Week #49: "I think we'll stop there because you must be FBI... how old are you?"

Kumusta kayon??

So yesterday, we had our interviews with President Barrientos. That's why I didn't email yesterday. And again, my interview was not long at all. About 5 to 10 minutes. Leaning more towards the 5 minute mark. He just stared at a paper and told me how the office elders put the totals wrong for the key indicators. Then on top of that, he told me I'll be transferred. There goes the surprise again. But this time he didn't tell me where or what I'll be doing.

So last week, ate's husband did pass away and it was from a motorcycle accident due to drunk driving. Well that's what I understood. Motorcycle accidents are extremely common here. We went to where the casket is last week and auntie Jean asked me to say a prayer. So I did. Odd enough, I lost my voice the day before so it was kind of embarrassing trying to pray.

We also attended the San Pedro barangay festival, just to eat. There was so much food. We helped the day before with preparing the vegetables, so we did some service. It's nice to finally see some more cousins here. I met ate Nympha and ate Lisa. Ate Lisa laughed because we finally meet... in the Philippines, instead of back home in Canada! For these next two weeks, I'm going to try to visit the family as much as possible to get them to go to church and to commit them to listen to the missionaries so that they have people to teach. I had a feeling I was going to be transferred hehe. I'll be able to come back if any of them do get baptized.

So when it comes to missionary work this past week, we had exchanges. I went to Cabugao and worked with Elder Benally. We taught this guy who we met on the street while we were looking for a referral. We sat down and he kept asking Elder Benally where he was from. Elder Benally repeated himself about 3 times and he asked again and I was about to laugh. The guy was like 1/4 drunk. But Elder Benally said he's a little crazy even when not drunk. He was asking good questions though and then he noticed how Elder Benally is good in Tagalog so he thought Elder Benally was FBI. He goes "I think we'll stop there because you must be FBI... how old are you?" Then Elder Benally tells him he's 20. So he says, "Oh okay, then you can't be FBI." What a weird old man. Then in our area of Vigan 2B.

We contacted this potential investigator and we taught him. We asked if he's looking for the truth and he said yes. We asked him if we could continue and he said no because it's bawal (forbidden). We then asked why it's bawal and he said he doesn't know... then tells us cause his pastor says it's bawal. Whatever.. so we asked him if he would pray about our message and he just flat out says no. What a waste of time haha. Didn't even try to find the truth.

One day, we had this fellowshipper and we wanted to take him to certain people but we asked him who the members are around him. He took us to this one lady and we were hoping to be there for 15-30 minutes. She ended up being super madaldal! Then we finally finished and went to the next appointment... another madaldal!! But we figured out how to help brother Arthur. He wants to come to church but the problem is he doesn't have clothes ready. Tomorrow, we plan on telling him to clean his clothes and just wear his tsinelas to church. We have someone to pick him up. That will work. He's been investigating forever but he knows everything is true.

Right now, there's some random girls who walked into the computer shop and are playing guitar and singing. It'd be nice if they were good.

Actually, in front of our apartment, they blast music from across at the shop. It's always Bon Jovi, Scorpions, random filipino songs. All those classics. Kind of like those songs that uncle Lito loves to sing. It always starts playing when we start studying. Super big distraction.

And now they those girls asked us for donations but we just told them no, we're missionaries.

Anyways, thanks dad for the hockey updates about the winter olympics. Sometimes it's playing on peoples' television.

Okay, anyways, wala na akong balita ngayon. Kaya nga, next time na lang! Paki-sabi nyo nga sa mga friends ko na sana po mag-eemail sila sa akin haha. Ayos naman kung hindi. Siguro, tell uncle Lito na mag-email sa akin din hehe. Anyways, ay-ayatenkayon!

Elder Morales

PS Pasensiya, wala pang pictures hehe. I forgot to take of the barangay festival. 2016 na lang. Here's pictures from the week before,,,

Week #48: He told us to be friends with Satan! Lol!

Hello everyone!

So this past week was busy. We were helping our investigators get ready for their baptism. It was a big day last saturday. We combined both Vigan 1st and 2nd's baptism so there was a total of 10!!! It's been 3 transfers that me and elder Oberg haven't had baptisms. So that's the good news. We still have more coming up for next month. We are hoping for around 3. Our zone last thursday set a goal of 35 baptisms for the month of march. It's a huge goal and it's going to take a lot of work. But with righteous desires, it is totally possible.

Other than that, nothing special happened this week. We just had our zone training meeting. It's pretty cool since Elder Williams and Elder Erickson are both in my zone now. Elder Williams is now our zone leader. Elder Erickson is the district leader for Cabugao.

We have the craziest teaching pool here. We have some investigators who love to talk about God. There's one... Arthur Acena. He knows everything is true and wants to know everything in detail. Before, we made the mistake of having him share his concerns or what he learned... then he'd totally control the lesson. Then we taught him where we dove straight into the lesson. And it was a success! He finally feels he needs to come to church to compare. Then we have this other investigator, Bong Bong Ardaniel. He's really interesting. He's been listening to a whole bunch of different religions and we think he may have been listening to this really crazy stuff too. He told us to be friends with Satan... because he used to be up there in heaven with God... (Basically it's the lesson on pre-earth life, but it's sooooobrang baligtad!) Hopefully we can correct him on it. That's the next lesson. Then he went on in telling us to read some book because it was written by the archangels. So I asked him does it have references to the scriptures and he said no because it's written by the archangels. Then we tried to explain to him how only prophets are allowed to write in books. I think we may need to have a lesson on prophets again. Anyways, some of the people we teach are just interesting.

Visiting our family has been hard this week because they are super busy with the barangay festival in San Pedro. Fortunately, auntie Jean still came to church on sunday!!! Julius Agapinan wants to be baptized but he's afraid of what his parents would say. And this week, we are going to try and visit Vanessa and her husband. There's so many people I still need to visit here. I told auntie to tell me when ate Liza gets here. Also when ate Nympha gets here too. It'd be nice to actually see them finally. We'll probably be attending the wedding while we're here... that's if it's before transfers. I might actually be transferred so... who knows?

So today, we went back to the zoo for a zone activity. It's still fun going there since it's a different group. I feel bad for some missionaries cause they've been in this area for awhile and activity's are always at the zoo if you are in the Vigan zone. Afterwards, some of us went to eat at the "Ihawan sa Caoayan." Ihawan is basically a place where they grill stuff... especially seafood! Yum! Elder Hunsaker doesn't really like seafood. Oh and we eat with our hands. It's the same place where I went with the office.

Anyways, that's the news for the week! Love you all and take care!!!

 

Week #47: Happy Birthday Dad and Free stuff this week!

Hello!

Happy Birthday Dad!

So this saturday is a big day for the Vigan District. We have 10 baptisms total here. 5 from our area. 2 from the sisters in 1C. and 3 from the sisters in 1A. We are going to have a combined baptism with branch 1 and branch 2. So it's going to be busy day. It was busier last saturday because of the interviews. Sunday also. I had to interview of them on saturday and it was super matagal. Ganoon din sa sunday. We didn't have time to eat lunch because the zone leaders came directly from Cabugao to do the interviews. I actually have to do another interview on saturday. So many baptisms now in Vigan. We barely had any last transfer.

Anyways, concerning our family here. They're good. I sent the sisters to go visis Vanessa and her husband. The new missionary extended them a baptismal date on the first visit. So mediyo magulat sila haha. But that's fine. I will be going there myself on friday to go visit them. I'll probably ask auntie to come with us there too.

Anyways, what interesting things happened this week... Oh last monday, we walked into some random museum. FREE!!! It's the Crisologo museum. Not really sure who that guy is but the main point is.. ITS FREE!!!

We also went to go eat some shakey's today to celebrate Elder Hunsaker's birthday... which was last week.4

We also went to go visit the Bantay bell tower. It was... weird being there. We went inside the bell tower and it's pretty odd in there. It's on some catholic church grounds. and again.. IT'S FREE.. except for a small donation of like 5 pesos. Some creepy kid kept trying to force us to donate. Then when we came back to the main gate, some lady asked us to donate... so we donated 5 pesos each. Forced donation... ano ba yan? Whatever haha. In the next few weeks, we're going to look for some more free museums.

On tuesday, I got to go to Laoag. I travelled up there with Elder Erickson. Got to catch up with some of my batch at the MTC. We were basically trained on how we should conduct district meetings and how interviews should be. They said how all our meetings should be really focused on helping the missionaries get baptisms instead of just improving skills. He compared it to a sports game where the goal is to score but to score we need game plans. Sometimes we're so magaling in the game plans that we forget to shoot. So that was the training. Then we went back to the mission home and played basketball there. I played in tsinelas. It's super hard! Then we had cake and stuff. Then slept in the mission office. So it was a good day.

So those kids in the pictures are ate Cristian's kids (Uno and Ace) and kuya Jeff's kid (Ashley). They're auntie Jean's mga apo. I have videos at their house but I don't know if it's going to fit inside the email hehe.

Anyways, that's the news for the week here in Vigan. Love you all!

Elder Morales

Week #46: New companion and the 10 Commandments

Hello hello

Here I am emailing today in Vigan. Tomorrow I'm going to Laoag. We have this special meeting for all District Leaders. It happens only once a year and I get to go! hehe. It should be fun.

Oh by the way, my new companion is Elder Oberg. He's from Utah. And it's good, he can speak Tagalog. It's nice to finally have a companion that can speak and teach so that way I don't have to teach most of the lesson.

Unfortunately, this week, we've lost another investigator. They are just so set in being Catholic. She asked us if we were there to convince her to be mormon and I told her yes. Funny thing is she asked us to teach her, so something is baligtad. We think it's her mom that's influencing her. That's the biggest problem here I realized, no one wants to change. There's one super dominant religion here and everyone is stuck to it. We even taught to auntie Jean and ate Cristian about commandments a few days ago and we talked about the 10 commandments. It's surprising how the 2nd commandment is missing. There's a million idols here and they have ginormous statues of Mary. We saw it a parade. It's really weird. Ate Cristian was arguing that isn't part of the 10 commandments, to not have idols, since we read it from the Book of Mormon. We then shared it from exodus, and then she realized. It gets people thinking when you open their eyes a bit. Me and Elder Oberg might just start sharing the 10 commandments whenever we present the first lesson, especially when we reach about prophets.

Also, we found out na parte ng area namin ay sobrang mahirap. Kasi, ang lahat sila ay ang mga tinuruan ng mga missionary. Kaya, sinabi ni brother Queypo na matigas ang ulo at puso nila. So that's a good chunk of our area. Sobrang mahirap to proselyte there. We are relying sa mga referrals. Sometimes we have to travel super far away to get to one of our investigators. It's good since she has a baptismal date. So that's the interesting stories we had about proselyting so far.

So one night, we got stuck in San Pedro Sur, so we were hunting for a tryce. Then this drunk guy stopped and came to help us but then the house we were next to had a tryce. One of the guys told him to go home and sleep. And he said, "If you you go to sleep, God will love you. If you don't go to sleep, God will not love you." It's super random. Luckily we got a ride home.

So I found out that some of my cousins don't talk to me because they're shy. It just reminded me of the first day I saw Vanessa how she ran. They're super shy here haha. I'm probably going to visit them one by one in their own homes. I'll ask auntie Jean to start sharing with the family. I think she may have a big influence on people there. Even when I do leave here, she can keep helping the missionaries.

So anyways, I'm not sure what else hehe. What are some updates from back home? Anyways, take care at ay-ayatenkan!

Elder Morales

Week #45: So my foot fungus or stinky feet is gone.

Hello family!

So my foot fungus or stinky feet is gone. That was fun. At least now I don't have to smell bad everywhere. And yet again, I survived a transfer and will be staying in Vigan. I have no idea how long though.

So yeah, auntie Jean told me that ate lisa's wedding is really soon. Ate Nympha is coming back for a bit too. It's super exciting to meet my cousins finally instead of always seeing them on facebook! Hopefully I can come back here and enjoy my time with them instead of just being a missionary. At least now I have a purpose to be here in Vigan. One by one, I'm trying to track them and teach them. So far we're teaching auntie Jean, Julius, Ate Sally's family, sometimes ate Ria, and we're going to try Vanessa this week. I have special permission to roam Vigan hunting for our family. Also please tell me what information you would need for family history since I'm here. This is probably one of the best chances you have mom to get names, dates and whatever while I'm here. Sometimes, it takes time for people to get information like those, but since I'm here, I can push them hehe.

So you don't need to send me stuff really. I can get soap, shampoo, and contact solution here. In a few months though I may need to buy some more contacts. But what I really need you to send are old scriptures! Anyways, if Uncle Lito does come, he needs to drop off the stuff at the mission home in Laoag. I'm pretty sure he's not allowed to find me while I'm here unless I'm still in Vigan. I'll most likely be here until the beginning of march. Unless I survive another transfer, then I'll be here until April.

So yeah, in terms of the work here, this next transfer, we have around 6 baptisms in the first few weeks of February! We have a lot of people in mind for baptism too. It's actually been awhile since I had a baptism. We couldn't get any in Laoag because we're always in the office. We got close though but that's that. Now the work to do is in Vigan. Especially helping the district out with the work here. Things are finally picking up here in Vigan. We were counting yesterday and there should be 11 baptisms in the district.

And yes mom, you should communicate with your family here. Encourage them to listen... since you're probably on facebook a lot. Facebook message them and tell them to find me. Tell them to ask auntie Jean. I'd give you my cellphone number here but that'd be a terrible idea haha.

So let's see... interesting stories this past week... So we met this guy bong bong Ardaniel. He's a referral from the Vigan 2A elders. He lives near the Rosario family (very big family in the branch). He lives near a bible study group. So we teach at this bible study group. And one time we walked in there and bong bong wasn't there so we kinna sat in on a lecture they were giving. A lot of their beliefs go along our beliefs: God's government, religions centralized on one source. So the lady giving the lecture asked us so many questions. We answered them and ended up teaching them and more people we're interested in our message. We found out later she used to be taught by missionaries since 1992. We also found out another missionary of that bible study group was a dating member. So that's a big reason why our beliefs coincide. What's interesting is that that dating member's name is Reynaldo Morales! That's just weird. Well our last name is extremely popular in many hispanic countries.

We also had this one investigator, su-yen. We extended her baptismal invitation and she seemed unsure. Later we found out she asked her father if its okay if we continue teaching her and one day if ever, she would be baptized. Her father said to stop taking lessons so that we won't confuse her... It's sad to see these things happen but what we're planning on doing is sending the missionaries to her father in Aparri. They need it. We can tell she wants to hear the gospel.

What I also noticed is how people know Jesus Christ, but yet don't really know Him. They know that Jesus Christ died for our sins. But they don't know what that means. They don't even know what Jesus Christ did while He was alive. Read 1 Nephi 11. It's all there. It's so simple. But they just don't know. Sometimes we just take things for granted and don't really know the importance of things. Especially the atonement. One thing we become really good at as missionaries is asking questions. That's one thing I learned here. Especially asking those questions that really get you thinking about life. For example: Why does your family mean so much to you? We never ever think about those things, then we really need to think about it. Another question: What does it mean to you that Jesus Christ died for your sins? Then people really get thinking.

It's fun teaching our family here. I have fun discussions with Auntie Jean about things she noticed at churches. She loves coming to church, so does Julius. They keep bearing their testimonies to me. I don't even need to tell them to come to church. They just come. Ate Sally's family has been really busy these past few weeks due to the longganisa festival. But since that's over. Restart kami. The lesson is about what happens after this life. That should be really interesting and fun to teach them. Please mom encourage them to listen! Everyone needs a push. 2 Nephi 2:16. Entice them to do good!

It's especially fun going to the family house. I've seen the house that Uncle Lito has been giving money for. It's BIG! But there's still a lot of work to do. It's fun spending time with the nieces and nephews. It's like spending time with Esa. They all call me tito Chris. It's funny hearing my name sometimes. But the kids are so cute haha. If only you could see. Especially Ace. There's also Ashley, who kind of looks like ate alicia. There's Uno, ann ann, may may. Marami sila! Next time I will take a picture with all of them! Hopefully those story books I ordered will get here so I could give it to the kids.

So that's the news here! Love you all!

Elder Morales

Week #44: there's one name that showed up and it's "Rose Morales." That's too funny!

Hello everyone!

And yes there is a longganisa festival here... Too bad I can't go check it out.. I'll just come back Jaunary 2016 hehe.

I'm gonna lend my camera to Julius to take pictures for me. And yes I'm extremely serious in sending old scriptures and sending missionaries to Auntie Linda. I'll also try and get dating Elder Soriano to go with the missionaries to her.

Anyways... nothing really interesting happened last week. We had extra meetings this week. I had to go to Cabugao for exchanges. Apparently there are Morales there too.. but Morales is just an extremely common last name especially here. There's actually a Reynaldo Morales somewhere in Vigan. Oh and while I was looking at the zone's baptismal dates while I was up in Cabugao, there's one name that showed up and it's "Rose Morales." That's too funny!

Anyways, your family is doing good mom. Auntie and Julius should be getting baptized soon hopefully. For ate Sally and her two kids, we need them to continue coming to church but they should be back next week. Ate Sally is too busy cause she works in the city hall, and its especially busy now since its the longganisa festival. She's actually asking us all these funny questions since she's researching mormons on the internet. We got one about Joseph Smith and polygamy. Obviously there will be A LOT of stuff on the internet, usually not pointing out the good stuff, since that is the knowledge of man. It's better to go to the correct source of information. Anyways, we're going to teach them this week again. It's just hard to catch ate Sally this week though cause of the festival. We're also going to try to teach Vanessa tomorrow. Hopefully that works out.

So yesterday, we taught this guy bong bong (I'm still not sure why bong is a nick name here). This guy had really interesting things to say. He really wanted us to come to him to teach him. He has a good belief in God. He mentioned how all religions are based on a central source and how they are branches of the main source. He also talked about God's government and how it will come to the earth. I tried to explain to him the restoration, which talks about that main source, and sorta about God's government (basically the church's organization)... except he's very madaldal.

Anyways, please try to send those scriptures right away. If you can actually send soaps and contact lens solution that'd be great. I'm gonna try some cheap contact solution here.. I don't want to spend too much money right now... personal care items become mahal after awhile... especially when they all run out at the same time and especially when pamasahe is extremely expensive here in Vigan.

So that's life here in Vigan... it's pretty mahal... well that's probably because it's the city. This week is kuripot week. I don't know why were always shopping at pure gold (supermarket)... there's a perfectly good palengke... and it's cheaper. That's what's important. Supermarket is just a luxury but my companion is kind of maarte when it comes to shopping for food. Whatever hehe... that's just what I learned when I was sent far far away to the end of the mission.. Sta Ana.. now I'm at the other end of the mission. And the best area. For some reason, every missionary wants to come here to serve.

Anyways, take care all of you and I love you all!!!

Elder Morales

Week #43: I found out that mom used to be the dancing star in the elementary school. LOL!

Hello everyone!

Vigan Longganisa festival is coming soon. 

And things are going to be crazy here again. It's always crazy here. There's so much people... except in our area. Our area is pretty malayo but we have to make do. Most of our investigators are from referrals. We have 7 baptismal dates and hopefully we can add some more. We had zone training meeting last week and the zone leaders set a goal for us to teach 2 new families by the end of this month. We're trying our hardest but families are really busy. It's fun though just teaching members and trying to get referrals from them. All I've been doing is teaching them from D&C 18. Over and over and over and over again... We also finally got a new BML, President Barrientos' counselor, President Rosario. So this is going to be really fun since he should already be super involved in missionary work.

Anyways, sorry no pictures. Nothing interesting happened this past week...

It was aunti Jean's birthday by the way on the 9th. So we had food. And we had a lesson. Will you be sending those scriptures for ate Sally? She really wants them. So mom, here's some information for you, inang's siblings, in order from oldest to youngest:

Rufina Dela Cruz Aludino

Geronima Dela Cruz Magno

Nicolasa Dela Cruz Agapinan

Inang

Rosalia Dela Cruz Magno

Soledad Dela Cruz Fernando

I think I'll ask them for a whole bunch of birthdays, death dates. It'll probably help a lot. I'm still getting to know the family here, especially uncle Terecisio's family. There's so many of them. I'm still super confused but I'm figuring it out still. I met kuya Alex two kids, may may and ann ann. Little kids. And some of the kids know be by my real name.. it's weird hearing "Uncle Chris." I'm like "kasano ammom ti naganko?" They just somehow know. Haha. That's fine. Auntie Jean has been telling Auntie Linda that she's been going to church. Auntie Linda apparently told her to get baptized now and Auntie Jean told me what Auntie Linda said. Auntie Jean said Auntie Linda should go to church too. So refer missionaries to Auntie Linda please, AGAD!!! HAHAHA. Tell the missionaries at home the referral and send a note saying Elder Morales sent us. The missionaries will send it to HQ. Apparently Auntie Jean has been reading in Ate Karen's shop when she has nothing to do. So far we have been really focusing on auntie, ate Sally's family, inang narcing and Julius. They're really progressing. From there, I figure we can start branching out to the rest of them.

OH! Ate Sally told me mom used to be the dancing star in the elementary school.

Let's see... any other interesting news... I really can't think of anything. I've cooked all week. Let's see... did I cook.. Sisig, Ginataan, Menudo, Sinigang, Tinola, Adobo, Pinakbet. I made a goal this week to learn how to cook new dishes... but I'm not sure what to cook. Man! Cooking takes time especially when it comes to chopping the vegetables!!! It's fun though. I don't use those powder mixes anymore so yeah.

Anyways that's the news! Take care! Love you all!!!

Elder Morales