From July-Aug. 2014

This area is great. The members here are humble and helpful and happy. The church building is just like a small American one, except there's no basketball court inside only outside. And like all the LDS Church buildings here in the Philippines there's bars on all of the windows.

My apartment is much nicer than many of the houses that we visit. Our floor is tile instead of dirt or cement, our walls are flat and painted, and made of concrete not bamboo. And our roof is made of metal and wood, not leaves.

I've had many interesting experiences in the last few weeks. About a week ago I ate dog. Everyone said it was pork, but when I found out it was dog I ate a little more. I baptized two children with a sprained ankle and an injured right hand. On Tuesday I left the SD card with all of my pictures in Puerto Princesa, (3 hours away) then, luckily, I got an infection in my right leg so I had to go back to Puerto on Saturday to do some blood work and buy medication, and retrieve my SD card. I got to play the piano at a funeral yesterday. And I just found out that no one from my area is getting transferred on Wednesday.

Love you all. Miss you too.

-Elder Southwick

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I'm allergic to Penicillin. Did you know that? I sure didn't. The antibiotics I was taking were giving me chest pain, and I took 9 pills before I found out that was because I'm allergic to them. I took some different antibiotics and now I'm back to full health and my infection is gone.

The typhoon that hit the Philippines this week resulted in 30 minutes of heavy rain here in Roxas, if I was in Manila like I was 6 weeks ago I would experienced much heavier rain and stronger winds and flooding, but luckily I was among the last batch that was transferred to Palawan before the typhoon. The typhoon actually delayed transfer day, but none of that affected me.

I've had a lot of interesting food since I arrived here in Palawan. There are red bananas and red pineapples here. The red bananas taste just like American bananas, but I've yet to taste of the red pineapples. (Both are just red on the outside.) I also had some green oranges the size of cantaloupes. Those were interesting. Today I had dragon fruit for the first time. It was interesting, but I don't even know what to compare it to.

I've gone on splits a few times now. It's weird to be the only full-time missionary when we teach a lesson. Of course the members that I work with are awesome, and preparing to serve missions themselves. I feel like I'm almost a real missionary, with the help of these members I even taught the Restoration to someone I've never met before.

I'm blessed to have a great companion who knows the gospel inside and out and helps me to see where I need to improve. I want to be more like him. He makes it easier for me to be a diligent missionary.

I'm very happy to be here. I'm happy to see how proud you are of me, but I'm just a tool. Of course in the Lord's hand even a simple tool can be used to do great and marvelous things. We should all seek to become tools in the Lord's hands so that He can use us for His great and eternal purposes.

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I feel greatly blessed. The missionary work here is new and exciting. I'm often surprised when people say that they've never heard of the church before. It's exciting but also a little bit overwhelming when I get to then explain the restoration to them, and answer all of their questions. I'm really glad that almost everyone here already believes in Jesus Christ. The Spaniards did some of the missionary work for us. Many people already believe that Jesus Christ is their savior and many have a desire to be close to Him. 

I write in my journal every 2 or 3 days. I should write more often, but time is a precious thing. We'll see if I can find more time for it. There's definitely a lot of noteworthy things that have happened so far.

I want to encourage each of you to practice your Tagalog for the next time we skype. When Mom said "Kumusta?" Mark said "Your Mom speaks Tagalog?" He was impressed and I was touched. Tagalog is a beautiful language. Each of you should learn how to say at least one sentence or phrase in Tagalog. I'll share the First Vision in Tagalog. It'll be fun, but only if you actually do it. 

We have an investigator named Kelvin. He's little, only 7 or 8, and he's very serious. I haven't seen him smile. But he's cute. He even looks a little bit like Kelvin.

I just found out that a girl I taught in Manila was baptized a month ago. I'm so happy for her. I wish I could have been there, but I'm still really happy for her.

Maraming salamat po sa inyong mga emails, mahal-mahal ko kayo. Makakita ko ng mga biyaya ng gawaing misyunero sa aking buhay at sa inyong mga buhay. Ingat po.

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Some of you have been better at communicating with me than others. I'll assume, for now, that that's because you're too busy writing me letters. Elijah's letter just arrived and it was awesome. I'll reply to it today. I slightly prefer hand written letters to emails. If you've received a hand written letter before you'd understand why.

One of the best ways to strengthen your relationship with anyone is to communicate with them. If you want someone to feel like they can trust you and if you ever want anyone to understand you or your feelings you must tell them. Use your God given ability to speak (Exodus 4:11-12) and write (Acts 15:23) to bless and strengthen those around you and your relationships with them.

Dad sent some great pictures of all of you boys all dressed up. I miss being one of the boys. Elijah, you're getting tall, don't stop. You guys better be having fun together. Don't wait for me to get home to have fun. :)

I heard that you're still praying for me consistently. Thank you. The Lord has been watching over me.

Keep doing what's right. You only receive blessings when you are obedient (D&C 130:21). If you're truly converted to Lord and His gospel then you will have no more desire to do evil (Mosiah 5:2).

I've been called by God as a special witness of the truth and divinity of this work, but don't take my word for it (Moroni 10:4).

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It seems like you guys are having a lot of fun trips and such. I hope you had fun in Legoland. You are very blessed to get to go to fun places like that. I'm glad you're all getting so big. I love you all. I'm trying to be the best missionary I can be, in part because I know that many of you look up to me. I want to make you proud. You should know that deciding to go on a mission is not the easy part. I have to decide every day to be a missionary. Going on a mission is no great feat. Anyone can pack a suitcase and step on a plane. The part that makes a mission hard is that your family, your leaders, your friends, those that you teach and the Lord expect you to be a disciple of Christ and a righteous servant of His in every thought word and action. Oddly enough, if you have the Spirit with you even this strenuous feeling can be lifted. I've begun to see that with the Spirit I can bear this load with ease. The hardest thing for me right now is the language, but I know that if I truly dedicate myself to learning it, that the Spirit can help me overcome this hurdle as well.

I've been an Elder for 1 year and 364 days. Tuesday will be the two year mark. :) I've only been a missionary for a few months though. I know I have a lot left in store. I'll try to share with you all of the experiences that I have here on my mission. Either now or after I've returned home. 

You should know that I love you, so I'll tell you: I love you!

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It's great that you're all keeping busy. I can't wait to be a part of that busy-ness again. It seems like I'm in a different world, but I feel greatly strengthened by the constant communication that I have with you.

I wish I could have been there for Elijah's talk. I sure love that kid.

Anyway, I remembered an experience that I had when I first got to Roxas. I was walking with my companion, and I saw a big house ahead of us. I said "That's a nice house" then asked my companion "Who lives there?" he replied "That's a hospital".

Maybe that gives you a sense of how primitive my area is. I was surprised, but a lot of things here are smaller than I'm used to.

Another thing that surprised me when I got to the Philippines is how many people like my arm hair and my nose. I've had people ask if they could have my nose. The Filipinos think that they have flat noses so they love how pointed my nose is. And there have been countless people that have run their fingers through my arm hair. Most people here have arm hair that's barely visible. I thought it was weird at first, but now I just roll with it. It usually happens a few times every week.

Right now, I'm on exchanges with Elder Eera. Elder Espano and I were not getting along, and not talking to each other, and on Saturday he threatened to "smash my face in" so I'm on exchanges until the zone leaders come up here to settle things. He's not dangerous he just doesn't like me. Elder Eera is awesome. I'm doing great.

Amanda said that I should tell about something that I do every day of the week, so I'm going to try.

Tuesday: We taught 3 lessons, and our first lesson was to an investigator. She said she was moving so we expected that she wouldn't be there, and she wasn't, but her house wasn't there either. It was taken down after she left.

Wednesday: We taught 3 lessons again, to 3 different people. We did a lot of walking. I wish we had bikes, but the highway that goes from one end of Palawan to the other goes right through our area, and it's busy, and the trucks and buses go quite fast.

Thursday: We taught Kelvin and Zedrick and Dorely. Kelvin is a 10 year-old that we just started teaching. He hasn't come to church yet, but he's really interested in our lessons and he reads from the Book of Mormon (Ang Aklat ni Mormon) occasionally. He's best friends with Zedrick an 8 year-old that I baptized recently. And Dorely is a 60-70 year-old that has been taking our lessons for a few months, but he hasn't come to church because he works on Sunday. They were all together for one lesson. We taught about the atonement. We taught 2 other lessons, but that's the one I remember the best.

Friday: We had our studies in the morning like we always do, but then we had weekly planning like we do every Friday. But most Weekly planning sessions last 3 hours and this one lasted 6 hours. We planned for 2 hours then I started updating the area book and my companion fell asleep so I had to do all of it by myself. 3 hours later my companion woke up and then we talked about 2 or 3 of our investigators and then Elder Espano said it was time to close. We have about 25 investigators, but Elder Espano didn't want to spend time discussing their needs. After that we went and bought a new faucet, because the night before the old one exploded. After that we didn't have time to teach anyone. Sad day.

Saturday: Elder Espano got mad at me because I tried to correct him. We taught the Plan of Salvation to all of the same people as on Thursday (some of them had already heard it before, but it was a good review), then we had an activity at the church and then we started exchanges.

Sunday: I spent the whole day teaching in Elder Eera's area. We had dinner at a members house.

That's only 6 days, but I'll work on doing better next week. I've been writing in my journal everyday, so there are some good records there.

I love you guys

-Elder Southwick