I am certain you will be envious of this hair do. This dear sister use to live behind us and I love her dearly. She is in another district now and we visited their district meeting - so good to see her. She goes home in September. I will miss her. She is the one that told me she wasn't afraid because she had the best companion of all, the Holy Ghost.
This is the road on the way to Tagbilaran. We travel this road a lot and it is so beautiful! The trees almost make a tunnel.
Up in the mountains we are helping with the housing project. One of the older ladies died. They live under that blue tarp. They are carrying her casket through a rice field.
The family got in the back of the truck.
This is the cemetery. They bury above the ground and after 3-5 years they clean out the bones and put someone else in. They are cementing this up.
On Thursday we did a Community Service Project at the housing project. We got there 45 minutes early and the man in charge was another 45 minutes late so it was a very slow start. This Elder is from Utah - Elder Francom. A couple Filipino missionaries could almost run on these and Elder Francom tried and tried and tried. He did manage to take a few steps.
Success! We had 22 missionaries. 18 of them were squished in the zone leader van and we had 6 in our truck. It was a full day. Didn't get home until 5 and we left at 6 a.m.
Sister Mangompit was pretty good at it.
So they finally got to work. They were divided into groups of 5 and they mixed cement for the floors. The first sister on the right worked as hard as the Elders. She has been giving her companion fits but she surely is a worker. They mix the cement by hand on the ground.
Time for a break. That is the time I show up. None of the people getting theses 27 homes are LDS so we all had on vests that tells them we are Mormons.
This man is tamping the ground before pouring the cement. Norm was quite fascinated with how they do things. This is why he isn't building.
There is our Normie taking a turn. He reminds me quite often he isn't what he use to be. I think he does pretty darn good.
My job was to take pictures :)
It is amazing how they do things.
This guy is in the cement in his bare feet leveling it off. He just washed off afterwards.
One of the groups got fed. I think it was corn beef and rice. I liked my sandwich.
A really pretty view on our way home.
Saturday we got to go to another ocean baptism in Ubay. These two sisters are truly sisters. One is 15 and the other 13. They have been investigating for a year. The tide was in. Water higher than we have ever seen it. These Elders did the baptizing.
These are the Sisters that taught them - Sister Perez and Sister Lappay. They are wonderful Sisters.
This is an amazing experience. I was hoping for a nice day and that we would not get rained out or melt and neither happened. We got a bad rain storm coming home but all was ok at the baptism and there was a little breeze which helped a lot.
This is the little hut we are in for the meeting and to eat. It isn't easy for these people to get to the ocean. The zone leaders take their van and we have the truck. The rest go on motorbikes. They bring the food on motor bikes in big drawstring sacks. Notice the big pot - full of Bihon. The Branch President's wife always brings it along with the glass dishes and glass glasses. We furnished a couple cakes in the boxes we buy from our landlord. It is a custard cake and quite tasty.
I am always amazed at how nicely they do things. These dear people always have a program printed out, take song books, we sing, have a prayer, talks, the whole works right there by the ocean. I truly love it. There were probably 25 people there. They are going to have another baptism next Saturday. I don't know why they don't combine but we will try and go again.
We are always noticing the beautiful clouds. Every day the sky has beautiful clouds.
President and Sister Tanner had lunch with us today. We are eating Annie's birthday cake. We love having the Tanners here in our humble abode. They are so kind. It was our district conference today. I was in charge of the music and it went well for which I am grateful. We did the "As Sisters in Zion and Armies of Helaman" combo. Had about 36 singers.
Our conference came from Salt Lake and was just for Filipino people. It was amazingly wonderful. We are so privileged to be here with these dear people. They talked a lot about the Typhoon that hit a year and a half ago, when Jake got here. They showed pictures. It was amazing. These are truly resilient people. They know how to make do and do without and they aren't afraid to work.
Elder Burke Nielsen spoke. They were here for 3 years in area presidency I think. When they moved in someone was helping them and his wife went to move a ladder and the man said to her " I will be the One." He used that for his text throughout referring that I will be the One to serve etc. I will be the One to do what needs to be done. I like that phrase.
Sister Wixom said "I will be the one" to express love for the Filipino children. She said with the Filipinos, family comes before worldly wealth.
Elder Craig Christensen, President Adern and Elder Neil Anderson also spoke and they were every one inspiring talks. I wish I could hear them over so it would soak in. I needed every one.
The closing thought I wrote down from Elder Anderson was, "Now is the time to show the Lord that we love Him." I know that is true for all of us! Love YOU!
