Life in the Philippines - October 2011

President & Sister Stucki, Elder Kaka and I


Me at the Manila Temple after I got to do a session there.


Me with Elder & Sister Fleming. They serve in the MRC.


Elder Jimenez and I. He helped me learn in the MRC (mission recovery center). He is from the Quezon City area and is serving in the Cagayan de Oro Mission.


Elder Kaka and I in San Gabriel.


Me in San Gabriel. Check out those stairs. Some are super steep and there are some made out of tires. It is cool and crazy. The hard part is that it gets dark at 6 or 7ish and we have appointments in these homes. No lights. It's alright, we have flashlights. Hooray.


Me in front of a members home. We are waiting for an investigator named Sister Alice. She has a great view. You can see a town, that I think is called Binyan. Also you can see it is on a cliff.


Sunday dinner with the Salazar family. They are awesome and they fed us well. They also have filtered water so I drank plenty. That is my trainer Elder Kaka. He is pretty awesome.


My district. I don't know all their names. I met them today at our district meeting. I think the sisters are in Carmona and somewhere else, but I don't know for sure. Elder Ward is our district leader and he has the flower. Elder Cuch is the other Elder. He came out the same time I did. We all room together.

November 6, 2011

Dear Family:
Life sounds pretty crazy right now. So Brother Evans and Brother Standage both had heart attacks? I'm glad that Bro. Evans is ok. Wow. Life is so crazy. You never can know what will happen next. But the cool thing is, we have the gospel so even in hard times we can receive peace and comfort. When I was in the hospital for my cyst it was hard on me. I wanted to be out working. It wasn't that big of a deal and it is silly to complain, but it happened. I loved the realization I got that Christ is always with us. Anytime we struggle or have a hard time we can pray or read or listen to music. God is so wonderful to provide so many ways to receive peace, comfort, and strength. Anyway enough preaching.

The babies are super cute. The Neiswender family looks like they are happy and prospering well. I am glad that Cole is getting bigger and stronger each and every day. Curtis makes an awesome bear and Heidi is a very cute pumpkin. She has a great smile. Wait, so what happened to Rob? I am sorry about all the things breaking around the house. I have no solution. All my solutions are gospel related and I don't think prayer and reading the scriptures will help the computer work better. Sorry.

Life in the Philippines is awesome and crazy. We have lots of study time and we have plenty of people to teach. It is hard but good. I am trying hard to participate in the lessons. I have a hard time staying focused. Listening to a different language for 8 hours straight is hard. It is coming along though. I am working on learning 6 new words a day. This week has been crazy. We had a mission tour with Elder and Sister Arden. Elder Arden is the first councilor in the area presidency I think. Anyway it was good. The meeting was awesome. I learned we as missionaries need to focus on teaching better so we retain more members. We have a lot of less actives in our branch. That is the main reason it is a branch and not a ward. Also we learned that we need to flood the earth with the Book of Mormon. We just need to focus more on it. It is the key to conversion. One of the things I learned today at our district meeting with the Teaching Assistants was let the Book of Mormon speak for itself or let the Book of Mormon teach people and answer their questions. Anyway the Book of Mormon is awesome.

Then on Saturday we had a temple tour. We had 11 people come. A recent convert mom, Sister Siapoc and three of her kids. Her husband's brothers wife, who is an investigator, and her three kids. Also Brother Santa Anna and his two kids. We rented a bus as a zone. It was packed. It held 58 people or so and we had maybe 65 on the bus. It was good. The temple is awesome and some other missionaries taught about the ordinances that go on in the temple, such as baptisms for the dead and eternal marriage. I think that was all. I can't remember very well. It was in Tagalog and my companion and I were trying to keep the kids from distracting the parents. We did an OK job. I think they learned something. Hopefully they remember the spirit they felt. At the end of the day after we ate food, it started to rain hard. Then the bus got stuck in traffic on its way back to us and so it was an hour or so late. It was a long day but good.

I think I am healing. There is a space still but I think it is healing up alright. Luckily for the both of us Elder Kaka doesn't have to pack the wound. He just puts some ointment on a gauze and tapes it to the wound. It's alright. Now the tape is the worst part. My companion and I get along alright. Sometimes there is a bit of a miscommunication or a small disagreement but no one is perfect. Elder Kaka is awesome actually. He is one of the best in the mission. He is awesome at planning and he is good at teaching. He has been zone leader for about half of his mission. He helps me with Tagalog. Maybe not as much as a Filipino companion could but he teaches me about the people and the culture, how to find people, making lesson plans, and setting goals. I am glad I have an awesome trainer. So Tagalog, it is one of the easier languages. They throw in some English words as well. It is hard now but I haven't been here that long. I know I just need to be patient with myself. I try hard to open my mouth and speak. That is probably the hardest now. Making sentences on the spot and having decent grammar. It is very interesting that there aren't many words to describe gender. It isn't as important. They just say Brother or Sister in English. I like it. It is hard but I know I can do it. I just need to learn the basics and what I want to say in English. That makes it a lot easier to translate if it is simple in English.

Thank you for the letter. I love you lots and wish you the best. I am excited to receive a package in a month or so. I am glad you had a good Halloween. It sounds like things are good and crazy. I love to hear from you and how life is in Arizona/California/Utah/Iowa. I love you lots and wish you another awesome week.

Love Elder Woolf

October 30, 2011

Hi Family,
Wow, Halloween time already. Crazy stuff. I am glad everything is going well. Life sounds awesome in Arizona. I got dad's email. I am glad that work is going well, that is crazy that he is staying in CA for 2 weeks. That is a long trip. I wish him the best of luck. I bet my niece and my nephews are getting cuter each day. I am excited to see some pictures later.

So I am healing great. After I emailed last Monday President and Sister Stucki came and visited me. They were on the island of Palawan during my surgery. It was a little weird to have President Stucki on the phone with you when I was in the next room. Everyone in the MRC was way impressed with President and how he really cares about his missionaries. I love them, they are the best. While President Stucki was here he gave me a blessing and the spirit was so strong. Just a fact, sorry everyone else, I have the best mission president, and it only took me a week to figure that out.

The MRC is a big house. It is maybe 5 minutes away from the Manila Temple. It has 3 bedrooms with 2 bunk beds in each. A man named Boycee runs it. He is also a Stake President. He is awesome, he takes care of everything. If you throw his name around, things get done plain and simple. Also there is a cook and house cleaner name Divine. She makes sure missionaries are fed well. A senior missionary couple also lives there, the Flemings, who are from Calgary Canada. They are super nice and Elder Fleming makes sure we exercise. It is cool. They would also drop us off at the temple. I did one session. It was a bit hard (after my surgery), but good. While I was in the MRC I met Elder Jimenez. He had a broken arm and needed a bone graft. He is Filippino and is serving in Cagayan de Oro. He helped me with training for a few days.

My cyst was cut out so there was a big hole. It is pretty crazy. It healed really fast. It was big then I went to the temple and did what I was supposed to. The next day it was almost closed. It was definitely a blessing. So now I can do all I need to do. It’s not completely healed but it gets better every day. I have another appointment with the Dr. on Wednesday of next week.

I was released from the MRC last Friday and was able to go back to my mission. I left the MRC at night and got to San Gabriel late. My area is 2 or 3 hours away from Manila. So now I am back with Elder Kaka. San Gabriel is awesome and a bit crazy. It is built on cliffs. There is the main road then off to the side there is a street or two like a normal city. Then there is side road that goes down the side of the cliff and there are lots of houses. There are lots of people here. Sunday we got to go to church and our branch is pretty awesome. They have a temple prep class, gospel doctrine class, and a mission prep class. They are pretty well organized and pretty willing to come with us to lessons. I think good things will happen here. I am working with awesome people and it is good to work again.

So here is crazy story. So we got lost yesterday and it was at the end of the day. Thirty minutes or so left and we decided to go tracting. The first house we get to, Elder Kaka says we should talk to them. So we stand outside their gate and say “Tao Po”, which literally means, “people here”. Then they know to come out. But this time nothing happened. We could see them but they ignored us. I said let’s go, but Elder Kaka told me to stand up in the light and say it again. So a bit reluctantly I did. The grandma came out and told us she didn't want to argue about religion. We told her we had a short message to share so she let us in. We taught her and her granddaughter who is 16. We even read 2 Nephi 31:10-12 and asked them if they would follow Christ. It was a cool process. We asked them to do what Christ did and to follow Christ's example by being baptized. The granddaughter Ruth said yes. She was into our lesson. The grandma said that we used the Book of Mormon and shut down, so that was sad. But I got someone to commit to being baptized on my first try talking to people. It was awesome. So after I did my part, Elder Kaka jumped in and made sure that they knew that they needed to prepare before baptism. We need to follow Christ and repent.

The language is pretty tough. It is hard to speak up, but life is good. Those are my only problems. I look forward to increasing my fluency in Tagalog and being able to work among these people. Oh also it is a big deal being white. They always say stuff to me like what they hear in songs, …. I got cussed at by a little kid. They don't know what they are saying. I just ignore them. Anyway, I love you all and I love serving here in the Philippines. I hope you all continue to be healthy and continue to be even more awesome. I love you all. Until next week.

Love Elder Woolf.