I'm Melting

So first let me start of by saying it's hot.  I've been here for close to 3 months and still every time I step out of the apartment I cry a little bit (and those tears sizzle and dissolve into the sun because DANG it is hot)  I got a fever from the heat and i've been recovering from it the last few days but we've still been able to head out and work every day which I do not regret.  This is what we eat when it gets super hot it's called Halo-Halo and it consists of whatever the heck they decide to put in it (Coconut, Jello, fruits, condensed milk, etc.) + ice!  It's saves lives. 

So this week is transfers and we are extremely sad since two missionaries in our District will be finishing their missions this transfer.  Elder Sanchez, one of my best friends on the mission, is one of them.  (Please excuse how sleep deprived I look in this photo).  He has taught me a lot about missionary work and what it truly takes to serve the Lord diligently and i'll never forget him! 

Also not to mention since it's their last week here we were able to obtain more dinner appointments because the members invited our whole district to dinner.  This was one of them with the Ronquillo Family, they are always so kind and love to have dinner with the missionaries since they too have two missionaries serving in the field right now.  

The other missionary going home is Sister Crichton, she is the one in red on the right of me.  She is one of the funniest people I have ever met.  She is from American Samoa and loves to joke around.  These two missionaries are still very diligent and hard working even though they will be going home this week, this was taken at their baptisms that they had this week.  

Not exactly sure what is going to happen this week with transfers since i'll finally be graduating from training!  I'm extremely nervous and intimidated but all I can do is trust in the Lord.  He wouldn't give any of us trials that he knew we wouldn't be able to handle.  That's it for this week I love you all remember to brush twice daily to avoid gingivitis!!

Elder Burdeos​

We're Just Getting Started

This is Tess Montilla​ (I promise she's usually smiling i'm not exactly sure what she's doing in this picture)  She has been an investigator here in Paranaque for 14 months.  She comes from a catholic background so she already had somewhat of a testimony of Jesus Christ as our Savior (as do the majority of the people here actually)  She is a single parent with a son named Roland who is a member of the INC (Iglesia ni Cristo) a popular church here in the Philippines.  I've mentioned her in my previous emails, when we began to start trying to teaching her again back in February she was super receptive to the message and accepted the baptismal date we extended to her for a service in March.  We encountered a stumbling block when she was informed by one of her friends that our church was a cult and she told us that she wanted us to stop teaching her.  We were able to resolve her problem and ever since that day we noticed a very apparent change in her.  She began to take our lessons very seriously and STUDIED the Book of Mormon.  Not only did she read it but she had pages of notes that she had been writing as she pondered its message.  It was incredible!  I was able to baptize her this last Saturday and she bore a strong testimony at the service.  It felt amazing to know that just like that, another one of Heavenly Father's children is on the path to salvation and will have a chance to return to him!

We also threw a sick party after the baptismal service and a lot of members showed up and brought food.  It was also a party to celebrate Elder Sanchez's birthday so there was also cake and ice cream so if you're wondering why my face is way more round than it used to be there is your explanation.  You can also see that Tess looks a lot happier in this picture than in the previous one!  Baptisms are a great experience, we'll keep working to find more of scattered Israel, we're just getting started.  

We also had the opportunity to visit this majestic House of God last Tuesday.  ​So if you were wondering why my email was one day late last week (which i'm pretty sure none of you were except for my poor mom who waited until 2 am to read my email) this is where I was sorry mom.  The temple provided the spiritual jumpstart that I really needed.  

Also something that excited was one of our investigators who we had actually dropped because he was not replying to our texts showed up at church yesterday!!  He told us he wanted to continue hearing our message and that he had some family issues and that's why he had not been able to attend for the last two weeks!  So exciting can't wait to start teaching him again!  Missionary work is great, such an honor to be here!

Elder Burdeos

What in the world is Holy Week?

So this week was Holy Week!  A celebration of the Resurrection of our Savior!  This was new to me, we left the apartment and walked outside.  There was not a person in sight.  I began to think that we had just slept through the Apocalypse and we were the only ones alive but Elder Desabille explained to me that usually people go out of town on vacation or stay inside on Holy Week.  This was a good and bad thing for us.  Good, because we were able to get to our appointments REALLY fast with no traffic, and bad because nobody wants to hear from some little boys while they're celebrating Holy Week.  Since we were not having a very successful time finding new investigators, we decided to focus our attention on less active members and recent converts. This is Sister Corpus, a less active member in our ward.  She is SO nice.  We talked to her and taught her and after we were done teaching she saw that my bag was torn and jumped up and said "ELDER SAGLIT LANG" (Elder wait one second) and she went and grabbed her materials and told me she was going to fix my bag, and that she did.  She did an amazing job!  The people here are so hospitable and friendly!

This is me with Brother Aaron, one of our three youth workers.  We took this while Sister Corpus was fixing my bag.  Brother Aaron is such a great help to us because without him we wouldn't be able to visit some of our investigators due to what we call the 3rd lalaki rule.  Strong testimony too!

We also had our zone conference on Friday and it was so enjoyable.  We truly have the best Mission President.  I have a lot of trust and faith in President Ostler.  He'll be leaving in July though so that is a nice kick to the face but i'll enjoy him while we have him!!!  

And here is just a picture of me (in case you forgot what I look like), my room mate Elders, and Brother Credo, one of my favorite members.  Loving the work and it just keeps getting better and better!!!!  The church is true I love you all have an amazing week!!!!!

Earthquakes and Heartbreaks

Super crazy week this week!  A lot happened but i'll try my best to sum it all up in an email.

We had our interviews with President Ostler this week!  We ended up waiting at the chapel for 9 hours just studying and watching the approved church movies it was actually very enjoyable!  I had a great interview with President and got to know him better and he is incredible.  We left to return to our apartment at around 6 pm.

We found this cool horse statue on our way to the shuttle back home! 

Our shuttle actually broke down on the way so we had to switch shuttles and so it took about an hour to get home and we were exhausted.  We were just chilling in our apartment and I was talking to one of my roommates, Elder Sanchez (The Elder in my picture above) and all of a sudden our whole apartment started swaying.  I thought it was Elder Sanchez shaking my desk at first but I looked up and everything was starting to topple over and I had no idea what to do.  I had never experienced an earthquake before!  After our apartment stopped shaking we grabbed our 72 hour kits and headed outside.  There were tons of people evacuated out of the building and we waited there for about 40 minutes until it was safe to go back inside.  We went up 10 stories of stairs and it really sucked.  But i'm still alive!

We also had our Zone meeting on Thursday and I love seeing our zone they're super chill and give really good advice!

We finally got to watch general conference and they announced another temple that will be close to our mission!  Unfortunately I might not be here by the time they finish building it :(  But it's a great symbol of the gospel progressing here in the Philippines!!  I appreciated general conference 10x more as a missionary, I felt such a burning desire to progress this work and it was such a priviledge hearing from our church leaders and living prophet!  When we returned from watching general conference at the chapel on Saturday to our surprise ANOTHER EARTHQUAKE.  We joined the people who had evacuated and we waited another 40 minutes to return to the apartment.  

THEN ANOTHER 10 FLIGHTS OF STAIRS.  My legs still burn.

During the Sunday session of General Conference I was able to watch conference with some family! This is my cousin JT and his wife Mona and their beautiful family!  I got to meet my little cousins for the first time and i'm pretty sure they read at a higher reading level than me already...  General Conference is amazing and it's even better when you have family with you!

That just about sums up my week, crazy but so enjoyable!  I love you all have an amazing week and the church is true!!

Elder Burdeos

Another Week in the Manila Mission

This week we were not able to do too much because Elder Desabille was sick so we stayed in for a couple of days but that gave me a chance to read the scriptures and improve my tagalog so I was not complaining!  We focused on progressing our investigators this week towards their baptismal dates that are approaching this month.  We were able to extend another baptismal invitation to Sister Jennifer.  Sister Jennifer is the girlfriend of an inactive member, Brother Jonathan.  We approached their house just going door to door asking if people wanted to hear our message and they immediately let us in.  Brother Jonathan explained to us that he had been praying for missionaries to teach his family!  He told us that he wanted us to teach Sister Jennifer about Joseph Smith and the Restoration!  Crazy right?!  Missionary work is no joke, the Lord actually prepares people for you to teach!  After a couple of lessons, she wanted to be baptized and to follow Jesus Christ.  Other than that awesome experience we basically just tried to finish teaching all the lessons that are required to teach prior to baptism to those investigators who have baptismal invitations.  I will be sure to send the pictures of their baptisms and explain more about their backgrounds when you can actually see what they look like haha!  This picture sums up my whole week!  Love you all have an amazing week and trust in God, He is always with us!