Elder Head in the Philippines - Too busy to write last week- Happy Birthday Mitch! #skypein5days

Thanks for the all the pictures. Yikes. The kiddies...they're all so darn big now! Jeeze, that snow looks absolutely beautiful. I can't believe it's been 15 months in the blistering heat. Haha. Right now it's rainy/bagio (typhoon) season so it's so unbelievably humid. I've been doing my own hand washing of my clothes lately because it's easier to just do it myself than find a ride to the mission home with all my laundry in tow each week, but it's so humid that my darn clothes just won't dry! I've been donning damp clothes for the past few days. Haha. They get more dry after I iron them but there's still a kind of sogginess to them. Haha! I walked by a poster in the mall for the new Star Wars movie and it was super sakit. It looks so cool. Haha. So last week was SO hectic. We had the Christmas Conference in the mission which I didn't get to stick around for the whole time because we were doing this or that or running this errand or making sure we had enough chairs and then buying tickets for every missionary to return to Bohol. I took some pictures, but the majority of them are in Elder Bayot's camera. And he just went home. So I'll hope for an email with some of the pictures from Christmas Con. I took a few of the set up which was also fun. We set up a Christmas tree, but it didn't turn out very American looking, which is sad because the only ones who worked on the tree were the two Americans. I was actually kind of proud of how it turned out even though we were rushed! Haha.

So for Christmas Conference, we started on Wednesday night, gathered the entire mission from Bohol, Cebu, and Camotes to watch the Christmas Devotional with everyone staying over in the houses close to Lilo-an afterwards. This meant I needed to make up a list of where the entire mission was going to sleep for a night, making sure all the zones are still relatively close together so they could easily coordinate to get everyone to Lilo-an again the next morning by 9.

Check.

We then set up right afterward, getting everything decorated, which was super fun. I'll send my pictures. The next morning was a mission devotional with 4 speakers. President Tanner chose 2 missionaries who were relatively new and 2 missionaries who would be going home in the next week. It was so cool to see that even though 2 had considerable less bags under their eyes than the others, the same fire for the work and love for the Lord was constant in all 4 talks. There were musical presentations from each zone, some being better than others, and I performed a solo for our zone, O Holy Night (that being the reason the others were better...Haha) Just kidding. We did well too :)

After Christmas Conference ended, we had to get everything ready for the departing batch of missionaries, so Saturday I really didn't get a P-day. The Filipino missionaries will take an English test, just like grammar and stuff. It's not really a big deal if they don't pass, but it could help them a lot with getting a job after the mission if they get a good score on it. I was proctoring that last Saturdays I wasn't able to do much else because we had a batch of 16 missionaries going home who were all Filipino. Each test takes about an hour. There's a practice test the missionaries will take too. We spread it out for Friday and Saturday. So kana. That's why I couldn't email last week, I'm sorry. But thanks so much for the birthday wishes and the cute pictures!

On my actual birthday, we were pretty busy with the departing missionaries and some other vehicular things, so for like 2 hours, I sat in a Filipino DMV and just worked on the computer for most of the day. After that we had to do a coordination meeting with the Assistants to plan for the ACTUAL departure home for the out-going missionaries the next day. To be honest, I was not jumping for joy, which was really selfish of me. I thought to myself, "Worst birthday ever", but it was truly needed and I got over it quickly....in the same day, even.

The next day, we had some missionaries miss their flights. Yep. We were super blessed to have one of the workers at the airport be a member though who offered to pay for their tickets on the very next flight out. Nindot tender mercy.

We took all the trainers to the mission home to meet all the new missionaries, when Elder Jimenez & I drove all the trainers that were Elders to the mission home, we saw a little boy get hit by a motor (A guy driving a motorcycle) on the bridge going to the mission home. The guy wasn't wearing a helmet and the poor little kid (probably about age 7) wasn't wearing a shirt, so they both got some gnarly road rash. The little kid didn't look both ways before crossing the street. They both were ok but really scraped up and sore.

Then, the NEXT day, we had Transfer day. Oy vey!! Haha!

We got a call in the morning of transfer day from Elder and Sister McNett around 7:30am saying that the battery on their truck died, so they had no way to get to the office because President Tanner was on Bohol with his family with one car and the Assistants were going to the port in Cebu City with the others to pick up missionaries coming over from Bohol. Elder Jimenez and I manned the office for the morning until the Assistants got back and picked up the McNetts.

I just noticed how super ridiculously long this letter was, so if you made it here, thank you. Haha!

When it rains, it pours. It was basically a tropical typhoon of busy stuff these past few weeks. I haven't even been able to work in my area for the last two weeks because of the craziness.

I've been able to see a lot of tender mercies in the past few weeks as well too, and I'm grateful for that. But, boy, AM I tired. Haha.

Yep. Love ya. Haha.

Elder Head

Hey Pops! 

 It's been raining cats and dogs here in Cebu. We've got a couple big storms coming in (Typhoons) so we're feeling the effects of it through the rain only. But it's like constant rain right now. haha. Take it easy shoveling all that snow, Pops. Just drink some hot chocolate or something for me. Or some actual milk. The milk here sucks. Just ask Ryan. Also, eat some christmas goodies too. I kinda rambled in my email, so if you and mom want to make some revisions, feel free. I'm super excited to see you guys this next week. It's super weird to me that the Skype is already here. I'll only have one more after this......  I love you Pops. Thanks for your example to me.

Today I'll actually be able to work in my area!!!!!

-Elder Head

Funny message from the Cebu East Mission Facebook page :) I sent a screenshot of this & sent it to Mitch.
He said this about it, "Oh man, I know exactly what Heather is talking about. Traffic that day was HORRIBLE and we were also in a hurry to get them to the port so it was doubly hectic. Haha."

Happy Birthday Mitch!!