fast week

Hello family! How’s everyone doing. This has been a relatively fast week. We’re in Malasiqui right now and just ate a lot … at Mang Inasal again. Rice is a death food. So let’s talk about a couple things before I forget. Apparently American Idol is over? People here are talking about it so much because they are livid [is that the correct word?] because Jessica Sanchez lost to .. Phillip Phillips [is that really his name?]. They think he only won because he’s American and Jessica Sanchez is a Filipina [pretty sure she was born in the states… at least that’s what it sounds like] and so they’re taking the loss pretty personally , haha. It’s a funny thing because they love EVERYTHING Filipino but they have so little national pride. But any Filipino that becomes famous they automatically love. Unfortunately you can count the number of famous Filipinos on one hand. So yeah … I’ve been hearing about that from so many members lately , haha. Right now I’m trying to do all this college stuff … but super slow computers are a bit of a problem when trying to work through not knowing your own password for three years ago , haha. I never imagined it’d be this difficult to go back through all this stuff. I got an email for Cameron today actually ! If you remember him. He’s at BYU Provo right now and likes it a lot more he says , haha. I’m excited to go back to the Idaho , though , if only for one semester. I’m trying to convince Elder Mayes to transfer to Provo or Idaho. Anyways , I guess I’ll talk about my week a bit. Monday – last time I wrote – was a really good day , and the camera is reeaallllyy nice , haha. Later that night we taught two fun lessons to people that always enjoy our visits , so we love Mondays. Tuesday we had a zone gathering in Dagupan so we met as a zone and broke off for our district meetings. My district is Elder Tan and his companion Elder Dela Paz. So it’s fun to have him in my district meeting again. Elder Tan is just a really respectful person so it’s nice to have him there. After the district meeting and zone gathering we had exchanges in which I went with Elder Tan to our area here in Malasiqui. It was fun working with him again. He’s really refined himself as a missionary over the past few months and teaches really well. It’s funny how when you’re with a companion it’s hard to see their good side because you think there’s so many bad , but hindsight is 20/20 and it was just all good working with him again. Wednesday we went to Sta. Barbara to exchange back , then came home and went straight to work. Taught back to back to back lessons without any punts , so that was awesome. Picked up a few new investigators , including the children of a woman we just helped come back to church. So those kids have come three weeks straight with their mom whose come 6 weeks straight , so they’ll probably be baptized pretty soon. One’s 9 and one’s 12 I think , both boys. Also this other woman and her kids now promised to come to church after months of us working with her. She’s still pretty young , about 34 , and is really nice. She was just hesitant for the longest time. But we finally got the relief society to  visit her and now she wants to come back! Haha , members do this work so much better than we do. So that was a joy. Another family has the mom about to go to Hong Kong for work so we’re pretty she won’t … that really hurts families here , everyone wants to go abroad for work because the pay is better. Then we taught our recent convert whose super firm. Thursday was weekly planning , my companion doesn’t enjoy it too much , haha. It’s a long time to be at the desk. 7 – 8 [personal study] 8 – 10 [companion study] 10 – 11 [language study] break for lunch 12 – 2 or 3 [weekly planning] so by the time we’re done we’re ready to sprint out the door .. being in the house is miserable. It’s so hot , haha. But work that day was good. We ate dinner at a really old woman’s house , whose one of my favorite people. I tell her she’s my “nanay” [means mom but also like older womanly figure that watches over you]   [btw I can’t budge with this college stuff , it keeps telling me it’s unavailable]   So it was fun eating at her tiiinnnyy house and she can hardly see. She fed us corned tuna … but we appreciated it , haha. After it started to pour so hard. Elder Blancia’s umbrella is broken , so we were stuck sharing my small little thing as we crossed a football field size bukid [farm] that was pure mud and water. By the time we go to the other side … we were a bit wet .. and muddy… The Macaranas family took care of us and gave us hot chocolate really fast , haha.   Friday we went to the church to set up for the baptism on Saturday and make the program. I got the program made and went to fill up the font but they were cleaning so they said they’d do it for us. We gladly accepted. Work was then good that day. Saturday …. So busy. The zone leaders had a couple IBDs so we had to go to Dagupan in the morning so I could interview them. Very strong testimonies and converts. Afterwards we sprint back home , I get my clothes and we head to the baptism. Get there just in time to finish up some last minute stuff. The two being baptized show up , we change , take pictures , then start the service. It was a really good service , and it was really fun baptizing again , haha. I hadn’t done it for over a year now. It’s fun to watch my companions baptize … but it’s more fun to actually do it. I was all smiles. But … I’m always super slow at changing , haha , it’s so hard in tiny stalls and with a lot to take care of. By the time I got back they were waiting to begin the latter portion of it. After the baptism we then sprinted to a FHE. Got there about an hour late [Filipino time] but there were so many of us that were late that it didn’t matter , haha. Had a really good Branch Home Evening and everyone was super happy. The next day , church … soooooooo many less actives. We were ecstatic. So many came out. The branch is helping so much and it’s reaping the rewards. At least half were less actives , so much fellow shipping … just a really awesome day. Work afterwards was really good as well and our last lesson was with some recent converts in which the husband is now the young men’s president. Shared a good message with them then they fed us … really good food. Waited in the rain for a while to finally get picked up by a tricycle and got a ride home.   THAT’S ALL FOR THIS WEEK! I’m in a rush now. Gotta go. Love you all , write me tons of letters!