Onto Week 3! I Still Can't Understand Anyone

Well were now done with week 2 of this transfer cycle! It's been crazy, and exhausting, we've done so much hiking(it's about 8 hours of just pure hiking a day), but it's been awesome because you get to see some stunning views. 

So I had a couple highlights this week, so i'll share those now.

 

First off, yesterday we had Stake conference for the Goa Stake, which was amazing. It's actually crazy how many members there are in this little zone, the place was packed and was like twice the size of a normal stake conference in the states. It's amazing how much the church has grown in the Philippines. Our small little branch had to take an hour ride in jeepne(which was short considering how far some other people came).

 

Speaking of our branch, I think I failed to talk about it in the last email. We have about 30 active members, and we meet in a tiny building with one room for Sacrament meeting, Sunday School, and Relief Society/Priesthood. One super tiny room for primary, and an even smaller room for the bishop's office. It's awesome little building though. Exposed rebar, wires, and all.

 

We did our first tracting on Wednesday, well it's called finding here. We've had to drop some of our investigators because their not progressing, so our teaching pool has gotten really tiny. We went to an area neither one of us has been before and did some street(or shifty mud path) contacting. Which was cool, we got to meet some cool people and see some really weird bamboo huts. Some wanted us to come back, so we'll follow up on them later this week. 

 

We also had exchanges with the Ocampo Elder's, which are the only other companionship in our district. One of them is Elder Johnson who was in my district in Provo so it's been awesome to see him. I went with his companion, Elder Nalbog and we got to see the Ocampo area and teach some people there. It's a lot more modern than are area, there was a lot more concrete buildings(in our area if you house is made of concrete cinder blocks your doing very well). 

 

We also today had are district activity, we wen to a little yet cheap resort up on Mt. Iraga where we took some pictures and ate food.

 

So a weird thing that happened this week was we were followed by a crazy lady. We were visiting a referral we were given by a member, which was a like an hour hike into the middle of nowhere into the jungle. While we were walking, out of the blue this lady carrying a machete and hacksaw started following us and kept saying we were her husband. It got shifty pretty fast, and the investigator didn't want to talk to us because of it, even after we communicated that we didn't know who she was. We eventually found a motor and got away much to her dismay(and screaming and brandishing a machete). That experience left me pretty shook.

 

Me and my compaion are doing well though, and trying to do the best we can with our tiny area, but were getting there. I still don't know Tagalog though, but I can understand people a little better, and I try to speak it when I can(it takes me a while though). Overall, 

 

All is Well 

Elder Bills 

 

p.s. I'll have to upload pictures later, the computer i'm using is being really painfully slow, and having some other issues, such is life in the Philippines though, i'll have some more next week.

 

And this is what he sent to Bekah and me: 

 

So we had this thing called white christmas, which is Dec. 8th, which is President Zapanta's birthday so we were all challenged to get 8 baptisms by for that date. We had four coming into this area that Elder Richards and his old companion had, and then we got three more Baptisms for that date while I was there. Yet none of them showed up to church, so now we have zero. The original four are the Chasow family, which is this sweet little family in a Barangy(section, kinda like a town) called Catalutuon. There mom was a member but had gone inactive. Elder Richards and his old companion though started teaching her kids. She started coming back to church and brought her kids with her. She has four little kids, Gerald, John Menard, Julia, Sarah. They were taught all the lessons and Gerald stopped chewing dip(he's only ten but that's normal here). But they didn't come to church this Sunday which is the second sunday they've missed so we have to start all over again. We had this other lola(grandmother, or elderly lady) Nanay Latica who also was commited to Baptism, yet it's a struggle for her to come to church because she runs a tindahan(small store, their weird, ill explain them later i'm running out of time.) So in order to survive She can't always come. We also had to drop some investigators because they wern't keeping commitments and proggresing. I'm out of time and got to go. Overall were struggling a bit. But we got keep pushing foward, keep trying again, and really, really rely on the lord. We'll keep doing our best.

All is Well

Elder Bills