Ending the Cycle With A Bang, Starting Anew

Even though the trip to Laoag is not fun coming from Claveria, Zone conference is worth the travel, and while I'm here in Claveria at least we can keep ourselves happy with food and family home evenings. It's slightly strange to me that spaghetti is considered aa snack here, but I guess it works! 

Snacking, and talking to some moms and their children that are fond of ballroom. If you are snacking, be careful not to accidentally drink the water from the baptismal font, because it's still pretty brown and might go up your nose, like it happened to Sister Florida this last Saturday. But you know what that means? Elder Bulado and I's last week together had a baptism of an awesome new member!

I hope my first little intro sparked your attention, because I don't want to bore any of you in my letters! Like I said earlier, we traveled down to Laoag last Wednesday for our zone conference! As always I quite enjoyed the zone conference, and one thing that stuck out to me was when the missionary assistants to the President talked about practice. 

Of course the way you get good at something is by practicing it. Everyone who has found a love for something knows that. One of my favorite quotes about practice is that practice doesn't make perfect, it makes permanent. So if you practice lazily, that's how you will perform once the real thing comes. This was related to us missionaries for practice teaching. 

In order to get good, you have to practice always! We can relate this to anything we are doing! Whatever you want to get good at, practice! It doesn't get amazing after the first time. It takes a lot of time but eventually if you keep pushing yourself and practicing, you will get better and better at it! I am doing my best to get better at teaching people here in Claveria, and I plan to get better at practicing!

Speaking of practicing, while I was on an exchange with my other zone leader Elder Nuada, we passed by a school. While we passed by I looked over and saw a bunch of students that were actually dancing. What style were they dancing exactly? Of course the thing I miss a lot, ballroom! I looked over at Elder Nuada and he asked if I wanted to go talk to them, so I we went back to the main gate and entered the grounds of the school. 

I ended up talking to all the moms watching there kids and introduced myself as a missionary, but was a dancer back then! I showed them all my pictures of ballroom and all the youth dancers swarmed around too. So I got to talk to them a bit and talked to them about what I am doing here in the Philippines!

When we asked them where they all lived it turns out they are in the are of the zone leaders. So maybe they could have a good change with teaching one of those mothers! It was fun to talk about ballroom to the people here and it worked as a way to find! Use any honorable way to find right? I found it pretty honorable.

Now to a great honor this last Saturday, I got to baptize sister Florida early that morning! She was one we have been teaching since I got here and she progressed so fast. She was the one who wanted to be baptized last Saturday the 23rd, but she had to wait, which was okay for her! The baptism was great and her testimony was so strong despite the water being brown and the fact she forgot to plug her nose when she immersed so she struggled just a little bit. She's okay and happy as ever! 

I felt this was a good way to end the cycle, and a good way for Elder Bulado to end his mission. He's now going back home to Tacloban and though our time as a companionship was short, it was fun and I learned a lot from him. 

Lots of family home evenings this last week and a lot of fun times to end this cycle in the mission. So a little surprise I received yesterday. I’m going to be a Father! The meaning of this is I am going to train a new missionary this next cycle. I have been wanting to train and now here's my chance. Training’s not easy, but I know I can do it! And because I will now be the senior companion it means I'm becoming the new district leader of Claveria. It is going to be a challenge, but I know with the Lord’s help I can do it, and I am pumped. Can't wait to see what this next cycle has in store! 

Elder Espiritu

**you can email Elder Espiritu at joseph.espiritu@myldsmail.net

Bangui zone at Zone Conference

Got them Krispy Kreme doughnuts

My fellow brotha Elder Uele 

(my old zone leader 3 months ago)

Branch family home evening

The beautiful baptismal water

The baptism of Sister Florida and 

another little member 

(sorry there were a lot of cameras to look at)

The Labii family 

(they are both returned missionaries)

The Worth of Souls and Squid

Well I never thought I could say that we caught a big crab and hermit crab in front of our house, sudden rainstorms that soak you from head to toe in a couple of minutes are pretty out of the ordinary. I also never expected to get inked on by some dead squid. I admit there were some random things that happened this week. 

Two out of the 3 happened the day I got to go on exchanges with our zone Leader Elder Langeveld. I quite enjoyed it actually. That day at 1 we went to work. It was raining slightly hard so we decided to bring umbrellas. Elder Langeveld was just on a different exchange the day before which took up all his appointments. That day we decided to just find new people to teach. It was really great to talk to everyone and for me to realize how much I can talk to people. They still always question how I'm full Filipino. 

Only an hour into finding, we went to a current investigator of Elder Langeveld. She was a really nice lady. As soon as we were about to leave she asked "do you like squid?" At first we thought she wanted to sell them so Elder Langeveld asked how much (I probably wouldn't have because I'm not a fan), but turns out she just wanted to give them to us. 

So we had 2 dead squid. Knowing we couldn't carry them around the whole day we took them home. Once we got them out we put them in the sink and took them out of the bag. Turns out the ink sac was still inside both of the squid and they started leaking ink like they were bleeding heavily. We ended up having to clean up an ink bath for a little bit.

After that we went to work, and right after we visited a member, it started raining really hard. I've never seen it rain so hard anywhere. Within 5 minutes the streets where flooded. We took shelter by a local basketball court and just talked to some guys for a little and took a selfie with them. By 10 minutes we were in the rain it felt like we jumped into the ocean due to how soaked we are. But we still enjoyed teaching and talked to a lot of people.

Now to a little more spiritual side of my week. Update on Sister Florida: because of district conference we weren't able to have her baptized this past Saturday because she couldn't be confirmed right away. But she did pass her baptismal interview, and this Saturday April 29th is her baptism! I am so excited for her and she will probably be joined by another member’s daughter who is turning 8 that day. I am really excited for her. She has really been our focus this past week so that's the update on our work. 

Now I will tell you a little bit about our District Conference. All the missionaries within the Bangui district (22 of us including the senior couple), members of Bangui district and President and Sister Andrada attended this meeting. There were 3 meetings this one day and they were all great. Elder Langeveld, Elder Bulado, Elder Nuada, Sister Ganaden, some other members and I sang a couple songs as "district choir". I quite enjoyed it. 

One thing I liked that President Andrada talked about is one of the easiest and best abilities is to be available. The question for all of us is, "Are you available for the Lord?" Do you not have enough time to remember Him? There are 6 days that we are free to use to what we need, and all we are asked is to read, pray every day, and go to church on Sunday. It is simple, but sometimes we tell ourselves we're "too busy". We are never too busy for that. We should never be too busy for God. 

The 2nd thing I really liked (some of you may have heard this before) was a talk about the worth of souls. She first held up a 500 peso bill and said "who wants this?" Of course everyone would. Then she proceeded to crumple it up to make the bill look ugly and undesirable. She then asked if we still wanted this. Of course we all still did. It was still 500 pesos even if it wasn't "pretty" anymore. 

Now we relate this to our souls. Some of us may have been crumpled up, stepped on, more dirty than others, but the worth of our soul is still the same. In the scriptures Doctrine and Covenants Chapter 18 verse 10 it says "Remember the worth of souls is great in the sight of God" 

So remember that no matter what has happened to us, God still loves us and we are just as loved even if we are a little more crumpled up or dirty. I'm sure none of us are a perfectly clean bill or soul, but that's what the gospel is here for. We do our best to keep improving ourselves every day. No matter what happens, the worth of our soul is still the same. 

So my request for all of you reading, never forget your worth! You are still of worth and we can always do our best to clean ourselves up and become clean again! Love you all, and miss you! Until next week!

Elder Espiritu

**you can email Elder Espiritu at joseph.espiritu@myldsmail.net

It's always fun by the Sea

Squids are messy

Lunch with the Labii family

District Conference

It's The Random Moments that Are Great

Well, learning my name in Tongan, doing practice English interviews with members and my companion, and having a investigator want to change her baptismal date can make up for a slower week.

It was a little slower of a week when it comes to working and teaching people due to Holy Week. The people of the Philippines are very religious, so this last week they celebrated Holy Week, which for a lot of people is just a holiday (mostly on Thursday and Friday.) It was a little more difficult to teach people just because there was no one out or they were out doing things.

Something I thought was cool that happened this week though is while we were waiting to meet someone by the beach, a less active member (whose brother works with us a lot.) Turns out he is really fond of dancing, and actually competes in dance sport, which is ballroom! I've talked to him a couple of times about dancing, his partner competitions and such. His name is Carlo and is 14. 

He showed me his videos of him competing. For a year of dancing experience his videos weren't bad. It did make me miss competing a little. Part of me wishes I can join in their ballroom competition this coming May, but I know what I am doing is more important. It is cool though to talk about something I really love doing to someone here in the Philippines. 

Aside from that little cool note, another thing that I enjoyed happened this Saturday for a branch activity. All 6 missionaries and the members who attended went around from 2-8 visiting less active members. It was really fun to visit people and I didn't even realize how many less active members there are. We had a lot of stops in those 6 hours, including going from the very end of our area to the other. We had to take a bus and a couple tricyee's to get to the members but it was quite fun. We got to eat with a couple of members and just talk to them. 

While we were walking from place to place is when I learned my name in Tongan from Sister Latu, a new missionary from Tonga. I decided to learn a couple of greetings and such from her, and she is really fun to talk to so I learned things such as Fefe hake (how are you) or ha mea fai (what are you). Oh by the way my name is Siosefa Laumalie in Tongan, and if I served in Tonga my nametag would say Elder Laumalie. I think it's pretty cool. So From what I've learned, Tongan is not an easy language, so I give props to whoever is learning Tongan and such. That Saturday was filled with lots of laughter and smiling. 

The next night on Sunday, we visited a member here who is just visiting from Manila and will return on Tuesday. Her name is Ruth and she's 19. Even though we met her that day, we became good friends right away. She had a really fun personality and was one who liked to mess around. She told me she may go to America to New York. Knowing that she'd have to take an English test, I decided to have a "practice test" with her and Elder Bulado (who has to take an English test pretty soon anyways.) 

I put some fake glasses on and then started the interview. I just asked them simple things such as "tell me about yourself" or "tell me what you're learning/learned in college." They're actually pretty good at speaking English, they're just shy once they have to start talking for a while. It was really just fine and nice to have a more relaxing time.

During that time we received a text from Sister Florida, one of our amazing investigators, saying she wanted to change her baptismal date. So as soon as we got home, we called her. Her baptismal date is currently Saturday April 29th, but she told us she wants to change it to this Saturday the 22nd. We were more than happy to help her change it, and we believe she is already ready. 

We just have to teach her a couple more lessons, but she has been doing awesome. She told us she loves the teachings of the church and really want to be baptized. Hopefully we will be able to change it to this Saturday, we just need to talk to our Branch Mission Leader and Branch President. I am thankful to be able to teach Sister Florida. I love going to her house and teaching her and her best friend Sister Delos Santos, a returning less active. We feel we are close to them both.

That sums up my experiences this week! Even though it might have been a little slower work wise there were still great things that happened. I'm still very happy and am enjoying my time here in Claveria. Well now, until next week!

Elder Espiritu

**you can email Elder Espiritu at joseph.espiritu@myldsmail.net

Claire and I

Sister Latu and I (She is from Tonga and this is her first cycle in the field)

Elder Langeveld (back), Alex (next to me) and Reinz (front in a slightly interesting pose)

Elder Langeveld, Sister Latu and a really nice member (I forgot her name) (also sorry I'm really white in this picture)

Sister Ruth and I

Sister Ruth, her grandma and I

Sister Ruth, Elder Bulado and I (we basically had a short photo shoot)

Fruit of Your Labors

So alright, even though I may have thrown up after an awful bus ride and found a lizard fleeing from a bag of snacks that it chewed through, I still experienced a lot of great spiritual experiences and continue to love being here.

So now to better explain part of the first section, i'll tell you this: I guess I wasn't careful enough and I had all my snacks in my drawer. In this apartment we don't have ants everywhere so I wasn't really worried about it. Then one day I opened my snack drawer (which was on the left side of my desk) and noticed holes all over a bag of pretzels. Then I opened the right drawer (which shouldn't have had food) and found a bag of little chocolate covered peanuts (which should've been been in the left drawer) with holes all over it too. That's when I remembered we had a rat problem, but I never thought it was capable of getting in. Yes it may be 6 or 7 inches, but I didn't think it would be able to get inside a drawer. So I took the affected items out, and layed them on top of the desk and started checking to see what else was affected. I was a little surprised that while I was checking a lizard ran out of the bag of pretzels I just pulled out. I never thought I could say that that has happened to me before.

Well now on to the more spiritual side of things. First I'd like to talk about 2 really awesome sisters. One is a member Sister Delos Santos and the other is Sister Florida. They're best friends and next door neighbors. We have been teaching Sister Florida and it has been going really well. She committed to baptism on the 29th! One day while we were teaching her she was just felt like she wasn't ready yet and just had a lot of questions. But she understands all of the lessons we teach her. While we were teaching her we asked her 3 questions to see where she was at. First we asked "do you believe that what we are teaching you is true?" She said yes. Then we asked "do you believe the Book of Mormon is True?" Another yes. Last we asked "Do you believe that this church was restored through the prophet Joseph Smith?" Yes! We knew she was ready for baptism, if she just keeps continuing to come to church, she will be baptized soon! 

A little thing that assured us she would be baptized is Elder Bulado said he's going home on the 3rd of Mayand she told him not to worry and he will be there when she is baptized. That's not exactly what she said, but we knew that's what it meant!

A day later after we came home from work, we got a text from Sister Delos Santos. The text first read (with my rough translation) What did you do to Sister Florida yesterday? Now she seems happier than ever and she told me what you taught her! It made us super happy to know she was happy. After a little conversation sister Delos Santos asked us a couple doctrine questions and we assisted her in finding them. Sister Delos Santos then told us how she has regained the desire to have scripture study because of us. I am grateful to be able to help her, and I love these 2 sisters.

Now on to another cool experience, on Thursday we got to have a Zone meeting in the are of Pagudpud, which is about a little over an hour away. Side note our area is known as the worst part if you're driving, because it is just windy mountains for about an hour. (luckily I made it there without throwing up, the way back I wasn't so lucky). So we got to meet our zone, (which I like) and even cooler we got to meet the new missionary couple Elder and Sister Nelson from Alpine Utah. Elder Nelson actually served here in the Philippines back in 1980, and told us how different it was. 

What I really want to share is his story. He told us in 1980 he was put in the area of Laoag, with 2 other elders. Back then there were only 40 members. A promise was made to them that if they could have 100 members for 4 weeks they would have a church built. They ended up getting 100 members and he was able to speak at the ground breaking of the new chapel then had to leave. That chapel that he spoke of is now known as the Bantay chapel for Laoag 4th and 5th ward. That is the chapel of the last area I just served in (for those of you who remember it was the picture where I was copying my mom's picture when she served!) 

Elder Nelson was never able to see the church built during his time as a missionary, until now 36 years later returning here with his wife. The first Sunday he was here he went to the Laoag 4th and 5th ward for their sacrament meeting. While he was at the meeting for the 5th ward, 2 of the older women came up to him and asked if he was the same Elder Nelson 36 years ago. Turns out he baptized these 2 sisters when he was still a missionary in 1980 and finally he got to see the fruit of his labors. They stayed strong in the church all these years and now both have big families and sons that have served missions. 

These 2 sisters were actually part of my 2 favorite families when I was still in Laoag 5, the Bituen family and the Gaspar. 2 of my good friends Kevin Bituen and RJ Gaspar have both served full time missions. My last week I had a family home evening at both of their houses and I thought it was really cool to see at the Gaspar family a wall with several missionary nametags in the family.I once again love seeing the influence of one persons lives to several and Elder Nelsons testimony was very strong and motivating. 

A small little fruit that I have been able to seen while I was still on the mission was that a while ago I was talking to a former companion in my first area. I asked how my friend and Recent Convert Kat Kat is and her family. He told  me that they were doing great, and one lesson Kat Kat bore her testimony to her mother which opened her heart up. A few weeks later while I was still in Laoag, I heard from Elder Andon that Kat Kat's mother was to be baptized that coming Saturday. I am so happy to see the spread of the gospel here in the Philippines and I am glad to be here.

I may have talked about this before, but I want to again restate how much of a difference we can make in the lives of several. You may not be able to notice or see it at first like Elder Nelson, but our good decisions do make a difference. I hope as we all follow the right path and help others we can affect others in our lives for good. Love you all, and know that many of you have made a difference in my life! Keep being a shining influence to others!

Elder Espiritu

**you can email Elder Espiritu at joseph.espiritu@myldsmail.net

A little resort in Taggat 

Sister Morton (we're in the same batch)

Elder Lewis (First met him my first cycle in the field when there were only 4 Americans)

Early morning Taggat

Early morning Lagoon