08/10/2014

Ang aking pinakamamahal na kaibigan,

Yay, what a great week. :)

Tuesday:

We had zone training and found out that mail run will only occur twice a transfer now... so sad. This means I can only send and receive mail every 3 weeks. Then we worked with a returned missionary and a missionary leaving on Friday and taught a referral which went really well. We taught a less active as well and his situation is really difficult. He goes around collecting junk on his bicycle and then sells it for a living. We testified in the name of Christ that if he gave up one day of work and came to church that he would have enough money to feed his family. The spirit was so strong that he stopped making excuses and his whole family was at church on Sunday.

Wednesday:

Sister Mabini and I embarked on an epic journey to Manila because she has to have an x-ray before she goes home at the end of the transfer. On the way to the bus stop we noticed this little old nanay walking a little ahead of us, very slowly with a hunched back, and she had nothing but a coin purse. I felt bad for her but I didn't think to act on it until Sister Mabini walks up and grabs her hand and asks her where she's going. She said she was going to visit her son somewhere really far away from where we were. After 45 minutes of waiting the bus finally showed up and I walked faster, and then came to realize I was alone. I looked behind and Sister Mabini was helping nanay to get to the bus even if it meant we didn't catch it and had to be late. I was very touched. I'm learning a lot from her. When we got there, we helped her onto another bus and the man who was helping us help her was a great potential investigator! OYM points! We almost had a taxi driver kidnap us. We told him to take us to the temple and he drove in circles hiking up the price and didn't even know where the temple was. We called the APs which freaked him out and he finally let us out. He dropped us off at a place where I saw the coolest jeepney's I've ever seen. My favorite was probably the one with every character from Frozen. After we finally got to the MTC where they did her xray, we went to the mission office and picked up my packages (THANK YOU MOM! :))

Friday:  

We had a reallllly long, thorough weekly planning because there are so many new investigators. We didn't finish until 5:30and then we had a dinner pointment with... an American family! The only one in the ward! And probably the only one in this whole area... Haha it was great. They made us roasted chicken and mashed potatoes, YUM. They told us the story of how they met each other serving here in the Philippines in the same mission and then they met up again and got married. It was a cooler story than it sounds. ;) Their kids reminded me of my own little brother.

Saturday:

The sisters thought it would be funny to pretend like they forgot my birthday and then throw me a surprise party at the end of the day, so that happened. ;P For my birthday, Heavenly Father gave us 10 new investigators in one day. Talk about miracles! 7/10 of them came to church the next day. I was so pleased.

That's about it. :) Loving the mission, loving the area, loving everything! And I love all of you. That's all!

Sister Wilson

Edited to add from a later email:

How blessed we should feel... my house mates don't know what a dishwasher is. Also, the other day I saw a bunch of little kids being forced to sort through garbage so their parents could sell it for money. At 10 PM on the streets. We are not poor. Don't complain, k? ;)

By the way, if you wanna look up where I live again:

Regatta North Subdivision

Sumapang Matanda B6L9

Malolos City

The CR, or comfort room.  There's nothing comforting about it.  Hideous and smells like a dead skunk.  Editor's Note:  The bucket and spigot comprise the shower.

The front of our house.  It looks cute, but looks can be deceiving.  

After my surprise birthday party.