Monday, June 26, 2017

I totally high-fived a monkey. It was sweet.

Hello everybody.

 This is going to be a super short letter this week, but you're just going to have to deal with it. We went this morning to some super sweet waterfalls and explored around for a long time this morning. The only problem is that they were a lot farther away than we thought and the bus ride was over an hour and a half just to get to the trail. Kaya, medyo ubos na ang oras namin [Sorry, out time was a little out of date] . It was super great though, and I got some way sweet photos that you can be excited to look at next week. :)

Mostly all this letter is, is a message to let you know I'm alive and didn't forget about you all in all my adventures. There is one thing I have to say though before I go that will make Heidi a little jealous. I totally high-fived a monkey. It was sweet. His little hand was so cute. What makes it better is that his name is Momoy. So yeah. Life is pretty nice here! I'll get a better e-mail next week, promise!

Mahal ko kayong lahat! [I love you all!]


Elder Fawson

Monday, June 19, 2017

We had been "tao po"ing every single house up this road and everyone was not being very nice...



Hello everybody!

This is Elder Uncle Rob, reporting in. It's so cool that Claire had her baby! Margot is a nice name. I'm trying to think. If she was born at 1:40pm, Thursday, then at that time I was in a lesson with a new investigator we had just OYMed. It was crazy! We had been "Tao po"ing [knock knocking] every single house up this road and everyone was not being very nice. they were all like, "Iglesia kami" (They're from Iglesia ni Cristo church), or they would just pretend not to hear us as they turned up the volume on the TV. Then out of nowhere we saw this ate outside and we were just like, "Hi Ate!" then she ran inside. We were like, "Oh. okay." Then the dad came out and was like "Pasok kayo!" [Enter it!] so we went inside and talked to them. They are from Ilo-ilo and his aunt is Mormon. He and his wife are so nice! The guy’s work is he takes care of a bunch of chickens. 2,500 to be exact! Then he has a friend who has 2,500 more! It's super crazy! They are the ones who supply all of Roxas with their chicken consumption needs. I'm pretty sure they're going to get baptized! And when we do, we'll party with a bunch of lechon manok! [roasted chicken!] MMMM BOY!

Another fun thing that happened was last Monday after I finished e-mailing you. We went and walked around the beach next to our house for about an hour looking for fun creatures and we found a bunch of crabs. Then we also found a lot of star fish. One of them was huge. He was as big as my face!!! He was cool. It was orange and had spikes on him. Sort of like a Bowzer star fish. Then as we were leaving I saw a little creature so I got a closer look and it was like a deformed shrimp of some sort. He was crazy! He had his shell thing on his head instead of his back and was super creepy lookin'. It was a fun adventure. We're going back later today too.

The zone leaders and sister training leaders practiced OYMing using the umbrellas and pass along cards. The umbrellas say Families Can Be Forever in Tagalog and help start conversations about families.
This Wednesday is my last zone conference with President Ostler. I'll probably never see him again after that for the rest of my mission. It’ll be way fun though. I'm excited to meet President Fermanis! I hear he's super awesome! However, the Ostler's will be greatly missed. 
Final Zone Conference on Palawan with President and Sister Ostler




I don't have a lot of stuff to talk about today. I saw a guy earlier that looked like he got some blue cotton candy dropped on his head because the top was bright blue, but the sides were still black. He looked pretty doofy! :)

Anyways, all is going well here. I'm exited to find another huge star fish. I'll bring my camera this time so you can have some photo documentation of the cool mga hayop [animals] I see later. :) Bye for now!


Elder Fawson

Here's some pictures of when Roxas ward was organized. No one told us they were taking the photo so Elder Tanner and I aren't in it, but it looks like everyone else is. :)


Monday, June 12, 2017

MASIKIP!!! Elder Fawson knees are not Filipino knees.

Where is the leg room?

 
Bus Stop in Roxas

Hello everyone!

This week has been super crazy and masikip! [crowded!] Crazy because we had to go to Puerto not once, but two times! Masikip because the shuttles we ride in to get to Puerto are built for Filipinos. Elder Fawson knees are not Filipino knees! Don't worry though. I survived and both trips were super awesome once we got there! The first trip was for zone conference. We learned how to use family history more effectively in our finding and got some sweet new tools to do it. Everyone has their My Family booklet. Mine is all done and is lookin' prime! I have lots of good pictures that I snagged off the familysearch.org. There's lots of cool stuff on there! I wish I had more time to explore the realms of my ancestors. I'll just have to magtiis [suffer] until I get home. It's pretty exciting stuff though!!! Also I finally got the long awaited OYMing umbrella. To bad it hasn't rained enough for me to have to use it yet. Don't worry though. I'm sure it'll happen soon and when it does, I'll be sure to tell you all about it. :)

The other trip to Puerto was for a Philippines area broadcast. President Lynn G. Robbins, President Bowen, Elder Ardern, Sister Oscarsen, and Elder Bednar were the speakers. It was super great! If it's on lds.org you should definitely watch it. It was really cool because all of almost all of them have recently been here so they were able to share about their experiences they had. Elder Ardern was here for 5 years in the area presidency, President Bowen is still here as the area President, then sister Oscarsen and Elder Bednar both came here and visited the Philippines within the last 6 months. They had some really great talks!!! Believe it!

It was sort of baliktad [reverse]. When Heidi and Dad went to Lake Powell on Monday they had no hot showers, but I did!!!!!!!!! When we went for zone conference we stayed in a hotel the night before and it was glorious!!! I just thought I should make known that observation. I haven't had even a lukewarm shower in the last year and a half. I don't expect it'll happen again until the day I can do it when I get home. Then I can dry my warm roasty toes on the cool frog mat on the bathroom floor. That'll be a day to look forward to. :)

So that's basically what I've been up to this week. There is one thing I forgot to say last week. HAPPY FATHERS DAY!!!!! I actually didn't forget, but didn't know until it was too late. Sometimes I just don't hear important world events like that. It sort of weirds me out sometimes, but what ever. 

Mahal ko kayong lahat!!! Have a nice week!


Elder Fawson

Wednesday, June 7, 2017

"Come in" the most glorious words in the dictionary

Rublez family wedding. That was a happy day! Because the baptism was on the same day. It's always nice to not have to remember so many anniversaries. :)
Helo everybody!

The craziest thing happened. I think I time traveled into the future. 2 Fridays ago we did our weekly planning, and had a baptism which was super awesome. Then on Saturday Elder Tanner was super sick and we didn't work, then it was Sunday and we went to church and stuff, then it was P-day, then on Tuesday we went to Manila and didn't come back 'til Thursday night, then it was weekly planning again!!! I was so shocked when it was Friday again because time just went by so fast. In my mind it was only Wednesday, but in reality it wasn't. Time is weird when you can't work much in your area! 

Saturday was our only full day of work all week. It was a good day though. in the morning we walked around and OYMed a ton of houses. It's always awkward when you walk up to a house with the door wide open and the TV clearly on, but nobody comes when you shout "TAO PO!!!" [knock knock!!!]They thought we wouldn't notice the sound of the battle cries of Encantadia coming from the television. We just shout "Tao po!" a few more times and then say, "sige po. Sa susunod na lang!" [Okay. Go to the next !] After 2 hours of "pasensya. busy po ako." [patience. I am busy.] and "Catholic ako!" [ I’m Catholic!] we finally found the right house. It was really cool. It was on a street I hadn't noticed before and Elder Tanner was like, "lets try down here." So we did. We went to a fun looking yellow house at the end and said, "Tao po." That was when the glorious sound came to my ears."Pasok kayo." [Come in.] Those 2 words are the most glorious words in the dictionary to a missionary that's been punted all morning. Oh what rapture and bliss, there's no song can express the joy that filled our hearts as we crossed the bamboo threshold of that yellow kubo hut! There was a nice family and they let us share with them. It was a lolo and lola, [grandfather and grandmother] their kids and young grandkids at home. One of the grandkids was only 2 weeks old. I think when we go back to them they'll be ready to come to church and everything. They've already met some missionaries before so that's always a bonus too! It was awesome!

I restarted the Book of Mormon again last week too. I'm in 1 Ne 13 already. This time I am underlining all the names of Christ and making a list of all the different names. After reading only the first 13 chapters I already almost have 30 different names. It's way neat to see all his different titles. Most of them are "Lord" and "God," but there are some super cool ones too! You should read it to find out what they are. :)

Our bishop is doing a super awesome job. Last week we asked him if he could call some new ward missionaries because there were only 4. Three of them were girls, who we can't work with if we don't have a 3rd lalaki [man], and the other one is less-active. Then yesterday in sacrament he stood up and was like, "I'd like to call the following as ward missionaries." then he read a list of like 10 super awesome members. Then after church we had coordination and all of them were there. Later that day each companionship had like 3 member workers with us. It was super sweet!!! Things are really starting to pick up a lot faster now that we're a ward. 

Tomorrow is zone conference, so that's always fun. Surely if you check up on the mission blog soon you'll see some nice photos of me. :) We're getting these cool new umbrellas with pictures of the temple on them so we can OYM people even if it's raining. "Oh, you look drenched! Come stand here under my umbrella with me for a couple minutes so I can share to you about eternal families." (2 minutes later) "You should come to church some time. Well, I know it's still raining, but I got to go. bye." I got this umbrella thing down. We practiced for a while in MLC our umbrella OYMing approaches. I'm bound to have at least 1 baptism off this thing! :)

So that's what's up with me. I hope you all have  nice week and have fun with whatever you're doing. Be grateful you're not going to school. Today is the first day of school for the kids here in Roxas. kaawaawa sila! (too bad for them) hahahaha Anywho, Mahal ko kayo!


Elder Fawson
Elder Fawson "teachin' 'em all"


Toothpaste miracle!

That's the mamoth spider. Maybe a little smaller than the one you put on my blog, but pretty big none-the-less. :)


This one at the ocean is Jomar with his family. He's super awesome too! His dad baptized him as well. :)


This is Sister Jocelyn in front of the church! Her dad baptized her. He was super nervous because he's never baptized anyone before, but it was all great. She's the best!!!!