Predicare il mio Vangelo: Sorella Hamblin's Journey in Italy: I am in ITALY!!!!!!!!!!!!!

WOW!

Everyday I can not believe that I am here. Italy is AMAZING. Italy is everything that you can imagine. Literally everything: the buildings, the sounds, the food! italians are loud and itmidating but once you get talking to them they are pretty nice. They all talk with their hands and practically yell at each other. The members of my tiny little branch are the sweetest! When I got up to bear my testimony on Sunday they were all cheering me on and helping me with words I did not know.

I am emailing from a train station and the keyboard is old and gross so sorry if I have a lot of errors. Plus it is telling me I am spelling every word wrong and I can not find an apostrophe anywhere.... haha hope this turns out!

I am the Montevarci area but I live in San Giovani, our branch meets in Inchiesa, and most of the members and investigators live in Arezzo. Oh and we have district and zone meetings in Firenze (Florence) or Sienna. Yeah... we are on the train all the time.

The work is hard. Like really hard! I am just starting to understand what people are saying. Unfortunately once I figure out what they are saying I can not form a sentence fast enough. But I knew it would be like this, so I am not too discouraged. In fact it is a miracle that the understanding is coming so fast. The hardest part for me is the fact that I am exhausted! I came from the MTC where we ate and sat all the time to running around everywhere in the hot sun carrying scriptures and only eating 2 meals - Italians don't eat dinner. And add Jetlag to that. But mentally I'm doing great just tired, all the time. But I can already tell it is getting better.

Have I Â told you how wonderful ITALY is yet. wow. I really am so blessed to be here. I have had gelatto 3 times and yes it is way better than ice cream! I had my first pizza today. wow. just wow. Every sister I have met here has told me that they have gained at least 15 pounds on the mission. But I am not too worried yet because I eat way less than I did and work out way more than I did at the MTC. My companion is good about watching what we eat.

AND MY TRAINER IS PERFECT! I know the Lord picked her perfectly for me because she is everything I need in a trainer. She is so patient with me and is so positive. She teaches with so much love and power. I already want to be just like her. She is so fun and pushes me which is good.

The work is hard but it is moving in this tiny branch. All the investigators I have met so far are from Africa. I think it is because they are super humble. They all are so sweet and go through so much to take care of their families. Also family is super important to them.

Something that I heard this week that I really like was when Adam and Eve were cast out and when Lehi left Jerusalem they both built alters to the Lord. Coming on a mission is kind of similar. I am leaving my comfort zone and going somewhere completely new, but i know i will be okay if I give everything to the Lord. If I show him I am willing to sacrifice and obey then He will guide me like He did with Lehi and Adam. I know I need to be patient and trust the Lord at this time.

Thanks for all the support!

Vi voglio bene!

Sorella Hamblin