Week #18 He Qualifies the Called.....

12/1/2014         Kumasta Family!

Getting a free ride on top of a truck

This week was really hard for me to miss not being at home for Thanksgiving :/  But besides that we had a really good week on Guimaras!

 

Thank you for your emails and for filling me in on life in Erda and for sending me pictures. Mom your Thanksgiving dinner looks really good as usual! I told my comp you always go all out and then we started talking about the pie and ahhhh man I was missing Thanksgiving dinner! Especially since Dad has your amazing mince meat pie all to himself with me not there! ahhh!! I'm jealous! haha Thanks for sending the picture of everyone at the table. It looked so good though and you all look like you are having fun. Darin's beard is intense haha!

 

I wish I was there to help you with your projects since you have so much time off from work this next month Dad. The grave marker you are making for Gertie and Maggie looks awesome! I've been thinking about our pups a lot this last week because of how many dogs we have around our house. Every now and then I'll hear what sounds like Gertie barking and It makes me sad :( Then I see the dogs laying out front all lazy like and it reminds me of Maggie haha I miss our puppies! 

A spectacular Guimaras Sunset

This week we had some great lessons and I'm also getting much better at understanding the people! Speaking is still difficult, but I am understanding more and more. I can teach the lesson's really well, but just random speaking can be difficult. I am understanding more and more of what people are saying and I can understand my companion perfectly. The hardest part is that the Filipinos often speak the "slang" and shorten the words, so I stll need to learn how to follow them. 

 

This week my companion and I got in our first real disagreement. It wasn't a big deal, but we were pretty mad at each other there for a bit and we ended up having to go directly home because we were so mad at each other. But we worked things out and we were best friends again by the time we got back to the house! We've done really good as a companionship gettting along, so I figure 1 time in 10 weeks isnt any big deal. We have a lot of fun doing the work together, so it was just a minor bump in the road that surprised me since we've been getting along so well.

 

Yesterday I think was the best day of my mission so far! We were fasting because we fast the first, third, and fifth Sundays of the month. I spoke in sacrament for the first time on the topic of tithing. It was a piece of cake to get up in front of everyone and speak even though my Illonggo isn't very good yet. But I did pretty good I think. After that I ended up teaching the Sunday School lesson on missionary work to a group that included a couple of our investigators, which was awesome! After church we did our monthly feast after the fast and I cooked curry and Elder F cooked chow mein and we had fried eggplant. The whole meal was delicious and I was so stuffed after so It was kind of a substitute for Thanksgiving. Afterwards we had appointments and we taught a few lessons that went really well. Our investigators were giving us bananas and mangos and we were feeling very blessed. Then we got a free ride hitchhiking on a truck to our next appt which was a dinner appointment with the member who has all the motorcycles--which is always nice! :) He always has his sons give us a ride home on the bikes and I wanted to drive, but my companion said to me "100% obedience Elder". (sigh) So I hopped on back as the passenger instead of the driver (even though truth be told I'd be much safer being the driver!). Then on the way back I was talking to the member's son and I told him how hard it is for me to be a passenger on a motorcycle since I want to drive so bad! But my companion will get "akig" at me ha ha. So we got to the house and the other two weren't showing up so we drove back to find them and freaking Elder F was driving the bike! I couldn't believe it ha ha. I gave him a lot of crap and we had a lot of laughs over it. That was a fun day!

I'm glad you got to feed the missionaries. I was really jealous thinking about how they get to eat my Mom's food but I don't!! :) They are very spoiled, I hope they know that! haha

 

Oh yeah I forgot to tell you this week we didn't have water or power in our house for a day and its been really cloudy so it had cooled the temp down a lot and made work so much more enjoyable. I'm still missing winter back at home. But it was nice to get a little break from the intense heat.

 

I still haven't gotten my packages from the mission home. It's driving me crazy! I am going to try again today to get them. If I'm not able to get them today, then they are suppose to be at our district meeting tomorrow. The dude who's job it is to get them to me has been dropping the ball big time. No hurray, but in your next box can you send me a microfiber towel and some waxed dental floss? oh and a big pack of M&M's too :) lol (Michelle: If he will ever get his packages he will be very happy when he finds out that the big bag of M&M's and the dental floss are in there thanks to his Mama's intuition! LOL).

 

I miss you very much and pray for you daily. I  hope you're happy Mom and Dad and don't get too sad with me gone. I know, since it's hard for me sometimes too, but we will find out that me being in the Philippines for awhile is a huge blessing and we are going to become so strong through this experience. The Lord always gives us more in return for what we give to him and I know that is 100% true. Thank you for your emails and please keep sending them every week. I love reading about how you're doing at home. I love you all very much! 

Love, Michael