February 14, 2011

hello.

I am in the philipines! hurray!

um ok.

So this last week I was trasfered to San Jose zone, and my area is San
Isidro. its...
`San Jose is... in Lusan (the big island of the philipines), in my
mission.... in nueva ecija provence. I think its in the top of the
mission. sorta middle (from east to west).

but first...
I heard andy went swimming. swimming the 200 is ... the best. yah. And
the 500... also. hahah thats a lot of racein. also Thats rad about
andy. 1.01 is really fast. plus it looks like your is better at the
distance races then you are at the short too(well or you just desided
to kill your self for fun). istig talaga. (cool-really... or really
cool).

Also, I heard jimmy is working now.. haha. you have to go to work now.

ok ok.

My companion is Elder mandoñahan. He is the distict leader in our
district. I think he speaks english just fine, but he doesnt. Which
has been good for me. Also I think, just havnt been speaking
english... like maybe 10 words a day. Pretty cool guy. knows how to
play the guitar... which will be important later.

the zone is about 16 people i think(hmm maybe 20). Its a lot for me.
we have 4 sisters in our zone. One, sister Decato who was in the mtc
with me. actally in my distict at the mtc. that was a cool surprize.

The area is hotter than my last one (hey my english is getting better
than not then), But That may be that its just leaving winter now. my
companion was in balar before, and he says its really bad in taga-init
(hot... place? i think thats summer). super humid there. So... yah we
arent near the ocean at all. The only area yata (i think), near the
ocean is balar.

travel... well so far, we are staying within a close area to our
house. the area appently didnt have any investgaters last trasfer, and
my companon and his last companion, found a bunch. I have used a
tricycle once, and a jeepnee to get to the city. about a 10 mintue
ride. (for a zone gathering... just earlyer).

For food, appently we have 3 dinner appontments set every week, and a
lunch appontment. yum. Not really sure what i am going to cook yet.
maybe some rice.

hmmm living quarters... yes. in a mintue.

so I didnt know how i was going to adjust to this area. But I have
really fast, for a number of reasons. Don't get me wrong, I really
like my last area, but there are just somethings... that they didnt
have. But there is alot more... temptions here.

So for the people. There are people here. check. I dont think i have
seen people with in 4 years of my age in my last area. maybe like 2
(guy or girl). In my branch there are about 16 guys from the ages of
19-25. They like to hang with the missionarys alot. I think 6 of them
are RMs. One owns a guitar. And a couple of them play. rad. service
projects ... alot gets done. Also I have notice that people, actally
look better, when they own more then 3 shirts, that they wear everyday
(like in my last area). I am mostly talking about girls. Everything is
fine actally. but they seem to try to hit on me alot. (espally the
members... just like some of my friends back home.. haha hitting on
the missionarys...hahaha).... well so far I just gave them lucy's
informtion (for facebook), cause i figured lucy wants to talk to
people... in the philipines... right. oh well. haha.

My ward has a chapel. And a huge attendence. like 130 or something. I
think that might be one of the highest in the mission. We have church
at 8:30 am, and do everything backwards (phristhood, class, scarament
meeting). I gave a short introduction at scarament meeting... short as
in, i went up to the stand, just said my name and yah.. ... maybe i
should have expanded on that.

This keyboard right now is bugging... balh! stupid space bars all
funky, and all of the letters on gone on the keyboard (like you cant
see them). i just wanted to complain real quick.

sige, um so for my living quarters... well we can have water at night
(unlike in my last area), which is good. We have a water tower outside
for just us.. i think. And we have a braker (like the ones at
grandpas) that is hanging out side, which we filp if we want to turn
on our water pump. its alright. We have 2 couchs. which... are mostly
useless.. since, no one can come over. the bathroom is inside the
house, which is good. (actally very good, becuase i forgot my towal in
carbonatuwan, and too cheap to buy a new one (for like 2 bucks... well
we will be going down there in a couple weeks). heh. um the bathroom
is ... well

the bathroom shower handle is gone, so i think it doesnt work. But we
have a bucket, with a little bucket(tabo), and .. well its the best
way tto shower anyways. the toylet... its great. To flush it, you
actally have to load the water into the back, because, the in-water,
isnt connected. But! it has a lever to flush. its great. And last but
not least... it has a toylet .. Seat! this deserves a monment of
silence...
...
...
Do you know how h.... silence...

...
..

ok um,

so yah, i got a package. Which was something i was going to complan
about...but maybe i wont. I really dont need a pound of chicken gravey
mix, or 1/3 pound of yeast... Well I will use them somehow. And the
pictures were really cool. um ok i geuss i am saying...

I am one of the cheapest people I know... And it really defeats the
purpose of me, being cheap, when you send 80 pounds of food. anyways..
also... i am one to not throw anything away... and so all of my bags
have rips in them, because i am too lazy to toss things out. soo i
guess i am saying probllly dont need to send anything... at least for
a while.

anyways... now that, thats out of the way... so the package was pretty
sweet. like for real. because the cininmmin exploded, over everything
in one of the pakeages, and for the first day the air tasted like
cinnimin. now just our food does when we eat at the table. its actally
a pretty good smell. And ill really find a use for all of the foods.
(well... i am still cooking rice everyday... so maybe lots of
different rice toppings).

um, something also rad. the 1st concalor in the branch, is one of our
eating appointments every week. He used to play guitar and owns one.
He also said that missionays used to borrow it and that if we wanted
to.. it would be fine. i think we might take it. at least weds-fri.
yes... Also now happy about packages. about the guitar muisc at
christmas.

About teaching. my companion doesnt want me to just not teach (like
his last companion, who has been out a lot longer)... so hes helping
me teach. or helping me study, and then telling me to teach. hes
actally been really helpful.
so....
some thing also good, about the 15 young men/SA what every, is it
makes it much easyer to do missionary work. becuase we just grab one
of them to help.
so...
the other day we went on a split. my first split away from my
companion. me and a guy, who later i found out his name was kevin (a
RM), went to Orsala. or something (er-sa-la). I didnt know who this
was. never seen her. Later i found out she is like 75. I thought..
well here goes nothing... then there was nothing. she wasnt home. Then
we went to the church, where he and others had a dance practice for
some church event. Successful split.

Well something cool about the 15 youngmen/SA people, is they are
really friendly and stuff. CSPs are huge. We have had all of them at
an appontment once, where after wards we all went to a dinner
apponiment. ... there was a lot of rice eatten there (there was a
couple people just dropping places of rice and ulam on the table...
and you had to be pretty fast.... allllllllot of rice). Later today,
we may go play some basketball. One, good thing... slash bad.. is they
all like to play dota. And they keep inviteing us to play. I told them
that I dont think thats what i am suppodes to be doing... plus i have
played too much dota.... like if i play another game now, or even
after my mission, i think my head might explode.

anyways soo we'll see how i do.
hmmmm ... yah,.. in short. cool area, lots of temptaion, has a toylet seat.

Elder Dickinson


ps... i didnt take any pictures. i will some time.

hmmmm bye