The Best 2 Years For My Life

[

Regarding Elder Matthew O. Richardson's conference talk during which he referred to his mission as "the best two years for my life"]

I did notice the phrase that the president of sunday school used 'The best two years for my life'.  In our district meeting that is what i bore my testimony on. And that is what paul had shared with me before i left. Trust me i would not consider this to be the best two years of my life. I feel i have had better moments, but everything i have done here is unforgettable and helped me learn and grow so that makes it the best two years for my life. I honestly have learned more in the Gospel then i could have anywhere else. I learned teaching skills that will be used my whole life afterwards. I have definitely learned to be more Christ like then i actually thought i could be, Especially in these last weeks.

So this is my last week i get to be a Full Time Missionary but i know it will not be the last time i do missionary work, and even so i know i have work to do. We will celebrate {my birthday] when i get back. Thanks for the birthday wishes and all the support everyone has given me along this journey. I thank those who helped in ways that were not necessary but wanted to help anyways, you for sure will receive those blessings you are in need of for your charitable works. I know the greatest thing i learned here was to "Learn of Christ, but do not just teach of Christ, Teach by Christ" If we teach by or with Christ we will teach his pure Gospel and people will grow faster and stronger. Help people exercise their free agency by moving towards Christ. Free Agency is a Great Gift of God, to choose to love Him and be more like Him. He gave us this Gift to experience life, but not only to experience life but to Choose to Love him and Follow him by our own Free Will. Because we know that when we do things that we choose to do we enjoy it a lot more, and when we choose to do the things the Lord asks, we will Enjoy being with Him even more. I know that those who feel far from the Lord or do not believe that he exists, Only have their eyes closed, backs turned, hands clenched and just need to open their eyes or turn around or open their hands to be accepted of Him or Believe in Him, because he is waiting and is willing. There is a scripture that was quoted in Conference i know it is also found in D&C 88: 63 but i think there is a better verse in the Bible, not sure of the reference. "Draw near unto me and I will draw near[er] unto you;..."  If we but take the chance to come unto Christ and Heavenly Father even if we take One step, i know that they will gladly take Two steps towards us. I challenge all who read this to take a step towards Christ and Heavenly Father. Whether it be Believe that they are Real, or Read some more in the Scriptures, share your beliefs with another, or even invite them to listen to the Gospel. Come unto Christ everyone and be perfected in him. I undoubtedly know that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is the one and only true church on the Earth, that has living Prophets to guide and help us return to our Heaven Father if we but choose to Follow the Counsel of the Lord in all our Doings. I know that no man is forgotten by God but man will forget God, and when we forget Him we need only to humble our selves and ask him for forgiveness and we will Gladly forget our faults, wrongs and Short comings. I plead as Prophets of Old pled for people to come be Followers of the True Gospel and Teachings of Jesus Christ, to learn how to obtain everlasting happiness, and I do so humbly in the sacred name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

Still Lost

yeah i went to the meeting house locator... Northville is on the map but the roads are not charted. We had a member work with us but we got lost and did not make appointments.  i once had 8 lessons a day now it went down to 3.

General Conference will be shown this saturday and sunday. saturday morning is priesthood session then after that will be the first session

Annoyed and Lost

just reallllllyyyyyyy annoyed at a lot of things..

why i am so mad right now is [the mission president]  just transfered Elder Cruz... Elder Cruz has been down and out for a week and a half.. i have worked in my area for no more than 8 days tops.. My area is a freaking maze. i get lost just trying to get home from church... and church is around the corner! and now i have to get a new companion and magically get us home on thursday. Last thursday me and Elder Cruz got lost in Angeles City trying to get home... we ended up going around in Circles for about 2 hours! We have an area that is just horrible [to find your way around] that has all of our investigators. We tried to send members to visit them.. they came back reporting that they couldnt find their house...our area we work in is Northville and its a maze really. i am looking at maps and can not find my own house. i literally know NOTHING about my area.

well we have to go because we have this JUBILEE thing about the church..  we have to sit in a room and wait for people to talk to us. we can not even be missionaries there [proselytize] but our president demands our presence.

More First Aid, Please!

So talk about my new area.. I am in Bulaon, Angeles... i am in the middle of two giant cities  San Fernando and Angeles. I am not in a City but its not a farm area either. i love walking around in my area we have two places called.. Saudi and Mexico. We do not work in Mexico, but we work in Saudi. the people are nice so you can tell people there are area missionaries working in Saudi...(philippines)   hahahaa but yeah work is good we have a lot of investigators which is nice!  My companion is also preparing to go home in two transfers so we are veterans and just get out and do work.

I bought a new knife for our kitchen.... you probably can see where this story is going if i am telling you about a new knife. hahaha the Ironic thing about all of this... i also bought  some tongs for our kitchen... Elder Cruz was washing the dishes and he went to wash.... no not the knife.. the Tongs and cut his thumb! so i was like just put alcohol on it and i have a band aid for you... and then the time came.. I was cutting up some Cabbage and i wanted to cut out its heart (if that is what its called) the hard part at the base... and i asked elder cruz what the word for sharp was... he tells me... i restate that the knife is very sharp... then i turn to cut out the heart of the cabbage... and OOPS.... i cut open the base of my index finger on my left hand... hahaha i laughed and told Elder Cruz not to look cause he probably would have passed out if he saw the blood. so I wrapped my finger up .. and yeah i finished cooking.  anyways my finger is all healed up it is really sore though but the skin is closing up. That was friday night i cut my finger. So all is well. 

Well i do not know what else to say. our apartment is really nice actually we have a little balcony that we hang out on at nights and talk. I am just enjoying the time i have left here that is for sure.

Traveling Around

we went out of town...  my companion had to take a test to get into byu hawaii so yeah i have been traveling around and sitting around we just got back to our area and so we were just emailing to let our families know we are okay and that we will write more next week okay!!! soo yeah love my new area and comp... more to read next time!

Transfers, Scones & First Aid

i am getting transfered to Angeles Bulaon area  i will spend my last 5 weeks there working. So this will be a nice little last area. Well a lot of good things that i am leaving behind here... Investigators coming to church and preparing to be baptized which should happen in Oct. I am also missing out on the opening of a very nice chapel that will be used on the 25th of this month. 

But this was the week of SCONES!!!!! Yeah i ate scones several times this week.. sadly no chili but it was great. There is this bread place and the bread they make is basically the scone dough we use. They bake their bread so i just asked to buy the dough.. this was new to them and a string of questions followed. I told them i was going to simply fry the bread. In this culture if there is a way they do something then that is the only way you can do it. Once someone becomes adventurous and tries something different.. they will normally take a lot of crap along the way. Non believers and what not but then when they try it and its good they are like wow this can be done! So i just was like yeah i am going to fry it... yes it tastes good really good. hahaha and it did! 

[what I learned] while on exchanges with a fellow american Elder from utah.. he was outside with a machete opening coconuts... when he comes into the house stating "Houston we have a problem..." and goes to the sink... instantly  i knew he chopped his finger.... so i state.. "yep you chopped your finger didnt ya?" and he was like "yep".  Now this Elder is a down hill mountain biker and has a good amount of cuts and scars now from his past days. And being the walking hazard that i am, of course blood and things like this do not phase me at all. So we needed to get this wrapped and apply pressure. It was a pretty nasty gash in his index finger lots of blood. I was like well i need something to wrap this with.. he tells me to grab that sock.. yes it was clean. so i destroy the sock so that we can use it as a good wrap. Tell him to put his hand above his head. After 20 mins he needs to shower. so i told him we will get it all taken care of afterwards.  so now we use the second sock to tie it down. the Elder did have a first aid kit so we had gauze pads to use as well and med tape. we needed to wash the cut because the machete was nasty and rusty looking... so alcohol was needed to clean it.... i grabbed his kitchen knife and told him to bite on the handle... he refused as if he could handle it... I told him he needs to or else it will hurt a lot more...  so he was like okay. so i poured the alcohol in the cut... it obviously hurt a whole lot. But after i got it all nice and bandaged he was surprised that there was no pain at all. And now it is nice looking and no pain. He really needed stitches tho it was really bad. but it healed up nicely now and he will be okay. so that was this last week! 

well love ya all and see ya all in 5 weeks 

Rain, Rubber Boots & Pizza Hut

Yes it has been rainy but its not bad or anything. There was some strong winds but nothing serious. Yeah this typhoon [Nanmadol] is way strong but it does not effect us. and if so we all have 72 hour kits we had to make and so if i was stuck in my house, we would survive. so no need to worry

my shoes are still usable but i do not use them because they are just CRAPPY looking! so i found a pair of rubber boots and then cut about a fourth off from them and put flip flops that are nice and soft inside them to make them comfortable. I wear them everyday and never have wet feet! and they look cool!

Got my flight plans last week so that is cool to know but whatever. its a holiday here (National Heroes Day) for like 3 days. We just went to the Mall earlier and it was just packed with people... wayyyy fun! Ate pizza hut. we have a new investigator we just met and he came to church... nice guy! thats what we have been doing in short

Two Experiences

Well last saturday night I helped dress a deceased member with a white shirt/tie and suit coat... i held up shoulders and arms. So because he is an endowed member, after the service and before he goes to the cemetery, we dress him in temple clothes. But yeah that was a great experience this week, watching the Plan of Salvation give support to a family. So yeah that is about it for the adventure. On the sad note one of our investigators who is supposed to get baptized would not ask God if any thing we have shared and taught is true in order to be baptized. But that is how mission work sometimes goes. So that is about it this week!

A Hike

well we went on a hike.................. I WALK ALL DAY........... I hated every moment of this stupid hike.. and now i have marchers foot... my feet feel really heavy.. so yeah.. it was planned and then all the plans failed and then when we left it was already noon and........ just not how i like to spend my p day's so yeah thats about it......

oh we have been told we cant really talk about investigators specifically when we email home because people are posting blogs and are not taking out names and things (world wide problem) so we cant tell you names of investigators or talk about their concerns.. so yeah our emails are pretty much vague and pointless now! hahaha but every area got DVD players to study PMG DVD's for personal and companionship study that was cool. We will all get cellphones soon so that is a nice help with communicating with other missionaries which is HORRIBLE! Today would not have been so bad if we had cell phones

Not Much to Share

not much to share. week went by pretty fast, nothing new and exciting just talked to some people and taught some others. Investigators are okay.. could be better i hope in the upcoming week here. Also bad news- the New chapel will not be finished until the last week of september [and] transfers fall on the 2nd week of september! and i will probably get dumped in a new area for one transfer and that will just be lame.. but whatever... do not really have a choice or say in the matters about that!

okay well i think i am going to head out. we have some shopping and a meeting to do later today. Love ya!

All is well and happy on this side of the world

awhile back i heard people randomly playing strauss music and just was like oh man i can not escape strauss festival! anyways sooooooooooo yeah all is well and happy on this side of the world... very rainy... i scored this blanket that is a blanket not a bed sheet that was left at the missionaries house.. Now i sleep with an electric fan blowing on me and i am now all cozy in my blanket and bed sheet, I Sleep like a LOG! hahahaha Love it! so yeah what else.... i think that is all i got right now.. i am actually going to go shopping for food and then i have a meeting to attend later on! so i am off! love ya!

New Mission President!

anyways, it is transfers.. i did not get transferred and all the transfers are just CRAZY right now. new president must have received some crazy big revelations because there are a lot of things that are not normal. Like new greenie americans training that do not speak very good yet. So whatever... we had a good laugh at the craziness.

President Martino is nice.. different.. but nice. he actually is learning tagalog he studied before he came he served a mission in italy so he is picking up tagalog really fast. President Martino is from texas sounds like George W. Bush... its funny. Sister Martino is really nice and fun to talk to. All their kids are married and have their own families. That is about as much as i know. Just got to visit with him shortly. They came in on june 30 or something i forgot.. so they are still very new. I have done a lot of english assignments here... i imitate their english very well... and now my english is just as bad as theirs! hahaha

This picture of Elder Declaro and Elder Grow was taken July 27, 2011 at about 11am. (That would be July 26, 8pm for us) This was just a little less than 2 hours before he emailed it.

The signs in the background indicate there is "isadahan here." Elder Grow explains, "they are just like signs from other places in the philippines. they just mean there are fish in the water and if it was a real isdahan you would actually fish for your food."

we went to this place (its like a restaurant) and we walked around then as we left we saw that they have one of those things where you buy plates and stuff then you can break it... so i did i bought a 16 peso plate and frisbee'd it at the wall.. that was fun! [If you play the video frame by frame you can read the signs on the walls.. which say, "for effective release of anger shout tacsiyapo before smashing your plates" and the "targets" say things like "professors, classmates", "mother-in-law", "boss", "mahjong / poker" etc.]

A Day in the Life

Our week was just busy and tiring but nothing out of the normal. a normal day is waking up early, 6 am, because there is a recorded prayer that plays on a megaphone from the catholic church a block over from our house. when that rude interruption is over i tend to go back to sleep and wake up again around 630. i walk around to wake up, go to the bathroom, shower, sometimes i cook (Pancakes or french toast or eggs or noodles or hot dogs just depends). 8 am personal study, 9am companionship study, 10 am work, (here in Anao the only people left home are OLD PEOPLE that only speak ilokano and do not understand us.. or maybe they do but they just speak ilokano to us so work in the morning has never given results because its the time for people working in the fields and they are just not home in the morning) So we just study more just to help elder declaro practice teaching and knowing what to teach. at 12pm its rest and lunch time until 2pm then work again until 9pm so that is a day summed up for ya. we walk a pretty good distance because we just work in like a circle. so we go out one way then circle around and come back. We cover a lot of area that way. Lately breakfast lunch and dinner has been the same foods... elder declaro bought a kilo of chopped pork and he is just trying to be conservative with money.. he is a worry wart about that stuff. So i am sick of eating at home. we have eaten at members and what not. We have had members with anniversaries so that was good food we got to have. we have had a funeral service to attend, that was good food so yeah we get a good variety. So yeah that is about it...

The Work

anyways the work has been picking up here in Anao and its been nice. We are still struggling with some investigators and being able to teach them again [return visit]. Here in Anao people are out working in the fields or Bukid and are just not at home or are asking us to come back a different day. This is nothing new here in the work but it becomes discouraging to new Missionaries that do not have different aspects of Missionary work. The people we are teaching are very good and are interested. just have a few hurdles to work with, like one investigator met missionaries long ago and was not interested at all. but now, after she felt she needed to read the book of Mormon one day and happened to read Alma 32, she has seen how a seed had been planted and is growing now. She can not come to church because of her work schedule and it has depressed her but hope that it is not permanent and it will be changed. We have one investigator that is new and is struggling with changes but she is making efforts like wanting to try to pray and she is making the steps to come to church just has not continued. All in all the area is starting to become great, we are planting and waiting for the Harvest. Well that is how the work is going. as far as the companionship-- it is good. Elder Declaro will be a fantastic missionary once he gets out of his head more and focuses on the doing part. He is trying to obtain every ounce of knowledge but is missing the simple things he needs to teach and share. He does make improvements everyday and has already made changes and is becoming great. He is very enthusiastic about the work but he does get depressed when things do not end up the way he thought and it bothers him. he will need to learn that he does not have control of their [investigators] agency. as long as he knows he gave them a chance and tried his best to share and explain its [the gospel's] importance, then he has successfully done his part in the work. Once he understands that, then his teaching will have so much meaning and feeling behind it and people will feel the Spirit telling them what he is sharing is true. that is what I hope will happen for him and his mission that he is serving, to gain that importance of the Gospel in the lives of others and in especially in his own life, much like how I realized that while I have been here. So yeah that is whats gone on this week in the mission. this transfer has gone by pretty fast and only a few more left.. not that I am counting or anything... but I am getting excited that is for sure!

Rice & Training

i am good... And yeah i am amoeba free! i just do not like eating rice anymore... i have loved it my whole life! but now it makes my stomach hurt.... so i just eat it at lunch only and a little at night. rice is great and i love it... i just cant stomach it now... but i am sure i will want rice once again

what do i do as a trainer... i try not to make him [Elder Grow's companion] want to go home. I have to teach him how and what to teach. I have to teach him how to talk to people and just be normal. Its a whole lot of stuff i am not good at because i also cant just go and do everything myself. i have to let him try and then of course he fails and gets depressed but he keeps on trying to do things he just is not an adjustable person. He is a busy-body [always working] (which apparently he was not before the mission). and that is causing him to stress a little, because he is trying to do everything at once. He is homesick and can't get it out of his mind and he just does not always focus in lesson and annoys me a little. But i do my best to keep him occupied and sometimes it works and other times it doesnt but the members are helping as well. so i just do my best not to tell him to just go home because he is not ready... but then i have to think that one day he will be ready and if he just gets out of his head and follows the Spirit more, then he will finally understand everything he needs to know, do and feel in order to teach people. so yes that is what is going on with my companionship... that is training apparently

our work here is just slow and its rough but its not discouraging just normal so it doesnt bother me

Rain

so we just ended a WEEKS worth of rain. It has rained non stop and it was like super strong rain and would not stop. So yeah we were not in the storm but the storm was pulling all the clouds and rain and it was passing all over us. But all was good. work was very slow for us but we were at hitting it hard and just getting wet and doing our best to try and find people who would let us teach them. That is still not going well its always come back another day and they are not there on that next day! So yeah but my new comp is getting a lot of good practice with trying to talk to people.. but he is doing his best to get work done. So yeah that is what is the newest news here from Anao, Tarlac, Philippines!

A Good Feeling

So there is nothing new to add from last week except my new companion is Elder Declaro he is fresh from the MTC excited and Nervous about a whole lot of things. He is running way too fast and trying to just know everything within one week so that he will not hinder the work. He is a really nice guy born in the church and is just wanting to serve and be a missionary. So happy father’s day to dad totally forgot about fathers day really.

JUST FIND OUT THE FAMILY I WAS TEACHING IN MY LAST AREA WAS BAPTIZED! The Father, Mother and one of their Children! man that is a good feeling. Now just hope they stay strong in the church!

well yeah that is about all we have, a lot of work to do this transfer in my area. so that is whats up now

Still in Anao

its transfers tomorrow so we had a sleep over and that was just fun. you go over to the elders house and sleep... normally you mess around all night then on p day you are tired all day! its awesome! so anyways i am sleepy

i am still in Anao. What i know about the transfer is that elder abuan is going to my second area which is very close to our area so he will not be going far (but he will be traveling to far places to go back the other direction).

i will probably have a whole lot of new things next transfer to talk about. there is nothing to talk about now because i do not have investigators or anything

Big Bowl of Popcorn

yeah i am good now!

so... i got a letter that i will be training this next transfer... i am staying (in Anao)

i cooked a big bowl of popcorn on friday night... i always get this crazy look when i am like, “no i am just going to eat popcorn tonight or in the morning”.. i have to explain that is what i learned from my dad hahahaha

i think i have described it [Anao] before... its got a lot of houses that are next to each other and its kinda like downtown sacramento... but its not really a city, its just out on the outskirts of Paniqui city... its a nice little place. We just have no investigators and its reallly annoying. all of our investigators are like old investigators that are like done listening and are not reading or coming to church.

we have to go to Paniqui every monday, so we shop here. its like 30 minutes by tricycle [Go to blog entry December 2009 "Pictures" to see photo of a trike, then imagine 2 Elders in the sidecar on a 30 minute ride!!]

well i am off ... it is waayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy HOT here!

Healthy Again

I am healthy again. i got some drugs to flush out amoebas and after i took it i got energy and my poo normalized again the next day. so either it was an amoeba or just got healthy again the following day

sister puzey gave [the medication] to me after i complained some more. i asked her if it could be possible if i had an amoeba and she said she don't think so.. i responded (respectfully) you do not think i do but youre not positive if i dont. She then said she was going to give me medicine. and now i am okay!

[while sick and confined to home] i learned a lot of cool verses to teach with from the bible about apostasy and other principles with the bible... i rarely use the bible in teaching so i just do not have my scriptures marked up like my BOM is... so yeah i gained knowledge there.. my sickness made great conversation with people... “what do you think i have?”... anyways i do not know exactly what i learned [from this experience] but i really hate just being in my house not being able to work!

the meetinghouse [in Anao] is actually a house turned into a chapel. [The meetinghouse being built] just got the steeple and its coming together. it will be finished maybe in august. Yes i have gone to the site i have walked around it and looked at all the blueprints. They just asked locals who have experience that live near the site to work [on building it]. Members and non members [work together and we] help share the gospel with them.

[regarding recent tornado activity in California] what is going on over there!!!!! that is not normal! and actually our weather is not normal as well. its more relaxed than normal around here. But we have been having rain a lot at night! OHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH I SAW LIGHTENING STRIKE THE GROUND!!!!!! i did not see the bolt but i saw the splash of electricity. i was watching this crazy storm that appeared in minutes through a crack in the wall from inside a house. and BOOOM it was about 10 yards or less from the house. then lightening struck a few more times close to the area!! it was awesome!!!!!! i saw this BIG OLE BAD BOY STRIKE but i was behind trees a good ways away so didnt get to see it actually hit [the ground] but it was awesome!!

nothing really new to talk about but i am loving this area so i am happy!