BIKES AND STRIKES

Hey hey -

I have great hopes for email writing in the future. Google has taken over my myldsmail email account officially PLUS since Cory sent me a link to his talk which was written on OpenOfficeWriter I was able to download the program. So, I am typing up my email on the program, saving it regularly, then will copy and paste it to the email. Actually, that might not be necessary, eh, because GMail saves emails as we type.

Anyway. Its been an awesome week. A not so awesome morning, though. I woke up at 5:30so that I could exercise and shower before being at the train station at 7 to go to Milan for my permit. All three of us were going to have to go and we had bought our tickets the night before just to be safe (35 euros per person each way! ai yai yai, thanks to everyone who pays tithing!). When we got there, though, we were informed that our train was not coming due to a strike. We were not going to be able to make it to Milan on the next train until 3 (2 hours after my appointment to pick up my permit and 2 hours before the last train would leave from Milan back to Pordenone). So we hung around the train station for another hour trying to get our tickets reimbursed. The mission office is in the process of getting me a new appointment to pick up my permit now.

On the bright side, there are basically 2 things that have made this week awesome. The first being that we are on bikes now. I thought I loved walking. And I thought we looked ridiculous when we were sprinting home at nights with out big bags to get in before 9. But biking with skirts and giant bags just takes everything to a whole new level of excitement. I have seen so much more of the city in the past few days than during the first two weeks on foot...turns out there is a gorgeous river just a few streets away from us and a lake not too far away also. We found the lake a few nights ago while on what turned out to be a wild goose chase looking for an address of an ex-investigator that the elders had commented in the records was “golden”. Unfortunately the Elders did not record the contact information very well and we ended up on the edge of town by this lake where there was a long stretch without any houses nearby and no lights.

I think pop asked about what kind of bike i have...A couple in the ward I had talked to finally gave me their old grandma cruiser bike last Saturday. We were all on our cruisers for the first day, then my companion's bike broke. Luckily I discovered that the apartment actually already had 2 other bikes that my comps just had not wanted us to use because they are men's' mountain bikes (this city just changed over to sisters a few months ago). So Ive been on the men's' mountain bike for the past few days and I am pretty sure my legs are 20x stronger already. I just ride standing up in hopes that everyone doesn't see up my skirt...I'm pretty sure it is a lost cause, though. I normally have on about 20 pairs of spandex and tights, though, so whatever. And yeah, like mom said, in Milan all the old women wore skirts (which were always surprisingly short compared to what old women wear in the US) and rode their bikes too, so no big deal.

The helmets are the most ridiculous part, though. I have started laughing out loud a few times when I look in a window and see my reflection or try to have a serious conversation with my companions while they are decked out with their scarf, hat, helmet, riding a bike with a skirt. Ive been debating about whether or not I should top it all off with my head lamp on my helmet for nights like that described above (where we ended up in the middle of nowhere by the lake).

So, second source of awesomeness for the week – a training session that we did during Interviews this week was about doing 'door to door'. Our zone leaders were explaining that we need to show people that we really believe that they need our message and make sure they understand that we don't just want to stand at their door until they shut it on us. They had us practice being bold, enthusiastic and brief at the door and just stepping in, etc. Not only have we gotten inside homes and given way more lessons this week, but with this mindset door to door has become much more entertaining. People's reactions are priceless. Some pretend to not be confused. We were inside one house last week for about 5 minutes chatting before the woman really asked us who we were and what we were doing. By that time we had already gotten her to gather her whole family to hear our message. Other people are completely baffled and show it. One family (that we ended up finding right after our wild goose chase by the lake,) even after asking a million questions, couldn't figure out how we ended up inside, but we were so confident and acted like it was completely normal and eventually we got them to sit down and listen to a message.

OK, so three sources of awesomeness. We got an entire family of non-members to come to church this week. We hadn't even had a lesson with them yet (and in fact still haven't). They are from the Congo and have 2 daughters in middle school. Speaking of Africans, I LOOOVE their prayers. They are so passionate and interactive when they pray. Those that aren't saying the prayer, but are in the same room always give 'amens' and 'Thank you Jesus' and add little things to the prayer when it is being said. I tried to add something to my companion's prayer this morning, but then I wasn't sure if it was only OK for Africans to do...any thoughts on the topic?

And a few very minor sources of awesomeness...I discovered some Crystal Light hidden in one of our cupboards in the house. Must have been left over from one of the elders from a package from the states. I also found some gum here that is very, very similar to Trident Tropical Twist. The only problem is that gum here loses flavor after 5 minutes. Did you really send candy in my package?!?! What happened to the 'Coalition of Skinny Returned Sister Missionaries'? And FYI, so you don't worry too much because of that fat picture I sent last week, I weighed myself this week and I have lost weight since I left home. Must have just been a odd angle, bad camera, bad lighting, I dunno. Oh, and on the shallow topic of my appearance...my French companion cut my hair this morning because she said I was picking my hair too much. She sounded exactly like Mom... “Sister Cozzens! If I see you picking your hair once more, I'm going to cut it all off!” and then while she was cutting it today....”I better not catch you picking it again (and then she added some analogy to baptism that I would just feel ridiculous sharing because only those of us with the missionary mindset would probably actually think it was funny).”

And of course Scripture Study is always the main source of awesomeness in my weeks...so here is a bit about what I have learned:

In following up with our advice from President Paya to work on increasing our individual Spirituality (which he defined as our relationship with Jesus Christ) so that we can be more effective in building Zion, our President at 'Interviews' asked us all to read the conference talk “To Acquire Spiritual Guidance” by Richard G Scott. In the beginning of the talk he asks a few questions which I brainstormed:

What can you do to enhance your capacity to be led to correct decisions? What are the potential barriers in your life to receiving spiritual guidance? For me, I determined that pride was the number one barrier and I think it is for many of us. The reason why prayer is so important in increasing spirituality is because it humbles us. It makes us admit to the fact that everything we have is because of God's and Christ's mercy and everything we need we can only get by their help. (quote from the talk – "as you pray with all the fervor of your soul and with humility and gratitude, you can learn to be consistently guided by the Holy Spirit in all aspects of your life"). Pride is generally what leads to contention with my companions which keeps me from feeling the guidance of the spirit. And Contention in turn keeps me from feeling the joy that can be felt by doing this great work. (Some awesome scriptures on the importance of not having contention – 3 Nephi 18:34, Alma 31:5). When we are not feeling joy we need to do a self check - see Alma 5:26-20. If we really are humble we can always feel the joy that comes from God's love. Oh man, I have a million more good scriptures to share on the topic but I have probably confused you all already and this thought is probably more for me than any of you. So, I'll just summarize...be humble! And be patient with others as they are trying to learn humility!

Love you all so much.

Thanks for the letters.
Write more.
Help the missionaries more.
Read the Scriptures more.
And send more pictures.

Sorella C.