Sorry this is so Long!
Happy Chinese New Year and Happy Corn and rice festival. There are scarecrows everywhere here in Isabella providence and there are shops set up and on Monday there was dragon dancers going around and dancing at every tindahan (little shops on every street corner) and there is also a week where they have a parade for every brngy (neighborhood in a town) that is happening next week so a lot of our teen people are dancing in that so they aren't home.
Tuesday: weirdest day of my life. So we where punted beyond punted. Back up plans not home either, but I think most of them where partying or preparing for a party with all the festival going on. So we walked out up and down the street and there was a guy that had a huge cross as bling and I said hi to him like I do everyone. So he starts walking towards us. We ask what do you want. He mumbles and we just walk past him. then we though he just walked on but he starts walking up the road again so we stop to let him pass us but he stops and starts walking closer to us. We just walk around him again and go to some other places. No one was home and the other scheduled lessons were going to happen at night so we decided to just go home, and prepare for them. So we walk down the same road and I see him in the distance and turned around. I told my comp he is following us. we walked down a random road my comp stopped and waited at the corner and said "no he's not" I told her he is and grabbed her arm so we could find a place to hide while he pass by. We turned around and he speed walks around the corner. We start running. Everyone already looks at us anyways because I am a tall American so they were really looking at us now. So I yell Hello to them as we run past. We are getting to the end of the road so I stop next to a lady street vender and ask if I can use her bathroom. (They usually vend in front of their houses) she takes us to this really really nice outhouse thing (super nice clean tile and everything.) so I lock myself in there and make it sound like I am peeing and we wait. My thought is the running can be explained that I needed to pee really really badly. So we get out and he is gone. So we talk to one of the ladies that we said hi to as we ran past and asked where he went. Then she continued to give us great gossip as who that man was. Apparently he had a wife and a job but lost them both and went crazy. There are a lot of weird stories here in enchage. I love enchage it is so interesting. So then we got an Oym and invited to teach the lady later and by the time that was over it was time for our lessons we only had two. After that we had a dinner appointment but while walking there I about kicked something that I thought was trash on the street but avoided it at the last minute. Then I thought about it and realized that was a man! We grabbed our elders and a trycie driver and walked back. He was drunk and passed out in the street but we wanted to make sure that he was ok and didn't knock himself out or get ran over by anyone. The dinner was delicious
Wednesday: miracle I really really wanted to teach the Dumon sisters but they were at school and we didn't have time that day. So we visited their aunt and one of them was there. She had been kicked out because she was late so she ran to her aunt’s house. We gave them a really good lesson.
Thursday: Zone conference, it was good, I really don't remember the first part but the last part was about Joseph of Egypt and how the bible stories apply to our lives and how we are placed in specific places for a reason, even if we don't like it at first and how to make a good thing out of hard things, to grow in adversity, And how Lehi and Joseph Smith are related. I liked that. After that we had two lessons. One with a new family the Casco family! they are former investigators and they just need to get married to get baptized but they can't just yet because they are looking for jobs and can't find a good job if they aren't single. (There is a lot of that here. it isn't fair, it bugs Me. but oh well) we teach them and they referred their teenage cousins to us and they are amazing. Both the cousins came to church on Sunday, and I think had a good time. They ask questions and are really smart.
Friday: Miracle we usually teach just one or two principles at a time so people understand, but sis Marifel was just so ready and prepared. She was born again but didn't like they money thing. So we said hey come find out about us. So she read the whole pamphlet and prayed to know if it was true then read it again and prayed for understanding. So we shared the whole lesson. It was amazing and she usually has a huge amount of grandkids around her making noise but they were quite and still. It was amazing.
Nanay Rosa an oym but she was a member already so she turned into a less active, but just because we invited her she comes every Sunday. She is lonely but sometimes I think she just thinks that in her head because she lives in the back of her sister’s house and there are kids always there. But maybe she can't hear them. She is deaf in one ear, and her back is paralyzed a little but she can hobble. So she hobbles to church, cries because there are people there and we guide her to RS. For two Sundays that has happened it is great. We had a lesson with her she didn't feel that good. I think she is close to having a stroke because her left arm was numb and hurting. But she hobbled to church next Sunday so that was a relief. We also taught this dad the plan of salvation out of nowhere but it was fun, and I ate a fruit thing it looked like a bean with bark on the outside it grows on trees and the inside is like an apple and it is sour like mustard but sweet too and it has a big black seeds in the pockets. Casco lesson and Bambalan they are so happy.
Saturday: Gamad, he breeds chickens to fight (it is not illegal here in fact it is televised) he has a testimony, and knows and recognizes the spirit and is a super nice guy, but he drinks and he is not worried that his friends will disown him if he stops. but he is worried that the members will go down a wrong path if he goes to church and he doesn't want to be a hypocrite. We told him that is ridiculous, as long as he tries to be better and come unto Christ and to try and lessen his drinking so he can feel the spirit. We asked the single adult people to invite him to the activities because he really wants a member wife to straighten him out. But that's not going to happen if he doesn't come to church. On Sunday we stopped by his house to get him to come, he said next time. We tried hard but he said not yet. So we said next time. We also set up a family home evening with him and his less active sister. So that is good.
Taught all 3 of the Dumon sisters, one likes cooking, one works in a bank and one likes math too. They are cool. Taught both of our recent converts and taught Tatay Alamby about his choices that he is making.
FHE with our elders, the family brought a karaoke machine that killed the spirit. Like it was dead. Here they have videoke where there can be anything going on in the back of the words. This one had America’s next top model. But then they turned it off and we had a lesson about the temple and then they turned it on again and we had to go into another room to eat. After that their nanay asked about how we can have families forever and the elders got a referral.
Sunday a good day, testimonies, people went to church and worked in Maligaya and taught about the book of Mormon to everyone, then dinner. Tatay Alambay prayed about a baptism date and didn't get an answer but we told what date should we shoot for he said the 28 so we said let’s do it and we told him as long as he prayed that the lord would be with him and that maybe any date would be a good one because with the lord nothing is impossible and it was just a test of his faith.
Today we did laundry and we are going shopping in the shops for the festival.
"Mowing" the grass with mechete not as fun as it sounds hahah
It was good to serve.
this is a picture of a black caribou that is picking his nose ewwwwww! hahah
this is a picture of an albino caribou (they are usually black).
Over the river and thought the fields to the lunch appointment we go.
FHE.-- not the one with videoke all the young single adults where there.
Fruit/Bean thing
Cafe by the park, it is like a landscaping heaven and it is really nice home made food too. it is the place to go to treat yourself. i wish he would get more customers because he deserves it with all the hard work he has put into that restaurant
