Mom, Don't Phreak Out!

We have been trying to teach the Filipinas in our house the concept of trick or treating. We said "yeah, everyone has free candy for the children except for the occasional grumpy old people that turn out their lights." haha, I’ll just leave it at that. We explained it pretty thoroughly. It involved a demonstration. The only celebration of Halloween I saw here was everyone going to the cemetery, more drunk people than usual, a couple scary masks and everyone puts candles outside of their house. We were having dinner at a member’s house though on Halloween. For a Young Woman activity, they went "trick or treating." It was cute. They dressed up and went to a few members houses who had prepared little treats. Too bad only one young woman showed up. haha So, it was just her and two leaders. Also, the dinner we ate was pretty good…sisig (made of pigs ears). It is supposed to have this uncooked egg on top too but then she looked at me and the other American and realized we probably wouldn't like that so she cooked it.

We had a couple creepy things happen to us this week. Mom, don't freak out. I’m very safe. We were walking out of a lesson one night this week and we were about to go home. Our investigator asked us if we wanted him to walk us out to the highway but we were like “oh, no, we'll be fine! Don’t worry about us." Then we started walking and saw this very small woman. She was way shorter and skinner than Maddy. I accidentally shined my flashlight on her face. Her face was horrifying! Her teeth were black and brown and yellow and her face looked so old, but her body looked like she was about 11. Then she kept talking to us and saying things like "it's late, you should go home." or "Mormons!" so I just thought "oh that’s a pretty creepy looking lady." But I just kept walking normally. Then my companion turns to me and says "she's creepy. Hurry up!" I said "No, she's really small. She can't do anything." My companion starts jogging to get away from the lady. I’m just casually walking. All of a sudden, I hear the lady come at us! She just starts to sprint towards me. So I take off sprinting too and so does my companion. So we just sprint sooo fast out to the highway. Then we couldn't find a trike so we sprinted down the highway a little bit. Luckily we were much faster than her. When we got on a trike we saw her emerge onto the highway and start to look for us. SO CREEPY!

Here's creepy story #2. So, we were trying to find more less-active members in our area. One of the elders told us to go to this place that is technically in their area, but it is very close to our area. Basically, one big family lives there. They are literally all members. There are so many of them that the place is named after their family. It’s like a whole barangay. So we went there and started to look for members. We cross over the bridge into their territory and all of a sudden, everything just felt different. There were soo many people and they were all just staring at us…mostly me! This place is just like this little city. The houses are just built on top of each other. It’s weird because the rest of Agoo isn't like that. So anyway, we taught a few people there. One is actually the grandmother of one of our investigators. Turns out she's a member. Also, she doesn't speak Tagalog so that lesson was rough. There are probably about 100 members over there. Then we met this old guy that seems to kind of be the leader of the colony. He was sooo mad. He told us that all of them got offended because the church wouldn't pay for this operation his son needed on his arm. It’s this whole big giant story. He kept saying, "He is not a child of God. Who could do that! HINDI SIYA ANAK NG DIYOS." He was soo mad and this happened in the 80s. Anyway, we were just very creeped out over there because everyone is scary and it just has an awful feeling. So, we left. Then we mentioned to some investigators that we went there and they were like "Sisters!! You should never go there, especially at night." Turns out this family is well known here for being pretty violent and creepy. They always apparently have wars with each other. Yes, wars! And they fight with machetes. People in Agoo don’t have anything to do with them, and good news! They’re all members!

We were telling the elder that sent us there this story. And he's like "yeah, it's pretty creepy over there. That’s why I just went there once and never went back" ok... so it's too creepy for him so he just sends the sisters in his district. That’s cool....

As far as missionary work, things are going ok. Our investigators have soo many problems. I don't know why. Something that I have always struggled with on my mission is disappointment and rejection. I feel like I have been rejected soo many times whether it be people refusing to listen, people falling away from the church, or people choosing not to accept the gospel even after they have had spiritual experiences and I know that they have a testimony. I discovered that since this had happened so much, I was starting to lose my faith in people. But this transfer I have been trying to restore my faith in people and believe that things will work out. We have been working so hard to get these people baptized. We have been doing everything we can. I was thinking about this a lot and I got a letter from one of my old roommates from BYU last week. She just randomly wrote me and said a lot about how she wishes that on her mission she wouldn't have taken all of that upon herself. Her letter was great! So right now I feel kind of disappointed and really sad for some of these people because I really love them. But I know that I did everything I could, so I’m not disappointed in myself. (That's a quote from Preach My Gospel.)

On the plus side, a former investigator that we started teaching again came to church. Also, we started teaching one of our investigator’s older sister too. She is awesome and has a lot of potential. I’ll let you know how things go.

There was an area broadcast last night from Elder Oaks for the whole Philippines. It was pretty interesting. I’m not really sure if they do things like this for all countries, but it sounds like the church is pretty worried about the Philippines. In my opinion, that’s rightfully so. The Philippines has so many baptisms, but soooo many less actives. Here are some of the highlights of the broadcast-- return missionaries should not go abroad to support their family, don't get in debt; pay your tithing, save money. Don’t just moan about your poverty, get out and get a job. Go to school. Get a part-time job while you’re in school. Fathers should not rely on mothers to be the primary bread winners. Don’t postpone marriage. It was very interesting to me. All of these things are very Filipino. In Filipino culture it’s very normal to be super dependent on those around you. He said that he loves Filipino culture, but when Filipino culture conflicts with the gospel culture, we must change. The gospel culture should be more important in our lives and families than any culture of any country.

Photos from Baguio

 

 

 

Agoo

Phertile Lizards and Phaithful Members

Hello! Right now I am emailing from my favorite place in the Philippines... the city of the pines, the only place with pine trees…..BAGUIO! And I just ate some calamari, root beer, and sweet potato fries. Life is pretty good! There’s no way that there is root beer or sweet potato fries in Agoo. haha.

I just love Baguio. There is a huge mall named “SM” and it is such a great place. It’s awesome! Obviously it's missing a lot of stores that I love, but the mall is way bigger and way nicer than the Boise mall. I love that we can go to Baguio on p day if we want. It takes about an hour and a half.

My hair is falling out as usual, but not as rapidly as it has at other times in my mission. I'm excited to get some decent shampoo and conditioner in Baguio.

Here's a funny story. Last Monday, I walked into the place to pay our electric bill. The guy there said "ay, Mormons. One time I watched a movie about a Mormon. Kolipoki!' then Sister D says, "Hey! that's her uncle!” That was pretty funny.

We had a pretty good week. The work is going well. We are still struggling to get people to church. People in Agoo are so kind, but also no one can afford money to come to church. We also had interviews with President Balledos. They just popped in at all the missionaries’ apartments. It was a little weird talking to him while he sat at my desk. Anyway, we don't use the two upstairs rooms because of the rat problem, but I cleaned them in case president went in there. In the process of my cleaning, I found several lizard eggs. They looked like very large mints. Several of them had already hatched...

Here's a funny little thing. Yesterday during sacrament meeting, the counselor gets up and announces that we will be pleased to witness the primary program. Then the primary president freaks out and says, "It's been moved to the 9th". haha. So then there was a whole lot of scrambling and finger pointing and embarrassment for about 5 minutes and then the bishopric ended up all speaking on the spot. We had primary program practice after church and I ended up playing the piano for them. The branch mission leader wanted me to be in MCM but then the primary people needed me to play the piano... everyone just fighting over Sister Mortell! haha. But I just saw into my future as a primary pianist.

Our investigators are doing fine. We have 9 IBDs. (That’s really good). Sadly, most of them are not coming to church!! Only one comes on a regular basis. So that has been very frustrating. We don't really know what to do. I guess if we're doing everything we can, there's not really anything we can do about it. Our one investigator is doing well. We are seeing some major progress in him. He likes to give us percentages to tell us where he is. Last week, he believed that the truth was 50% Mormon, 50% Catholic. Now we've moved to 60% Mormon and 40% Catholic. So that was a big success this week. He loves the Book of Mormon so much and knows it's true. He’s just having a hard time leaving the Catholic Church. He is scheduled for baptism November 22. Happy birthday mom! And then we have a whole slew of people that are supposed to be baptized December 13.

We are working very hard and everything is going well. The only thing I’ve been struggling with lately is feeling disappointed. I feel like we're running around every day trying to do everything we can and there's not a whole lot of progress. We are just teaching the same people over and over again. But, I am very happy and training is going well and everything is great!

Also, weird! I just saw someone wearing a Boise State shirt. I am so sad that BSU beat BYU.

Also, here's a sweet little thing. There is this couple in our ward and they do about 90% of the work in the branch. They are so devoted. They are awesome. They were supposed to go abroad (That is a very big deal here because the people that are able to go abroad have a dramatically better life. They can all earn money for their families and stuff). But they decided not to because they knew that the church needed them here. I think their devotion is very admirable.

Love you! Have a great week!

Running with Sister D

 



 

 

 

 

Another Phamiliar Week in the Philippines

This week was pretty much the same as last week. Wake up, go on a run with Sister D, eat breakfast (very delicious thanks to my jam, peanut butter, honey and bacon bits.Thanks!), get ready, study, eat lunch, go teach people, come home, plan, chat, go to bed. We had a good week though. We had lots of lessons. We worked really hard and we got the standard of excellence again. Sadly, we're having a hard time getting people to church. Everyone has been so busy for the past month harvesting rice. It is everywhere. Pretty much all men, women, and children are always in the field gathering the rice and putting it in the machine thing and then laying it on the ground to dry. There is drying rice everywhere (sidewalks, roads, basketball courts). People just drive right over it.

Anyway, the H family is doing great. [The family with the returning less-active father and his recently baptized wife and son] Brother H told us that when the missionaries knocked on his door they were holding a restoration pamphlet. He saw the picture of Jesus holding the sheep and he remembered about the story of the 99 and the one sheep that was lost. Right when he saw that he realized that he was the lost sheep and he decided to come back to church. Then 2 ½ months later he had overcome his Word of Wisdom problems and his wife and son were baptized. Now they are happy in the church. Their son is singing in the primary program and hopefully they'll have callings soon. Just shows that Heavenly Father has actually prepared people to accept the gospel (or to accept it again).

One of our other investigators is doing pretty well. He knows our church is true but is still having a hard time leaving his traditions and whatnot in the Catholic Church.

We're thinking about buying a pig and roasting it (the missionaries in our ward and the ward mission leader and some ward missionaries). Haha. For some reason, everyone is just insisting that one of the American Elders buys it. The members keep saying, "It's very cheap in your money, Elder. One pig can feed many people." they even started a chant of "baboy! baboy! baboy!" that means pig. It was pretty funny. Hopefully he comes through. I think it is about 100 dollars.

I almost died this morning because this man driving this creepy looking old jeepney thing was wearing this awful mask that looked like the joker mixed with a werewolf. Then he just looked at me and said "Hi sister!"

My companion is a gem! The rats sure have been acting up upstairs. They are quite the racket. It’s like they’re putting on a dance festival.

Ok, my time is up. Love you!

 

 

Delicious food in Baguio.

 

Birds Phlying in my room

We watched conference this week. Probably my favorite talk in the whole conference was the one by that guy from Ukraine [Elder Jörg Klebingat]. I also really loved Elder Bednar's talk. I wish we had more investigators there to hear it. I was going to ask you what’s going on in the world because it seemed like conference had a huge amount of talks about following the prophet. Also, Elder Andersen's talk was interesting. Sister J and I have been trying to figure out what is going on in the world based on the subjects of conference talks.

This week was good. We had a great week. We now have 7 ibds [investigator’s with baptism dates]. We found this giant family that might be kind of golden. There are so many people living there and they really want to be baptized. Hopefully things work out there. We’ve just taught them twice, but we have only been able to teach a couple of the family members because everyone is always at work and stuff. But their dad wants the whole family to be baptized. I’m not really sure…because he hasn't really read the Book of Mormon yet so I don't know how he has a testimony or why he wants to get baptized. We’ll see how things go there. They said they were going to come to church, but they didn't.

Anyway, the work is going pretty good here. Last week we reached the standard of excellence in every category and we have the 7 investigators with baptism dates. (Sorry, I know that these statistics aren't interesting if you're not a missionary). Our next baptism is set for November 8. There are still a lot of obstacles with some of these investigators ... including getting them married and living the Word of Wisdom.

Here are a couple of weird stories. A couple of days ago, I had just stepped out of the shower and I was walking into the room to change. I was only wearing my towel. When I walked in the door, I found 3 birds flying around the room! I screamed at the top of my lungs, slammed the door shut (almost losing my towel in the process). Then 3 other missionaries all came running. My companion got the birds out of the room (I have no idea how, I was too busy hiding in a different room). So good thing my companion is awesome.

Here’s another weird story for the week. So here's some background to the story. Besides our apartment, there are 4 other sisters in Agoo. They were on exchanges so the whole apartment was Americans. Anyway, at about 11:15 at night one night last week, I’m sleeping and then I hear all these people yelling my name out the window. I go outside in my nightgown and I see the 4 sisters and their district leader and his companion. I’m hoping the elders didn't notice I was in my nightgown. So, I let all the sisters in and they tell me this story of how they are locked out and they tried everything they could to get in. They and their district leader and everyone had used everything from bobby pins to spatulas to knives to credit cards to get into their apartment. No luck. In the process of them trying to break in, somehow the neighbors got really freaked out. haha, It's this sweet little Filipino family and then this herd of 4 Americans sisters and 2 Samoan elders trying to break into the sisters’ apartment. Then the apartment neighbors called their friends to come rescue them. So all these people apparently showed up on a trike…with two men standing on the back holding swords and other weapons. hahah. So then the missionaries do their best to explain the situation and then the barangay police got involved. haha, it was just a mess apparently. So finally they come over to our apartment so they can sleep. So I gave them some food because they hadn't eaten in a few hours. I gave them all some clothes to sleep in. Then we shoved my bed next to my companion’s bed and I slept with my companion and two sisters slept in my bed and one sister slept on the couch and another sister slept on the floor in a bed made out of my clothes. The funniest thing about all of this is that my companion just slept through all of it. She just rolled over and put her pillow over her head. She said she woke up for a second when I was upstairs getting everyone clothes. Only one of the sisters was downstairs and my companion just asks "Where's Sister Mortell?" "She's upstairs" then she just goes back to sleep. haha, She doesn't even care that there are like 10 million people in our apartment. So I hardly slept that night because things were pretty crowded. A locksmith came in the morning, so all is well now.

 

Have a good week. Love you.

 

We just thought it was funny to put that picture of me looking so mad with that little poster.

 

 

Baptisms, Phootball, and a Phrog

We had a couple of baptisms on Saturday. It was great. We were very nervous because the ward did not communicate very well. As of Friday night there were no speakers, no program, and no one knew where all the baptismal clothes went. So we showed up early on Saturday to figure everything out and the branch had everything perfectly under control. I was pleasantly surprised. This lady from the other branch even brought a cute little table display thing. They were so happy at their baptism. Sister J cried and gave a great testimony. Her husband was very happy. Their son gave a cute little testimony even though he is shy. Elder G baptized them.

This week was a lot of ups and downs as far as missionary work goes. The baptism was a major up and outweighed all the downs. Yesterday we learned of a lot of problems with 2 of our investigators... I’m not sure if they're going to get baptized anytime soon. We’ll work on it. That was definitely a down.

 

Another up...Sister A in Baguio was baptized last weekend!

We will watch general conference this weekend. We were supposed to watch the relief society thing on Saturday, but they announced the wrong time so everyone showed up with only 30 minutes left. Also, after the women’s thing on Saturday, the BYU/Utah state game just popped up on the screen. We tried not to watch it, but it was there just blasting in the chapel. We watched for about 10 seconds. I’m pretty sure all the members were confused because when we saw the score all the kids from BYU freaked out and the one Sister who went to Utah State started to cheer on her team. So that was a weird little flashback. I felt like I was at home just listening to a BYU football game. That then started to make everyone freak out about their future plans because they started thinking about going back to school and the real world. I've been removed from the world for over a year.

Anyway, we went to San Fernando last week for new missionary training. Best part? We got there an hour early so we went to McDonalds for breakfast. Yes, I’ve changed. An egg McMuffin was the best thing I’ve eaten in 7 weeks!

Things are going fine in training. My companion loves being a missionary, loves proselyting, is obedient (although some rules she is just unaware of, but once I tell her she’s fine with it), knows Tagalog, and isn’t homesick. So things are good.

We have someone do our laundry for us. Except I think she might hate me because she always charges me more than everyone else (ok, only sometimes). I actually think I just have more clothes than the others because I don't like wearing dirty, sweaty clothes. But I’m just glad I don't have to do my laundry myself.

A couple nights ago we fell asleep and there was a frog in our apartment but we were too tired to get it out. When we woke up, it was laying on the floor…dead. So weird! When I finished cleaning up the frog, I opened the door and had two cockroaches fly at my face as I started to gag on the smell coming from the water/drain in the bathroom. Yep, agoo is just like camping. Then I spent the morning pouring permatox everywhere and finding more and more piles of ants everywhere... and we told one of our families the frog story and they concluded that it was most likely killed by a rat (which is very likely). Then they told us to make sure and not walk barefoot inside the house because rats carry this communicable disease in their urine that can make you really sick if it gets in an open wound. So, my conclusion is that I’m just glad I’m in this area at this point in my mission, because I would have died if this was my first area haha!

 

Oh, also last week, someone told me I looked like Jennifer Garner. Haha. Then the same person told another missionary that she looked like this UFC champion. He showed us a picture. She was kind of pretty but also terrifying!

Lately, the weather has been hot and there has been very little rain. The Christmas decorating was well underway when I arrived in Agoo 7 weeks ago.

Love you! Have a good week.

Gorgeous Sunset in Agoo!

 



We Pheel Like We're Camping

Here's the news from transfers.  Sister Glori got transferred to Baguio. Sister Dial got transferred to.... AGOO 1st BRANCH! That's right, we're in the same branch and she lives next door. And I'm... training! My companion is Sister Caveli from Negros Oriental something (it's by Cebu).

 

Sister J and her son passed their interview! Hooray! I’m so happy for them. 

 

Things are going pretty well. I can't imagine training a foreigner, because it's kind of hard training a Filipina. It is funny though. She speaks Visaya. Of course, she also speaks Tagalog, but she doesn't know a lot of words in Tagalog. She is very kind. She just turned 19 in the MTC. She’s probably the youngest sister in the mission. And I just got done being companions with the oldest sister in the mission. Training is going well. I kind of feel a lot of weight on my shoulders... it's like I am doing literally everything, but it's good. It’s helpful that she knows Tagalog.

Sister Dial and I now get to run every morning. It's also good because Sister Smith is still next door and her companion is her MTC companion, Sister Morrill. So it's pretty fun. I have actually felt pretty calm and confident about being a trainer. I just am trying to remember how hard the first few weeks of the mission are. I am very impressed with my companion. She has great questions that she asks investigators and whatnot. I still do about 95% of the lesson, but she is way better than I was when I got here. I still play the piano a lot.

Sister Dial and I are freaking out that we're coming home so soon... part of me is excited to come home and see you and go back to BYU and everything but I’m also really sad to stop being a missionary. I woke up a couple days ago and started to cry because I don't want to quit being a missionary.

Life is just the same here... run around teaching lessons, try to get people to come to church, some show up, some don't. haha. We had a good lesson with Sister M. We taught her the law of chastity. She's not married. The lesson went really well and she really accepted it. That was a little stressful teaching law of chastity completely on my own. But it went well.

Nothing too terrible happened this week... just the usual rats, cockroaches, ants crawling on me nonstop, smelly water. Same as always! One of the new sisters in Agoo keeps freaking out though and saying that Agoo makes her feel like she's always camping. It’s true. Oh, recently I have developed the skill of getting ready very quickly. Now I can get completely ready including shower, dress and everything in about 7 minutes. You learn so much on your mission! haha

My time is up! Love you all. Have a wonderful week.

 

 Baguio

 

 Interesting Jeepney

 

 So cute!

 

 Love these girls!

 

Sister Dial is in Agoo!

More Phoul Things and Typhoons

Well, let me just start off by telling you that the worst experience of my entire mission happened this week (ok, that's a slight exaggeration). But it was pretty bad. We had just finished an investigator lesson. We had taught the wife 2 or 3 times and it was our first time teaching the husband. All through the lesson, their brother-in-law or something kept walking back and forth holding a giant rooster in his hands. It was the kind they use for cock fighting. Pretty common, I’m used to people holding their roosters and taking them everywhere. No big deal. Then right when the husband said the closing prayer, the rooster leaps onto my upper back! It latches it huge talons into my back and starts to flap around and freak out. It was flapping all over my hair and on my head! I slid out of my chair onto the ground in an effort to get away from the huge bird. Then the guy half-dove over the chair and finally was able to catch the rooster! My hair was all tangled from the flapping of its giant wings. Everyone thought that was pretty funny. They all just laughed. Luckily I laughed too... I brushed it off pretty well, but as soon as we got home I ripped off my shirt and right after nightly planning I washed my hair very, very thoroughly. Sister Smith just laughed and said that could only happen to me because of my hatred of birds.

So far in the Philippines a rooster has attacked me, a chicken has pooped on my head, several children have tinkled on my leg, this morning we found lizard poop in our rice, I sweep up the rat poop upstairs almost every day and every day I go back and there’s more... ok, I better start a new topic now...

Good news! Sister A (the lady we found tracting in Baguio) passed her baptismal interview and will be baptized on Saturday!

October 4 is still the day Sister J (age 32) and her 11 year-old son will be baptized. Sister J’s husband is a returned less active brother. We are just making sure everything is set and they will have their baptismal interview on Saturday. We still have some stuff we need to teach them. They recently changed it so now we have to teach lesson 5 out of Preach My Gospel before someone can get baptized too. They are doing great though. It’s kind of hard to make sure that the 11 year-old is ready. We have to teach things pretty simply.

There was another typhoon... we missed quite a bit of proselyting time on Friday and Saturday. The zone leaders made everyone go home. It was very boring just sitting there at the apartment. This typhoon wasn't nearly as bad as the last one though. As soon as we were allowed to get out we ran around and taught lessons like crazy while the weather lasted.

Once again Sacrament meeting attendance took a huge hit because of the storm. People refuse to leave their house when it's raining. Also, I feel very sad because I feel like everyone has been having all these problems lately. The other sisters in our ward have investigators who were kicked out of their house and are now living under a bridge. They have 8 kids. They also have investigators that had to stop all their kids’ education because they can't afford transportation to the school. I just feel so sad for them. People in our area have been having lots of problems too. A lot of people’s houses flooded pretty badly... the water was probably as tall as Maddy [5’2”].

Our apartment is pretty elevated so it was fine. Although the other sisters’ apartment next door had their desks and beds soaked from rain coming in somehow through the windows and like seeping through the ceiling and walls.

One of our other investigators that used to always be drunk is doing well. Too bad she didn't come to church. We taught her the Word of Wisdom. She just readily accepted it and committed to live it. She hasn't drunk in almost a month, but she smokes. But she's already cut it from 2 packs a day to 5 sticks... so hopefully we'll get that figured out. I was about to extend a baptismal date to her and then a thought popped into my head in the lesson that I should make sure she isn't a special case... turns out she and her "husband" aren't married. Too bad. So we can't extend a baptismal date until they decide to get married... but she has been reading like crazy and she is doing great.

There are lots of problems before people get baptized... and alcohol and cigarettes are extremely popular in The Philippines, as is living with people before marriage.

I don't like this. Right now people are waiting for computers and there are all these teenagers looking at my screen hovering around waiting for me to be finished.

Also, Brother Romero still writes me all the time. He wrote this poem about his conversion and stuff. Very sweet.

Love you! I’m out of time. Have a great week.

 

 

 

[More Photos from Baguio]