Thieving magpie

Sometimes. Missionary work is hard! We have been going through all of the former investigators and everyone that is in our area book, but they are all coming up short. L There were definite reasons that they were all dropped. So we decided that it would be a good idea to do some finding but the problem is that our fellowshippers all hate finding and they will just take us to less actives houses…. Which is fine and all if they are on the 15-focus but most of the time they aren’t so it is a little difficult. When we got to the area everyone could only talk about how great our BML was…. Well I’m sure that at some point he was…. But at this point, I’m not too impressed with him. I think that he has a serious phobia of American girls. He will talk to Sister Buduan alright, but when it comes time to talk to the rest of us, it seems like we are the biggest burden in the world. He has yet to put forth any effort to accept our invitations for him to work with us. But despite that, we do for the most part have fellowshippers that always work with us. One of our fellowshippers, Sister Harline, she is the greatest! She works with us all of the time and she has such a love for the work! She is preparing to serve a mission.

This week we have had some pretty great planning…. And then it rained so we weren’t able to go out. It was a little bit of a bummer, but we were able to get through a lot of the training while we were stuck inside all day, and Sister Smith has started to take the lead in most o the lessons! She’s a rock star at missionary work! We are gong to have 25 baptisms in October! Prepare yourself… it’s going to happen.

We have one investigator… I think that he is an eternal investigator. We tried to get him to be baptized this weekend seeing as how he always comes to church and just wont get baptized. Sunday morning pops up and he doesn’t even come to church. After Sacrament meeting Sister Smith and I ran to his house to get him…. He was making pizza and said that he was just going to come next week…. He’s an unprogressing progressing investigator. :(

Then there is Denmark…. He was progressing…. Now he is persecuting. He hates us. But he did give us a great referral and she is gonna get baptized I just know it! Haha the other day we were down the road from his house and he yelled to us in a slight British Accent, “Mormons! I’m Here Mormons!” Well…. At least he is funny sometimes.

We contacted one of our 15-focus this week, Tatay Cu. Haha that’s actually a way funny story! So you pronounce his name, Tatay KO not CU and our fellowshipper said lets go and visit tatay ko… which means my dad in Tagalog…. So the whole time we thought that it was our fellowshippers dad….. nope…. Just the name hahaha we were very confused. He is the cutest little old man! I have never seen so many wrinkles in my whole life! But he is just sop great! The poor guy lives all on his own and doesn’t have a way to get to church. Luckily we have a really great Branch Missionary that will try to pick him up every Sunday, So that will help a lot. It’s nice to see that people are reaching out to others in all that they do.

One day we taught 10 lessons and did some finding at a really big house in our area. It turned out to be perfect! We were just there Tao-poing like crazy and then his son came and opened the door, he arrived at the same time as us. The Tatay turned out to be a college professor and he is very interested in our message and asked us to come back. Lucky to for Sister Smith and I that he speaks really good English! What a blessing!

Sister Smith is so great! I love being her companion! We talk like real friends and laugh like real friends! I haven’t had that since Sister Woahn in the MTC ( and of course a tiny when I shared a house with her and sister Tauti in Cam) but it really is just such a blessing! I love her!!! And she likes to go running! Which…. Let’s be real…. That alone could make me love her!

Church on Sunday was so great!!!! Everyone was being so funny! Even though we couldn’t understand a single word that anyone was saying, we were just laughing so hard!!! Man! I love some Filipinos! In Gospel Essentials the teacher taught in all English and he was like what is the one place that every Filipino wants to go? And the whole class answers, “AMERICA!” and he goes, “No. Croatia.” It was sooo funny! Sister Smith and I were dying!!!

We were also dying when I mouse climbed into our dish drainer. Which dish drainers here are a little different… they aren't just like a basket…. But its like a whole little plastic cupboard for all of your dishes…. So we had to carry the whole thing out with all the dishes in it and then I stood on a chair and poked at the little rat with a crusty old mop until he scurried out.

Sister Smith and I have just discovered how awesome our balcony upstairs is! We love it! We spend like every single night our there! It’s so awesome and quiet! All of our neighbors are working abroad…. So its just a lot of empty houses…. Always quiet. J I love it! I also love YEMA bread…. It’s the best! It’s so delicious! I don’t even really know what it is… I just know its good and super cheap!

We have been seeing these pink blob things all over everything everywhere that we go… it sorta looks like a big wad of bubbalicious bubblegum…. Turns out that they are snail eggs… I think there is going to be a plague of snails based on how many that we have seen!!!

We were looking for 2 two of our investigators this week. Josephine Duke, and Josie Pindoke. Take a look at those names….. yup we definitely should have played more mad gab before the mission…. Then we would have realized that they are the same person.

We taught a less active this week… I stole. His whole pack of cigarettes and his lighter. He was like Sister that’s against the rules for you to smoke! I was like freak I’m not gonna use it! I'm gonna dump em!!! Haha it was so funny! I am a little thief now. J I also stole some ashtrays from an investigator…. Oops!

 

 

 

Soda in a bag

Love you all! I'm about to reach my 6 month mark! I will be home before you all know it!

Rain, rain and how about some more rain?

Aloha!
Well this week has been a really great week despite all of the rain! We have finished up week one of training and really gotten a feel of how well we teach together. You know on the District 2 DVDs when the girls says, “I’m not training sister Voyles, She came pre-trained!” That’s pretty much how I feel about Sister Smith! She is super magaling in al of the work! She’s always happy and never homesick. J I’m so grateful to have her as my companion!
. Actually that is a really funny story we were out finding people that were on the former investigators section and we went all the way (way far) Out to this one investigators house and she wasn’t there;9 but her daughter was and she is really active and likes to work with the missionaries and stuff so she said we could still teach her…. So I made Sister Smith teach the whole lesson of the Restoration. Haha. She left out a few parts, and obviously her grammar wasn’t the best… but she did soooo good! I was way impressed!
We’ve definitely been working this week in all of the rain and floods, we didn’t know that we weren't supposed to, so now we will repent…. By working even harder. Actually after all o the rain had dried up and the roads were clear we were working again in one of our areas where we had been working all week and there was a giant dead snake on the road left over from the flood water…… um…. We definitely had the protection from the Lord over the last couple of days.
The branch here really is so helpful in missionary work. I can’t figure out why the attendance is so low every Sunday because they are doing so much to help the church grow here. Anything that we need (fellowshippers, forms, 15 focus) they get it to us right away! We are almost always working with fellowshippers and everyone does a really great job with fellowshipping on Sunday. What’s the real concern?
We have a couple of really great investigators right now, the Capuchino family. A family that Sister Boekweg taught way back in the day and they stopped progressing but I think now might be the time. J It’s a family of six and when we teach, they all listen J…. Okay so we have only taught them once so far…. But they are totally going to get baptized. And the other two are Kathlyn and Denmark. They have a lot of changing to do, but they both come from really broken families and I think they really can feel that the gospel can help them in their lives.
One day when we were going to teach Denmark, I said “who are we going to teach right now?” And Sister Smith responded, “German I think? Ah! Denmark! I knew it was some European country.” Haha she is so funny! And she like to run! Yes! Thank you Heavenly Father for answering my prayers!
It flooded so bad this week that we took a tryce to one of our areas and it flooded inside of the cab while we were inside…. It’s a little deep.
Oh! And you know what! Once upon a time, it rained REALLY bad in Paoay. And we taught a lesson and then it wasn’t raining. Well then we get to the other side of Paoay and it started raining… no umbrella. I forgot it at the last appointment. I’m not talking a casual rain here. It was pouring! I was soaked and so freezing! Someone gave my their broken umbrella and I pretty much used it as a blanket. I was so cold L Sister Smith did try to share hers with me, but she’s so tall! By the time it got down to me there was nothing blocking it anymore L And I got the run-off from her umbrella. L Needless to say I was a little wet.
Later that day there was a black out…. No lights anywhere and pouring rain… we might have gone home early. I felt super guilty. Then later that week when we had interviews, I found out that we weren’t even supposed to go out that day because of the bad weather, President just didn’t have our number, so we never got the text. L oops!
I had a really great time at interviews this week, I feel like it helped me a lot more to feel like I was actually a part of the Philippines Laoag Mission, up to this point I’ve kinda felt like I don’t know anyone and that I was just kind of going solo in everything that I did, but this week I really felt a lot more connected to President and Sister Barrientos and also to the Zone…. Even if there are a billion of us. J
Sister Smith and I haven’t been sleeping too well…. Which for her is understandable because she probably still has jet lag. We both wake up at about 5 every morning. By the time 9pm rolls around we are both so exhausted that we can barely think!
Today as you know is p-day! Sister Smith washed her clothes for the first time today by hand…. Well I might have helped a little. But I’m so proud! My little anak is growing up! I can hardly believe she’s already 2 weeks old!
While we were working in the flood water too this week…. There was definitely a downed wire that we saw in one…. But don’t worry we didn’t see it until we were already halfway through… the feeling kind of resembles that moment when you tip your chair just a little too far back…
 
-Sister Schultz (Shorts)

New faces and new places

Man this week has been so crazy! First off... I got to work in Laoag with the Sisters there! It was so awesome! The bus ride from Camalanuigan to Laoag was a little sketch.... actually there was one time that we stopped to go to the bathroom and I walked to the little shack things that they have for their bathrooms, and oh what the heck?!?!?! there was no toilet..... you just go on the floor!!!! Freak no!!! I'm not doing that!!!!! So even though there was a huge line waiting for the bathroom with the toilet.... I made the bus wait for me and I waited patiently (as patiently hat you can when you really have to go to the bathroom) And used the lesser of the two evils.

When we got to Laoag, we stayed at the Laoag 5 apartments..... What the heck!!!!! They have air conditioning.... hot water.... a bath tub... showers.... and an oven.... I have not seem most of those things in almost a year! I almost cried when I took that hot shower! Actually I think that I might have a little bit.

So I worked with Sister Richards and Sister Dillman in Laoag in their areas, It was way fun, but it is always a little exhausting when you aren't working in  you own areas.... But I love those two girls so much! AND we got to go running while we were there because they have a huge rooftop area that they can just run around.... some people get all of the glory.

We had trainers training and both of my trainees are training now, so I will get two grandkids the same time that I have another child hahaha. Supposedly I'm training in 6 weeks again too.... I'm starting to feel like I am never going to get away from 12 week training in my whole mission. But training always has its fun little surprises.....

Before training we did a little Book of Mormon placing and it was really fun, that was the first time that I have ever done it and I worked with a new Sister, Sister Cooper. It was really fun, the poor girl hadn't slept in about 36 hours so she was so tired, but her Tagalog was really good! And she was really excited!!!

Best ICE CREAM EVER= yellowcab Ice cream! go team! It was the best investment of my money that I have had so far on my mission:)

And now the moment that you are al waiting for! My new companion is Sister Katy Smith from Utah! I'm so excited! Her Tagalog is way good! So I actually knew a long time ago that she was going to be my companion, ever since my sister told me that her roommates little sister was coming to my mission I said to myself, I am going to be her companion some day. I didn't want to hinder inspiration or anything, So I didn't even tell President Barrientos, But lookey here! She is my new trainee! Crazy small world!

Well, opening an area has its ups and downs. First of all everyone was really excited to get new missionaries, but we have no idea how to do ANYTHING! Upon arriving at the apartment.... well let's just say that the Elders before us weren't exactly the cleanest.... okay our apartment was disgusting! So President told us we could clean first.... we spent about 6 hours cleaning the house and even now it's not exactly the cleanest thing that I have ever seen. Then on Saturday we had our weekly planning. First we had to go to the church and meet with the Branch President to split the area and coordinated fellowshippers. The branch her is super great with their callings though and so the coordination has gone really really well! Then we went back to the apartment and split the area books and tried to figure out who was what in the area book.... the elders just kind of shoved all the papers in the book not bothering with the labels, so we don't know who is progressing who is recent, baptismal dates? nothing. We just have a lot of names.... so it looks like everyone who was taught at least twice in the last year will be getting a visit from us in the next couple of weeks. Planning basically took all of Saturday as well.

By Sunday we pretty much had cabin fever so we were way excited to go to church! There is a WICKED rain storm going on all day on Sunday, So there wasn't tooo many people at church, but I will tell you what Paoay does have!.... Carpet and cushy benches!!! Oh man I was so happy!

After church we had a great meeting with all of the branch missionaries and they are all really excited to work with us! That is really great because we don't even know how to get to and from the market yet:)

So even though the streets were all flooded with a foot of water on Sunday, we couldn't take not working anymore and we paired up with the Branch Missionaries and headed out to work! We only taught three lessons but there is a really great story here. So While I was in Sinait way back in the day I went on exchanges with Sister Deyro and we taught a recent convert named Kharen. We were like instant best friends. Well she is now a recent convert/less-active and when she saw me she was soooo happy! She was like Sister Schultz you have no idea how hard it has been for me to stay active in the church! I have WOW problems and I've been praying for you! I prayed for you to get assigned here so that you could help me come back to church! Crazy! way to receive that revelation President Barrientos!!!! She committed to come back to church and she is going to fellowship with us every other day!

Sister Smith is SOOOO good at Tagalog! She is already teaching sections of the lessons and she understands most of what people are saying. I'm sure it's a lot harder than she lets on, but she is one tough cookie!!!

Til next week.

Side note to Sister Woahn: This week feels more like LONGER instead of SHORTer, we will see what next week is.

Love you all!

Change it is

This week has been a really.... difficult/ good week. First off, we had two baptisms this week! One: Julie Ann Malicad, she is so great and she totally has the strongest testimony ever! Actually her testimony made me cry after her baptism. She is about 21 or 22 and I just love her so much. The other baptism that we had was a tatay. J He is around 64 years old and his wife just got baptized 2 weeks ago. Right before his baptism, we taught them about eternal marriage and baptisms and works for the dead, and him and his wife were just bawling they were so happy (they have had three of their children die) They just are so excited to know the things that they know about the truthfulness of the gospel on the Earth. J It’s just tender.
In other news.... I got transferred. L They say that once you really start to love an area that that is the time when you get transferred and it is sooo true. While I don’t necessarily love the branch here all of the time, I am soooo attached to my recent converts and my less actives that it is just so hard to say goodbye to them. I really only cried in weekly planning when I prayed for all of them, But still it was pretty rough. I will be transferred to Ilocos Norte, to an area called Paoay. I worked there once on exchanges and it was really beautiful and the branch I hear is super progressing, so I’m excited but a little nervous. I never have opened an area before, and I will be training again.... probably an American, maybe a New Zealander. That would be pretty cool.
What I think that I will miss the most about this area is the Salvador Family. I just love that family sooo much and I have seen such a strong conversion process in them over the past 3 months. They are my favorite,. And of course the Teja’s.... I can’t make it through all that I have been with the Teja Family and not love the memories that I have had with them. Change is hard, but it’s one more growing step that will prepare me for the rest of my life. J The very hardest thing that I think will be for me though is going to be saying goodbye to Sister Woahn and Sister Tauti tomorrow morning though. L I love those two girls so much, they really are my Sisters and I am going to miss them so much! I’m definitely going to go and visit Sister Tauti after the mish.... and Sister Woahn... Let’s be real, we are like best friends, so of course I will visit her all the time. J
This chapter of my mission is just finishing up, but the next is just about to start. I am excited to see what the Lord has in store for me.

Sometimes people name their children after you

This week was... good but crap at the same time. It all started on Tuesday when we had district meeting and it just progressively got worse until President Barrientos came. Things improved, but then they got worse again, and lets just say that I am readily looking forward to transfers, even though it seems as though I am going to be in the same area again.... three areas on my whole mission? It appears that that is just how it is going to be. \

Well a couple of highlights from this week. We once had a baptism, and his name was Brother Rolden and His Wife's name is Jenny.... well, Jenny was pregnant, and to this date she hasn't been baptized because she has been pregnant with... a little girl! This last week, she finally had her little baby and guess what they names her!?!??! Julia Hazel! That's so awesome! Here are some pictures!

Look closely

Forgive me for the short blog but I still have to write President and We are out of time! But how are you all?!?!? I am missing you all and I really cant wait to see you.. in seven and a half months. The other highlight of this week was the two baptismal interviews that we had that will be baptized next week. The LA (less actives) that I offended are now returned to church and they said it was because I was so bold with them :) Thank you Heavenly Father:)

Love you all!

All my companions left on the mission

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