Only in the Philippines can you come from teaching a pirate and then walk through the 12 plagues of Egypt.

Well hello there Family! I miss you! And friends of course din! So this week was a pretty exciting week, okay not really but no one hated me this week and it seems to have gone by really fast, Just yesterday I feel like it was my dear sweet mother’s birthday and look! She’s already a week older! Lucky for you all, my companion has training again so I get to write  nice lengthy blog again. J Man I could really get used to this 12 week training thing. J
So this week, We…. Had a baptism! Yeah! One of our Nanay’s (old ladies) that we re teaching was baptized and her husband will be baptized in 2 weeks from now. J Yay for families and for strong testimonies! I am really happy about the progression in this area, we have a lot of baptisms set us now for the next coming weeks, hopefully they all carry through. J Yes that’s right the area is finally set up, just in time for…. Transfers… boo! That’s upsetting, but to everything there is a season. Sometimes when Sister Walker tells me that she has almost hit her 3 month mark, I think to myself, what! No way! Your last 3 months went so fast, but then when I think about it for myself, I think…. Man the last 3 months have gone by so slow! But definitely my time here in this area is going a lot faster than my first 6 months went in Sinait while I was still struggling to learn the language. Hopefully the same thing will happen in the next 7 months as well.
So this weeks favorite investigator, is still Julie Ann, she is the greatest! She has such a strong testimony, and when we give her reading assignments she not only reads them, but she researched them too so that she knows all of the answers to our questions. J She will be baptized in 2 weeks after her wedding. J We have this one less active that we teach and he makes me a little bit mad, and he kind of looks like a pirate, I was so mad after we taught him that while we were walking home I was just complaining to Sister Walker the whole time. Well also there has been a lot of rain here lately, and with all the rain comes a ton of bugs and grasshoppers, with an increase in bugs and grasshoppers, comes about a kjillion frogs! So as we were walking home we were also swatting at bugs and tripping over frogs, I thought to myself, “Only in the Philippines can you come from teaching a pirate and then walk through the 12 plagues of Egypt.”
We had a really sweet lunch appointment the other day , we got there and all the people were waiting until we got there so that they could start (because I had to bless the food first) I was a little nervous seeing as how there were over 2000 people there! But it all went well and the food was dang good!
I have officially started my diet, I figure I can tell you all and then update you every week so that I have some accountability of something, food here is just so good, what can I say?!?!?
This week we are working with Sister Pabricante in our area, I love having her with me and Sister Walker. She fills in all of my awkward silences. It’s nice, Like yesterday, we were teaching four new investigators (they are so awesome!) And the lesson just went so smoothly….. Ahh. J That’s nice! Another week down and only 32 more to go for all those of you who are wondering. J Don’t worry, I’m still keeping track! Love you all!!!!
-Sister Schultz

3rd world problems, zombies and cooking concoctions

This week was really a great week! We had an interview for one of our investigators to get baptized next week and she passed! Yeah, it’s sad that there actually is a question about that but our district leader is a little Nazi when it comes to baptismal interviews. After her interview he invited us into the room so that he could have a word with us, he doesn’t even say anything, but just points to a chair and there is a mint on the chair that says, “It’s a no!” My heart just dropped I was so mad, then he gave me another one that said, “No problem!” ha-ha I was still pretty mad. Afterwards he told us that we needed to make sure that she understands that God is a God of flesh and bones….. Um…. Where was that in the interview questions? Whatever she still passed.
This morning Sister Woahn was talking about a website called 1^st world problems, where it says stuff like, “the batteries in my remote died so I had to get up and press the button to turn off the TV.” Stuff like that, so we have decided to do 3^rd world problems.
“Every time I close the bathroom door a piece of the cockroach nest falls out…”
Man! I hate it when I open the door and it falls off!
The door won’t shut again.
The water isn’t working again.
The water is brown….
Man! We are out of gas! How can we cook our food!
We’re going to have to get water from the well….
Sick the giant spiders are back!
 
This week I got to go on exchanges with Sister Tauti! Man I love that girl, if it isn’t enough that she is just so kind and caring about people, then you can add in the she too loves Nazi zombies and then you might come close to understanding out bondmanship. J Man we were talking about zombies and laughing so hard that we both loved it so much and … ugh poor Sister Woahn and Sister Walker just had to listen to us, but we just had a moment…. I seriously laughed so hard that I almost peed my pants.
Oh Sister Woahn had a great idea! If there are an missionaries out there who are reading this who are coming to our mission, you can feel free to email me if you have any questions. J It's Julia.schultz@myldsmail.net.
I giant spider crawled across my stomach while I was making French toast this week….
There is a couple here that has been working with us a lot lately, and they are just so great! They are so dedicated to the church that I just love working with them. The other day we were teaching the Salvador family and they really want to go to the temple to be sealed s a family but they don’t really have the money for it, then the Arteta’s who also don’t have all that much money, were like don’t you worry about the money, we will take care of all of that! Amazing people. On the way back we were riding in their giant jeep thing and it was dark and we were in the jungle and stuff and just talking and I just thought to myself, “Oh my gosh… I am on a safari in the jungle in the Philippines talking to a Pilipino in their native language…. Weird/crazy experiences.
Yesterday we didn’t really have any real food in our apartment so we experimented with everything we had. We ended up making oatmeal chocolate bananas with pineapple syrup…. It was actually dang good! Even though the picture, if it will send, looks like a weird steak, it was actually a delicious pancake. J
That’s all for this week! Don’t forget to write me!
-Sister Schultz

Progress

OH hey! My companion has online training to do this week, so I get to write a somewhat longish blog! I just have to press the spacebar really hard for it to work… so that is kind of lame. But this week has been really good as far as the teaching has been going this week! Sister Walker has made some huge improvements in the teaching and it is getting a lot easier to equalize the lessons. I actually threw lesson on her at the last second the other day because I had no idea what we were going to teach this less active about, and she totally dominated it. As far as things are going with the branch, they seem to be going really well this week, I mean granted they were all out of town for most of the week because of their temple trip, but it was still good.

This week our land lord people decided to turn off the water…. Without telling us. Man we already don’t get very clean because the water is like dingy brown color and smells really bad, but none of us could shower for like 3 days because they didn’t even both to tell us that they were going to turn off the water…. What the heck?! Luckily all four of us are getting pretty good at survival skills; this week we fetched water from a deep well so that we could flush our toilet. One week when we ran out of gas for the stove, we used hand sanitizer and matches to burn an old broom and some crunchy leaves so that we could cook some meatballs. We wash our clothes by hand; make our own curtains out of old bed sheets…. We are basically modern day pioneers! Although I think I will pass on taking a handcart to some of my areas!

This week’s progressing investigators are: Julie Anne! She is one of my favorites! She is the fiancée of one of our recent converts and she is so cute and excited for baptism! She helps teach primary every week even though she isn’t even a member yet, and she didn’t do her reading assignment in the Book of Mormon because she was too excited to read the children’s picture Book of Mormon that they brought back for her from the temple! Precious!

Another one of my favorite is Nanay and Tatay Artizon! They are so excited for baptism and so ready! The other day we were teaching Nanay and she was like, Sisters, I already know about fasting and tithing and (listing everything in the teaching record) then she says, “how much longer do you have to teach me until I can be baptized?!?! Ha-ha she is so excited!!

This week has sort of crept by; I feel a little bit like I have had 8 months left of my mission for the last 2 months…. Mostly because I have, but I finally broke out of it and am officially down to 7 months and 3 weeks! Yes! Not that I’m complaining, I mean I kind of am, but I feel like they should have at least let us pick whether we wanted to stay the extra transfer or not, but no…. they didn’t L So much for January. Something great is going to happen because we got extended I just know it! Actually I found out that I’ll be coming home with just 2 other people, Sister Woahn! Of course, and Elder Knowles, he’s from Utah…. I barely know him. But hey! At least Sister Woahn will be there!

Pictures only

Jessa and Jaylord

Bata



Exchanges with Sister Woahn



Rolden Baptism

Sister Walker and Sister Schultz

Short and sweet

So this week will be a short email because I'm not in a positive mood so it will just be about the good stuffJ So this week we had two baptisms! Jaylord and Jessa Salvador, they are part members and brother and Sister, their baptism was way good though! For the most part. The computer wont let me send pictures, again, but maybe next week. They were so funny though, all throughout the week this week they have been practicing their baptism in the canal so that it could be the best baptism ever, haha for Jaylord they had to do it over 4 times, but Jessa totally nailed it! They are my favorite investigators! Well… members now. JAylord is 19 and Jessa is 13! They are so awesome! I just love them!

Extreme makeover Philippines edition

Sorry this is a bit late. Ironman got in the way. Julie had an awesome surprise for our dad since she couldn't make it to the race. She made us (Cathy and Julie) matching shirts and sent me mine and then took pictures of herself in hers holding motivating signs. I then put them on the mirror in the morning, inside his bike shoes and his running shoes. It was great!

This week has been pretty good. I have been pretty sick the whole week but we were still able to work so it’s nothing to worry too much about. Actually on Tuesday Elder Teh came and talked to us and we took turns reading scriptures and stuff on the mike…. Of course he started with our area…. Man I said a little prayer and was so sure that my voice would come out alright and then… Fail! Oh man it was a fail! Sister Woahn was laughing so hard and everyone was giving me this oh man you’re so sad sounding look… it was embarrassing, but whatever, Sister Walker saved the day when she took the mike from me and read the next scripture!
Speaking of Sister Walker, She has been doing really great this week with everything. She has been a lot more involved in the lessons and has been doing really great with all of the paper work and stuff. I don’t think that she is quite ready to try, but she would definitely be able to lead the area really well…. Actually she would rock at it!
This week I also got to go on exchanges with…. SISTER WOAHN!!! Haha bet you didn’t see that one coming! It’s actually way awesome because she is one of the sister leaders, so they have to go on exchanges with all of the sisters, which means that even though we share a house and an area, we still got to go on exchanges with each other. It was awesome to see the progress that we have both made in the language and with the teaching since the MTC and even since our last exchanges. We are hoping that President Barrientos will receive some revelation that we need to be companions for our last transfer… that would pretty much be the greatest ever! I think that since we have to stay until March…. It’s the least he could do….
This morning we cleaned and repainted the apartment…. It was like a dungeon. Let’s just say that if they decided to make an extreme makeover home edition in the Philippines…. I totally know 4 Sisters that could totally take on the job. Sometimes I feel like they should have some Sisters who just go around to all of the apartments and make them better and livable and stuff. It is much needed sometimes, at least for our apartment it was.
Well, not much else to report except that we had a great baptism this week! Brother Rolden was baptized and he totally has the potential to be a great leader in the church! Oh and also, Sister Walker and I started teaching the missionary Preparation class….. It was awesome! The upcoming missionaries are so excited to learn and this is going to be a really great thing for the branch!

The whole shebang

Okay! How are you all doing this week? Sana…. Mabuti. So this week has been going by sooo slow…. But now that it is time to email, I feel like it has actually gone by way fast! This week was Sister Walker’s I want to go home week. Considering the fact that at her point in my mission I had already had about ten of those, I would say that she is doing really well.

This week was a little rough because we both were really sick. Colds, coughs, headaches…. The WHOLE shebang, Seems like I pretty much got the worst of it but hopefully it passes soon.

I sang a solo the other night at our fireside. Sister Woahn made me do it. I was ticked! Haha I wasn’t really all that mad, I just felt a little bad for all of the poor people that had to listen. Our fireside this last week  was really well prepared and set up mostly by Sister Woahn and Sister Tauti…. But we helped…. A little. We put everything together and the branch was supposed to all come out and support and invite everyone that they knew. There didn’t end up being a lot of people that came, but we still continued on with the program. Actually funny story: So right before it started  there was hardly anyone there and we were a little bit on the mad side, so we decided to just go out and invite  everyone that we could see… so we did. We went to a bunch of different houses and just told everyone about to. No one came. But we were at least pleased with our efforts.

The branch is really starting to work and understand the missionary work a lot better now in this area so hopefully we will see some changes for the better pretty soon and we will really start seeing a ot of miracles and baptisms in this area.

Tomorrow Elder Teh the Area President is coming to do a fireside in our area, so we are all pretty ready and excited for him to come. Oh yeah…. Sister Woahn is making me sing again…. She’s so meanJ But at least this time it’s not a soloJ P.S. I only say that Sister Woahn is so mean, because I know that she is going to read this next week and it will make her laugh…. But really she is nice!