Week 6 4/23/13

Sigel,

This week has been pretty legit.  Last week I was on early because we were seeing if we were going to have money that day we ended up not getting money, haha. I texted my mission president and asked him if we could get permission to go to Naga on Tuesday so thats what we ended up doing that day.  Got money and Food!!! Bought some totilla chips really expensive, dip and some frosted flakes and fake milk yum!! Then on Wednesday I had exchanges with my district leader, elder Bangal which was awesome.  He's from Quezon city but now lives in the San Pablo mission.Anyway that day went good but our appointments didn't really work out, but we got 3 that day not to bad.  It was the first time I was away from my Tatay (trainer-companion) which was really weird.  The next day we got ready for the district meeting right before we left there was a brown out great....then we took th 1 hr and 30 minute bus ride to Pamplona and guess what?? there was a brown out.  Me and Elder Parohinog were the ones giving the workshop, that went good even though I was sweating like a pig.  That would be the last time we would be together as a district because next week is transfers.  I can't believe its already been 6 weeks since I have been here.  We took pictures and messed around on last time. Then we got home, guess what?..yo're correct...brown out!  That night we got some lessons in and we ate dinner at Nanay Benabetes and had some pig head soup and  intestines ahhh  not to bad. The next day we got to work again and got a lot of referrals from a family.  We visited Nanay Magcayon she has something wrong with her, so we asked if she needed help with something, she said she could use some help on the farm.  so we did service for her, cut some grass and weeds with an itak/machete, got a blister and it popped on me hurt like a mother.  Then after I poured some alcohol on it so it wouldn't get infected that sucked.  After we ate there with her and her children.  We are going back next Monday.  Saturday was legit, we had a district/ward activity we went to a resort and they rented the pool out for the families so that was cool relaxing by the pool in my tie.  We saw a cool river/creek and followed it up to Tatay Cordes our baptismal invitation investigator and went exploring, we followed the river up and found a water hole and it was super pretty, a bunch of little kids were diving and stuff it goes pretty deep.  Water was just coming out of the mountain must have been a fresh water spring somewhere in the mountain.  I started playing with the kids/anak and the next thing I see is them bringing me a crab!!!!  What the heck a fresh water crab it was super Astig/cool.  So then we pretty much chilled there for like an hour.  Probably the most awesome/beautiful place I have ever been in my life.  So more missionaries are going to be in our little/big district.  But they might split our district and have a Sipocot district, that's where I am and they are going to put another pair of missionaries with us and they are going to make my companion the district leader...who knows we'll fine out soon.  But unfortunately that night we went to Nanay Benabetes and ate there.  She got really sick and we took her to the hospital.
the next day we went to Ragay about 2 hours our and had our church service there in a hut with 11 people.  I blessd the sacrament and gave a talk.  I can really tell that I'm starting to understand the Tagalog and I'm starting to get it so that's really awesome. Had some raw fish there and we had a later appoinment in a really pretty area as wella dn that went good it was with 3 investigators and their daughter who is a member. I messed up totally on my tagalog but the daughter saved my bacon by bareing a powerful testimony that the church is true and that made a great impact on the family. Before that I had a pretty good lunch some chicken, some brown sauce and some noodle and rice and veggies.  They later told me that the brown stuff is pig blood and that the soft noodles were its intestines, I started to just eat rice after that, it was good but I wasn' down for eating blood.  then on the way home we took the jeepney and then Bam! we almost died, this truck driver tried passing us on a 1 way highway and he almost killed us but I was like, hey not today! and used the force and luckily I focused in on the bus's pedal and stepped on its break.  so I saved us whew!

When we finally got home we talked with the President about the district, visited Nanay B, then did family home evening at the Cordes's and found out about the Boston Marathon.  I jsut remember that my heart was broken, it was hard explaining to everyone that its difficult for Americans to see their country attaked like that.  You forget how far away from home you are when you see something like that. Hope everyone is good in Boston, thought about you Curtis hope everything is good there and I hope you were one of the people that boo'ed the patrol car with the loser in the back seat like a typical Bostonian.  so yeah justice will be served, "Merica!" then yeah today woke up at 5 am headed over to Nanay Magcayons got dirty sweaty and tan and did some farm chores.  Got some more blisters and worked hard with my companion, michael the district clerk and Darryl who's been called to serve in the Mindanao mission. got done and all 4 of us crashed at our apartment and now I'm here in the computer shop, nothing really new just improving alot in the language. I am not really in culture shock any more.  Everyone calls me "Joe" because I am American. I feel like now I'm really good friends with the members from this district and with the investigators and less actives. Got to see some beautiful land and eat some weird stuff this week and got like 6 referrals and 4 potential investigators.  so that's really good!  So I'm doing good, I hope everyone is doing good back home, I really miss you.  I appreciate the e-mails alot.  I'll talk to you all soon.

Love, Elder Llorens