Hello Family!
...Wow! Where to
start? I mean really... this week was the best! Whole week
was great, but wow, the weekend (especially Saturday) was the best! Phew!
I'm just sitting trying to figure out how to express this to you in an
interesting way over the net. Here's a big list I guess of what we did,
hope you are just delighted to read it. If not, know that at least I'm
delighted to write it! (:
So Tuesday we're on a
tricycle coming home from work to eat lunch and we got a text from the AP's
(Assistants to the President), "Text your zone about a potential long term
brown out!..." So hah, get this: the province that we live in,
Albay, basically didn't have enough money to pay for the government run electric
company so they were going to kill all power in the entire province
for at least a week to be able to pay their supplier of electricity (long
story). Hah, that was awesome since we bought a food for the next two
weeks and put it all in our refrigerator (which would also suffer from the
power outage)...
So under the candle
light on Tuesday we got prepared for out meeting with President on Wednesday.
Basically, the best part of the meeting was when President came up to us
with an invitation, "Elders, would you like to come with me to Catanduanes
this weekend?" Okay, remember now that Catanduanes is the island in
our zone. We had a plan to leave for here this Monday morning, but
President invited us to come with him on Saturday to attend meetings with him
for the District Conference (like Stake Conference) here. Uhh... Yes
President, we'd love to join!
The days go by then come
Saturday, we were out the door at 6AM to meet President Guanzon at the pier for
out big trip. Turns out, it was just him! He didn't bring his wife,
the AP's or anyone. And so it was just me, my companion and President for
our island journey. After a 3 hour boat ride we arrived in Catanduanes
and went straight to President's hotel to drop off his luggage. He walks
up to the counter and then turns back to us, "Elders, would you like to
stay with me tonight?" Uhh... Yes President, we'd love to join!
Dropped everything off, ate lunch with the missionaries here then President had
meetings and my comp. and I went in search of apartments (lots of new areas
opening here). We got back to the hotel around six to drop off somethings
and President had gotten there just before us... "Elders, would you like
to join me for dinner?" Uhh... Yes President, we'd love to join!
(:
And so we talked and
really got to get to know our Mission President. I've learned so much and
have just really loved the time together. We were so excited every time
we'd get invited somewhere, but the best was Saturday night when we were finishing
the day at our small little hotel room. This time, we were the ones doing
the inviting... "President, would you like to join us in closing the
day?" "Uhh... Yes Elder, I'd love to join." You
know, as missionaries, we have daily planning at the end of every day to close
the work and plan for the morrow. We talk about this. We talk about
where we could improve. We talk about what we did well. We talk
about the missionaries in out zone. We talk about each other. It
was just so special to have our Mission President there with us. Well,
thinking practically, the specialness of this maybe doesn't quite make snse to
someone who hasn't served a full-time mission. But to those who do get
it, do you understand what a wonderful experience this weekend on a paradise
island with my Mission President has been? The best.
So this morning
President went home and we visited some waterfalls (beautiful!) and went to a
super nice beach (started pouring rain!). We're here 'till Wednesday to
work with other missionaries and other stuff. If my story wasn't as
exciting for you, I'll share this: Remember vans shoes? Remember
how they can cost $40? I got a brand new pair, straight from the
"Vans [knock-off] Factory" for just $5! What a steal.
They're definitely [NOT!] genuine (:
Love you!
P.S. August 1st
was the official first day I could say I won't be here in a year... PABABA NA AKO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Pictures -
There are some big file
ones... I'll send them in another email (imagine me giving you a reassuring
thumbs up)
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