Elder Fawson in the Philippines : 20 new investigators are proof of this week's hardworkingness

Robert's Zone in Roxas

With his new mission president and his wife President and Sister Fermanis from New Zealand.

Helo po!

This week is super awesome! We had almost nothing to do to distract us from working in our own area. This is the most full week of work I've had in the past 2 transfers, so that was cool. Our 20 new investigators we found are proof of our kasipagan (hardworkingness). :) 4 of those investigators are a new family we found. It all started last Thursday. We had been punted for a few hours (which I wish happened a bit less often) and were on our way to a birthday party of a member we had been invited to, the Orio family, when we decided to stop by this house just a few houses away from our destination. We said "Tao po!" and this lady walked out and started talking to us. I could see inside this bald guy sitting facing away from us and he didn't have a shirt on. Usually shirtless bald guys have this impression in my mind as super stern grumpy people, but as he heard us talking he started putting a shirt on and told us to com inside. Turns out he's not grumpy at all, but super friendly and nice. We had a nice first lesson with them and taught them about temples because he used to live in Quezon city right close to the Manila temple and had some questions about that. It was great, and the next lesson we taught them about Joseph Smith and they were super cool about that too. Brother had to work yesterday kaya hindi sila nakapagsimba [so they an not go to church], but I feel they are super prepared and ready for the gospel. I like it when stuff like that happens.

That's not the only thing that happened that was crazy cool this week. Just yesterday evening we were teaching this girl and she has had some bad experiences with some other churches she's been to (I won't go way into it) and she started saying to us "I wish I had a Mormon bible so I could see what it has that could help me." Then we were like, "well sister, we have a Book of Mormon with us that we could give to you if you want." Then she was all like "Wey! (that's the Filipino equivalent for "your joshin' with me!") Talaga? (for reals?)" Then we were like "Syempre! (Of course)" and gave it to her. Then she was like 20 seconds straight of "Salamat! salamat! salamat! salamat! salamat!" It was so cool. Then she gave the closing prayer and actually started crying. I've never had someone so excited about receiving a Book of Mormon before. It was awesome! What makes it even cooler is that during the whole lesson Satan was blasting Babylonian music super loud, but it was to no effect. The still small voice of the Spirit conquered the blasting speakers of evil and I felt like Satan took a spiritual round-house-kick to the face.

Those were the highlights of my week. We also made good use of our oven and baked like 30 cookies for us to eat all by ourselves. Maybe sometime we'll give some to the members as bribes for more referrals. hahahaha We just have so much brownie and cookie mix that we found at a mall in Puerto a few weeks ago and feel a need to ubos it before I get transferred. It's rough stuff! It really is. :)

inspecting a lightbulb in his apartment

at the church for a meeting with the president

President Fermanis came to visit Roxas last week to see what it's like up here so we had the whole zone meet in the Roxas chapel and had a little zone meeting when he got here. It was way cool. Before he got here I was thinking to myself, "I hope he likes it here!" Then I remembered a nice movie quote and tweaked it a bit for my situation that brought peace to my soul. "I think President Fermanis will be most pleased with the world of Roxas. I know I am!" (If anyone lacks wisdom of what movie that derives from, let him ask of Heidi)

Map of their area in their house

picture of Robert's kabahay

I must say, things are going pretty good. I wish I could just stay in Roxas for the rest of my mission, but I find the odds not in my favor. Whatever happens though, it'll be fine. That's called faith!

Anywho, I'm glad you were able to have fun at the baby blessing of my new niece who I haven't seen yet and I hope you continue to have fun for the rest of your stay here on Earth until the time comes to check out of this hotel of mortality. I know I will. :)

Elder Fawson