February 23rd, 2014

February 23^rd, 2014
Metro Manila: Pamplona District, Paranaque West East Zone

Everyone,

Ok I have like five minutes, so I'll make this quick.

I had a great zone conference, which focused on faith. Truly inspiring. I'm surrounded by those willing to step into the darkness and exercise great faith in the Lord. But, at that time, I still had my doubts in my head. Then, in church, five minutes before Sacrament Meeting started, I was asked to give a talk. Yikes! Well, I rushed to put together a talk, and decided faith would be a good subject for me. Knowing how much Filipinos love jokes, and how bad I am at making them laugh, I asked my companion, Elder Rafon, for a joke I could give. His response shocked me. He said "Whenever I get asked to speak, I get nervous, and my butt gets realllly big." That sounds totally inapproriate in English, right? Well, not so in Tagalog! The audience cracked up. Filipinos are so chill!

In my talk, I asked a question: “When do we exercise faith in Jesus Christ?” For me personally, I understand that exercising faith is doing something you know is right but is hard. When have you exercised faith? Not to make us feel guilty, but when haven't you exercised faith? I'll leave you to answer that for yourself personally. 

Two pictures of the Great Gabino on that great day with me and Elder Rafon and a member!

The cake we bought brother Gabino. He deserves it. He was smiling before I took this picture, but I one thing I still don't understand about this culture is how they don't like to smile during pictures.

Still not smiling. This is actually my tie and polo! I gave it to him. He said it's the first time he's ever worn a tie.

This is the Robles family. Their son, Lehi, often works with us. As you can see, they are quite nice, and love to feed us American food whenever possible!

This is siopmao (show-pow). I got it at 7-11 which is ABUNDANT here. It's this doughey goodness with teriyaki.

This is me at Jollybee, a huge food chain here in the Philippines. I bought a float.

This is a great example of how unreal this city is. This guy is selling homemade baskets, pulling it along using a cow, in the busiest city in the world! What the freak!

Me and my companion chilling at the great and spacious building (our church) before Sacrament Meeting starts.

GAAHH my time is up! I have much more to write. Bye!

Elder Thurber