2014/02/23 "That's what you need...that! And a brain."

Haha, yes, I really did just quote that! Bam!

Hello my wonderful wonderful family!!!!

How is everyone this fine week?!?!?! Once again, I had a super dope killer awesome week! First off, the good news is, they are putting in a store that will sell cheese, and it opens this week... I am super excited! Because cheese I am pretty sure is another word for "food of the gods!" Yup, I am super excited, cause nobody here has cheese! which, I mean, they don't exactly need it, there food is fantastic! But when I am cookin' at home, and don't know how to cook their food exactly, some cheese is always welcome. Especially in the morning for breakfast... through some cheese on them rice! Yeah! That sounds like some breakfast-y stuff! hahaha, anyways, this week was super great! As far as numbers, it probably didn't look the best... we got punted for two days straight, and then Sunday we only got one real lesson in... so that was slightly sad. But we had some other super awesome things like my first Baptism!!! Sister Alma. She is super awesome and this week she got baptized... the only problem was, the person that was supposed to conduct didn't show up, so I had to....... yeah.... lets just say my Tagalog skills are improving. And we spent the first half of Saturday doing a service project! Which was super dope! So the numbers didn't look all that good, but since when did numbers mean anything!?

Yup, so it was a super great week. One of our investigators, Joel... man he is a stud! He was the one that just kinda dropped everything immediately when we taught him the word of wisdom... We taught him the Plan of salvation this week. He got super excited! So he read the pamphlet we gave him really in-depth, then he taught his wife (who is pregnant, and never joins in with the lessons) And then came to church on Sunday with his wife! He is super awesome. Haha, so we talked about how the he knew through the Holy Ghost that the BofM was true. And then he was like, "Ya, and if the Book of Mormon is true, then Joseph Smith was a True Prophet, so this is gods one and only true church on the earth today, so I want to be baptized." All by himself... it was kinda unreal. And then he was talking about how once we are baptized its our responsibility to share it with others and he told us how he wants us to teach some of his friends.... dang! He is a stud! so golden. I keep wondering if its even necessary to even teach him! Oh yeah, and the way we found him was that he walked up to the church during sacrament meeting and asked for missionaries. What?! His biggest problem is that he is so so so so so so so so soooooo dirt poor that he cant afford to come to church every week. like... a peso is about 2 cents... and so church round trip at most costs like... 40-50 pesos with his wife.... so like a dollar.... and unless he saves every penny during the week, he honestly cant afford to go to church... its way sad! Its crazy to think how poor some people are in the Philippines. The good news is that he came this week and he really has the desire to come to church. He is awesome.

So we were out tracting my first week and we found Tom and his sister Mayline. I think I already told you about them. But one of them has to stay in the shop every week. So they can only come every other week. The sad news was that Mayline didn't come this week. But, hopefully Tom will come next week... They are progressing really well though and we are hoping to set a baptismal date with them tonight.

It was really cool this week. We got punted from one of our appointments, and as we were walking away we remembered a less active that hasn't been to church in years. My comp has visited her once in the two or three transfers that he has been here... so we decided to go talk to her. So we were talking to her about why she doesn't go to church and her answer was really weird. She said something about "people at church have sexy bodies and distract us from god. So we just worship at home." It was a really weird excuse, oh, also she said something about, "I feel Satan's presence at church." It seemed really odd to me and kinda made up since that is the exact opposite of what the rest of us feel. So we were talking to her, and I had no idea what we were talking about, but it didn't seem to be going anywhere so I jumped in and started teaching her about how families can be together forever through temples. And of course she wanted that. So then we taught her about what she needs to do to go to the temple with her family to be sealed forever. She ended up getting super excited and then she got super serious and told us that actually she has been thinking for a while about going back to church and sometimes she cries at night and just wants to go back... but she was afraid to because she didn't feel like she was worthy or something. So basically her excuse was just that... an excuse! So she came to church yesterday! And the members did a super good job at fellow-shipping her and making her feel welcome! So hopefully she will come next week too! So that was super awesome and I was so so so so happy for her!
So, we were walking into this little neighborhood village thing and one of the little kids said something to me. So of course I did my best to talk to him in Tagalog. The kid started laughing and went and got all of his friends. Our appointment was on the porch of this investigators house and all the kids came and gathered round to hear the bago misyonero speaking Tagalog. (First, you have to understand that all of the Philippinos call us Joe. Like... literally all of them. I think it is a reference to GI-Joe...) But I found out that they respond to Joe too! The kids were being a little bit noisy (cause I was speaking Tagalog and it was very funny to them), and so I turned to the boy that was the loudest and said with a very sarcastic face, "Hey Joe, shhh!" And he did! haha, it made me laugh. After the lesson the kids followed us so they could hear me talk some more. Always a good time ;)

Anyways, its been a super awesome week for me! I love you all! And I hope you all just have simply fantastic weeks! Till next time, Peace Out!