Photos Hilongos Week 11










March 22, 2010 Hilongos Week 11


Jessie~
It takes really long for packages to get here because we only get to
pick them up once every 6 weeks, during zone conferences. (When all
the missionaries in certain areas meet together for training from the
mission president) So it may get here quickly... but I end up waiting
for it anyway eh heh... I'm including a picture of what happened to
the gummy bears mom sent me. :)

Eva~
Cebu is actually REALLY CLOSE. Only a 5 hour boat/car ride. Which is
actually really really close. Because Cebu is another island. Haha.
Hahahaha Morgan wore red on St. Patrick's day. :D

Mom~
You will have to have Jessie send me pictures when the bathroom is
done. Or of the house/gate. You sure have a lot of projects in mind.
=X As for the food in the Philippines... yum! Of course! Today we
ate Chicken Curry for lunch. It's a sweet curry and not spicy at all,
made with coconut milk. :) I'm lucky S. Taunan knows how to cook.
If you tell Emily or Jessie that you want to watch Twilight, just have
one of them be in charge of borrowing/renting it.

I'm attaching a LOT of pictures <3

Some of them are from when we went to "Big Momma Mary", which is
basically a giant Catholic statue of Mary on top of a rather large
hill. The scenery of the city below is Maasin, it's not Hilongos
where I'm assigned.

Some other ones are from when we went to the waterfalls the next week.
My personal study time here doesn't always include a waterfall in the
background. ;) We washed some banana tree leaves that were nearby on
a tree, dumped rice and fish/pork on them and ate with our hands!!
>:D It was pretty awesome~ As you can see, those pictures were when
my hair was 'all natural' and curly.

But like I mentioned last week, I got my hair done and it's now
permanently straight. I'm SO happy because now I'm "gwapa" all the
time now with no effort. ;) I've included a hair-flying fan picture
than S. Taunan tried to sneak into which made a great picture. <3

There's also this one bridge that is over a river that leads into the
ocean that we pass occasionally on the way to an investigators house.
Almost every time we pass it in a truck, (its far, so we always ride
there) I hold ready with my camera, hoping that THIS will be the time
I get a great shot. :P

I finished reading Jesus the Christ by James E. Talmage! HOLY MOLY
it's a very large book.
My next goal is to finish the BoM (I'm in Helaman, so I'm close!) and
then I'll start on the New Testament.

Guess what though! I'm completely fluent in Cebuano now!!


















Just kidding. :S
I usually get my message across, but It's hard to understand people exactly.

We had a good investigator, a tatay named Martin. He was a very kind
old man and he would read the assignments we gave. His wife was nice
to us as well, but after we met her she told us she doesn't want to
listen because she's Baptist. It's the first time someone's actually
said that to me. (so far... I'm certain it'll happen later too xD)
Usually the people just hide and pretend they aren't there. But it's
kind of nice, so you don't have to worry if they're hiding or if
they're just hard to get a hold of. :P

And I drank out of a coconut! Hahaha. It was strange.

Next week is the start of new transfers again! And my companion will
leave me... again. I will probably be assigned in Hilongos... again.
hahaha. I hope I don't end up staying here for 8 months like Sister
Holden did though... :S Or maybe I do want to stay here that long.
I'm scared of having to learn Waray-waray.

Alma 16:14 - Teach to everyone!!
Alma 32:6-7 - And then... focus on those who are ready to hear the message!

--
~the end~

March 15, 2010 Hilongos Week 10

Sister Lillywhite, aka. KAREN!?
YESH. Elder Erickson and I were actually talking, and we figured out
that he was the one you told us about, how his english was failing in
his emails home and you were so proud of him. :P

Mom:
I've never met Michelle.

Eva:
My ipod works. My charger I brought works on 220 and 110 electricity. :)
I just have been using the same 110 songs over and over again
though... so I don't know when I'll go crazy. We have a cool set up
thing with a CD player if we want to play music. I could probably
find a CD case here if I needed it. So whatever's more convienent for
you and mailing. <3 style="color: rgb(136, 136, 136);">--


~the end~

March 8, 2010 Hilongos Week 9

~Mom
I did get the valentines day package. I was surprised because it was
a really hot day, and when I opened the package half of the gummy
bears in one of the bags had melted into a large colorful gelatiness
mass. :P

~Eva
At least if Katie is going to stay with you, you will have someone to
be with sometimes. :)
And I wanted to ask you to send me burned CDs of music that you
liked/think would be mission appropriate to listen to. I trust your
judgement. I think I'd like best two years, for one. :D

Hi everyone! More questions~

"You would be just starting into fall over there pretty soon wouldn't
you? So in a few months you'll be going into winter, right? Your
seasons are reversed from ours correct?"
I suppose that's the way that it's figured out. But it seems like
over here there's only hot season and rainy season. And I don't think
they're very specific to time. If it's hot, they just say its El
Nino.

"So how was Zone Conference? Did you have to travel to get there? Are
you the only missionaries in Hilongos? How far away are the nearest
other missionaries?"
Zone conference was so small this time! We only had 16 missionarys,
two zones, for the one that we attended this week. S. Taunan and I
are the only missionarys in Hilongos. The other missionarys are
fairly near it's not too difficult to meet them.

"Do people ask to touch your hair?"
No, not really. My hair doesn't look very soft, being all frizzy and
things. But I'm actually probably going to get it straightened next
week. :P We'll see how it goes~ I actually think the Philipina's
hair looks so much softer than mine. <3

I don't have alot of time this week because we had an activity at some
waterfalls in Bato, the city next to us this week. I'll send pictures
next week! Love you all <3

DID YOU READ YOUR Book of Mormon?!

--
~the end~

March 1, 2010 Hilongos Week 8

Questions from Eva. :)

Are there ever any hurricanes or other scary things like that?
Apparently we had an earthquake somewhere in Letye just this past
weekend. So we were told not to go near the beaches because of big
waves. But I haven't noticed anything, we only knew of that report
because President Malit txted it to us. (Yes, we have a missionary
cell phone :P)

I hope your house is not made of straw. ;-) Do you feel like you are
on "other side of heaven?"
Our house is made out of cement and its actually pretty nice. The
nicest houses have tile flooring instead of plain cement. We have
tile flooring and a little bathroom and a fridge.

Are you allowed to eat fish?
Fish is well... pretty commonplace. Yeah I eat fish. :P

Today we went to a place in Maasin called the shrine for big Mama
Mary. It's literally a chapel on top of a large hill with a giant
statue of Mary on it. I have pictures that I will send later.

Zone conference is this Tursday! So I might be able to get my
Valentine's Day package. :)

Christopher and Janice are continuing to progress! Christopher has to
contact his wife in Manila so they can separate (they haven't had
contact for 4 or 5 years already) so he can properly marry Janice.
He's soooo willing to keep commitments and live righteously! It's
usually a big hassel (and requires money) to be separated, so it's
commonplace for a "live-in" situation.
We also had NINE investigators come to church this week! NINE! Our
gospel principles classroom is small, but we managed to fit 9
investigators, us two, and several new converts in for the lesson. If
there had been even 2 more people I think we would have had to go into
a bigger room. It makes me happy because I told S. Holden before she
left that I had a goal to have so many people in the classroom that we
would need to use a bigger one. ;)
Another investigator that we have was a surprise. He's attended
church 4 times already. S. Taunan and I thought he was a member!
Hahaha! So of course, we immediately made appointments with him so
that we could start teaching him ASAP. :) His name is Julius and he
had been attending the Youth class instead of Gospel Essentials, which
is why we thought he was a member. He also attends seminary! Yeesh!
:D

We met a sister who is a Catholic equivalent of a seminary teacher a
couple days ago. She was very um... forward in her proclamation of
how she only believes in God the Father, Jesus Christ and the Holy
Ghost. I responded "Bitaw" which is like "True!" but I think she
has a misperception of what LDS believe. I think she was under the
impression that we worship Joseph Smith because we said he was a
modern day prophet. She was gone before a proper conversation could
happen though. Yes, we believe in prophets, the same way that we
believe in the Bible and the Book of Mormon. But we don't worship
prophets, because they are esteemed only as servants of the true
subject of our worship, God the Father, Jesus Christ, and the Holy
Spirit, the Godhead.

Alma 40: What happens after we die?
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~the end~

I am a LDS sister missionary serving in the Philippines Tacloban area. I made this blog so that I may share my experiences with my friends and loved ones and anyone who may need to hear my story. My sister will be updating this blog with letters that I'll be writing home.