Week Five in the Philippines!

As usual, this week has been a whirlwind of emotions and super busy; all of which was awesome! I am getting better at the language every day, unti-unti (little by little) and I am learning more about the Filipino culture every day. 

 I got to try a ton of new/tasty foods this week, 

saw my first rooster fight and experienced a couple of blackouts but overall, life here has been pretty good!  :)

Last week, I had a little less time to email than normal because we had to go to Naga for a Christmas conference Monday afternoon through Tuesday morning. It was really fun! 

At the conference, we all played games, had a cook-off between the different zones, and had a talent show. The talent show was really funny/fun and I definitely felt the spirit really strong through a couple of the musical numbers. But my favorite part was definitely the food. 

  Everything we cooked was so tasty! Even the coconut drink for desert. Before coming on my mission, I hated coconut (which they eat a lot of here). Fortunately, coconut here is way better than what we have back home so I'm slowly starting to like it. My favorite desert though, was the gram cake. . .

which is hands down my favorite desert in the Philippines.  After living here, I don't know if I will be able to go back to American food!

Wednesday we had our final lesson with Brother Emmanuel, which was probably the hardest part of my week. Throughout the lesson the spirit was so strong! We testified our hearts out, but it still ended up being the last lesson. He still wants to be friends though and says we can come say hi every once in a while so I still have hope for the future, but that was the last lesson for now. 

It was really hard for me because I see so much good in Emmanuel. He is patient, humble, keeps commitments and is so kind to the people around him. I know this is not the end though because I know how much God loves him and I think He still has a lot of awesome plans in store for Emmanuel.

After the lesson, I was in so much shock that I didn't realize until I got home that I understood everything that was said during the lesson! There was even one part where Sister Trisha said she would share her testimony in Bikol. When she started speaking, I remember thinking "that's not Bikol, that's Tagalog!" I understood it all perfectly and didn't know until after that it had in fact been straight Bikol. 

I am coming to see that as we put out trust in the Lord and all our effort into the work, we really do see miracles. For me, that lesson ended up being exactly what I needed. I learned so much about teaching, was able to reaffirm my testimony, and was able to see at least one miracle come from all my efforts to learn Tagalog.

On Thursday, Sister Villa and I went on exchanges for the first time! So I was companions with Sister Stackhouse for the day and Sister Villa was with Sister Hausaia. It was so amazing to get to learn from Sister Stackhouse! For one, she is also American so she has a really strong American accent when she speaks Tagalog, which is a lot easier to understand than the Filipino accent I have been hearing (so I followed the lesson  a lot better). Second, since we are both American, all the people here wanted to talk to us! So it was super easy to get OYMs. Third, Sister Villa is an amazing trainer and an amazing missionary, but Sister Stackhouse has been here for over a year so she has a lot more experience than either of us. 

She had a couple of really cool ideas for OYMs and it was so fun to learn some different methods of doing things. I loved getting to work with her and hope that I can be half the missionary she is one day. She really helped get me motivated and ready to work hard the rest of the week.

Since then, Sister Villa and I have been working hard to try to bring the gospel to the world! As I am learning Tagalog, I am starting to get better at recognizing what people are saying and it is becoming more and more apparent how awesome Sister Villa is. She is very good at teaching and always explains things so well in a way the investigators will understand. It is hard to believe she has only been on a mission for three months!

Anyways, I got to try chickens feet this week! 

 They were super tasty! To eat them you basically eat the tender, fatty meat off the bone. It is a little tedious, but definitely worth it. Also, I saw my first rooster fight yesterday!  

Apparently, it wasn't a "real" rooster fight because it wasn't very climactic at all. I was actually a little disappointed. I think the best part of yesterday though was our final lesson of the night. We taught this 80 year old couple and their (great??) grand children. The grandpa was practically deaf so we ended up having to shout the plan of salvation at him and half way through the lesson, there was a brown out.

Since it was night, the house went pitch black. It didn't end up being a problem though because within a minute or two the family had a couple of candles lit so that we could keep teaching.

It was really nice! I felt so much love for that family and was so happy as we continued the lesson. These people really are tough. They take what comes without complaint, with a smile on their face and everything always seems to work out alright in the end.

Within a couple minutes, the power was back on, we finished our lesson and headed home. That was a fun trip! We walked down a half-mud, half-dirt, bumpy road in the pitch black. Lets just say my feet weren't nearly as white as normal by the time we got home. It was fun, I just tried not to think too hard about the fact that their might have been cow poop mixed in with the mud.

As I was walking the other day I started thinking, I don't think my mom would like living here.  I tried to imagine her hand washing her laundry, picking rice and living in a shack with dirt floors and bugs and I almost started laughing.  To be honest, I'm not sure I could live here!  I guess I do but we have a nice house with real beds, walls, and a washing machine.  I am so thankful for that and the longer I'm here, the more I realize I have taken for granted!  

SPIRITUAL THOUGHT

At our Christmas conference Sister Zapanta told us the story of David and Goliath and compared it to our doubts. She said that our trials are like Goliath. They are giant, strong and seem very prepared to attack us. They have on shields, armor, breastplate and helmet while it seems like all we have is a sling and a couple of stones. But she said that the power of faith is greater than any of our doubts. Like the small David took out Goliath with a stone, we can overcome our doubts by faith. Through faith, there is absolutely nothing we can't do.

So even though some days I might feel homesick, or we might go through rejection after rejection I know that if we just have faith, all of the Goliaths in our life will eventually be conquered. I know I have a lot of Goliaths here in the mission. But as I am learning to trust/believe in the Lord more and more, I am finding that my Goliath aren't really as intimidating as they first appeared. 

I hope for another great/productive week full of fun and a ton of new experiences. Have a great week to you all! And Merry {early} Christmas! :)

-Sincerely Sister Matheny

The Power of Prayer

This week was so amazing! Sister Villa and I taught and met lots of people, had lots of fun and my testimony definitely grew a lot. 

I am also finally starting to see some real progress with the language! Granted, one day I feel like I'm great at Tagalog and the next I feel like I know nothing, but I can definitely tell that I am improving. Also I am already getting faster at hand-washing laundry! It still takes me a while, but all our neighbors are no longer laughing at me for how slow I am :)

Last Monday, I was so happy to get to hear from my family and everyone else back home/on missions. Sorry I do not always have the time to respond to everyone but I promise that I read and love all of them. They definitely help make my week so much better and I will do my best to respond to as many of you as I can.

Last week, I was feeling a little anxious because I was anticipating Sister Villa's and my's last meeting with Brother Emanuel, who we have both come to know and care for a lot. I didn't know what to do about it so I was definitely saying many prayers. We taught him again last Tuesday and it ended up being a huge faith building experience for me. I wanted to share a little bit about it. 

As I said, a lot of prayers went into preparing that lesson because I knew that it might be our last. Before, I expressed my love of Christ and testimony through a piece of art that I drew...

and a letter in Tagalog for Brother Emanuel that I was hoping might help change his mind. 

Last lesson, we also strongly encouraged him to read the chapter of the Book of Mormon that we assigned him for this upcoming lesson and prayed that he would feel prompted to actually read. 

Long story short he did! We went over to teach and ended up having an amazing lesson. Additionally he agreed to let us come back and teach again.

I felt so happy and thankful about the lesson and after, I really started to think about how God answered my prayer. As I was pondering, I realized that God has always answered my prayers even if it is not always in the way or the time I expected.

Learning this really helped me to build my testimony on the power of prayer. I started thinking about all the answers I have gotten just in this past week and in this past year. I know that if we pray with real intent and faith we will always receive an answer. Learning this made me realize even more how important it is to pray for our investigators, and I plan to pray twice as hard for Emmanuel and our other investigators this upcoming week.

Besides that, things are going as usual here. Every day, I am slowly improving at Tagalog, my faith is growing and I am getting better at managing my time. The rat poison we bought last week is already gone and I haven't seen any rats in the past couple days and I got to go to a trainers and trainees meeting in Naga last Wednesday. I learned about how to be a better missionary and utilize my time. While we were in Naga, we also went to the hospital to get an ointment for Sister Villa's rash. 

We think she is allergic to something in Goa because she keeps getting an itchy rash on her arms and legs. Additionally, I am no longer afraid of spiders or cockroaches and I make a personal effort to kill a couple every day.

Last Friday, I killed my first rat. We came home from an interesting day of work when I found a rat who had fallen off of the pipe in the back room and impaled its leg on a wire on the pipe, so it couldn't move. 

Sister Villa wouldn't kill it so I ended up having to do it. Let me tell you... it definitely was not fun. I felt so bad and was almost in tears by the time the rat was dead. One thing I learned from this experience is that I don't like killing rats.

Finally, I experienced my first black out this week! Sure, we always lose power in our house but this time there was no power in our entire area for about 30 minutes Thursday night! According to Sister Villa that is pretty normal in the Philippines. Which I understand because once the power went out, everyone went about life as usual. Some people even pulled out candles and used them to light their little shops.

The longer I have been here, the more I am beginning to appreciate all the luxuries I grew up with. I am thankful for AC, real roads,

  a house without rats, cockroaches, or spiders 

and a nice car. I am thankful I grew up with toys, games and nice clothes. I am thankful for washing machines, toilet paper, showers with warm water and flushing toilets. I am thankful for ovens, English and my family.

At the end of each day, my feet are always covered in mud

 and I have a couple new mosquito bites. I hand-rinse my clothes, take cold showers and eat rice with every meal. 

When I ride a tricy or enter a home, I always have to crouch and my feet hang off the end of my mattress. But I have never been happier in my life. I love the Philippines, every part of it :) and I am so grateful that I am lucky enough to serve here.

 -Sincerely, Sister Matheny

Another GREAT week!

So this week was another awesome, fun, culture filled week in the Philippines. I am loving it here more and more every day! 

Also, I am getting better at understanding Tagalog and am starting to get used to some of the differences in culture. For example, to say yes here Filipinos will raise their eyebrows, instead of nodding their head. Additionally, I can now cross the street without Sister Villa having to grab my arm the whole way. People just cross wherever here, so it is always fun trying to weave your way through all the traffic.

Here in the Philippines, we ride what is called a tricy everywhere. They are like the "taxis" of the Philippines. They are basically a motercycle with a side car attached. This week, there were six sister missionaries from the Goa area headed to Naga for a Sister Training Conference. We all went together so all six of us crammed into the tricy. Two in the cart, two on the back and two on the motorcycle with the driver. I FINALLY got to ride on the motorcycle and it was so fun! The only problem is, they are really not built for people my height so I had to duck the whole time, lol. Oh well, it was still really fun :)

It is gorgeous here. Every turn, twist, bend and path is gorgeous! 

 The mountains are nice and the view is always spectacular. 

It is usually pretty hot here, and getting hotter, but it can get a little cool whenever it rains. I love the rain here because even when it is pouring, it is always straight down. So, you can always stay pretty dry with an umbrella. 

 This week has been full of many prayers, frustration, joy, hope, faith and every other emotion you can think of. It is crazy how much of an emotional rollarcoaster it has been so far! More and more, I am really coming to love the people here and I want the best for them. I have had ladies break down in tears as they tell us about their struggles and men tell us they never want to see us again at their house. Sometimes it is really hard, sometimes it is amazing, but I am coming to learn that at all times, if I put my trust in the Lord, it is always amazing.

I've  learned, changed and grown so much this week. I also feel like I am getting an appreciation for my life back home more and more every day. I was talking to Sister Villa, my companion, and she was telling me about how hard she worked to earn the money to come on a mission. In the Philippines, it is 1800 pessos to come, which is roughly about 40 US dollars. I was shocked to hear the comparison and it put even more into perspective. Many people here cannot afford missions, I could have paid for the entire mission of a Filippino in half a day of work. It is so crazy!  And Sister Stockhouse (my american roomate) and I were talking and she told me it was a shock for her to realize that a homeless man in America has more than the average Filippino here. 

I always see people washing and doing laundry in the dirty lakes, wearing holey clothes, or with missing teeth because no one has enough here. Last week, we taught a lesson to a lady who broke down crying because her child is sick and she has no money to go make sure they are okay. I felt so bad.  I have seen disabled children whose parents can't afford to help them, people living in what you can barely call a hut, 

old ladies begging for money because they have denge fever and can't afford to treat it, and families offering to share their rice when they hardly have enough to meet their own needs. It is really sad and very hard to watch. I wish I could do more.

Additionally, despite all these people's problems, they are so loving and humble! It is amazing! They are all so kind, nice and willing to listen. They are patient with me learning Tagalog and always happy to get to know us. I love it. After talking to Sister Stockhouse (my American roommate), I agree when she says that American/other missionaries can have cars, nice houses, washing machines, flushing toilets, no spiders and cockroaches, I am so grateful I get to be serving these people. They truly are amazing.

 Last Tuesday we taught Brother Emmanual (a born again Christian). During the lesson, he shared stories with us about how he came to have faith in Christ that were so touching, I almost cried. After the lesson though, he told us that next time would be the last. As he put it, we are really strong in our faith and he is really strong in his, so he doesn't think the discussions are going anywhere. I was so sad to hear him say that. Emmanuel is so amazing and I have so much respect for him! In these past few weeks teaching him, I have learned so much and really come to care for him. We still have one lesson, so I told him how important it is that he reads a chapter of the Book of Mormon before, and asks if it is true.

Before coming to the Philippines, I thought that the weather, the houses, hand-washing laundry, the bugs and the food would be the hardest part. But now that I am here, I realize how wrong I was. The hardest and best part of the mission are the people. As I said earlier, I am already coming to love them so much, and it is so hard to know how best to help each individual. I really REALLY want the best for these people, and it is hard watching the people you care about turn you away or say they have had enough.

On a brighter note, Sister Villa and I have also had a lot of successes this week. 

We taught a lot of lessons, met a lot of really cool people and had some fun experiences. We were walking down the street on Wednsday night when a man shouted at us that we were beautiful. Sister Villa and I laughed so much! Also, someone asked me to marry them while I was walking down the street and I always have tons of kids following me around with huge eyes yelling "American! American!" It is really fun :)

Additionally, I got to eat balut again this week. 

And this time there was an entire chick inside! Feathers, beak and bones. I was a little hesitant to try it, but it was actually pretty tasty. It was still soft, not crunchy like I had expected.  I've been surprised at how good the food is here!

  My favorite thing here to eat is definitely fried chicken and spaghetti. 

The spaghetti here is sweet, so it is really good! But I think my all time favorites are gram cake and mango sago. So tasty! It is basically a tasty pudding with mango and jello balls.

 Finally, we killed a rat this week!  So about rats... they are all over our house! One pooped on Sister Stockhouses bed last week, I am always finding rat poop on my desk and we have seen them in the kitchen. Sister Villa called me to the bathroom last Wednesday because a rat had fallen asleep in our trash. So... super scared, I grabbed the trash bag and we tied it up. After that, we got rid of it. It was gross, but I am happy that there is one less rat in our bahay.

TAGALOG

I think the language is still the most frustrating part of being here. I know I am improving. I can now usually teach (mostly) in Tagalog with no problems, as long as the ideas are simple. And I can understand main ideas and simple phrases when people talk. Here, a normal greeting is to ask someone where they are going or coming from if you see them on the street. Also, it is not rude to ask peoples age here and it is not an insult to call someone fat, so I am getting really good at asking where people are coming from and going on the street. 

I know everything comes in the Lord's timing and if I keep woring hard, I will learn Tagalog. I just need to learn to be patient until I get to that point :)

SPIRITUAL THOUGHT

I think for my spiritual thought I am going to share what I have been sharing with most people this week: The Book of Mormon is true. I know that with all my heart. I know if a person decides to take the time to read it, they will feel in their hearts and their minds that it is the word of God. I know it is. I don't know how many times I have testified of that this week, because I know that through that Book, people can find lasting happiness and joy in this life and for Eternity. As it says in 3 Nephi 12:16 "let your light so shine before this people, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven." That light is Christ. And by gaining a testimony and a love of him, we become capable of holding that light of peace, light of joy, light of happiness, light of CHRIST before the world for all to see. The Book of Mormon is another Testiment of Christ, and through it, we can gain a stronger testimony in and love of him.

I know The Book of Mormon is true, I could shout it day and night, but I know that it wouldn't make a difference. Each person must read the Book for themselves and pray to know if it is true. I know that if they do this, they will receive an answer.

To finish, I want to share a video clip with Elder Holland's testimony on the Book of Mormon:

https://www.mormonchannel.org/watch/series/mormon-messages/testimony-of-the-book-of-mormon-2

I love you all, I love getting emails from you and hearing about how everyone's lives back home and on missions are going. I don't always have time to respond, but I always read them :)

Anyways, happy holidays! And I can't wait to write again next week

-Sincerely, Sister Matheny