Notes About Nothing: There's no Place Like Rome For the Holidays...

Wellllll,

Okay so from the pictures you can see that the baptism was off to a rough start,

the power went out right as church started so the water wasn't getting warm. Stefano was freaking out about whether or not the post baptism lunch would all work out, which of course it did because we have the Relief Society! And all worked out well there and everyone is fed even though this week we probably had 3 hours worth of phone conversation and discussion about lasagna...

I dont want to talk about it.

Then they took forever to change and the guy who baptized him wanted to have this big pep talk and so they locked themselves in the bathroom and we didn't hear from them for an hour or so.

Then we sang a beautiful arrangement of Come Thou Fount and the baptism song which everyone loved.

Then the man baptizing him, who is giant by the way, dramatically stepped down into the font and Stefano followed and it was the most dramatic baptism I have ever seen...

cant explain, I'll have to reenact it for you.

But he bore an amazing testimony after and is soooooooooooo happy,

he keeps saying, "why did I wait so long??"

He is great and EVERYONE stayed for the baptism,

it was truly the Baptism of the Year.

The baptism planning took up most of our week but there were also other nice encounters we had, like teaching Achmed this great Muslim guy who when talking about the Bible said, "the Bible cannot be from God because there are things in there you cannot share with your children, or read [at this point he turns to Fausto, a member we brought with us, with a "you will understand what I am saying look" ]in front of the women..."

We got Slla Camp's permesso,

I still haven't gotten mine, and probably never will.

We saw my favorite girl, Teresa who just loves us and gave us Napoletano Pizza, yum.

We all love the Joy to the World banner you sent

and are doing our best to share joy and peace in this time,

it doesn't feel like Christmas in a lot of ways, every day on a mission is like Christmas.

Okay, that sounds cheesy, but it's true in a way.

So Friday there was another strike, which means that things are running but only every once in a while so we bought McDonald and sat on the train tracks waiting.

Then we get on the train and we are super close to everyone and I end up (I am only telling you this because it's my companions' favorite story) pushed up against this gray haired guy with my back to him, facing Slla Camp. And he points to her tag and asks about the name of the church, and I wait for one of them to respond because I am not even facing him and have no room to move, but they didn't really hear so it was up to me and I turn and look up at him, inches away from his face, and begin to explain about our church. Apparently it looked hilarious from their point of views.