The bugs really aren't that bad ...

man so many questions... so little time.... I'll try my best to answer them but we'll see how long my motivation lasts.... 

Sige, so the ward is awesome. We have like 16 Ward Missionaries that are like crazy helpful and awesome so that's been great. The members really want to help others and to build one another up so that's been cool as well. They really push a ward missionary effort here which has been really nice as well. Right now we've been teaching a lot of new people recently. We have this 13 yr old that we're teaching and through him we've started teaching like 8 other people so that's been awesome. 

Advenutres..... I don't know, we made a better mango float last week so that was chill. I think we're trying again later today. 

mmmmmm oh so kids here will fight spiders. Like they put a couple spiders on a stick and will have them fight. So a bunch of kids have like a spider collection and will fight and trade spiders. It's soooo weird here. 

Personal study I've been reading a lot in Alma and trying to use the missionary stories there to improve myself as a missionary. 

So I like really love the food here. It's amazing. But the people here are so nice and awesome and friendly and like dang I don't know they're hard to describe but they're great. I can't wait until I can really speak and understand the language so that I can really grow closer to the people I meet. Also I've only had like 2 companions so far so it's kinda hard to have a favorite. 

The bugs really aren't that bad. As long as we have a fan on us while we sleep the mosquitoes don't really bother us at all. We've had a couple spiders in our house like once, about 10 weeks ago. We have cockroaches but we spray the house down with bug killer every few weeks so whenever they come into our house they just kinda die. 

The sun actually isn't bad here at all. I'll admit that I haven't really been using sun screen but i haven't burned once since being here. 

Ya again not a ton happened this week. I'm on my last week of 12 weeks and I'm soooo ready to be done. Transfers are coming up next week so I should find out who my new companion is by next wednesday so that'll be interesting.

Love ya! Hope you're doing well! Enjoy Hawaii! The hardest part about serving on an Island is that you can't actually enjoy island life so that's been annoying.
Nahigugma ko nimo!

Elder Shirley

Round 2 of mango floats

kid's spider collection

probably the only time I'll ever eat at Pizza hut while on my mission (it's sooo mahal as missionaries)

 temple after interviews

 new family/ friends we starting teaching and the FHE we had at their house

 

Ward missionaries at an FHE

General Conference .... yaayy!!

Daaaang sounds like you've had a busy week or so. Also ya what in the world are y'all going to do with all of the meat that dad will be getting? you'll need like 3 more freezers. glad he's having fun though. The Family we would visit in Valdez was the Baczuk family, they're cool. You should say hi to luke for me, he's a senior so he'll be one of the older priest there. 

I must say it's kind of nice not having to deal with getting cold here. It is annoying how hot it is sometimes but really if you just drink water it's not that bad. I don't know if the garments arrived yet because we don't really go to the mission office that often. Also I meant they're not the right kind as in they're not the dri-lux kind, that's the kind I like. But it's alright, I really just needed more garments so I'm sure they'll work. The stitching on some of my garments just hasn't been the greatest so I've been getting really big holes in the seams of my garment bottoms so I've had to get rid of a couple of them. Oh and sometimes when it rains my panyo (sweat rag) will be in my pocket and it'll turn my garments blue or green or whatever so ya I had to get rid of some of those garments as well.

We finally got to watch General Conference yaaaaaaay!!!! The leadership is a little walay claro sometimes though so we actually showed up like 2 hours early on saturday because they didn't tell us they changed the time. It's cool all the changes they're making with everything. Really starting to push more of a family aspect to learning the gospel, it's cool. Favorite talk.... I'd have to look at my notes but overall I just really liked how they talked a lot about taking on the name of Christ. Between that and families they had a really good theme going on between all of the talks. Sunday we did have an investigator come to watch conference with us, he came for the afternoon session but, 20 minutes before it started, there was a "brown-out" (That's what they call Black-outs) at the church so we lost all the power in the church and didn't have any gas to power the back-up generator so we ended up not watching the afternoon session at the church. We did get to watch it eventually at a member's house so that was cool.

Oh sunday I got to baptize one of the sisters' investigators so that was cool to. The building still didn't have power when we did it so we did everything by flashlight light so that was quite the experience. 

And ya they don't really have a lot of holidays here. They don't celebrate Halloween or anything like that, so they don't really have any holidays from september-december. That's partly why people start putting up christmas decorations so early. 

I go on exchanges with other elders probably 2-4 times a transfer, this transfer it looks like it'll be more like 3 exchanges. I actually just had an exchange this last monday and I lead the area for the first time so that was cool/stressful. My companion will actually have been in the area for like 8 months by november.... no, that doesn't normally happen... Normally the longest your in an area is for 3 transfers, he's been here for 5.... maybe 6 or 7. Hahaha jokes, he'll most likely transfer out but it's really fun to joke that he won't. 

Last week we tried making mango floats.... It only takes like 4 ingredients.... yet somehow it still ended up really bad.... long story short we're trying again today.

I can't think of anything else that happened at the moment so that'll be all I say. Hope you're doing well! Thanks for all the love and support! Of course I miss you but i'll see you in like 70 days so I'll be fine. 

Love you! Nahigugma ko nimo!
Elder shirley


Mango float....




Not at all how it's supposed to be...




riding a dyip with other missionaries


Baptism




Riding on the back of a dyip because all the other missionaries had already got on and there was no more room for us


Visiting a member

Average life of a missionary

Not a ton happened this week, we have a couple new people we're teaching, had a could people we had to drop, pretty much the average life of a missionary. The area is still moving forward though. We started teaching this 13 year old guy and he's really been getting into the lessons and he's been inviting all his friends so that's been cool. I went on exchanges this last monday with Elder Gutual and that was interesting. He's actually from my batch so we basically had 2 trainees in an area. He's bisaya daan (like he already knows bisaya) so between the 2 of us we had some good lessons. Later today we're going to try making Mango Floats so that'll be exciting. But ya sorry I can't really write much. It was just a pretty mellow week. OH the office tried to tell us that 6 people got dengue, it was really just 1. I think they just try to scare us into using bug spray here.

Anyways that's pretty much it, I'll try to write more next week.

Sounds like you're doing well though and that you had a good time in utah. And so UTah state won???? ha in your face.

Love you! Gihigugma tika!
Elder shirley


And then we also had to chase a goat off the church property and I snagged this pic


I got a small set of scriptures and I made a box for it out of liahona magazines....








Then I took some more nametag pics for ya...

Another week gone...

My week was alright. 

For my interview with Elder Wakolo he just asked me about my family and about how I was adjusting to the field. 

Last pday we mainly just got groceries and then walked around and found 8 barbershops that were all closed so we didn't get a haircut last week. 

For conference last wednesday it was just like a normal zone conference except that we had Elder Wakolo do all of the workshops/teaching so that was cool. He's awesome. As part of the mission tour he essentially went to all of the zone conferences so everyone got an opportunity to see and hear from him. 

yes i'm taking lots of pics and writing lots. (in fact if you could send me another memory card thing for my camera that'd be great) 

The hardest part of my mission has probably just been not understanding/being able to speak the language. It's really hard to do the work/grow closer to others when I don't understand what they're saying or they can't understand what i'm saying. But it's getting better. I'm still improving and getting better and I know I'll get there some day so I just keep trying. I actually haven't really missed home at all, at least not yet. There's been a number of missionaries that it's been really hard for them but I haven't really had a problem with it yet. 

The rainy season has started but it generally will only rain for about an hour about every other day so it hasn't really gotten that bad yet.

I do carry my photobook with me but I haven't had a ton of opportunities to share it. Generally when getting to know people we try to focus the conversation on them, not on ourselves, so I don't show it to people that often.

This week we started teaching a couple new people and we've had kuyogs so we've been able to teach more of our investigators. Hopefully the work will continue to pick up. Right now the work is doing better in some areas than others but overall we're doing pretty good.

I'm pretty kapoy {exhausted} so I'll probably just send a ton of pics now. oh we also went to a family day thing so hopefully I can send some of the videos from that.

Gihigugma tika!
Elder shirley

Cebu Heritage momument. featuring Lapu-Lapu the one credited by the Philippians to have killed Magellan.








president pajaro, and sister pajaro - ME - elder wakolo, sister wakolo,




Mango float (cake looking thing)

a gang that we generally deal with 2 or 3 times a week

more floods

the river outside our house after a flood

Exchanges with Elder Sudayon and another flood

a street that we end up at a lot

Visit from Elder Wakolo

ps: there's like a mission tour thing going on so that's why I'm emailing today. Elder Wakolo from the area presidency is having a little conference for us tomorrow and he's interviewing some missionaries. Apparently I'm going to be one of the missionaries he interviews so we'll see how that goes.

Daaaaang, sounds like you had a busy day and that you have enough meat for the next year or two. I must say I do miss moose burgers so I'm a little jealous. Also that's great that no one lost their home. Looking at the map and from what I've heard from everyone It sounds like it was a pretty dangerous situation. And it's awesome that Devin got hired by the division. He'll like totally have his life together by the time I get back.... weird. And I mean when USU by some miracle beats BYU it'll be even better because I heard how BYU is actually ranked this year.

Also for conference we apparently watch it the Sunday after conference which makes sense because we're actually like a day ahead here so it'll be Monday by the time Sunday conference actually starts. 

Also I didn't get worms from wiping with my hand. And ya you pretty much just take a pill and it detaches the worms from your stomach and you're fine. And ya I've been feeling a lot better so I'm sure they're gone. 

Ya the Typhoon pretty much missed the Island of Cebu so we're totally fine. We did just get a whole lot of rain the other day, like so much rain we were actually kinda trapped because we couldn't get to appointments because roads were flooding and then we couldn't go back to our balay because our street had flooded. So we managed to get to a 7 eleven and we just studied there until the rain stopped. and ya i heard about the landslide, sounds like you pretty much have heard just as much about it as I have though. 

And ya it's kinda annoying because the new people we are teaching are actually getting really into our messages but we can't teach them that often because we need kuyogs (fellowshippers) to be able to teach them and we haven't been able to get that many members to kuyog with us. But ya we normally teach in people's homes. Which really varies from person to person. There's a couple people with homes similar to homes you'd see in the US but then there's also homes where it's literally the size of like a handicap stall. The people here live very humbly. It doesn't matter to them the size of there house or anything like that. In fact some of the happiest people I've met live in the smallest of homes. They really appreciate the things in life that actually matter and that's why they're so happy all the time. They care more about the well being of others than they do for themselves and it's honestly really inspiring. 

The Language is still coming to say the least. My language in lessons is pretty good but I'm still working on being able to have normal conversations with people which is mainly just hard because I'm still working on understanding so when I talk with people I really have to piece together what they're saying so it's hard sometimes to understand. If people speak clearly I do alright with my understanding, the problem is that Bisaya is supposed to be a very hard spoken language in that you are supposed to speak very clearly and say all the letters and parts very clearly, but most of the people that speak bisaya don't do that so that's been great. 

 Oh I almost forgot, we had a baptism this last week. His name is John Cordova, he's nine years old and belongs to a part member family. He was literally the best to teach because we would just teach everything super simply and he understood very easily so that was great. So ya had my first baptism this week. Yaaaaaay

Oh it was also transfer week last week so we have new missionaries in my zone so that's cool. There's one sister from the new batch of missionaries that just got transfered into my zone so now I'm not the youngest missionary in the zone! (or the most lost with bisaya, yaaaay)

Sounds like you're having a pretty adventurous time back home. The house looks great. I see you've already turned my room into a guest room. Must be very quiet around the house. Hope you and Dad are getting used to being empty nesters. Hope Pepper is still kicking too. 

Gihigugma Tika! Tulo ka bulan hangtud makatawag ko kanimo! Yaaaay

(*translated: Three months until I can call you!*)

Elder Shirley

Oh I also ate these noodle things because I told a member that I missed spicey food because their food is mostly sweet here so a member gave me these spicey korean noodle things. They were pretty spicey. Dad would've turned red and started sweating a lot.

Typhoon, Worms, & Christmas

Hey so I guess you forgot to email me so that's nice and all. I'll try being detailed and everything but I guess I won't be answering any questions which'll make this a whole lot easier.
(*NOTE:  I did NOT forget ...Spencer wrote early & I was stuck dealing with a moose...)

Basta. So this week was interesting and kinda fun. We have a couple new people that we're teaching so that's fun. The first one is Terry and she works at our favorite bread shop so she's seen us buy bread their a lot. But ya so since we're there like literally everyday she started talking with us one night and now we've started teaching her. It's also cool because anytime we walk by the shop she calls us over and gives us bread and soda for free so that's been cool. We also started teaching another person that we met through a referral. Her name is Mylang and she was one leg so that was interesting. We've only taught her one lesson so far but she really seemed to feel the spirit in our lesson and to really believe the things we were teaching her so that was cool too. On Saturday we went on Exchanges again and I worked in Arlington again. We got to work in the Bukid (literally translates to mountain but it's also like a reference to jungly mountain foresty stuff.... just look at the picture) so that was awesome. I've wanted to work in the Bukid ever since I've gotten to the Philippines so that was really fun. It's a lot of walking to say the least. It's the end of our transfer this week. Some missionaries from our zone already said their goodbyes last Monday during district council. We got transfer calls today, no change for us siempre (of course) cuz i'm still being trained. We do have some changes to our zone though. They just split the Zone Leader's area into 2 so now we have 2 new elders coming into that area. Yay our tiny zone got a little bigger! Today the new batch of missionaries come in and the missionaries from my batch that were visa waiting are coming in too! We also have a meeting thing in Lahug (where the temple/mission office is) so we might be able to see them today. Oh it's also Christmas time here so pretty much where ever we walk we hear Christmas music. Also one of the Barangays (township thingys) already started going all out with decorations, like with a tree and Christmas count down and everything. It's been great here. The typhoon that hit the Philippines had very very minimal affects on us. The storm mostly hit Luzon which is like northern Philippines so we were only getting the outskirts of the storm. It was actually nice, there was like a good breeze and it didn't actually rain like at all in our area. Oh last week I got worms so that was interesting. I pretty much figured it out after my stomach hadn't been feeling that well for a little while and when i went to the mission office and weighed myself I had lost weight even though I've been eating a ton. But ya that's over so all is good now.

Hope you're doing well, I still love you even though you didn't email me. Hope everything is going well at home. Since you're making so many changes to the house and everything I'm sure you were about to tell me about how you now have a movie theater kinda thing in dad's loft now so you'll have to tell me all about that.

Love you! gihigugma tika!
Elder Shirley


Bukid


A ton of cats, because there are a ton of cats and dogs here


Christmas at Barangay Day-as