1.12.15

Masaya ang Aking Kasama!

Well first off my new companion is great! I love Elder Lopez! He's so funny! We have a fun time together while we're out working! He has this great laugh that's contagious! If he starts laughing so do I! I can't help it! It's great! We were in the middle of a lesson the other day and the member who worked with us kept saying the word "kwan" which has like no meaning. It's just like saying "umm" probably. He would say like "Nagapamatuod ako nga kwan" which means "I testify that umm" it was hilarious. So after like 5 times of hime saying that Elder Lopez just started laughing and then so did I. It was great, everyone else starting laughing too!

Our MLC this past week was pretty great. At one point President asked "Who here will be going home before July 1?" As we raised our hands, so did President. Then he laughed and said "I'm raising my hand too!" President's getting excited to go home as well! He's got new grandkids he still needs to meet! But really MLC was great. So much to learn. Then our training on Thursday we're we trained our Zone on the things we learned from MLC went pretty well as well! We had a baptism on Saturday for Sister Delia Guinanao! She's been a long time investigator and we wee blessed to be able to finally baptize her! She was so happy it was great!

Well I don't really have anything else too crazy to say! Other than Elder Lopez and I are really enjoying our companionship and we're excited to keep working together!

I love you all and hope you have a wonderful week. Sorry my message is so short. Next week I hope to hear of your insights from the Book of Mormon, and I will share mine as well!

1.5.15

Happy 2015!

Happy New Year Everyone! I hope you all had a good holiday season! New Year was very loud here in Bacolod! New Year Celebration consists of lots of explosions. They have fireworks forever! It's not like out 4th of July either, it's just lots of personal fireworks at the house that are super loud and sometimes don't even have lights, it's just like bombs. So it was kinda hard to sleep on the 31st! I feel asleep at 10:30 and then woke up at 12:05 because of all the fireworks!

After I emailed last week we got a text from President Lopez telling us to go on a 3-day exchange with the Bacolod 6th Elders. I worked with Elder Brinton who is from American Fork, Utah. He's only been out for 2 weeks so it was pretty great! We were able to have lunch with Cobing family on January 1st and we shared a quick message with them and then sang a hymn! It was awesome, they were so good at singing it was amazing!

On Friday after Elder Pineda came back we got a call from President Lopez informing us that Elder Pineda would be given a new assignment in his new area soon. So we waited until Sunday afternoon for a call from the Assistants notifying us that he was transferring. So this morning he transferred and my new companion is Elder Lopez! President talked to me this morning and he said that he's been considering my reports for the last couple weeks about my struggles with Elder Pineda, so he helped us both out! Thank you President! Tomorrow we have MLC (Mission Leadership Council) and neither Elder Lopez or I have attended before. I'm now ZL1 and I have no idea what's going to happen. President just told us to read Alma 32 and that the two of us will be teaching a short lesson on Faith tomorrow, so that should be fun! I'm excited and nervous all at the same time. I always love going to the Mission Home! We have breakfast and lunch provided as well as ice-cream afterwards! it should be great!

I totally meant to challenge each of you when I called on Christmas to join me in trying to finish the Book of Mormon before I come home. That gives us 5 months. So let's do our best! I'm only in 1 Nephi 10 so I don't have too much of a headstart on you! I'm sure we can do it! Let me know next week if you've accepted the challenge! ;)

Love you all and hope you have a wonderful week! :)

12.29.14

Manigong Bagong Taon! #2

Christmas was great! It was so good to see all of your faces and hear your voices! For those of you who didn't join the call, I will see your face and hear your voice in just a few months! :)

Christmas here in Bacolod was great! We spent the 24th at Bishops house, dinner was great. I ate so much food, the main course was DUCK! It was actually pretty good. They just kept giving me food I was so full! It was great too because I poured my juice into my cup and somehow it ended up all over the table, turns out there was a hold in the bottom of my glass cup! It was great, my rice turned red!

After the Christmas call we went and visited a few families and also got fed pretty well! We visited the the 1st Counselor of the Stake Presidency's family, the Cobings, President wasn't there and neither was his wife, but 4 of his kids were and they gave us a ton of food and cooked us more while we were eating! it was great! Then we visited the Magallanes family, her youngest son is currently serving his mission in the California Long Beach Mission, so that's pretty cool! She also fed us a bunch of food. I was so full after that my stomach hurt for a few days! But now I'm all good!

We were able to meet a family of new investigators this last week! A whole family, the Algones Family, there's like 7 or 8 of them! They're so interested and I'm so excited to go back and visit them! That was a big boost to our week that wasn't super great work wise. So hopefully this next week will be even better! :)

I love you all and I hope that you have a Manigong Bagong Taon! :)

12.22.14

Bacolod 1st Ward

So it's kinda crazy being here in the city. The work is definitely not the same as the mountain. I really kinda miss the mountain. But I'll make the best of my time here in the Bacolod 1st Ward. It's kinda crazy because the Mission Office is part of my area. So it's kinda nice, I still haven't gotten my package because some things have been held up because of the storm a couple weeks ago, but whenever it gets here I can just go to the office myself and get it so that's awesome!

The work here is much much slower than in the mountains. The people here have a lot more things to occupy themselves with so they aren't quite as open to the Gospel as they are in the mountains, but it is what it is. The Ward is great. Our Bishop is great, Our Ward Mission Leader and his Assistants are great as well. So we have all the tools we need. We just need to put it all together to get the best results. Unfortunately we don't have a baptism this Christmas. Which I'm really disappointed about. To be honest it isn't our work. Since both of us are new here in the area. When Elder Pineda got here the week before I did his companion told him that we had 3 on Christmas. But since Elder Pineda got here none of them have gone to Church. This transfer is also going to be a bit rough because Elder Pineda is in his last transfer now, and he is not the most obedient to the Mission Rules. However we are about to move into another apartment with another companionship so hopefully those things stop when he realizes there's now 3 set's of eyes watching him and not just me. I really like Elder Pineda, he's super great to talk to and when we teach. Just the disobedience I think is taking a toll on our work. So I hope that gets fixed! I just hate to be the one to tell my companion he needs to change. Especially when he's older than me in the mission! Hopefully it all works out!

Other than that, I am super excited to Skype with y'all on Thursday! :) I can't wait to see your lovely faces! Should be around 10 am my time which I think is like what 7ish there? I'll leave it up to you to figure it out! haha I can't remember if it's a 14 hour or 15 hour difference! Other than that I'm doing great! I love you all and hope you all have a wonderful Christmas! :)

12.15.14

Transfer Day!

Well today, like you may have already noticed, was transfer day. And I was transferred. President Lopez attended our Stake Conference yesterday, and before we started he called Elder Manu and Me in to talk with him. He at the time tought that we were the Zone Leaders for some reason and explained to us that the Zone Leaders were going to be involved in Transfer Calls this transfer and that we need to call the missionaries in our Zone. At that time I reminded President that we weren't the Zone Leaders to which he just laughed, realizing his mistake! It was kinda funny. So that he just proceeded to tell me himself that was going to transfer. He also informed me that I would be a new Zone Leader! :| Crazy hahha

But we were able to have the wedding for Jear and Marissa this past weekend after a lot of stressful problems that eventually worked themselves out with scheduling problems. We also were able to have the baptism of Marissa and Alma. It went fairly well as well!

I am now assigned here in the Bacolod 1st Ward in the Bacolod Zone and am a Zone Leader along with Elder Pineda! Hopefully we have a wonderful time workign together. He goes home next month! Well, sorry I've been so short, but I don't have too much time to email today! Hopefully you all have a wonderful week! Can't wait to Skype and see your faces! Love you all! :)

12.8.14

Crazy Week #2

So you all though last week was crazy!!! Well I mean it was, but this week was pretty crazy too. In the past 2 weeks I have worked for a total of 4 days in Sewahon. This last week there was the possible threat of Typhoon Ruby to strike the Philippines. It missed us but it caused quite a panic. We went on lockdown again just like we did last year for Yolanda. So Wednesday we had p-day. Then Thursday morning we had our Zone Training meeting and were informed of the lockdown starting on Friday. Because we live up in the mountain we were told to get the things we need and then come back down to safety. So after training we did just that. Went and got extra things and then came back to Sagay. Then Thursday night the Zone Leaders called and told us and the Alimatoc Elders to come stay with them in Dian-ay. So Friday morning we woke up and headed to Dian-ay and stayed there until this morning! Then last night we got a call from the office saying Elder Derecho will be transferring. The problem is we were in Dian-ay. And they wanted us to be in Sagay at 8 am. We still needed to go back to Sewahon, he still needed to pack and the only transportation down the mountain at that time of day is a motorcycle. So that sure made things interesting. So we made it back up the mountain and got his stuff. On the way down I held Elder Derecho's suitcase on my lap on the motorcycle! It was pretty crazy! So right now I'm just waiting for companion to show up from Bacolod. I have no idea who it is. Also transfer day is actually next week, so there's still a possibility that I could transfer next week! It's killing me. President Lopez is just unpredictable! I don't know what's going to happen.

Also the wedding and baptisms that were supposed to happen last week got cancelled because of the Typhoon, that again didn't do anything here, but it's better to be safe than sorry! Then this next weekend we have stake conference so I have no idea when the wedding is going to be or when they'll be baptized or if I'll even be here. It's really unfortunate. But the work goes on! Also this past Sunday was the first time on my mission that I did not attend Church. Since we were on lockdown and couldn't leave. So that means it's also like the first time in probably like 2 years that I've missed church, so it's kinda weird! But it is what it is! I'm excited to find out who my new companion is and to get to work and to go back and visit all of our members and investigators in Sewahon who've probably been wondering where we have been! It's literally been a week since we've worked!

Also new rule. We are no longer allowed to 'chat' during emails. Kinda unfortunate but it is what it is! Let's be happy we were allowed to do it for 75% of my mission! The last 25% with no chatting will just make coming home that much more exciting! I love you all and hope you have a wonderful week and enjoy this wonderful spirit of Christmas! :)

12.3.14

Wedding!

So this past week was probably the craziest week of my entire mission. After my email last week I went on exchanges with Elder Goodmansen again in Colonia Divina to Baptismal Interviews again! Our exchanges went well and all was good until we woke up the next morning and he said that he had left the key to the study room in his bag which he had locked inside of the study room! So we had a problem! So we called his companion Elder Eyo since he had the extra key and told them to skip studies and come to Colonia in order to open the door for us. While we waited Elder Goodmansen tried to go all Boy Scout of America on the doorknob and pick the lock. In that process he managed to break the door knob. Then Elder Eyo and Elder Cicon showed up. Elder Eyo was sopping wet because it was pouring rain outside and he had no umbrella and had just walked for an hour from Alimatoc. Then Elder Cicon tells me that they didn't finish all the interviews in Alimatoc which means somebody needed to interview for them (which leaves me as the District Leader to do the job). Also Elder Derecho called and said Elder Ferrer didn't have an umbrella and he had lots of things to carry so I just said I'll just go with Elder Cicon to Alimatoc and finish their interviews for them. So we walked to Alimatoc in a slight rain and got a little lost as well because all the places to cross the river were flooded so we just went all the way around and came up the backside of Alimatoc. It took us probably over and hour and a half. Then the baptismal clothes that I had carried all the way that had just been washed got covered in mud when the bag fell off the crate that I had set it on. GREAT! haha Then Elder Eyo texts us Thursday night and says they have more people to be interviewed as well on Saturday. So Friday morning I went back to Sewahon and got to work for all of like 3 hours and then I went back to Colonia Divinia with Elder Eyo to finish their interviews for them. It was just the craziest week EVER!

Then Sunday morning we were blest with 4 baptisms! :) That always brings a smile to ones face! Sister Lera, Sister Mary Grace, Sister Amy Chen, and Brother Bernie! It was a wonderful Sunday!

Now for the WEDDING! Sister Marissa (mother of Mary Grace and Amy Chen) and Brother Jear are getting married on Dec. 6 so that Sister Marissa can be baptized! We've been working on this for a while and have had quite a few road bumps and even talks of them splitting up, but now it's official! Saturday is the wedding and we're super excited! Sister Marissa will be baptized later that afternoon as well along with Sister Alma (great LDS name no?) haha It's amazing to be here in the Mountains, the work continues to go forward!

Our Branch President was informed that Our Branch is probably the top Baptizing branch in the World. The Philippines Bacolod Mission is the top baptizing mission, the Sagay Zone is the top baptizing Zone in the Mission, and the Colonia Divina Branch is the top baptizing Unit in the Sagay Zone! How crazy is that! And I get to be a part of it! It honestly has nothing to do with me though! I just happend to be assigned in the right place at the right time! In the month of October the Colonia Divina Branch had 20 convert baptisms. In November we had 28! Now let's see what we can accomplish in December! :) The Lord is truly hastening His work and I'm so glad and blessed to be a part of it! :)

I hope you all have a wonderful week! We'll talk to you soon!