Week 18

So the beginning of this week I started of with one companion and at the end I am here with a different comp!! This week my old comp wanted to say goodbye to everyone so we had been giving everyone visits in our ward and on Tuesday we stopped by this old lady in our ward that is like our grandma, she is an awesome member! She made us soooooo much food then at the end of our lunch she wanted to make us this hot chocolate because it was freezing out and she had gotten almost all the way done when all of the sudden she picked up the pot and it slipped, and all of this boiling hot water shot everywhere! It showered my head and back of my neck but it was all over her face and her arm! I turned around to hear her scream and panic! I told her to go and run her arm under cold water so she did. There was water everywhere, so we cleaned it all up. I was totally fine, my shirt was stained but it was not really that big of a problem. She even dropped her glasses and the lens popped out, but we fixed it without her knowing! hahaha! Well that was just a little crazy! She wasn't burned that bad and she was just grateful we were there! 

Then the next day I got a new comp from Torrance, CA which is like 40 minutes away from Huntington Beach and he totally knew everything I was talking about! He even went to the same Mormon Formal "Mormal" as me, like two years ago and I had no idea! haha! Well then we were taking a bus to this one member's house and these guys on the bus were just like smoking and all of the windows were up so we just like rolled them down and the guys walked up to us super mad with us!!! They started telling us all this trash and were like cussing at us in a Barese dialect that neither me nor my comp could understand!! We were just like, "Dudes, we don't speak your dialect!" So they started yelling at us and wanted us to pay them money for living in Italy! They were like super drunk too, it was pretty scary because they were out of control and there were like 6 of them in the back of the bus. We were almost to our stop and the guys were like standing up just screaming at us to pay them and they even were like running their fingers in my hair saying they were going to burn it off if I didn't pay! Everyone in the bus was just staring at us, so all of a sudden I said a little prayer for help and all of the guys turn around and the bus stops, right when the bus stops we just jump out and start running, luckily the bus driver saw what was going on so as soon as we got out he started driving off... I don't think we will ever see those guys again thank goodness! 

Well I have just been so grateful for these miracles in my life and I'm grateful to be ok! This week also my new comp came and was looking through the apartment and saying how crappy it is without hot water and with like only three lights working in the whole house, so we got permission to search for a new place, thank goodness! Well have a good week Love Anz Goode

P.S. I saw another car crash and took a picture this time. Hahaha!

Saying goodbye to Anziano Seiko

Week 17 - 4 Months have passed!

Well this week was awesome!! We have been working super hard and still trying to have some fun at the same time!  This week we had a couple of lessons! All with people who could be very interested in hearing more about our message!! This week we also received transfer calls and it turns out I will be staying here in Bitonto but will be getting  a new companion from Torrance, California!  It should be awesome! This week we also did a bit of cleaning around the house and I found this bucket of water in the laundry room that was like green so I thought it was a bit strange so I took it outside and dumped is out. I looked closer in the water and there were some baby mosquitoes and all of these nasty worm things in it just squirming around it was absolutely disgusting but I finally solved the mosquito problem I think! hahha! Oh, and my comp wanted to use the bucket to mop the house, so he said I had to fill it up in the sink, but then when he saw the worms he totally changed his mind and said that if I would have filled up the bucket in his sink he would have made me drink it hahah! Also this week in our English course we had over thirty students!!!! It was seriously incredible!! 

Last night we had a lesson with these two people in their 40's. One is a doctor and is super smart the other is his girlfreind who is a psychologist! At first I was a bit nervous to meet them because I thought they would just destroy every thing that i would say because my Italian is still a bit broken. Well we started teaching them and they were both super nice! She asked me why in the world I would leave my family AND California for 2 years to go on a mission? And that is my favorite question to answer! I told her, with all sincerity of my heart, that I knew the church was true and that we are all children of a Heavenly Father that loves us and who wants all of his children to be happy and to hear this wonderful message to be able to return with him after this life! Me and everyone in the room could feel the Spirit so strong it was undeniable. She started crying as well as this member of our church that was there with us, I hope she will remember that feeling for the rest of her life. I know that there is nothing that I could have said to them, with my little knowledge  to convince them of the truth of our message, but I know that the Spirit told her exactly what she needed to hear. I have come to see the change in my self as well as the change in others because of the gospel and I know it can bring happiness to everyone!

I am so grateful for this wonderful opportunity i have to be a missionary and a representative of the Lord! I am seriously so grateful for this time to learn and grow and change! If I have learned anything, it is that everyone can change and should change throughout life, but we should decide today what we want to become and how we can do it!!! Thanks to everyone for all of the support! 

Love, Anziano Goode

In this picture I cooked Sicilian food, which was amazing but the first bite I took was the hottest pepper I have ever eaten and I started coughing and choking and crying! It was incredible how terrible it was!! The member totally understood that i was dying! hahah! Everyone was staring at me! I thought the whole thing was going to be that hot! I got so scared to eat more! 

       The guy in the picture lived in Huntington and helps me with Italian! 

This picture was taken last night just chillin' in this member's sweater that she wanted me to wear because it was cold!  

Love Anziano Goode

Week 16

Well Thanksgiving was awesome! I was actually on splits with one of our zone leaders from Michigan and he taught me sooooo much about the language and about how I can better involve myself and ask better questions and how to teach! We even had a lesson with this one girl, Gabriella, who is 21 and her boyfreind is a member who is 23 but hasn't served a mission yet. We think after she is baptized both will serve, but I am not sure... I seriously met them for like the 3rd time and I already love them! It's crazy how fast you can feel this love for someone just by serving them and helping them! I shared my testimony about the eternal nature of families and about how important it is to endure to the end. Then I told them about my great grandpa who told me before I left, to hold on the the gospel with both hands and with all my strength.  By the end of the discussion, we were all crying! I have learned so many things! One is that, all the way until the end of my mission, even if all of my bones and muscles hurt, the Spirit will sustain me till the very last minute of it! Even if I faint the second I am released as a missionary the Spirit will carry me until then! Everything is going great! We will have our big Thanksgiving today and after that we will have a lesson with a mother, Guiseppina, and her handicap son who is 15. I guess the hardest part is trying not to judge myself and compare myself to other missionaries and to not think about what I will say next but just letting the Spirit lead me and trusting in that!  

My next transfers are on the 13th but we find out this Saturday! I am pretty sure I will stay here in Bitonto for one more transfer, but my comp has already been here 6 months! I am ready for a new companion, just because we have almost been together for 3 months, but its not bad! 

My Italian is coming along pretty well.   I have been listening to Andrea Bocelli music for language study sometimes and it is amazing to be able to understand his words, finally! It sounds even better now that I know what he is saying lol!!!! A funny story, today on the train, which I take every week,  the ticket man came past and asked for my ticket and I told him "I have a monthly ticket" in Italian and everyone just stared at me because they thought I was just an American dude and then these 3 girls and guy were like talking about me and saying  like,  "Oh my gosh, it's so awkward, I can't tell if he understands us or not..."   hahha! I just started laughing! it was so awkward because then I started talking in perfect English with my comp and they were so confused, it was great!!! It is so awesome to learn new languages and new things!!! Seriously, I have stopped judging people at all instead I have been asking everyone if we can help them in anyway!! Another funny story, yesterday I saw these three beautiful girls my age walk by and they were all staring at me. When they walked past all they said was "Voglio! Voglio! Voglio!" which means,

I want! I want! I want!  I'm pretty sure they didn't know I understood them but it was funny anyway! All I know is that people and Satan will tell us sometimes how beautiful we are and will tell us all of these things to try to tempt us into bad thoughts or bad actions!! If there is anything I have learned it is to not pay attention to the distractions in life no matter how "beautiful" they seem! You can tell Nathan this story to warn him that girls are all on Satan's team! We must respect our lives and all of the power we have!! 

Well I love you guys, have an awesome week!!

Love anziano Goode

Happy Thanksgiving Week 15

Well this week was great! I have been thinking about how many things I am grateful for and I couldn't stop counting things until i gave up! This week was a little bit strange because at the beginning of the week we received a call from the mission president which is always a bit strange and he told us there would be a set of sister missionaries transferring from our district to Rome instead! We were very curious why because they were some of our best working missionaries in the district, so president told us it was because in Rome there was a sister who finally received her visa for Venezuela and he needed the two sisters there on Friday, so that was pretty strange! Then later in the week we had an investigator who went a little crazy and told us she was going to hang out with a missionary in our mission which is totally not alright! Also this week all of our members were in Switzerland going to the temple up there! They all brought back a ton of chocolates for us which was amazing!  This week our members all want us over for lunch which means we will have a busy week! We are also having Thanksgiving with all of the missionaries on P-day with the Senior couple serving here in Bari. 
I have seen so many blessings in this life it is too hard to count! and every time I am thankful for a blessing it seems as though we are just given more!!! Yesterday in church we had a less active family there with the mother and her two kids, Raphael and Michaele.  They are both really funny! We were talking about soccer and their favorite teams and stuff like that! I told them that I liked Roma and they were so happy! The kids even had glasses that were red and yellow like the Roma team colors!! haha! They were so happy to talk to an American about soccer and ping pong and all of that good stuff! They aren't actually baptized either but they are old enough so I  am hoping they will start coming to church more and the mom will want to participate more in church! She was very nice either way! She brought us bags of snacks because she loves the missionaries, but I am hoping to help that family start coming more to church and understanding the importance of it in their lives! 
I know I have been watched out for here on the mission there is no doubt about it! Yesterday when I was asked how I know God exists I said because of His creations and because I know he has helped me in my life! Unfortunately many people here do not understand the basic truths that we all have a loving Father in Heaven who wants the best for us! We all have many things to be grateful for! Happy Thanksgiving everyone!!!! Love Anziano Goode

Anziano Goode on the Adriatic Sea

Week 14

Hello Everyone!! 
     This week was truly great. We wave been focusing our time on finding new investigators and it has been going really well. We decided to use our English course as one of our main sources because we have only had about 5 students recently, so this week we flooded Bitonto with "Volantini" or advertisements for our free English course and they have shown some real promise.  Tons of strange people having been calling us as a negative result of these posters but it's alright!  One person even started talking in Albanian thinking that we would have no idea what they were saying, but it turns out my companion is actually from Albania! It completely shocked the person who tried to prank call us and they just screamed and hung up, hahaha! Also this week we have been having a lot of fun on the streets when finding, for some reason little kids always think we don't speak Italian which is great and they start talking to us in English or a kind of English and that is when we invite them to come learn real English! It's really great! Well other than that we had three lessons this week,  I have learned though this week that we can tell people all day long which things are true and which things are not true but unless a person has the real intent to find out the truth and then act on what they learn, nothing will ever change. We can teach the truths but without the Spirit, a person will never be converted. I love being a missionary and being a representative of Jesus Christ! There have been times already where my knowledge has been tried but I can never pretend that I haven't seen the the guidance and help from Heavenly Father when I am in need! Well to everyone who is wondering, my Italian is improving and I can understand and speak most things I want to say to people. My companion and I are getting along alright and the work is starting to move a bit with the help of our members! As Thanksgiving approaches I think even more about all of the many things I am grateful for! Thanks for all of the letters this week and all of the support! 

Love Anziano Goode

Matera, Italy

The Caves of Matera

Streets of Matera

Water Stop

I miss burritos so much, I made them for my Comp and myself!

Week 13

Hey everyone!!!!

Well I don't have much time this week because we just got back from this hike that took up most of our p-day, but man this place is amazing! The more people I meet and the more places I see here make me love it so much more! I have just reached the point where I can understand everything that the people around me are saying but as far as responding, its still a little bit slow, but coming along! So anyway, the work this week was good we had Stake Conference yesterday and I was able to meet a lot of new people. Today we traveled to this beautiful city which is one of the oldest in Italy called Matera.  Check out this link: Matera,Italy  Well, I am pretty much out of time. I hope everyone had a good week! Thanks for all of the letters this week!  

Love Anziano Goode

Photo credit: http://europehotelbreaks.com/check-out-the-sassi-di-matera-ancient-italian-cave-dwellings/

Matera, Italy

Matera, Italy  "City of Caves"
(photo credit: http://www.johnvitophotography.com/newwork.htm)

Another View of Matera

3 Months!

So this week started off pretty slow, my comp and I were both really sick, and so were our investigators. so this week the work didn't go quite the way we wanted, but everyone has those weeks. We had Zone Conference which was really good! We talked about obedience and how we can be blessed through our obedience to the rules. Of course this is like the most talked about thing as a missionary because we have been given so much freedom and we are to represent the Lord in all of our actions. It was also very nice to have Zone Conference because I finally was able to meet some new missionaries even younger than me in the mission! That was quite a confidence booster seeing how I was just like them the first weeks and how I have already learned soo much! They bore their testimonies in Italian and I couldn't understand them because they were speaking very slow and in Americanized Italian! I just laughed to myself and realized that was me just a few weeks ago! We also had Halloween this week which was very fun! For some reason the kids here go around throwing eggs and flour at people so we had to be extra careful when we were outside because we were just moving targets as American missionaries! So we dressed up in our street clothes trying to avoid attention and in case we were hit we could wash them easier than our suits and then we pretty much ran to the church! We made it there just fine!  One of the members painted our faces, actually pretty scary, and we had a nice Halloween party with all of the members and kids!  Well other than this nothing much happened during the week, oh and we made it home safely too, after being chased by a few kids and girls. Haha!  Well it was a lot of fun anyway!  Thanks for all of the letters! hope everyone has a great week!!! Happy birthday to my little Brother Nathan!!
If you'd like to see more pictures of those serving in the Rome, Italy Mission (200 Full-time Missionaries) check out: http://romeitalymission.blogspot.com/ 
Love, Anziano Goode 

Birthday Present to Myself!  Italian Soccer Uniform!

Halloween, Italian Style

Cooking Lessons

Homes in Bitonto

Streets of Bitonto

Zone Conference with my Comp, Anziano Seiko