World Cup Fever - 6/25/14

Hey everyone! I hear the World Cup is going on. Even though missionaries don't watch TV I'm still pretty updated on it anyway. It's a pretty sacred time here in Italy. Probably less now because we lost last night, but hey. When there's a game, everything shuts down... Going door to door is almost completely ineffective. Most people won't even answer, but we hear the game coming out of the windows. Apparently Germany is playing the United States tomorrow? I'm sure my family will be a little tense. Maybe it's good I'm out here instead!

It's transfer time again. This time "tocca a me" as the Italians say, or it's my turn. After six months in Bergamo it's time for me to leave. It's really hard to leave Bergamo. It's like leaving for the mission all over again. I've met so many great people and I've seen so much progress in our investigators, our members, and the branch. I honestly feel like I've been able to make a difference here, with the Lord's help of course. Tomorrow I'll be off to a city called Varese (vuh-RAY-zay). I tried to spell it American-like in the hopes that you can pronounce it. Hehe. I've never been there or heard much about it, but I know where it is. Go Google it! It's north of Milano smack-dab on the border of Switzerland. That part of Switzerland is in our mission boundaries, so I'll be able to go there on P-Day. Hopefully in the next few weeks I'll be able to send y'all some pictures of Switzerland. Die Schweiz. Excuse me.

Since I'm leaving, we've kind of been back and forth in the past few days trying to say good-bye to all the people I'll miss, i.e. all of them. I wish you could all meet these people. They've made such a difference in my life and hopefully I've been able to leave something with them as well.

I would include some pictures but my SD card is being a little wonky right... Either that or a year and a half of sketchy western union shacks is catching up on me. I'll try to get some out next week.

Our investigator from Bangladesh may have found a solution to his work schedule. We're hoping the best for him. Right now he only has a short break on Sunday afternoons. He works in a town outside of the city, but during his break, he takes the bus and the tram from his work to the Church, stays for about thirty minutes in the church and then goes back just in time for work. He's been doing it himself without anyone pushing him. This week though he got the week off and he plans to use it to look for another job. He will also be able to come to church this Sunday for the full three hours, so he's pretty excited.

Our Nigerian friend has fallen sick again with the flu... What a trooper though. We went over to his house Saturday night not knowing he was sick and he could barely stay awake. He missed church the next day because of it. He's doing great though and still preparing for baptism. He might not make it by July 5th, but a few weeks after that he should be good. All the good stuff of course happens when I leave!

Our investigator John, the one who got in the car accident and is off doing some physical therapy is recovering in a community very close to Varese. I'm hoping that I'll be able to stop by and see him! He would love to see me, and I'd love to see him!

My bags are all packed. We've got a few lessons tonight and then tomorrow morning it's off to Milano. I'll meet my new companion, Anziano Atwood, and then we'll head off to Varese.

Have a great week everyone! All the love, Anziano Simcox

6/18/14

So. Hot. Still. We hit 37°C, 98.6°F, plus all the humidity of Niagara Falls without the falls.

It's time to tell the story of what has come to be known as the Great Dough Scandal of June 14th. Disclaimer: This is in no way spiritual or uplifting, but it is funny. Ever since a member taught me to make pizza in Pesaro, I've enjoyed making it from time to time. To do it completely correctly, one should let it rise over night. As missionaries, we don't always have that kind of time. On the day in question I wasn't able to make the dough the night before, so I made it the next morning. I wanted to have it rise quicker, so I decided to put it out in the sun. We live on the fourth floor of our apartment building. Our balcony wasn't in the sun, so I decided that instead I would put it on the windowsill. We have a decently large windowsill, so I wasn't worried about it going anywhere. Fool am I. Quick Italian architecture lesson: Blinds aren't really a thing. Instead we have tapparelle, which are basically solid strips of plastic or metal that come down outside of the window to block out sunlight. Think garage door, but with six inch beams of plastic. Anyway, we usually close them when we go out to keep the house cool. Anz. Johnson, unaware that a bowl of pizza dough was out on the windowsill as he closed it, I heard the usual "thud" of the tapparelle closing, plus an extra "clang!" that only meant one thing. I ran to the window and pulled up the tapparelle. Dough... gone. All that was left was the lid. We looked in horror over the windowsill. The bowl was sitting on a ledge about two feet under our window. The dough however, was sitting on the two subsequent windowsills and the courtyard below. Because we're responsible, we decided to clean up our mess. Anz. Johnson got a scrub brush and some water and climbed over the windowsill down to the ledge. He was decently safe. It's a big ledge and he was holding on to the window. Anyway he's cleaning and I'm making sure he doesn't fall, when all of a sudden we see the head of our elderly neighbor pop out of the window below. She exams the dough mess. Anz. Johnson cringes against the wall hoping that she doesn't look up and see the missionaries hanging out the window. As if in slow motion, her head rotates upward to see Anz. Johnson on a ledge and me leaning out the window trying to clean up the mess. She asked what we were doing and we explained the situation. At this point, if I were her, I would A) freak out that the kids above me are hanging out a window or B) freak out that there's dough all over my apartment building. As we wait to hear the reprimand she looks up and says "Boys! Don't put dough out on the windowsill! It gets to hot and then it won't cook right!" Classic Italian response. Kids hanging out a window, apartment covered in dough, and the main concern was that the Americans weren't cooking their pizza correctly. Later, our landlord angrily confronted us and was surprised at our willingness to clean up the mess. He laughed as we climbed a ladder and hosed down his apartment building in the rain. At the beginning he was grumpy and by the end he was laughing. Overall, it made for a good experience and I also learned the correct manner to make pizza dough.

Back to the spiritual stuff.

This past week I've been trying something new. I'm keeping a tally in my planner of all the people we talk to. It's a bit inaccurate because sometimes we go for a while without having the chance to write the tally in my planner or I lose track sometimes. Anyway, my best estimate is that in the last nine days we've contacted about 350 people. I've enjoyed keeping track because it helps me keep an eternal perspective. Even if not every person stops to talk with us, I can at least say that I'm doing my part. And sometimes I can get home at the end of the day and ask myself if there's more I could have done. My personal goal was to contact 40 people a day. Some days I exceeded it, and some days I didn't quite make it that far, but the goal really helped me to keep going. I also saw blessings come from going "beyond the call." Classic missionary scenario: We were ringing doorbells the other day and it was about time to head out. We reached 40 people contacted conveniently at the end of the apartment building. I felt though that we needed to keep going for whatever reason so I suggested that we go down the street a ways to ring one more building. Person #41 didn't let us in but right before she hung up the intercom she stopped and asked, "Aren't you that church that does a lot of genealogy?" Anz. Johnson replied that we have the biggest genealogical library in the world and that our genealogy center in the church is free to the public. She asked if we could leave some information in her mailbox, which we were glad to do. The Spirit of Elijah is growing here in Italy. (See Malachi 4:5-6).

Our Nigerian friend was able to finally make it back to church, the one who walked an hour because the busses weren't running. He was very sick with the flu in these past two weeks, but he was able to return this last Sunday. He said he felt something missing in the time that he wasn't able to come. The members were happy to welcome him back. He is a very active participant in Sunday School and the members are surprised at his knowledge of the scriptures and life in general. He knows his Bible veeeerryyyy well, which is hard to come by in anyone. Although he's not 100% in his Italian abilities, he tries very hard and doesn't let that stop him from participating and forming friendships. He even used an Italian word that even the Italians didn't know. I watched him with two Italians as he was trying to convince them that the word he was using was a real word and the two Italians denying it. Finally, one whips his phone out, looks it up online, and what do you know. It's a word. Anyway, he is making his own progress and it's exciting to see. Right now his baptismal date is set for July 5th. We're confident he can make that. I'd love to see him be baptized on my birthday.

Transfers are next week. A large part of me wants to stay, but I've already been here almost six months. That's usually the limit. We'll see! Transfers are always a bit stressful, but usually pretty exciting too. Change can be good. I've learned to accept it in the past year and a half.

Have a great week. I love you! Love, me.

Morendo di caldo... 6/11/14

It's. So. Hot. 33°C... Conversion... *calculating...* 91,4°F. That's hot. Add on the humidity and it's even hotter. Spring has come to a quick and brutal end. And I'm really hot.

All of this heat is bringing back memories of Pesaro. That had to have been by far the hottest I've ever been in my life. This time I'm lucky though. Our apartment has an air conditioner that works wonderfully. After that realization, I'd like to get transferred even less. I suppose I'm too spoiled.

Fun events this week... Oh! Branch activity. In my time in Bergamo, branch activities haven't always been the most well-attended activities. For those that come they're great, but there's always room for improvement and "the more the merrier" they always say. We've been trying to figure out how to improve that. Missionaries care about activities because they are a "non-threatening" way to introduce people to the Gospel. Many a member has been found through ward activities. Well, a woman in our branch loves to dance. How could you not? Anyway, every year she plans this big night of folk dancing in the chapel. She hires a musician who plays the guitar and the harmonica at the same time. Che talento! We came to help her set up and stayed to see what would happen. For the first hour or so of the activity there was only a group of five or six people. She was teaching them dance steps in preparation for the actual event. It was amusing to watch. After a while, one of them asked a question about the church. This turned into a lovely Gospel conversation in which the member taught them all about the Restoration and the Book of Mormon in a completely natural way. She had it all covered. At the end she threw in "and these are the missionaries, who would love to tell you more if you're interested." That is the ideal situation. Once we got around to the actual activity, there were at least eighty people there, about half of whom had never been to the church before. We set out a table of pamphlets and pass-along cards next to the food (tricky, I know) that got put to good use. We had several opportunities to teach a bit about the Church and about the Plan of Salvation. Overall, the secret to a good branch activity: the members are behind it with the missionaries running behind to catch up, instead of the other way around.

We've had an investigator named that for most of my time in Bergamo has been fluctuating between progressing and not. This past transfer it's been more towards the "not progressing" side of things. It seemed to us that we were pulling out all of the stops and nothing was working. The branch is very concerned about his progress, but we haven't had much to tell them because it's been difficult to see him, let alone teach him. Last week though after some prayerful consideration we came to the conclusion that he needed to understand the Restoration more. It seemed strange because to us there seemed to be much bigger problems blocking him than that. We went ahead anyway and planned a Restoration lesson with a focus on Apostasy and Restoration of the Priesthood. A large part of the lesson was reading most of 1 Nephi 13. He usually doesn't like to spend large portions of our lesson reading, but this time he was genuinely interested. We read from verse twenty onward and explained things along the way. He was so engrossed in the reading that he got mad when we tried to finish reading, insisting that we finish the chapter. He now has a much greater understanding of the Restoration. He was able to explain it in his own words and with his own conviction, whereas before he struggled to see a difference between the Church of Jesus Christ and any other church.

There's the update for now. I hope you all stay cool. I'll try to do the same. Although "if it ain't sweatin' it ain't workin'."

All the love, Anziano Simcox

Picture: I couldn't make it greener if I tried.

6/4/14

Another Wednesday in paradise. Well, Bergamo... but it's Italy so that counts for something right?

Weather report: Rain decided to mess up life these past few days. It's also very hot. 24 celsius, whatever that converts to. Actually that's not terribly hot, but the humidity adds on to it. Good ol' Ohio... err. Italy.

In Italy there exists something called a bidone. The first definition is a garbage can, at least that's what Google translate will tell you. When used colloquially however, to give someone a "bidone" means to set an appointment with them and then not show up to that appointment. As missionaries, we become well-acquainted with this phrase. To me the concept doesn't make a lot of sense. If you don't want to see me, just tell me you don't want to see me. Everyone saves time. Anyway, there were quite a few bidoni this past week. It was a holiday in Italy, although of what I'm still not sure. Then it was also raining.

One positive thing that comes from a bidone however is that more time is now opened up to find other people to teach. The thought process is "well, if they don't want to be taught, we'll go find someone who does want to be taught!" Sunday night was pretty slow, so we decided to go ring some doorbells; classic Mormon missionary right? Although in Italy it's different than you would think because every apartment building is gated and to get in you have to ring the intercom. Some apartment buildings have 6 apartments, and some have 50. In big cities like Milano there can even be 100-200 apartments in one complex. So, the trick is ring an intercom and hope that they will either buzz you in without asking who it is or that they'll take pity on you and let you in with the promise that you won't buzz their door. Sometimes people get really mad when they find us at their doorstep, or even just at the intercom. Every now and then you'll find that super angry guy who threatens to call the police and even more rarely the guy who actually does. We have permission from the state to ring doorbells though, so the worst that happens is the police come, check our documents, we have a chuckle, and then we ring the next doorbell.

I know I sound like just another conman selling some sort of knock-off Windex, but I promise that what I have is much more valuable. No, it's a very rewarding experience. Anyway, we had entered into a building and we started from the top floor and worked our way down. I would say that every other door, we had a positive encounter in which we were able to at least hand out a card or a pamphlet. We had a nice chat with a very nice Italian woman who really needed it. She actually wanted to let us in, but we couldn't go in because she was alone in the house so we just talked for a while on the doorstep. In another building, the tenents were just as nice. We handed out more material and we even found a new investigator, a teenager who had read online about Mormons and was curious to learn more. Overall it was a very productive session of door-knocking and my testimony of it has grown.

That's the big experience this week. Another cool experience: Last week we had an Italian man walk into church in the middle of Sunday School. He asked if there was a way he could learn more about the Church. We were happy to help. This Sunday he came again. He has a Book of Mormon and a pamphlet which he's thoroughly studied. He participates in class and loves the service. It's been hard to meet with him so far to actually teach him, but he's doing a lot of study on his own and hopefully his work schedule will clear up so that he can start meeting with us. He read about Mormons online and was really curious, so he just showed up! That definitely doesn't happen every week, so we were really excited to see him.

That's the life of Anziano Simcox. Find, teach, baptize as I always say.

I love you all. Vi voglio bene. Cari saluti, Anziano Simcox

Picture: The Anziani of Bergamo. Typical characteristics too-- the four clowns having a grand old time and the zone leaders on the side "innocently" scheming.

5/28/14

Welllllllllllll. Another week! I'm feeling old lately.

Bergamo is so great. It's been a great week in my opinion.

Cool story. Sunday is obviously a missionary's most important day. The Sabbath is normally a day of rest, but I think I work more. Hah. The work of the Lord never ends! Anyway, it's always a big push to get investigators (and members of course) to church. If they don't come to church, they don't experience all the things we're teaching them. There is a major difference in comprehension between the investigators that attend church and the ones that don't. Plus, you can't get baptized if you're not coming to church. This Sunday, there was some sort of bike rally in Bergamo, so most of the streets were blocked off and traffic was a huge problem. Most people that live inside of the city don't own cars and just use the public transportation instead. Well, with this big rally, conveniently happening at the same time as church, it was a little more difficult than usual to get to church. One of our investigators however, a great man from Nigeria, lives just outside of Bergamo where the buses are infrequent, especially on Sunday. The past few weeks he's got the schedule down and has been attending church consistently. This Sunday though the bus simply wasn't running because of the rally. So, he decided he would just take the hour walk to the tram which brought him to church. Sure he was about an hour late, but he was happy to be there and the members were happy to see him. He speaks Italian very well, so he's been able to bond well with the members. He's also very intelligent and very involved in Sunday School discussions. He's loving the church and the progress he's making.

Our investigator John, Frank's son, had surgery on his leg this week and the physical therapy is going well. He should be back in Bergamo in three weeks. We called him and he was very excited to hear from us. He's already made a bunch of friends there in the community he's living in. He has such a good heart. He said that ever since he had his car accident he's realized what a blessing life is and just makes it his goal to be as happy as he can.

Arthur is still looking for work. Poor guy. The thing is, he has a good job, especially for a foreigner who hasn't been here that long. Even an Italian citizen would be happy to have the job he does. He's determined though that he will not work on Sunday. That's hard to do being a restaurant chef because in Italy, Sunday is the busiest day for food service workers. He is looking hard though and he will be blessed. As one member told to him a few weeks ago, "God didn't bring you this far only to turn His back on you. He will provide a way for you to follow His commandments."

I think i wrote last week, or maybe the week before, about family mission plans. Last night at our branch council (where all the leaders of the branch meet together) we proposed a branch mission plan. From the exasperated looks a few people I could tell that it was something that has been proposed before. However, we explained that it wasn't a list of numbers from the missionaries, it was a specific plan based on the needs of the branch. When we presented it this way, they were much more willing to be involved in it. By the end of the night they were very enthusiastic about it and came away with specific goals to ratify a branch mission plan in the next branch council. I saw especially the love our branch president has for our members. I learned that every Sunday he counts exactly how many people are at church, makes a note of every one who isn't, and then follows up on each person. His number one concern last night was the welfare of his members and then of our investigators. Also last night as we discussed specific needs of each person, I felt that each investigator was the branch's investigator.

I love serving in Bergamo. I'm hoping I don't leave any time soon. I've met so many good people here and I feel like I've been able to make a difference in this little branch. Although we're not so little anymore. Last Sunday we had 60 people in church. That's hardly not a branch. That's a small ward! I love seeing the progress the branch as a whole is making and I love every person I have the opportunity to work with to make that progress even higher.

TTFN. Ta ta for now! Love, Anziano Simcox

Picture: Apparently, there were once mammoths in Italy. Who knew? We went to a natural history museum last P-day and this is the first thing we saw upon walking in. I thought it might come alive and eat me.

5/21/14

Hello. Hello. Hello. I am your beloved, Count... err. Elder Simcox.

Random movie quotes come into my head from time to time. You'll have to forgive me.

What's new this week... The aftermath of transfers has finally been cleaned up. It was a little more precarious than usual. The new missionaries were supposed to arrive on Thursday, but they ended up not arriving until Saturday. They got to the Chicago airport and apparently there was a fire, so their flight to Europe was cancelled. They had to go back to the MTC and fly out again two days later. They were so exhausted when they finally got to Italy. An Elder in our zone was supposed to be receiving a new missionary, so he was our temporary companion for a few days. I forgot what it's like to serve in three. I'm grateful I'm only in two. Although, being in three works great for contacting people on really wide streets. On the skinnier ones we look more like FBI agents trying to interrogate people.

As missionary work goes, it's taken a bit of a different turn. We were hoping that our man from Bangladesh would be baptized this week, but his work schedule changed at the last minute and now he has to work every Sunday... Obviously that presents a bit of a problem. He's been looking around for a new job that will allow him to not work on Sunday. The hard thing is that he is a cook in a restaurant. Here in Italy, restaurants are busiest on Sunday, so if he were to ask for Sundays off they would fire him without a second thought. He's looking hard now though. We've run into him a couple times looking for work as we've been trekking around Bergamo. He's got such a good heart and he really just wants to follow Jesus Christ.

John, Frank's son, is going off to have an operation tomorrow on his leg. He was in a car accident a few years ago that's made it hard for him to walk. He'll be gone for about a month as he does the surgery and goes through physical therapy there. He's taken the Book of Mormon with him and he set a goal to read it all while he's recovering. What a goal! He's looking forward to being baptized when he gets back.

Other than that, our goal lately as a mission has been to focus more on the family. We've started using a new pamphlet about family history that talks about the importance of temple work and allows space to record family stories, information, and pictures. I highly recommend it for members. You might have seen it mentioned in General Conference. I think Elder Cook mentioned it. Anyway, it's great, especially for me. I love family history. Being able to speak Italian will be able to help me a lot with my family history once I come home. Another thing we've been doing is going around to the members in our branch and inviting them to create a family mission plan. Again, that's another thing I encourage all members to do. A family mission plan is simply a list of several specific things that the family can do together and individually to contribute to their personal missionary work. It is a commandment after all to share the Gospel! We don't need a nametag or a working knowledge proselyting to do it. All it takes is the desire. I've heard some great ideas as we've been visiting families. Some people suggesting always keeping a Book of Mormon in the car's glovebox. Another one was to invite friends to Family Home Evening once a month or to look for ways to do service in the community. There is a lot of simple ways in which ordinary people can contribute to the work of salvation.

There's my two cents for today. You all are great. I love you a ton. Love, Anziano Simcox.

Transfer 11! - 5/14/14

Here's the start of transfer eleven. I'll be staying for at least another six weeks in Bergamo. I'm content. I love Bergamo and I love my companion. What more can I ask? So, when it's all said and done, that'll be at least six months in Bergamo! It doesn't seem like it at all. I feel like I got here two months ago at max. I've been here four and a half. Time won't go any slower I'm afraid. A mission is sixteen transfers, so with the start of transfer eleven I'm finding myself on the older side of things.

Our zone is changing quite a bit. We'll be getting several new faces, including a "greenie" fresh from the States. That'll be a ton of fun! New missionaries have so much enthusiasm.

Today for Preparation Day we went to Sirmione, a lakeside city on Lago di Garda, one of the biggest lakes in Italy. It used to be a fortress however long ago. Now it's turned into more of a tourist attraction, but it was still fun to go see it, take some pictures, and "storm the castle" if you will, i.e. pay the two Euro entrance fee. 

There was a baptism in Bergamo 3. The sisters' investigator was baptized on Saturday. She's known the church for a long time, so it was a big day for her and for the whole ward in general. There were a ton of people at the ceremony. She invited a lot of friends and gave each of them a Book of Mormon. What a good missionary! Some of our investigators were able to come too and they really enjoyed their first time seeing a baptism.

I don't have my planner with me for some reason. I think I left it on my desk this morning... That's why this letter is so choppy, or as my brother would say it's written in Chop-a-nese. Usually it's so easy to just look back in my week, pick a moment, and write about it. I Skyped my families on Mother's Day. It was so great to see everyone's faces. All of my brothers are so grown up. One of them turns sixteen tomorrow! What?! 

On Sunday I had to give a talk in Church. The subject was the plan of salvation. The two speakers before me talked about life before life and life on earth, so my topic was life after death. At this point in my mission I feel that I can communicate decently well in Italian, but having a conversation is different than giving a twenty minute sermon. It went pretty well though. I was pleased. I was able to talk smoothly, even through my American accent. It's such a cool experience to learn a language. There's another part of your brain that opens up that you never knew existed. Italian has become so integrated into daily life, that the difference between the two languages is starting to get less and less. Lately, I've been mixing the two together, which gets pretty frustrating when I'm trying to teach in Italian. I guess it's a good sign because it means it's becoming more natural, but still.

Scriptural thought for the week: "And he [Jesus] said unto them: Blessed are ye because of your faith. And now behold, my joy is full" (3 Nephi 17:20). His joy comes from our faith! When we have faith and follow His commandments, He is joyful. He rejoices when we rejoice. He cries when we cry. He looks forward to our salvation and does everything within His power that we may inherit His kingdom.

I love you all! Love, Anziano Simcox

Wednesday... err... Thursday Update - 5/8/14

Hey! It's not Wednesday. Sorry if I threw your schedule off. I think we confused the guy at the internet point too.

Yesterday we had a conference in Verona. Elder Kearon is from the Seventy and he's the first counselor in the Area Presidency. For those who don't speak Mormon, basically he's the counselor to the man who heads the church in Europe. He talked to us about his conversion to the church and gave us encouragement. One thing he said that I particularly liked was "rejection is just white noise." It will happen regardless of what we do. Every missionary works through rejection, but we're here to find those that are ready, not to focus on those who aren't. It's like looking for a shell on the beach. Sometimes you have to go through the other stuff to get to what you're looking for. Elder Snow also came. He is the Church Historian, so obviously that was really exciting for me. He talked to us for a while about what exactly he does. Under his direction, the Church records its present history (I guess that's an oxymoron, but you understand) and preserves history already recorded. He has access to the church vaults where, in simple terms, they keep all the old stuff. He handles all of the writings of Joseph Smith and he has held the original manuscript of the Book of Mormon. He searches through old records to ensure that they have been properly preserved, recorded, and published. He stands as a witness of the beginnings of the Church in these days. I'd love to have that calling.

Cool story. Our man from Bangladesh is progressing wonderfully. He has a firm baptismal date set for May 23rd. Last week we taught the Word of Wisdom (the health code that prohibits alcohol, tabacco, coffee, tea, and illegal drugs, and encourages us to properly nourish and care for our bodies). Growing up in Bangladesh where tea is very much a part of their culture, we thought it might be difficult for him to give it up. He told us that he gets headaches and pains when he doesn't drink it. The next day he drank his last cup of tea and hasn't touched it since. Yesterday we taught him about keeping the Sabbath day holy. He has a job that requires him to sometimes work on Sundays. He wanted to change that so that he could keep himself in line with the commandments. Tonight he has a job interview. I wish that every investigator would understand and keep the commandments like he does.

Last week I wrote about our investigator Frank and his son John. They are Italians from Sicily. Frank we've been teaching since right before I got here in January. We had our first official lesson with John last week. Since then, John's progress has skyrocketed. Before, it was something he was mildly interested in, but now it's something that he is devoted to. On Thursday, he went to a Young Single Adult activity. One member picked him up and another one brought him home. On Sunday, he took aside a member, without our knowledge, and told him that he would like nothing more than to be baptized. Our very surprised member talked with us about it and we have now started teaching him. He is very excited to be baptized as soon as he can. He actually asked us how many lessons he had to take before baptism. Next week he is going to Varese for surgery and physical therapy. We have decided together that once he returns we will finish his lessons and get him prepared for baptism.

With all this great stuff happening in Bergamo, this means I'm probably getting transferred. That seems to be how it works. Hah! We'll find out. Transfers are next week, so we should get a call by Tuesday. As zone leaders, we get the information for our zones on Tuesday and call each missionary in our zone to tell them where we are going. I enjoy listening to the reactions from missionaries. Some are excited, and some less so. Last transfer, there was one sister who just refused to believe that she was getting transferred. After a few minutes we finally convinced her that we weren't joking and that she really had been transferred. It's always heartwrenching to leave a city, at least for me. Just when you make friendships and feel like you've made a difference, you're gone in the drop of a hat. That's the way it goes though. I'm not here for me. I'm here for those people that the Lord needs me to lift up.

Vi voglio bene. Alla prossima, Anziano Simcox.

The picture is a view of Porta Nuova, the main intersection of the city. At the end of the street at the top of the picture is the train station. In the opposite direction, where I took the picture is Città Alta. The green-capped building in the center left is one of the main churches in the city, although I'm blanking on the name right now. On the opposite right you can see the long strip that leads into the old center of the town, which is now all shops.