week!

XOXO

Sorella Smedley 

PS-Pray I don't say anymore totally awkward things during the lessons lololol

PPS- A literal bat may or may not have flown into the auditorium during our devotional Tuesday and I nearly peed my pants because it was swooping!

PPPS -Our tripanionship was at ShoTab Sunday night and we came back and realized we'd forgotten to unlock our room... so that's the awkward story of the time we locked ourselves out and had to talk to the front desk lol. what even?!     Quick explanation- annoying girls kept singing really off key in the shower and we could hear it from our rooms, so now our entire district showers at the same time and sings from a setlist of disney songs and its great. Calling it "ShoTab" was my idea lol!

Cheesing it at the MTC

#missionbadgeselfie

I love it here!

I'm the official 'hair do-er' for my District

Sis. LoRusso & I at the temple

Anziano Alexander & Hansen doing "Rocky" Impressions LOL

Sis. Anderson & I being dorks with the statue bc why not?

Pranking!

There's always TIME for Chastity:)