Christmas party and long walk to church

Hey!

Guess what, I got your package with the camera along with all the Christmas mga gasa, It was fun this week to take pictures of the Christmas party, and basa all the scriptures on my gifts in order to try and find out what they are, some I have no idea, some I have guesses, and others I thought the scripture was clever and I am pretty sure I know what they are. Thanks so much! (note from Cindy: I put a tag on each little Christmas present with a scripture clue, for example: D&C 111:11 "wise as serpents"  for gummy worms)

Time went by very fast this week, we had our Christmas party and me and Elder Aquino are working really well together, although not perfectly in sync, we are doing pretty well. We have some fun plans this week and ideas that we really want to test.

One idea is making our teaching appointments into walking routes, and tracting in between, so that we will always have visits to do if one fails, Oh and we need to make our area book exciting, because of one of the talks by Sister Tanner, have any ideas?

The missionaries were all given instructions from our leaders, the zone leaders about what to bring to the Christmas party, our zone leaders told us to bring a gift and a new pair of flip-flops, so I bought a small coconut coin purse that only can be found in some places of Bohol, and some flipflops that I drew a mountain on, Elder Aqunio did the same thing but he drew a piano on his, and got a tarsier coin purse souvenir. Unfortunately we didn't use the gifts at the party, only the flip-flops, but hey, got a coin purse that I don't need.

For the Christmas party we all exchanged flipflops in a fun game, by all 198 missionaries of the Cebu East Mission passing flipflops around in a circle with a fun creative game, and the flip flops you ended with was your Christmas gift, I got some really cool ones, better then the ones I gave.

When we came back from the party we arrived late on Bohol, and all of the elders that live near Jagna, slept in one of the churches on the floor, took a picture of my "bed" for the night, using my bag as a pillow.

We also were able to make a difference in someones life yesterday, we took a 30 minute motorcycle ride into a barangay called Lonoy, so that we could walk a 17 year-old girl from her house to the church at 6 in the morning, so that we could get to the church at 9, it was exciting to see the other young girls so excited to see her, you could see the love that the church family has for her, I wasn't sure if it was going to be worth it, but now I would be willing to do it every week.

Elder Remer

Hey!

So this week there was a super typhoon, luckly it didn't hit Jagna, but because there was a chance of it hitting us we evacuated to center Bohol, a valley called Pilar. It was kind of fun, having people try to give you directions for evacuating in a different language. We went up there Friday morning and just got back about 1 hour ago. Unfortunately the stories of this week are very short, and only have to do with the 4 other missionaries that me and my companion stayed with in a house, waiting for the storm to pass and for the all clear to sound.

I found out I am really bad at chess, I played so many games of chess with two of the Elders in the balay. I lost every one with them, always being fairly close games, but them always winning in the end. I had lost so many games, I don't even know, I kept playing and kept losing. I won two games total, and the best part about it was they were the last two games, and I did very well, I did so well the Elders thought that I must have been playing with them the entire time, and finding there weaknesses so that I could destroy them in the end. Its true I was trying to find weaknesses every game, but every time I found one, I used it the second I found it, and still lost, but hey its the last one that counts right?

It was pretty miserable at times being stuck in the balay, but I got cheered up when I did some basic magic tricks to the Filipinos and blew there minds, I mean if I did any of these tricks to you, you would catch me after the second time, but for them I could trick them over and over again, they even video taped me and couldn't figure it out, It was even better when I moved on to some of the more advanced tricks that I knew. I don't think I will forget the faces of amazement when I made a coin vanish or made there card appear.

Oh I almost forgot, Elder Aqunio, my new companion is amazing, I mean it blows my mind how good he is at piano, he plays piano without sheet music, by ear alone, he can just play any song with both hands on the piano, he is super smart and knows what he is doing. Also he likes to follow all of the mission rules, I think we are going to get along well, unfortunately I can't talk very well to him because I can't understand his accent in Visayan all the time, and he likes to shortcut words. He probably thinks I am super quiet right now because I have only taught 2 lessons with him, and other than that, I am pretty quiet because this language translation thing is hard work, so normally if it is just us I take a break and just sit quietly so I don't need to translate.

This week on Thursday we have a Christmas activity for all the missionaries, I have no idea what to expect, but we were told to bring a new pair of flip-flops, and a gift for a white elephant gift exchange. So sounds like it will be fun, I am excited to see the other missionaries in our mission!

Elder Remer

Typhoon Hagupit (known as Typhoon Ruby in the Philippines)

note from Cindy:
We received an email from Ryan's mission president this morning, reassuring us that plans were in place to keep the missionaries safe during Typhoon Ruby. Ryan is serving in an area that is on Bohol island, where the storm is classified as Category 1. Missionaries in areas where the storm is classified as Category 2 have been evacuated. On an ongoing basis, all missionaries are instructed to maintain a 72 kit, have an emergency fund of small denominations, keep extra food and water in their apartments, and keep their cell phones fully charged.

bamboo pole dancing and typhoon cleanup

Kumusta ka?

So this week is Transfer Week! So Preparation Day is on Wednesday this week. Elder Creswell is leaving now, going to Baklayon, might be spelled wrong, I am getting a new companion named Elder Aquino, I don't know too much about him besides that he is Filipino, and amazing at piano, I am so excited to work with him for the next transfer or two. This week has been amazing.

bamboo pole dance (tinikling), picture from wikipedia

Last Monday, we went on an activity to relax with the other missionaries, It was great to take a break. We went on a boat that was a restaurant, that went down the river. I got to do this crazy dance. I would explain it as doing jump rope and dancing at the same time, but instead of jump rope it was two big pieces of bamboo under me being slammed together at the beat of the song, it was super cool.

This week hasn't been just fun though, We also had a typhoon on Wednesday, and even though it wasn't very strong, it did a lot of damage to the homes next to the ocean because the waves were super high. We had one of our investigators houses destroyed because of the waves. Her name is M..., and we saw the house destroyed, so we have been doing service around that area every day since Thursday.

A cool experience was that Thursday morning I felt that me and Elder Creswell needed to go in jeans and a t-shirt to help somebody out, At this point it was a very unclear why, because we live away from the ocean, so the damage was leaves everywhere, and a couple of trees that fell, nothing serious. Confused we went to the center of town, where two massive boats had been lifted out of the water onto some stores destroying them. We then went to M... 's house and found it destroyed, but that she was ok, and feeling pretty good despite what happened to her. It was cool to receive that prompting, because if we had ignored it, we were too far away from our house to go there and come back to really help her.

Funny experience, we have a broken plastic chair in our house with 3 legs, that if you sit on it you will fall to the floor, I did not sit in it once in the last 3 months, and was determined to not sit in it. Well I sat in it yesterday, the last possible day because I was so tired, Elder Creswell saw it, and we both fell to the floor laughing about it, Good times.

I found out our house is not very protected, normally we are at our apartment in the mornings for studying the scriptures, but this day me and Elder Creswell were out doing service, well some missionaries from a different area came to our house so that they could charge their phones and cameras because after the typhoon they still didn't have any power, so they climbed up our balcony and opened our door by reaching their hand through a window to unlock the balcony door, in order to get inside and charge their phones and cameras, I was so confused to find our house filled with cameras and phones charging, with the balcony door open

Have a great week!
Elder Remer

Funny things and learning lessons

I have started taking notes of what happens, The week happens so fast that I forget about
most of the funny things, Thanks for writing me by the way. As for how I am doing I am doing good, I am experiencing so many things, and the language depends on the day and who we are talking to or where we are, I laughed because some of the other missionaries think that I am really far in the language, but I think that's just because I look like I understand the people, but I really only understand half of what they say, and then comment on the half that I do understand.

Well, lets see what other things happened this week...So on Tuesday Elder Creswell dared me to eat a mango seed, he said he would pay me $10, well I ate it, turns out he was joking, so I didn't get the $10 that I wanted, The next day my tongue turned blue, we were trying to thing of anything blue I ate that day, we couldn't think of anything, so we concluded must be the mango seed, because there was nothing else that I ate recently that might have been bad for me. My tongue turned back normal again on Friday, so note to self. 1) don't eat mango seeds 2) make sure people are serious when they bet me $10 (here that's 400 Pecos, enough to eat out every day for the next week) Learning lessons on my mission.

I found out that the kids here have pet spiders, and they are huge. A kid, about 11 years old asked me if I wanted to see his pet, I was shocked to find out that his pet is a spider the size of a computer mouse, and he just let it climb on him, and put it back in the box when he was done. I found out that compared to the Filipino people, I am scared of spiders, I am ok with killing them, or seeing them, but I would never let it climb on my arm.

Wierdest food of the week. We went to distract meeting on Tuesday and then out to a restaurant together where someone bought cheese icecream for us all to try, it was actually pretty good.

Fun times with American Movie Quotes, We were at a Members home, and they were confused about a quote they heard on the TV, I told them to ask Elder Creswell, because my Boholonon is still small, Well I choked on my water went they asked about a quote with the f bomb in it, I remember seeing the shock on Elder Creswell's face as we looked at each other in shock, then we started laughing, because Sister P... (the member) had no idea what it meant.

Fun lesson for this week was teaching a boy named Quin the 10 commandments, we have been trying to make our lessons more entertaining for him, because sometimes he doesn't want to listen, so we tried something I learned from the MTC, by making remembering devices with our hands, for example the first commandment is to have no other gods before me, we hold up one finger on one hand to remember to only have 1 God, then for the 2nd commandment we hold up two fingers, one on each hand and bend them back and forth to look like they are people bowing to remind us of the second commandment, that we should not bow down to idols, and it continues until commandment 10, It was pretty fun.

I also bought a Cebuano Bible for Sister P..., because she has been trying to read the English version for as long as I have known her, as soon as I gave her the Cebuano Bible, her face lite up in excitement, 2 days later she had read though Genesis until Leviticus, crazy amount of reading. It made me happy that it really helped her.

Until next week,
Elder Remer

McDonalds, big spider and more

Bohol Quality mall has McDonalds, photo from tourism.bohol.gov.ph

You won't believe where I went last Monday, I went to McDonalds! It is in the big city here called Tagbilarin, or Tagbi for short. It was so weird, I didn't think that I would get to eat at McDonalds while I am in Jagna. It was amazing.

huntsman spider consuming a small beetle, from wikipedia

I thought I would tell you about some fun things this week.  Like this morning I found a spider on our wall about as big as the palm of my hand. Trying to kill it I quickly found out it was a huntsman spider because of how fast it moved, I would say that it is a blessing that we don't have those in America. I have decided that fast big spiders are not my favorite thing in the world.

Lets see, I think the highlight of my week is learning about the different folk stories of the Philippines, some of them are crazy, and some are just funny. There are a few of my favorite monsters in the Philippines, 1st the wak-wak, most likely inspired off of the spiders like the one this morning, basta the wak-wak is a witch like creature that jumps out from the trees of the forest at night, and then drinks your blood. 2nd The santilmo is a floating fireball thing that shoots lightning or fire, only comes out at night. 3rd The dwinda is a dwarf with elf ears that hide in the rocks until you come by I think in English we should call it a dwelf (a dwarf-elf) and my favorite that agta/kapray is a 7-9 foot black man that climbs to the top of the trees and ... smokes a cigarette, not sure why that one is scary.

As for the language, its going pretty good. Some days are better than others but overall they are getting better. I am getting better at understanding the people I see often. Like the family of our Branch President and his neighbors, where I can understand them most of the time. Like on Friday night, we were over at their house and I was understanding all of what they were saying, and talking to them too, They told me that I was much farther in the language then other missionaries that had started in Jagna. It made me pretty happy, but then Sunday I was humbled again, and understood very little of what people were saying, but overall I am still happy with the progress I am making, I am told by most people I will be fluent by my 6th month out here, not sure about that, but maybe so.

They don't ask a lot about Colorado, specifically, but they ask questions about America in general, our schooling system, how many hours do we work a week, what the culture is like, what the different trees and plants and mountains look like, as in there language mountain is the same word as jungle, because here the jungle is is hill like areas, so they don't really know what a real mountain looks like.

Good lessons this week, I was able to go on splits with Elder Orton, an american missionary who goes home in January, it was cool to teach with him, and teach different people while we tract, at the end of the day we went to a members home to teach a recent convert. The member gave us Lamow to have, it was coconut milk, with coconut slices, and crackers in it. It was the best thing I have ever had, it was so good.

about the branch and who we're teaching

Questions from Cindy's email to Elder Remer: 

Did you see H..... this week? and how is she doing?

Who did you teach and/or help this week?

Are there children in your branch? Will they do a primary program?

We have a pretty big branch, it fills are small church building, and would be a ward if there was a stake on Bohol.

We have lots of children (for the Philippines) and a primary, sunday school, and young/men womens program, unfortunately there are no activities because everyone is to busy for that here, but we have about 6 young men, 4 young women, and I'm not sure how many children. 

I did see H..... this week, but I'm not sure how she is doing, something seemed wrong but she didn't want to talk about it, and at the end of the lesson she refused to pray, her mom decided to pray instead, and looked as if H..... was going to get punished. If that happens I'm not sure if she will want to be taught, but maybe its not as big of a deal and things will be back to normal next week.

We are very blessed here to teach a lot of people, we get anywhere from 16-25 lessons a week. 

We walk 6 kilometers a day, at least, which takes up most of our time. 

A few families that are my favorite to teach are the P.....s and Brother N.... with his wife Sister T.... , the P........s are a all Mormon family with their dad being a recent convert, we see them often as there dad is a tryk driver and that their house is normally on the route we walk so we get to teach them 1-2 times every week. Brother N..... and Sister T..... are both recent converts with a little girl, and a very cute and entertaining baby.