Busy Transfer Week

Start of another cycle already! I just realized that this one is my 11th in the Philippines! So crazy! But I think this cycle is going to be a great cycle! Tuesday was Elder Arorong's last day. I guess not really, he left in the morning around 7:40. I spent the day with Elder Romo and Elder Carrington, the elders in my apartment. We had a fun day together. It's a little weird sometimes working in three but we had a good day. They had a lunch and dinner appointment so I was fine working in their area for the day. Dinner was more of like a ward get together for Sister Ilago since she was going to transfer out of the ward. Dinner was good and I got to meet a few members from the other ward along with the Bishop. I'll just say getting to know the bishop was a great idea because he ended up inviting us to dinner on Wednesday night. He is the bishop of the other ward but his house is in my area. Turns out we now have dinner with him every Wednesday! Anyway, back to Tuesday. Totally forgot that since Arorong was gone, I need to plan the vans and stuff for transfer day the next day. Made a few calls to figure out how it works here in Alicia then called the driver. He has a nice van and his son has a little pickup. Everything went well for transfer day, other than the guy that has a pickup decided to show up in a car! What use is that?? The pickup was gonna be for the luggage and the van for the missionaries then he shows up in a car? We ended up making it work but we might as well have all just made it work in the van instead of taking the car and having to also pay him for only taking one companionship. Best part of transfer day is reading the list of where the missionaries in my zone are going and who their new companions are. It's always really loud and everyone goes crazy and everything so it's a good time. After I read off the list, I helped get the missionaries to the right vans then send them on their way to their new homes. Then we went to the mall to eat some lunch. I was with Elder Brandon. This is his last cycle. Crazy. Feels like yesterday I just met him in Bambang. But we ate at KFC, the only one in the mission. It was super good. Went back to the church and waited for the other vans to arrive coming from the other 2 transfer points in the mission. My new comp was coming from Tuguegarao. It is Elder Labrador! We were in the same zone in Roxas for three cycles and we went on splits once while I was there. I was his district leader in Roxas. We were pretty excited to be companions so we should get along great and work hard together. Finally got back Wednesday evening and went around to members that were close and introduced Elder Labrador to them. Then we had dinner with Bishop then went home.

Thursday was zone meeting, my first one. It is also Elder Labrador's first one and he wasn't even at MLC so I had to teach him what to teach. In the end, we got through it. Probably not the best or most fun zone meeting ever but that's good so no one has expectations for next time. Ate lunch over in Alicia then came back to Echague. Went around and met some more members and learned where they live and while we would visit with them we would ask them of any less actives in the area. For the last few days, that has been working really good. We have been able to meet a few more less actives and also strengthen relationships with the members. Even got one Nanay to make the missionaries a dinner calendar! Before the night ended on Thursday, we went to our most recent recent convert, Nanay and Alyssa Ballad to start the reteaching to them.

Friday was a good day. We had two SA work with us and they were a huge help. They showed us some of the area that I didn't know. It was a lot of fun having them work with us. One of them was a new RM and the other one is preparing for a mission. I think they will start to work with us a lot more so that will be nice. We were able to do a lot of contacts on Friday and also teach some first lessons to some people. Finished the night teaching Aaron, the other one that was baptized a week ago.

Saturday was alright. Just the usual day. We worked in an area called Soyung and an area called Tuguegarao. Best highlight of the day was in Tuguegarao, we were doing some finding/exploring basically in the middle of no where. We just turned down a random road with a few houses on it and started contacting. No luck. Got turned down by everybody. Then we went by this one house and met this brother named Neo. He's 31 and has one little girl. His wife is working abroad in Hong Kong. We got to know each other a little bit then started the lesson. He is familiar with the church. He has had a couple friends that are members. We started sharing the lesson then he started asking questions mostly about how can we return to heaven. We explained the gospel and the steps we need to do to return to Heavenly Father. He then asked us some questions about repenting and how we know if we repented. We answered it then he ended up opening up to us and sharing with us the things that he has done. Turns out, while his wife has been abroad, he's fell into temptation a couple times and been with other women a couple of nights. He feels terrible about it and he says he doesn't know how to repent. The way I described this story makes it seem like nothing special but this was one of my favorite lessons in the mission. We were just able to discuss things and teach while doing that. I know the gospel will be perfect for him! He said he was going to come to church on Sunday as well...but that ended up not happening. Saturday night we were supposed to have a meeting at the church to discuss missionary work. We got to the church and there was no one there. We called Bishop and I guess they decided to reschedule it and not let us know so we just ended up going to a restaurant for dinner.

That brings us to Sunday. Church was good. Elder's quorum was something else. They ended up debating/arguing on what activities were okay and what were not. I ended up just telling my companion that we should go to the hall and let them fight it out. Neo was supposed to come late, around 10:30, since he has a part in his church that he can't miss. He is Catholic by the way. But he texted us and said that his wife wanted to Skype and see their daughter so he wasn't going to make it to church. The meeting that was rescheduled for Sunday after church ended up not happening at all. We had some SA work with us again on Sunday and we went to the last part of the area that I haven't been to. Walked crazy far to get there and there is only one member there. They are somewhat less active but make a showing at church every once in a while. Got there and they were busy so we couldn't even share with them but at least we met them and talked to them for a little. Had a dinner at night then that was it for the week! Hope everyone has a good week this week! Love you all!

Love Elder Haacke