This week was quite exciting

We had mission training/Christmas Party in Orion on Wednesday. It was nice to see some familiar faces.

On our way home from training, I realized how beautiful it is, despite the trash everywhere. I was anticipating missing it here in the Philippines, and it almost made me already miss it, as weird as that sounds. We found a few new investigators this week. I am excited to teach/learn with them.

Every day, I'm learning and progressing, some days more than others. But this week, I realized that a lot of my pain and anxiety was coming from the fact that I was so attached to friends, my things, my life, and I was resisting the change that will inevitably come from learning how to love and serve other people.  I was fighting the change. I am a missionary, and I am starting to find inexplainable joy in that. This is the only time in my life that I will have this lifestyle, and do this work, the way that we do it everyday.

I prayed for happiness. I've never prayed for that before. I prayed for happiness, and that has been given to me. I am able to go through hard things, if I can find joy.

Many of my concerns from before, are slowly being resolved, mostly through studying the scriptures. That is hard to explain as well, but there is so, so much to be found there.

On Friday, Sister T and I split, so we switched companions for the day for training purposes. I went to Florida Blanca, and Sister Mamolang was my companion for the day. She's from Visaya, I think? It was really great to work with her and I learned a lot from her, how she interacted with the people, what she talked about. It all felt a bit more natural, probably because this is her culture. It's harder for Sister T and I to have really natural conversation with some people, because our Tagalog sounds different and we don't understand them as well as a native would. Sister Mamolang and I spoke tagalog mixed with english all day, but it was nice to hear about her and I told her about America too.  

Florida Blanca was really beautiful. I saw a field of sugar cane, and lemon bushes. We visited a family with no floor, just the ground. The woman there gave us bread that she made in her coal oven.

2 Ne 31:3-"For my soul delighteth in plainness; for after this manner doth the Lord God work among the children of men. For the Lord God giveth light unto the understanding; for he speaketh unto men according to their language, unto their understanding."

This was such a gem for me. 'according to their language' is probably referring to even a speech preference. Some people feel God through simple, plain words, and some people require other things. I'm trying to learn how to teach-how to be simple in explaining. I cannot give everything that I know at once.

I wish I could write more, but thank you all for your support!

-Sister Vickers

PS. Enjoy the pictures! A few are from the apartment. One is of the brooms that we have here. I think they look like mustaches, so Melissa Swan should like that. One is of my mission president and wife. Another is of Sister T and I. Another is of soap that is made from placenta that I saw in a store. 2 photos are of jeepneys- we use them to get everywhere, unless we take a tricycle. One is with a family in our ward in their home.

ok bye.

MTC Pictures

Family and Friends,
Here are pictures from Daniele's 8 weeks at the MTC. I picked a handful to show you and I don't have any explanation for any of the pictures. Sorry! Enjoy! Daniele's sister, ~Michele

 Daniele at the Provo Temple

 Daniele and her puns! She just loves them!

 Daniele and Sister Stromberg her companion in the MTC

Naramdaman masarap

Hi family,

I am happy and well. Tagalog is coming along, and I'm continually understanding more and more. Speaking comes slower, but the understanding is coming. 
Last week I think I said that Lubao is south of Olongapo, but it's actually east. 

The weather has been pretty nice. We carry around our umbrellas everywhere we go to either block sunlight or to block rain. 

I really enjoy teaching. I'm not a very good teacher. I have a tendency in conversation, to want to explain everything at once. It's been interesting to learn how to ask better questions so that people can teach themselves. It definitely requires a conscious effort to ask thought provoking questions. I forget that I learned the things that I've learned, over 21 years and I couldn't possibly explain everything at once, despite the desire to. 

Back home, I felt like sitting down and talking with someone was one of the most fulfilling things to do. I still feel that way. Yesterday we were visiting a family, and the father described how he felt when he read the Book of Mormon. "Naramdaman masarap." I can definitely relate to him having that "delicious feeling" when reading. I am understanding more and more why it is so important to study, in a personal kind of way-to have that time alone. It's been really great for me. 

I've already seen small small miracles in people's live. People are progressing that we didn't expect to progress. Djorn, a 14 year old, lives with his sister's family because his parents died. He can't go to school because he watches his nephew all day. (There is a lot to his story.) His nephew would cry whenever we would come over, so our time was really limited with him, like if his sister was home to watch the baby. We couldn't teach with whenever he had to watch the baby. Now, the baby likes us and shakes our hands. I was so shocked at the change from being terrified of us to wanting to see us. Anyways, we are able to visit Djorn much more frequently because of this change and he's making progression.

I feel like I've seen some of the most random things, here in the Philippines. (Corpse-I do mean 'random.') 

"Why are you white?" -A little girl asked me that the other day when Sister T and I were trying to find a house. Every time we go in that neighborhood, we'll get a small group of little girls that follow us around and ask us questions. I told her that I was born white. ha. 

I dislike being stared at so much, but that was life in Ecuador as well. I was feeling frustrated about it when my companion and I walked past a house of kids doing a choreographed dance to lady gaga outside on their porch. One of the kids yelled all in one sentence, "Hihowareyoui'mfinethankyou."  so so great. People like to practice their English with us. 

The other day I shook hands with a man that had 6 fingers. I thought something felt weird, but didn't realize it until later. I also realized that the sixth finger had nail polish-only the sixth. 

The Philippines are beautiful despite the trash everywhere. It's funny that in America, we have established rules and guidelines for everything. Here, it feels like there's not very many. Most people don't even have addresses. They'll live in 'puroks' or small neighborhoods. We just ask neighbors where someone lives if we don't know. We also don't knock on doors. We yell, 'Tao po!' outside of the house or outside of the fence. 

It is hard to see how poor some people are. We taught a woman and her children and father, and they didn't seem to have a bathroom. We sat on stools in her cement home. Some people don't even have cement. They'll make walls out of plants or whatever they can use.

Mom would be happy to know that we clean all of our own clothes. There are no washing machines where we live, so we spend 3-4 hours on P-day washing our clothes. Hopefully I will get faster!

We don't have a microwave or an oven in our kitchen, so everything is made on the stove. We have a fridge, in which we put EVERYTHING that we don't want ants to get into, even our toothbrushes, cereal, etc.

1 Nephi 2:14-15-- Verse 15 is so so great, but only because of what is in 14. Lehi was a man of power, but void of an earthly prestige. It reminds me of Christ when we says that He will give peace, "but not as the world giveth." That is something to ponder. 

2 Nephi 2: 13,16-- Interesting, as well.

Okayokayokay. I'm done. Love you all. Maybe I'll send some pictures next week.

P.S. If you want to send 'Dear Elders,' I think it is free. If it's not, just send an email, but getting letters through 'DearElder' is nice.

P.P.S.Corpse- I got your 2 DearElders at once. Letter coming your way!

This is the most ridiculous place I've ever been in

Hey family,

Sorry this is so long. I hate reading super long emaiIs so hopefully this is exciting enough. I couldn't possibly begin to adequately explain everything from this week. I'm in an area called 'Lubao' It's about an hour outside of Olongapo. 
I am glad that I was able to live in Quito for last summer, because it would be terrifying if I'd never left the country. It's even more foreign than Quito was, and it's been quite an adventure. Even being semi-familiar with the process of learning to be conversational in another language has helped and I'm already learning a lot of Tagalog. The structure is still confusing to me though.

My companion is Sister Mele Tupouniua. She is Tongan, but has lived in Utah her whole life. I am really glad that I have an American as my first companion, even though she's not fluent in Tagalog. (She is 5'11'' and since we are both tall and foreign, we are quite the sight!)  I am constantly asking questions about everything, so it's nice to not worry if I'm asking something that might be offensive or rude to a filipino. I've have so many questions and it's nice to learn a lot while still being able to speak English. She has been out in the Philippines for 7 months. With the new program that has been implemented, she will be my trainer for the next 12 weeks, and then after that 12 weeks, I should (in theory) be able to train someone else. Most likely I won't have to do that though. 

I'm not sure where to begin. Yesterday was my first time at church here, the Lubao branch. Everyone was super friendly and nice. I introduced myself during the testimony meeting and shared my testimony. I tell everyone that I was born in Chicago, because a lot of them have heard of Chicago (probably because of Michael Jordan.) My companion said that it's super unusual for them to hear an American speaking Tagalog, so they listen to everything, despite it being pretty bad Tagalog.

For Relief Society yesterday, it was combined with the men and instead of a lesson, they planned their ward Christmas party! haha. They have a Primary Christmas party, a RS Christmas Party and then a branch Christmas party. Christmas is such a huge deal here and my companion told me that other people in the area know all about the Mormon's Christmas parties. ha.

There are ants and bugs everywhere! I've been trying to plug up the pathways in the house where they move through and also doing a lot of spraying which seems to help. There are also small lizards that get on the walls sometimes. They are about 4 inches long. They aren't really a problem normally, except for last night. My companion and I were planning and I sat down at my desk and a lizard fell on me! It freaked me out. We live with another set of missionaries in this area. The two other sisters are filipino and are always laughing at my reactions to the bugs and lizards. 

Our apartment is definitely the nicest apartment I've seen so far, here in Lubao. (Most house here are just cement floors/walls with a tin roof. We usually will be teach people on the floor though.) We have real roofing and real flooring, and good lighting. It's basically like an American apartment, without AC. The houses that are considered 'average' would be considered very very poor in the US.

Unless we are going a long distance, we use either tricycles or jeepneys to get around. I usually feel like I'm going to die whenever I ride a tricycle. The jeepneys are basically way less classy limousines with an open back. Sometimes it gets super super packed inside the jeepneys. The driving is pretty scary though. Even when Pres. Querido was driving us to our area, he was constantly passing people and it felt like he was 'playing chicken' with the cars in the incoming lane. Sometimes they would pull off because we would get super close. ah!

We stopped by the market the other day to get a few items. There was an old woman selling stuff and she had a T-shirt on that said, "Young, single, and ready to mingle!"   So so great!

My first night in Lubao, we went to a missionary farewell of a sister in Lubao.. The branch had a small program for her, but the absolute best thing was the musical number. The Young Women's leader and the Young Women prepared a choreographed dance to a super cheesy love song. They performed it on stage and it was probably the best farewell I've ever been to. ha. 

On our way home after teaching a lesson, we stopped by a family in the branch. There was about 1/4 of a pig sitting on top of a bag on their kitchen table. NBD. I pretended like it was normal and laughed afterwards.

I don't have a lot of personal insights on things right now. I'm mostly just adapting now and learning about the culture and how to get by. It does feel weird to know that I'll go back home to an environment that is just generally safer and more clean/sanitary. That feels weird and in some ways almost wrong or unfair.


BYE. 

(My P-day is on Monday now.)