Our mission president is probably an average sized Filipino. Everyone is soooo tiny. And things are smaller here. I keep bumping my head on things. [This is in response to my questions about the photo of Allyson with the mission president and his wife.]

I was wondering if you have any ideas or maybe could send me recipes of things I could make. We need things to make for lunch/dinner.... do you have any ideas of things I could make out of chicken/pork/fish, vegetables, and rice? We have soy sauce, hot peppers, oyster sauce, garlic, onions, and a few other random spices.

Let me answer your questions.

1. We have a laundry lady that comes twice a week and hand washes our clothes. It is very handy! My yellow skirt is basically destroyed from the hand wash though. Here was her response when she saw my muddy skirt soaking in the bucket and we told her the mountain story "Oh, poor, poor sister. How many people saw?" haha

2. Normal toilet and normal shower. Can't flush toilet paper and no hot water. But at least we have a shower head.

3. Yes. We listened to Relief Society broadcast on Saturday and we're watching general conference next weekend. It's delayed a week.

4. My shoes are good. Although I wish I had ones with better traction. But they definitely have to be rubber because I literally scrub the mud off them every morning. But good news! There's a croc store in Baguio! And we're allowed to go to Baguio on a p day if we need to buy something not available here. So if I need new shoes I can just go there and get them.

So this week was pretty good. A few days ago I was really, really missing America. I would quietly sing patriotic songs to myself while in the shower. I decided I'm going to get over missing America and start loving the Philippines.

Also, I don't know if I told you, but our new apartment is in a great location. It's in our area and it's right next to San Fernando town plaza. And it's probably 1/4 mile from McDonalds, KFC, Pizza Hut, and some Filipino fast food places, and 1/2 a mile from the market. It's great. If it weren't for the bugs, our apartment would be perfect! Oh, and the fact that the water sometimes goes out, but that's mostly fixed :)

Have I told you about the market yet? I can't remember. But we always get our fish and fruit and vegetables at the market because they're way cheap and fresh. The first time we went, my companion said that she was really scared to go the market with a non-Filipino. I'm like a magnet. Everyone just swarms me and tries to get me to buy their stuff and little sad beggar kids ask me for money. The market has the most overpowering disgusting smell ever. There is so much fish. There is a huge room just full of fish. All of them were caught that day and some of them are still alive when you buy it! But they just gut the fish right there and cut them in chunks so we basically just walk over fish guts. It's great.

I haven't gotten sick at all! I feel perfectly fine….just a few random cuts and scrapes and bug bites. I also found out that I accidentally drank unfiltered water for like a week. We weren't using our filter properly. But I didn't get sick. Don't worry though; I'll be very careful about the water.

Oh my gosh! For some reason, last week in one of my areas everyone suddenly says hi and makes weird comments to us. They hardly acknowledged us before, but now for some reason everyone always stares at me and they make creepy comments to us. Everywhere I go I just hear "Americana, Americana!" And they all just stare at my skin and creepily stare at my blue eyes. And everyone calls me "madam". Just me. Haha, also, a couple days ago we were walking and this random kid just pops out of this trike used for transporting animals and stuff and says with open arms and a big grin on his face "Welcome to the Philippines!" and then just goes back into the trike. It was so funny.

Yesterday, I had a disturbing experience. We were getting off a trike and I saw a crazy man standing there staring at us. He just looked crazy. I could see it in his eyes. So I quickly walked away from him and I looked back and Sister La Torre was talking to him! I went back and he started asking me all these questions about where I was from. He was speaking in English, but neither of us could understand him. Finally we understood and I told him I was from Idaho and he said "close to Arkansas" so I explained where Arkansas was and he just kept saying "Arkansas Bill Clinton" "Arkansas Bill Clinton" so funny. I don't know how he knows that. So then he just is staring at me. Then he grabs my hand and I thought he was just going to shake it and he plants the biggest, slobberiest, kiss on my hand. Eew. He was so gross. So we quickly said bye and luckily we were right by Sis. Salvatera's so we ran there and washed my hand and told her and she said "No! We will find this man! I will ask the Barangay Council who this man is! Because, here, in Tanqui Gabaldon, missionaries are respected!"

So lately we have been focusing on working with members. We really, really need their help because since there are no addresses or street names here, we need them to show us where people live. Also, there are some areas that we should not go at night alone so we really really need members to go with us. So we've been trying to think of ways to get the ward more involved in missionary work. We are trying to make the ward stronger here. They really need leaders in our ward. There are a few (like 3 or 4) strong families that pretty much handle everything. The problem in the Philippines is that the poor people get converted really easily but then they go inactive so easily because they don't have enough money to get to church. It's really sad, but our mission president told us we have to focus on the people that live within one jeepney or trike ride of the church. That is a tiny percent of our area. The ward really just needs people who will stay in the ward to strengthen it.

Did I tell you that the lady that is really hard headed and that cried when I told her the scripture is the daughter of the 84 year old woman? We've taught both of them a few times. The older woman is Sister S and her daughter is Sister J. She keeps telling us to come back because she thinks our message is good, but last time she told us "I was born a Roman Catholic and I'll die a Roman Catholic." I guess we'll just see what happens. We're focusing on the C family right now. Their daughter is a member and they've been investigating the church for almost a year. But they totally refuse to ask God directly if the Book of Mormon is true because they think it's rude. Good news though! The husband finally agreed to ask God if it was true yesterday!

Okay, I'm almost out of time. Thank you very much for the emails. I love you all and I hope you have a great week. I'm going to try to send pictures now. It doesn't always work though. [And once again, she didn’t send any pictures; luckily the Dinkels had a few pictures of Allyson this week.]

Love, Sister Mortell