Funny
Story…we were doing training with the district (stake) and branch family
history consultants in the new district, Pamplona, we are beginning to work
in. Sister Watson mentioned, over the
pulpit that we were from Canada. After
the training a sister who was just called as a district consultant told us she
was baptized by a Canadian missionary.
She showed us a picture of her and the missionary standing by the ocean
at a town called Pasacao. There she
stood beside Joel! She asked us how old
she looked in the picture and we both said 11 or 12. We were shocked to hear she was 23 at the time. We asked if she was married and she
responded, “No! Elder Woodruff said not
to get married unless it was in the temple and I haven’t been asked by anyone
who could take me to the temple.” She
is beautiful, successful and very active in her call. When we see her next I will try to scan the picture of her and
Elder Woodruff. Until then, I took a
few pictures of the group while Sister Watson was teaching. She is the one on the front row, left of
Valerie and wearing a yellow top. Her
name is Sister Memoria Cerico, of the Pasacao Branch. They have a beautiful new building there. We are doing a training with the
missionaries there on Tuesday. We hope
to connect with Sister Memoria then.
High five you Joel! You are
still famous in Pasacao.
This will be a short blog for
the week because all we did was get set up in our new place. On Tuesday we got most of the furniture
rebuilt and the clothes washed and put away.
Late in the afternoon we went out to Leesom motors to make an
appointment to get the car fixed and serviced.
They said we could take it in on Wednesday morning. We were without wheels for until Thursday
evening. We had time to catch up
on home work and get ready for our
training meeting in Sipocot on Friday.
The car was fixed and serviced on time!
The front and back fenders had been ripped off on the country roads we
traveled in Iriga district. The molded
mud flaps are all part of the bumper systems so when they scrape the ground the
whole fender is torn off. Both were
just hanging and the mud guards were wearing against the tires. There was about 3” clearance from the ground
to the mud flaps so we did a lot of damage doing our function in Iriga. We trained the Pamplona zone on Friday in
Sipocot. The problem is tha we will ust
get all the companionships trained and then transfers will affect many of
them.
This is the group we trained. When we first began training missionaries in
Iriga we learned so much from them.
Four of them are now serving in Pamplona zone. Elder Tuituvakii is the one on the far left in the blue sweater. He was a zone leader in Iriga then and was
one of the first to have success with using Family History as a finding and
teaching tool. The tall blond sister
behind him is Sister Killian from Washington who served with Sister Bakly in
Baao last summer. It was her first
area. She is now a trainer and an
amazing missionary. It is so good to
see them again although Elder Tuituvalkii goes home next week with the next
transfers. He is Samoan from
California. I hate saying good-bye to
the ones we attached to.
We
left early Saturday morning to go to Iriga to President Chua’s father’s funeral. It was raining but we found the cemetery in
time to see the entombment. President
Chua is the only member of the church in his family. We met his 80 year old mother who was such a nice lady. President lost his wife to cancer last year
and has a beautiful 17 year old daughter who is in college. They are a big family and the cemetery was
packed.
On
our way back to Naga to attend an area FH meeting we stopped to take some
pictures of things we always meant to when we lived there, but didn’t take
time. For Joel, this is a picture of
the new Jeepneys that look more like a limo than a jeepney. This one is a Hunday but we have seen a
Toyota model that is even more fancy.
We still like the old army jeeps converted to a commercial van the best.
I
can’t wait to show this farm equipment to my friends on the colony. This is a thresher for threshing the rice
out of the straw. It then has to be
dried and taken to a mill where the rice is separated from the coating that
covers it. Then it is bagged in 40 to
50 kilo bags and thrown on and off trucks by hand. These guys are tough.
Remember, a cool day is in the mid 30s with oppressive humidity.
After the rice is harvested
the straw from the thresher is piled around the field and burned. The field is flooded again and the carabau
pulls the plow through the muck with the farmer wading barefoot behind. It is not unusual for guys to get bit by snakes. After the muck is turned over by the
plow it is floated down by a carabau or
rototilled up and harrowed down by a machine that looks like this although this
one is new and does not have the motor mounted yet.
with oppressive humidity.
Farm is all labor intensive
here. The field is then planted by hand
by a seeding crew who put the seedlings spaced about 6” apart in perfectly
straight rows. The already seedling has
about an 8” stalk.
They too are barefoot with a
bag on one shoulder holding the seedlings.
A guy with two baskets, one on each end of a 6’ bamboo pole run to each
planter with new seedlings then runs back through the mud to the edge of the
field where the new seedlings are stored.
Each worker makes 250 pesos a day which is $6.85. They work to eat and many eat only rice
three times a day.
I had to take a picture of the Iglesia ni
Christo church building. They are blue,
beige, green or white depending on the amount of money the congregation paid to
erect the building. They baptize by
immersion but continue to immerse the person in the water until they come up
and say they saw the face of Jesus.
They fine the people if they are late, absent or don’t keep the
commandments of their religion. It is a
very powerful religion and has penetrated the government of the nation.
That
was the end of a very busy week. I am
behind again in my blog but will try to catch up today. This is a big file so I will end it now and
send when we have internet again. We
love you all!
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