Verona, Italy - October 20, 2010

So, we went out to Lago di Garda today for p-day, which is a big giant famous lake right here near Verona, and it took a while to get there in the bus, but it was absolutely gorgeous with a castle and a swan that tried to eat me. We ate some really good fish from the lake.

It is really hard for me to get up in the morning every morning at 6:30, and then even harder to exercise. So this week my companion and I wrote a jingle, and we sing it every morning when the alarm goes off, and it makes a huge difference. It's amazing. The only day I didn't wake up was the day we didn't sing. (Today, actually.) It is to the tune of Good Morning Baltimore, from the beginning and through a chorus. It goes like this:

Oh oh oh woke up today just in the way the handbook says.
Oh oh oh dreaming of sleep that I can't have, when I hear that beep!
That's my alarm clock. It's going tick tock. It's 6:30 and time to exercise.
Oh oh but I know I can cuz of 1 Nephi 3:7!
Good morning mission life! Exercise helps us beat the strife!
It's the way that we show our faith that there are those who do us await.
And one day these children of God will get baptized and then hold to the rod!
And we'll be right there to say: I exercised today!

It may seem silly, but it's fun, and it works for real, I suddenly am able to get up and exercise!

Also, on Friday the bishop (vescovo in Italian), called us to tell us that there was a wedding for a random inactive member from Bulgaria the next morning at Juliett's tomb (yes, as in Romeo and Juliet), and that he wanted us to go and convert the non-member she was about to marry. So we show up, and it is the strangest wedding ever. We are at a tomb of a fictional character, with some judge lady wearing a sash who does the wedding, and the only people there are the two getting married, one legal witness they brought, us two sisters, and the elders. So Elder Bartholomew got to be the other witness, because there was no one else. The lady started off asking if they wanted to exchange rings, and the member from Bulgaria said of course and starts searching through these thousands of different small bags she brought for about ten minutes, and never finds them, finally gives up and says that they will just do it at home later. Then the ceremony takes about two minutes flat, and then the judge spends about ten minutes getting Anziano Bartholomew's information, because he didn't have his passport on him, just his U.S. driver's license. Then the bishop and his wife showed up late, and the bishop was taking tons of pictures. And then Anziano Bartholomew couldn't understand what the lady was asking him and so his companion had to tell the judge what his birthday was. It was really funny. Then afterwards we went onto the lawn and the Bulgarian member had us take a ton of really goofy pictures, she was super excited, and then they wanted us to go to a bar and drink with them. The bishop luckily tactfully got us to go to a pastry shop instead. It was so weird. But we are going to go see them day after tomorrow, so hopefully it will have been worth it! What a strange wedding.

Also, Anziano Jones, our capo zona (zone leader) here in Verona, told us at district meeting on Monday that his grandma is the one who picked the color for the cover of the hymn book. Apparently she was working doing colors for the church. They presented her with a bunch of choices, and she told Anziano Jones that she looked at them and simply knew it had to be green. So green is our hymnbook. Thank you, Grandma Jones. How awesome is that?

Also, an investigator got baptized on Sunday! And now his sister, another of our investigators, is totally excited to get baptized too. It was amazing to see the change in her, and hear her telling us about how she finally came to gain a personal spiritual testimony this week of the fact that Joseph Smith was a prophet. She is so happy now already, and she hasn't even gotten baptized yet! And her brother is so happy. It is so awesome. And Sorella Tramacchi, with whom we started teaching them, came back to Verona with her parents this weekend because she finished her mission and got to see the baptism! Woohoo! It was cool to see her too.

My companion the other day was trying to say that it was just the beginning of winter, which is inverno, but accidently said instead inferno, which is hell. So instead of "it is just the beginning of winter," she said "it was the beginning of hell." Very funny.