November 22, 2010

Hello,

So by next week, everyone will be more mataba. or fat. or eatten turkey and mashid potatos. I will have ..... Rice! yes.

Hey so I was thinking, What is a senoir companion? do they have those in other missions? the name seems familer, but they dont have them here. besides trainer/trainee and follow up trainer/trainee. then its co-seniors. thats it (well district/zone leaders) anyways.

Was reading a note from a friend, who was saying how "90% of the time your mission you will be going to places where no one is there.. but the 10% of the time is great..."

well here in dipacluo (not all of my mission, but here), we have 100% of the time we can teach... sooo the hard part is finding who would be the best to teach, and then being very very efficient with our time.

Um, well i have a new companion. Elder Yap.

soooo my companion hurt his leg and so we haven't been able to really work at all since transfers. (we got one day in). I think he sprain something, and cant really walk. He hops around pretty good. um, yah. Something kinda funny about our area is, we have been having some of our investigaters come find us, begging us to come teach them. But we cant go. doe.

Also because of the sprain, I have been getting a lot of studying in, which has been pretty nice. um yah. Also me and my companion have been able to get to know each other a little better.

like the first day, he was here... He was saying some crazy stuff, how we are going to be changing everything, and blah blah blah. So I was like.. um I dont know if we should do that. Anyways, and then When I would try to speak tagalog with people or I try to plan (by myself practicly..because he doesnt know the area) he would always say stuff like, ohhh, you have lots to learn, I will help you fix your problems.. (what?!) or stuff like (after I had tryed really hard to teach and talk to some investigaters), "yah, your tagalog needs alot of work, it was really bad. I mean the investigaters could understand you, but yah lots of work." Anyways it was pretty annoying. I actaully was just taking pretty much anything he said, and converting it to :"oh elder dickinson, you are super rad."

There was one other thing.. so The way I saw it, anytime we talked at all, I would just get a little more mad at this kid. But we when we eat food and talked, (something I like to do is eat with my companion, which according to him isnt common) then everything was good again. Food.. its a great thing. I actally figured it was going to be like this the whole transfer.

Anyways I wasnt too happy with him. Anyways, in these last couple of days, after I kinda just gave up trying to hate him, (yah I didnt like 'um ha..yah) I started over with him, and realized he was is just a very very honest guy, and his super plans for changing everything, was really just working hard. I think I am starting to understand that, his english isnt perfect, and has picked up werid ways of saying things. After we got talking a bunch, I started to realize that he actully was just trying to be helpful, and to be a hard worker.

so pretty much we are pretty good friends now. and ... yah . but rad. He has a Naruto headband with the leaf symbol like in the show. And real nunchucks. And has a ton of spongebob stuff. Like everything. a bag, his pens, his notebooks. yep.

um so I am awesome! I dont know what to write. I prolly had a bunch of things I wanted to say, but I dont remember now. I did get spongebob song, and puff the magic dragon.. which may be used.

ummmmmmm meh. If I have mail (paper), Ill get it for the 2nd time since I have been to the philipines on thusday. yah! Its best!

ummmmmmmm b..... heidi mabaho. bye.

eldur dickinson

November 17, 2010

Hey mom and family,

um, well to start, I didn't buy the cheese ice cream... i should have. maybe next time i have the chance.

Ill anwser first about what mom (and dad.. mostly the same things)

So, I heard a little bit about family at home...

looks like dad gave a away a book of mormon on an airplane... and from what i hear, peter is losing? hmmmm book of mormon? wait peter losing to dad? ha ha.

Andy is swimming now? hmmmmmm.... jealous. ( and Heidi no not, that kind) Thats cool, I get to look at water. Thats almost like swimming.

Jimmys moving to america now! hurray.

Marks getting married! hurray. no, actually thats pretty cool.

heidi is mabaho! (ask heidi)

And grandpa may be coming to philipines. That would be rad. From what I understand, I will be fairly far away. but if you (as in dad) want to figure it out with my mission president, and me with the times and dates... It might be possible.

so...
um Hi. So this week is transfer week. meaning we do email on tueday. And we have transfers. My companion is being transfered away, so I will have a new companion. That stinks. We just got to be really good friends. Also about the new companion... he won't know this area at all. hmmm I should have payed a little more attenchen, how to get to everywhere (well I know some what.. there may be some wandering in the near future).

um, so what did i learn from my companion? that you are supposed to use the soap. on you. Ohhhhhhhhhhh. I thought it was just for the dishes. I told him that shampoo counts as using soap. yah, he doesnt think so. Yah, soap makes you clean. why didnt I learn this earlyer in life? I have also learned to not ask your companion what deodorant is used for, he did Not like that. hahaha. oh well... i do use it, sometimes... but i still dont know what its for... He wouldnt tell me. (for some reason, he thinks its funny it pick my arm pits. even after this he still does. hmmmm thats nasty).

ok well. now that we all know something new. um. yep.

Um so every day I see frogger being played. There are frogs here. alot of frogs. they like to cross the street, just for fun. just like in the game. expect, when they lose they dont just disapeer. And my companion likes to kick them, which makes it harder for them to win.

hmmm oh! I have found out why the chicken crossed the road. well sorta. Every day, I see a chicken cross the road. but like the joke, there is no one reason. Some times its to run away from the missionarys. Other times, its to play frogger (they are not good at frogger). hmmm ok I dont really know.

Oh! llamas. The other day a llama 'baaaaah-ed' at me. So in turn i baaaah-ed back. then 2 llamas baaaah-ed at me. So I continued the converstaion. Then the whole group of 4 llamas were baaaah-ing at me. So I baaaah-ed at them like 10 times. They were going crazy. That was sweet. I wonder what I said to them.

ok so the other night, i had this dream were, me and some random dude needed to write this computer program. We desided to make a baseball game. After a lot of work, we actally wrote it. When I woke up, I thought about it, it was fairly complex and I am fairly sure i could have just went to a computer and wrote the whole thing. that was werid.

ok about more missionary... things.

So about the baptism. We had it. That was sweet. It could have gone smoother. but yah. Like some how me and my companion got shoved on different tricycles last second (prolly my falt), and his tricycle ran out of gas, so he had to push it for like 20 minutes. He was like 40 minutes late.. that was weird. There was part of the people getting baptised on that tricycle too. And... The water turned green sorta. And we were one baptismal clothes short (actally we had 0 at first).

yah... Then I conducted it. And I dont know what to say to conduct. And the branch president wasnt there, and i didnt know how to say the 1st concerloers name. And it was in tagalog. Oh well. They got baptized hahaha.

um me and my companion actally did a musical number at the baptism. But the thing is we didnt have a song ... well about a week ago. We didnt have the music (notes), but the words kinda just found us. and I kinda knew how the song went. We sang come thou fount.
So for the presentation, my companion sang the first verse. I sang the 2nd one. And then to mix it up, for the thrid verse, I made up a tenner part and we sang it together, that was rough. hahaha

ummm, we met these old nanays (ladys... maybe like 70 or something).
They were living together. Both of there husbands had died. They look so serious, but they are such hams! sooo funny. like we asked one of them were there husband was, she said he was away, aboard... so we asked how long for, she was like, hes going to be gone a while. Then she said he was in the world of the spririts.. haha. Oi. They crack jokes all the time. I wish I knew more tagalog to understand them. funny people.

We had a branch FHE this monday. Was actally very successful. Didn't know what to expect before hand. we had a lot of people. members, inactive, active. Progressing investigaters, and new ones. 2 of the new ones that came were these 2 nanays. So while we had some games going on, i sat next to them, because i dont know what they would think (they are both 2 different religons)... but they were just cracking up the whole time. soo funny. sooo old.

well.... oh. So at this investigators house, they had a guitar, and my companion always says that i am the master at guitar. almost true. anyways. I played puff the magic dragon, but i didnt remember the words. soo, if someone wants to send them to me, ... I will give you a ... nothing. Or any other songs like sponge bob (words and chords) or other rad songs send them to me. do it.

um. yep. ....... oh one more thing.

I should probability just send this to jimmy.... but too lazy. um, so every time i want to send pictures, I have to go to paint to shrink them.
I got an idea for you. make a program that i can just use, that will shrink them for me (some normal size, or changeable), without having to go to paint, selecting all, shrinking and then saving.
that would be rad.

Another idea I had earlyer, I figure ill share too. So when I take a picture with my camera, and then try to look at it in paint, its super big and useless.
---sooo--- what about a program, (like they have on the camera) were you can look at picture and zoom in and out, with a little mini map, so you can know where you are.
(that way, you can see the photo, and make use of your 1 jillion mega-pickle)


ummmm the end. oh wait. did i tell you that me and my companion made a apple shake. (no icecream, but yes apples). yep. the end.

elder dickinson

November 8, 2010

Hello family!

um, so from reading mom's letter, I see that I actually got a nice check from my summer job. I thought they werent going to pay me my end of the summer check. Yes! Im rich. kinda. ok not really.

I see that jimmy is still moving to Oregon.. maybe?

I also see that someone found my picture of me on my toilet... or made one. hahaha.

And looks like I have a package coming. sweet! Yeah.. about earlyer, (a couple weeks ago) I sent about how you shouldn't send packages and stuff. Yeah. I am starting to realize that I was taking somethings a little too seroisly. Go a head and send stuff if you want. There prolly be a big fee, like maybe 200 pasos which 5 bucks (i just made that up, could be more or none). But I can buy stuff here. And most every thing is here... and much cheaper.(although cheaper quailty.. as most things just say "nike" or "vans" but really its just someone printing the name on it.. as no real copyright laws. Most tricycles have a sticker that big company for motorcycle (i forgot, harley maybe) ... but can hardly work)

Anyways thats fine. about packages.

Oh about letters. On saterday I got my first letters. That was cool. Bunch of different letters (3 paper letters, 2 postcards, and 3-4 letters through dearelder... but still no fill in the blank letters like i made and sent to peter and jimmy), a bunch of different ways, so maybe ill give an idea how people can send things.

So first, anything that gets to me has to go through our pouch... anything can go through our pouch, but it means, I can only get letters when I or someone from our zone is with Mission president. This is at transfers, zone conference, and when we have mission prez interviews. so only 3-4 times a transfer i think.

Sarah (John), sent a letter through dear elder on the 18th or so (someone else on the 23), and asked about what is the fastest way to send letters. Well for family, you can just email, I see that every week.

(I have also gotten letters from mom like this before.. but mom, you email them too, so it means that when I get the letters its been a long time already. like I just got a letter from one of the first weeks i was here).

if your not family or want to send paper mail, then there are a couple ways. I think all of them take about the same amount of time, but can't really be sure.

I got a letter from Craig, my roomate at college, who is on a mission in florida. He send it to salt lake to go through a pouch system.

To:

Elder Luke Dickinson

Philippines Angeles Mission

P.O. box 30150

Salt Lake City UT 84130

the problem with this is, you can only send a white piece of paper, folded into 3. He did this,and on the out side of it wrote the addesses and stuff, and put a stamp on it (to get to salt lake), and then a piece of tape to keep it closed.

I have also gotten a postcard this way. postcards seem to be fine too.

(the dear elder thing, as I understand, is the same as pouch, except, you dont have to send it to salt lake, someone else does.)

Another way is to send it straight to the philipines, to the mission home. From what I understand its 2 stamps for this. I got a letter from derek, another roomate from college, who is califorina.

Again.. I actally got a postcard like this, stuffed with 98 cents worth of stamps.

There is actally one more way. kinda.

All really know is I got a letter from Angela from our ward. I dont know how it got here. From the stamps on the back, I understand I went through philipines mail. But She only put one stamp on it (maybe thats enough.. dont know) and she forgot to put the address. (well she forgot the line '1827 gumain st.')

oh well somehow it got here. haha.

About the mission. oh hey. um, We have a family plus one more, for a total of 7, getting baptized this friday. thats pretty cool. um exciting. um, transfers are next week, (which means ill be email a day late), but from rumors that are going around, my compaion is going to stay in the area. which means we will prolly both stay... but hmm maybe ill transfer... prolly not though.

um, yah lots of lessons and stuff.... Oh! ok so i think last letter or so, I was talking about a member we found who was going to another church because it was closer? I think i might have said something like i was thinking that not punching her was a good thought? Yah good thing. For a number of reasons. But she came to church this sunday, and stayed the whole time. (thats a problem.. we had 63 at church, but about 10 stayed after sacrament meeting this week).

hmmm things are doing alright... hmm i am thinking i ate something werid, this week, but i dont remember what. Oh I found ice cream! I didnt get any this time, but i found for 99 pesos (2.50 ish) a tub of cheese flavored Ice cream!

well i attached that picture of me and the toilet, because i thought that was rad.

ummm well .. till next time.

November 1, 2011

Hey Mom, and family.

Things are doing good. um, so yah.

About your questions.

Zone conference is only once a transfer. We have transfers every 6 weeks. So that middle city (carbunatuan), I will only be going to if i am transfered or for zone conference. Most likey I wont be transfered, and the next zone conference is on the 21 (or so) of December (moved to be closer to Christmas).

Oh actually I only was 'sick' for about one day. I think I have had the best health up here so far from everyone I have met. I still have a lot to go, but so far so good.

About the % of mission thing... I forgot already. I don't really remember.

So Jimmy and Troy may be living in Tigard? thats rad. um cool to hear.

About whats going on here. Um, that family, Rocapor, that I was talking about last week, came to church, and we have set a baptism date for the Nov 12. We hope that will stay. We also have Jomark (age 13), scheduled for Nov 12. If all goes well, there will be 7 baptized.

hmmm. Well maybe ill tell about some stories I was thinking about.

So while walking to an appointment, we stop by someones house just to talk to them, and hopefully set up an appointment. Well one person we stopped at... was a inactive member. They had not ever been to our church since coming to moving to this area. They had been going to a born again church... because it was closer. I asked them if they had a testimony and stuff. She said she did, but that church was too far away. Merrr bum! we talked so more and I wanted to punch her or something. Good thing i didnt lol. Finally she said she would let us come walk her to church. Well she wasnt there when we got there, I think she went to her other church which started an hour before ours (8am.. our is 9am). Bum!

Well...an unknown fact to me before my mission... When I come on my mission... I am still the same person.

I know that sounds dumb... but yah. Like I still like to wear my 4 doller shoes, over the 150 doller shoes.(I actally still have those sandles I swiped from andy .. 3 years ago? anyways they finally broke.. but i got them repaired. yes.)

And there are other things like (was tell heidi last week), warm showers are still nice.

uhh.. i cant really remember were i was going with this. meh.

Oh story right. well, something I have noticed.. if i am going to be really honest, is sometimes I lose focus and get a little homestick... but for the weridest things!

"so I was at a lession, like at 8:40 at night. The person we were teaching was chewing on something.. i first thought it sounded like rocks. Then I thought, why would they be chewing on rocks... I know what it sounds like kinda.. cherrios. mmmm cant forget that nasty, dry taste of cherrios. Like when its 9 o clock, and your government class is just finishing. Thinking maybe you should make it to your Spanish one class, but you know there isnt gas in the car, so maybe if you take your bike Heidi will put gas in the car.. and you can park the bike right next to the swim center which is right next to spanish so you could slip in just before the bell at 9:30. While doing all of this, you start pouring your self a bowl of honny nut cherrios.... and then when you take a bite you realize that, you grabbed the wrong box. uhhh nasty, dry taste." Anyways Usually I wake back up and try to join the lesson again. yeah. I should work on that.

About halloween... Well they dont have trick-or-treating here (right where i am at least), but it was still scary. They actually celebrate some thing on the 31st, 1st, and 2nd. Something to do with graves and stuff. so maybe more like real zombies.

Anyways that wasn't the scary part. On Halloween it was sunday. at church, we had 10 people there... untill like 1 mintue before we started. we had 60 in the end. Also they had me bless the sacrament in tagalog. Oy. Then I had a 7 mintue talk on honsety in tagalog. yah. scary day. When I was on the stand, I was thinking back to the first sunday when I was 12, and I had a talk in church, and could have had the first time passing the sacrament.. but was too scared. It was kinda like that, except, we didnt have anyone else who could bless the sacrament.

Well I have some pictures of my house and Pday. And food. Ill send those. I think i g2g sooooooooooo bye.

Elder Dickinson