1st Cycle Completed!

October 29, 2018

So, on Wednesday, I will have completed my first cycle in the field! Crazy how fast 6 weeks goes by! Through all my mistakes, my Tagalog is finally getting decent! haha! Understanding Tagalog is still hard because they speak so dang fast! But my comp, Elder Johnson, said that I am learning way fast, compared to most American's, and there was even one lesson, where he said I didn't make any grammatical errors during the lesson, which I'm sure was my first time ever -- even though I still don't talk nearly as much as my comp does in lessons! I'm so excited to be able to speak and understand the language well enough, to the point that I will be able to learn about those I teach and express to them just how much I love this gospel and how happy it's made me, and also to be able to speak well enough to just become friends with them! 

Last Friday, I went on exchanges with this Filipino, Elder Agustin. This was my first time leading the area, and it was kinda stressful, but it turned out alright. Something cool that happened is when we were tracting, we found this family and the father had just passed away 40 days earlier, at the age of 28. I can't imagine how devastating that would be. We usually teach about the Restoration of the Gospel, but I felt impressed to shift the lesson and talk about The Plan of Salvation. As Elder Agustin and I explained The Plan briefly, the Spirit was so strong and the woman started crying when we testified that she would be able to see her husband again. THE GOSPEL IS AWESOME! 

Also, last Tuesday I got to see all my missionary batch again because it was the 5 week checkup -- this is where the Mission President checks in on us and makes sure we're doing everything we're supposed to. It was so fun to hear of everyone's struggles and successes, and I got to see my Provo MTC comp, Elder Linton, haha!! he's the best!

Mahal ko kayo!

Me, my MTC comp, Elder Linton, and Elder Grant

One Month in the Field

October 22, 2018

This month has gone by fast, but when I look back I've done sooo much! Walked A TON! Easily eaten more rice than I have in my whole life! Struggled with the language, and also discovered that I was better than I thought at Tagalog in some things... haha! Oh, and also every morning for breakfast I eat oatmeal, and it's honestly the best! haha I love oatmeal and I have really mastered it! I buy these little cinnamon packets and brown sugar to put in my oatmeal. Then Elder Grant and I share this fruit drink called Tang and we just talk, it's honestly the best! 

But Mom, if you think that's all I cook you are wrong! I've perfected cooking rice! It only took me burning it three times haha! Also Elder Grant's companion is a native Filipino and has been cooking his whole life so he is teaching us some pointers! 

This week we had Zone Conference, and once a year a member of the seventy comes, and this happened to be that time. So Elder Teh of the seventy came and it was super awesome! He talked to us a lot about having the Spirit with us and relying on it to help us in our lessons, as well as to not rush through lessons. Silence in lessons is always okay! This is when the Spirit often works the most. 

CHURCH IS SO SO TRUE!!! I have learned so much over these almost 3 months and there are so many things that I do now in my everyday that I want to keep doing after my mission!

 Mahal ko kayo!

Award for cleanest apartment! 

General Conference!

I know everyone saw General Conference last week, but here in the Philippines they broadcast it the following week because we are 14 hours ahead of Mountain Daylight time. It was so awesome to watch conference as a missionary, and it was nice to finally hear some uninterrupted English for a couple hours haha. This was the first Conference that I can say I intently listened to all the talks! Super cool! We are so blessed to be living in a time of abundant revelation. The 2 hour block with the family integrated teaching system is a great idea and I feel like it will work really well! Also, it was so exciting to hear of all the new temples to be built! The hardest recent revelation from our prophet, to implement in the Philippines, is the name course correction. We always introduce ourselves as missionaries of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, and 90% of the time they have no idea who we are until we say the word Mormons and then they're like Ohhhhh Mormons! So my companion and I said we're never going to refer to ourselves as Mormons and we will just let them be confused until we show them The Book of Mormon... haha. It's funny because when President Monson was the prophet I couldn't picture anyone else taking his place, but now that President Nelson is the prophet, I can't think of any man more fit for the role. I know these men are called of God!

So I've had some things that I have not yet told my Mom about (sorry Mom) like chicken intestines, which aren't actually that bad. But I was on exchanges with Elder Grant's companion, Elder Rebuya, and he "treated" me to some grilled chicken blood liver and chicken intestines from this little side row bbq grill stand that was a little sketchier than usual. I ate it, of course, and it wasn't actually bad. Well that's what my taste buds said, but later on that's not what my stomach said. That night I was feeling fine until around 10:30, when I was going to bed, my stomach started killing me. I took some stomach relief medication and tried to get some sleep. I couldn't fall asleep all night and then finally around 1:30am I got up to go to the bathroom and puked a bunch in the toilet... GROSS! Hahaha... after that I was able to get some sleep, and then I felt fine when I woke up. My body still needs to adjust a little more before I eat more of that! 

CHURCH IS TRUE! Never forget it! Love you all! 

I realized I haven't send a good pic of my comp and me!

Gross spider!

It's Christmas time baby! Haha... From Sept-Dec they celebrate Christmas here!

Spiders in Lopez...

This week went by really fast actually!

My companion is the district leader, so I do a lot of exchanges with other missionaries and proselyte in different areas. Tuesday, I was in a city called Calauag. It was a super cool experience, but the kids LOVEEE Americans here, even more than they do here in Lopez, so they would follow us around and listen as we taught other people! Haha they always say phrases like, "What's up" "How are you" "Hey Jo"... They're funny!

The rest of the days this week were pretty standard! My Tagalog is getting better, but there's still SO MUCH improvement needed. Understanding Filipinos, as they speak, is extremely difficult. It's hard to know when one word ends and another begins because they talk so so so fast! 

Oh, one day I got back from proselyting, and as I was walking upstairs to change, I almost stepped on this HUGE spider haha! It scared me so bad! Elder Grant's Filipino companion told me not to kill it, but I wasn't looking to wake up with that thing on my face soooo... I killed it haha! 

This week was good! We haven't viewed conference yet because we don't get it until a week later! I did hear that church will only be 2 hours, starting next year, so that's exciting!

Love you all! 

First week in the field!

First full week is finally completed! It was a long week! 

On Monday, my companion and I traveled to San Pablo City for district leader training because my comp is the district leader. It was a 5 hour bus ride, and had to spend the night so we went to stay at the zone leaders apartment with 8 other elders. SLEEP OVER! Haha... we laid out all these mattresses and then played monopoly... AND Elder Wolferts took the W! 

Tuesday, I sat through the 5 hour district leader training, but then afterward we got to have real pizza, so that was good. Then we made the long bus ride back to where we live.

Wednesday through Saturday, we were back to a normal schedule and got a lot of work done. I'm still rocking the broken Tagalog, but I have faith that I will learn... eventually. 

Sunday, I was asked to bear my testimony and I felt like I was able to express myself really well! The ward is super nice, I just wish I could talk with them more!

I hope everything is going well for all of you in the states! The church is absolutely true!

Filipino Views

FILIPINO KIDS! haha... they're awesome!

 I rode this sick rail road cart thing to an appointment! It was like riding a roller coaster!