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Goooood Morning family. I think it's almost10PM for you on the East Coast , which means 8PMish for Andrea and Callie and Grant. .. I think. I'm not the best with time. So yeah , we don't watch General Conference at the normal time because of the time zone differences , so when it's airing there it's like something AM here. So we just watch it one week later. And we go to our stake center to watch it ... which will probably be packed like crazy with all the members plus all the missionaries from the zone. I'm way way stoked though. Ha , speakers and stuff are so so much better on a mission. I remember sitting at the Doying's last October and watching but ... not really watching ... haha. Oh man , now I take notes and stuff. Crazy the change. Also Liahona's and Ensign's are way awesome now , haha. Every morning I eat my Energen (it's like an instant breakfast thing that costs 5 pesos and is awesome) and read a Liahona or Ensign. Man I'm weird now , jokkesss.

Today we're just in our area , because it's like a 45 minute bus ride + 40 pesos to get to the SM (yes shopping mall , not sister missionary.....andrea...) and our area really does have everything we need , so we'll just stay here every other week. We woke up this morning to go play basketball at 5AM with people from the branch... no one was there... haha so we came back and I just read for a long time. I GOT YOUR PACKAGE MOMMA , thanks for it. After about 4 days of reading in mah spare time I'm about halfway through the first book. Plus I'm reading the book of mormon over again and so I'm about at the same spot that I'm at in the books , so it's way cool to read his insights and then to have your own. Some of his stuff I think he's looking too far into , but others I'm blown away by some of the insights. Stuff about George Washington and that little note about Nephi breaking the bow and stuff , stuff like that is way cool to me. Oh yeah , finished the book of mormon a few weeks ago - forgot to mention that. It's actually the first time I've read it on my own outside of seminary or college , so I was pretty happy , haha. I started on October 25 , and it took me a little longer than I was hoping. But when all I have is one hour a day , and I usually only get about 2 or 3 chapters at most read because of all the highlighting and notes and stuff ... I was pretty stoked to finish. But I love love love this book and oh man it makes me way happy to get to talk about it everyday and bear testimony about it and everything. Insights I've received while reading have been crazy and it all adds to my testimony of it's truthfullness. How anyone can doubt that it's not a true book is kind of beyond me.. but everyone has their own theories. But to imagine that a 14 - 22 year old kid wrote a book like that ... yeah. But please tell President Checketts that I'm doing as he asked and I'm starting over now reading it twice at once. I think I want to have read it 5 times by the time I come home , but I've also got the rest of the standard works plus a lot of other stuff to cover as well , so we're going to see what happens. But really , some of the best parts of my day is when I get to just read for an hour in the morning and then whatever time I have at night before going to bed. And then during the day getting to bear testimony in Tagalog about it is just more fun than you can imagine. You just need to experience this kind of life to really understand it. But I love it , ha!

Anyways!! So we're here in an internet cafe here in San Quintin.. so I don't really trust it.. probably riddled with viruses.. so I'm sorry but you'll have to wait another week for pictures. My area is San Quintin , Rosales Stakes , Pangasinan , Philippines. That's probably as exact of an address as I can get. It's a pretty awesome area , but I do miss the middle of nowhereness that Malimpec was. But there's no ward here (yet) just a branch , and they're all way way nice. The church building actually is under construction right now and they started about 2 months ago and say it'll be finished in July. Dad... construction here would confuse you more than it does me , ahaha , but it gets done and it looks good. I heard from a member actually that the Urdaneta temple should be started in January and that it'll be more than double the size of the Manila temple , so people here are so excited for it. And I would love to come back for the dedication , but we'll see my money situation in 3 or 4 years , ha. By the way - did you hear Grandpa's name during General Conference for the authorities and others that have passed away this year? I found an ensign the other day with his picture in it and it brought back a lot of memories , ha. But I'm excited for that or to read it in the next Ensign or Liahona. It'll be really weird.. actually... anyways. Oh , doesn't TK come home around the same time I do? I thought his time over there was 2 1/2 years , is that right or wrong? If so , that'll be way cool hearing his stories from Africa. That's such a different experience than mine , but I'm sure he's going to be an entirely different person. Maybe not entirely , but different.

My minds a little scattered this morning , sorry. So yeah - it's a branch here , but once the church is built the work is going to go straight up. That's the thing here , people look for authenticity in the wrong places most of the time. For instance , it's really hard to get investigators to come to church because we just have a meeting house below a welding shop. And so because of that (I mean , I can honestly understand , it's hard to take someone serious when they're meeting below a garage (not literally , actually , it's more behind) ) they go to the huge Iglesia ni Cristo churches , or just say they're catholic and not do anything. That's another thing that's funny here , theres a lot of active church goers here... but if you're not religious you just say you're catholic. That's pretty much code word for it's not important to me , so I'm not a Jehoava's Witness or Iglesia or Born Again or anything , but I need to say I believe in something. By the way andrea Iglesia is spanish , ni is Tagalog and Cristo is spanish too. Simbahan is church in Tagalog , but yeah it just means the Church of Christ. Rumor has it , it was started by a member here that wanted to be a Q of 12 but was really proud and so left the church and started his own church. They also announce during their mass or sacrament meeting or whatever it is who pays their tithing and who doesn't , so that's how they get funds really quickly. (that's actually a practice I advise the church to pick up.. it's quite effective)

So yeah , back to my thought. The work is hard here until we get the church built , but after that this area will be golden. Too bad I'll most likely be transferred one day after it's completed. The normal time for almost every elder in this area has been three transfers. But the people here area really sweet , and some are really really funny. There's actually a woman here whose daughter lives in America with a former missionary in this area. This was his first area ... and last , aha. He came here , fell in love with the daughter , she went to study in Manila , he ran away and found her , got sent home , came back for her. But apparently their lives are way happy and they live now in Mesa Arizona , haha. But I really like the people here , and the area has a good palengke or market and a small grocery store that has what we need. Also it's not a city , which I love , but not super bukid na bukid (like.. lots of farms and middle of nowhereniss) .. so I do miss that. I think I'm gaining weight , but I could be losing it. I think the ab roller though is starting to work , haha , but my Don White inherited love handles are shining through proudly.

This week there hasn't really been any profound moments of work , unfortunately. One lesson maybe - there's a family here that's been investigators for a long time. It's a mother , father , and like 6 daughters. Ha... it's really uncomfortable when they ask if you have a girlfriend (haha so Junie I say yes) but anyways it's really hard to teach them because the daughters all want to be baptized but the parents won't allow it because there's a conflict with another church. [What happens often here is a baptist or methodist or born again or something church will sponsor a kid or family to go to school , but in return their family must attend their church]. And so if they get baptized the money flow gets cut off. So basically Elder Salde was like I'll let you teach , because I asked him to let me take the reigns because I wanted to see if I could get them to understand how important it was. So basically he threw me the lesson right away and I taught about the atonement and then baptism and why it's all important. And during the lesson I could feel the spirit guiding me a lot because thoughts came way clear and scriptures and stuff all just were so readily available in my head , so I was so grateful for that. So during the lesson I had them read a number of verses in Alma 7 and 2nd Nephi 31 and then basically tried to teach like Amulek , haha. He's an awesome example of a teacher because he just asks asks asks and gets them to realize their own testimony. So in the end we discovered that Sister Hermosora (oh btw , sister and brother is everyone here.. not just members... that'll be a really hard habit to break when i get home) had a strong testimony of the Book of Mormon , but still doesn't want to be baptized. So , everyone has their agency , and hopefully one day she'll understand the importance really. But we did really all we could for her and now we'll just have to support them and keep inviting them.

That was really the only moment of lessons that stood out this week. We're still getting used to eachother's teaching styles , me and E. Salde , so the lessons are still a bit off in my perspective. But it's good , the work is progressing , and the area really is awesome. And General Conference is this Saturdy and Sunday and so I'm so excited for that. Daaaaang this letter is long. You guys are lucky.

Mom - I'll let you know next week if I have a cell phone or not , I think I will , but go ahead and add that plan if yo uwant ... but I still think it'll be cheaper here. But 5$ is already pretty cheap , so go for it. But I'll let you know next week.

You didn't really answer my question about world news and stuff , haha. Nothing in the Middle East? Or Economy? Or anything? That's awesome that Callie and Grant have a job now. I'm sure it won't be a long long time for them in SLC , and Utah is better than Texas ( haha ) . That's awesome that Brandon wants to have a show as well! Tell him I plan on spending a long time at his apartment when I'm back - so have my room ready , please.

I think that's all for this week , gotta write the Mission President now. That was a crazy long letter. Love you all!

-ElderWhite