Blogging from Baguio: This is what dreams are made of!

January 5, 2014

This week I celebrated my 1 month anniversary in the Philippines! That same day we had a mission wide training. It was the third day of a three day training and the Sister Training Leaders, Zone Leaders, District Leaders and Trainers were invited. The trainees (me!) were temporarily reassigned companions for the day. Guess who my companion was?? SISTER GOLIGHTLY! We had an amazing day! We went to my area and taught 5 lessons, found 11 new investigators and had a grand time while doing everything. I am super impressed with her Tagalog and especially her teaching.

OK, so before I tell you about our day, I really need to emphasize how rare this is. Sometimes we go on exchanges (trade companions for a day), but it is usually just once a transfer with our Sister Training Leader. You NEVER get to be back with your MTC companion after only 4 weeks! Super rare. Really.

So! I got us to my area! The second jeepne that we took told us it was 11 pesos each when I know it is only 8! But, I have no idea how to ask for change back, so he just kept my 20. Oh well. It’s 4 pesos. When we made it to the area, and got off the jeepne, someone said, “You’re Mormons, right? Come to my house!” So we did! We started teaching her and 3 other neighbors came over out of curiosity. One of them remembers being taught by the missionaries in 1989 (that’s the last time missionaries were in this area). She wanted us to teach her again so badly. She said she would meet us back at this house whenever we could come back! Sister Gerhards and I will teach all of them again on Tuesday. I’m so excited!

Then we taught Erika the Plan of Salvation. That lesson has some hard vocabulary! She asked a question part way through and we had no idea what she said, but we really wanted to answer it. We asked her to repeat her question like 4 times! The fourth time I caught the word “resurrection” so I just explained the resurrection in greater detail. She said it answered her question – I hope she didn’t just say that to get us to stop asking her “Paki ulit?”

We were going to a sari-sari store to buy Sister Golightly some more water. We went to a store that is owned by one of our investigators. She was out of water and heading into town, but invited us to her porch and her cousin Danny got us some of their personal mineral water. So nice! We taught him about prophets, the apostasy, Joseph Smith and the restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. When we asked him at the end if he had any question, he said, “I never knew of this Prophet called Joseph Smith. But now I know!” I think his testimony is a perfect example of what Christ means when he tells us to become as little children. Sister Golightly and I were so impressed by him. We didn’t teach him about the Book of Mormon because we ran out of copies! We were both thinking, “I hope she doesn’t go into the Book of Mormon! It will be heart breaking not to give him one!” Kasama telepathy is still alive!

Then we went to teach Violetta, the woman who came to church last Sunday! We went by earlier in the week but she wasn’t home. Today, however, her mom and 2 sons were home. Her mom is awesome! The first time I saw her, she hobbled over with her bamboo cane and hunched back and whacked some dogs that were barking at Sister Gerhards and me! She doesn’t speak any English or Tagalog. But, whenever we are there she is grinning an adorable toothless grin. I love her!

So, we taught the two sons and the nanay! We taught them about God and that He is our Heavenly Father and wants to talk to them! We tried so hard to get them to pray, but they are way shy! Next time, we will get them to pray.

Then on our way to Alvin and Imeldas, we stopped to teach a really big family: a mom, a bunch of teenage daughters, and two little boys. And an aunt was there too. They kept playing with our hair; even during the lesson a couple girls kept touching our hair! Two of the girls were really interested. The other two told us they were lesbians. Makes sense now. But hey, our message is for everyone!

It was such a blessing for me to be able to spend the day with Sister Golightly the day before we both got our new houses. I learned so much. I learned from her example and teaching style. I learned I know a lot more Tagalog than I thought I did. I learned how much I rely on Sister Gerhards! I also learned – again – that the Lord doesn’t make up the difference. He makes all the difference. I need to let Him make all the difference in my lessons with Sister Gerhards too!

Sistas Just Wanna Have Fun!

On New Year's Eve a senior missionary couple had all of the missionaries in our area over for scones and chicken noodle soup. They are so nice! They reminded me of Grandma Jackson and her scones and chicken soup. :)

Old men, little kids, people on the street, investigators, ward members... will come up and tell me who I look like. Look alikes for me, in order of most frequent to least frequent:

1. Barbie