Trainer/Trainee

Can't believe a school year has already come and gone since I've left! Still feels like yesterday! Bet everyone's happy they're out for summer and it sounds like there's some pretty fun plans ahead! 

This week was a pretty good week. Like you already know, I got my anak (trainee) on Wednesday. All the missionaries that came in were Filipino and I knew that last week so at least I knew I wasn't getting a foreigner. I did not want that cause I probably wouldn't have patience with them having to learn the language. 18 missionaries came in so that was the biggest batch we've had since even before my batch I believe. My companion is Elder Estuaria from Davao which is like opposite side of the Philippines. It is way down South. His hobby is basketball but we weren't able to play this morning so hopefully next p-day we'll be able to play. He said he wanted to go jogging which was awesome cause I do too I'm just to lazy to get up and do it. So far we've only gone once and only went about 1 1/2 miles. So far all is well with the training. It is actually better than I thought being able to teach someone about the mission. Also you pretty much make all of the decisions so that's pretty cool. The training is also nice because it makes me lead pretty much everything. Not that fun but you learn a ton more! 

Work wise we've been focusing on finding new investigators and contacting. I think that's what we will do pretty much this whole entire week this week also. This last week I talked to more people than I ever have and just by talking to random people we found 5 that are actually less actives just in one day. Hopefully with all the people we talked to this last week and all the people we will talk to this week we can get a lot of new investigators and be able to be teaching a lot more lessons by next week. 

Church was great this week. We had 72 in attendance which is way better than the last few weeks which has been in the 30's. I don't know if it was because it was the first Sunday of the month or what but hopefully it will continue. Also had 3 investigators at church. One I don't really count because it is a child and we've never taught her before but all the RM's in my branch said it counts. But that was exciting to have them at church. Summer break just ended so everyone is getting back in school but hopefully we'll still be able to teach to those that were at church and hopefully set a baptismal date. One of them is going to Tuguegarao this whole week and won't be back until next Sunday afternoon so she won't be at church next week but we set an appointment with them right when they get back on Sunday. We also had 3 less actives that were at church. One of them was his second Sunday in a row and it was the first for the other two. I was pretty happy with the success we had this week. Even though it wasn't a lot, it is still improvement from how it's been.

I'm looking forward to this coming week and I think it'll be a lot of fun. The work is finally getting better and more exciting. Plus we have zone conference on Friday in Cauayan so that'll be a lot of fun. Hope everyone has a great week this week! 

Love Elder Haacke

 Me and Elder Estuaria coming back from a part of our area called Marcos.

Rain and More Rain

Another cycle gone and finished. Also another month has already come and gone! I can't believe it is June already. This week was a busy week and because of that it went by very fast! I guess it starts Tuesday morning when we were getting ready, Elder Iuli called. I answered the phone and he said that I had been called to be a trainer this coming cycle and that there was a meeting for me on Wednesday. I wasn't too surprised about the call because I knew it would come sooner or later. Also the zone leaders had been telling me for a couple weeks that most likely I was going to train. Elder Latu is also training so I guess that's cool that we'll get to train together. Elder Latu is in my district. Went to district meeting that morning and that went well. Just the usual I guess. After district meeting we ate lunch as a zone then we went on splits with the zone leaders. I had to do 2 interviews for them, one at 2 and one at 5, so we just decided to go on splits. Interviews were good and they didn't have any problems so that definitely made it easier on my part. 

 

Wednesday morning, Elder Latu and I went on splits since we had to go to Cauayan for the meeting since we were both going to train. Meeting was pretty good. President used a lot of examples from the scriptures that related to being trainers so I liked that part. It was mostly just the things that I expected it to be...obey the rules, work hard, be an example, etc. It was a good time though since I got to spend some time with some other Elders I hadn't seen in a while. I was able to see Elder Poulter for a little bit while we were both there so that was cool even though it was only a minute or two. Also got to eat at McDonalds since there is one in Cauayan. They are supposed to be building one here in Roxas but it hasn't made any progress since I have been here. After we ate at Macdo, Elder Iuli and Elder Cruz (the zl in Cauayan) took us back to Roxas in their pickup. Nothing like a free ride with air conditioning so we weren't complaining! When we finally got back to Roxas, we went directly to Elder Latu's area because I had to do 2 interviews for then also. The interviews went well but by the time we finished it was night time and there weren't any rides to San Pedro. 

 

Thursday we didn't get back to San Pedro until a little later in the afternoon since we wanted to split in Mallig for a little bit since it is close to San Pedro and we weren't really able to do a real splits the day before because of the baptismal interviews. Splits was good though and it's always fun to teach with other missionaries and learn from them. 

 

Friday was finally a normal day. Almost the entire week had gone by and we had barely been able to be in our own area. As we are boiling water to cook lunch, the gas in the propane tank runs out. So then we didn't have anything to cook with and we don't have anywhere in San Pedro that you can go eat other than like a small snack. The closest thing in our area is like a 25 minute walk from our apartment. We ended up texting the zone leaders if we could come sleep in their apartment that night after work since we don't have anything to cook food with, plus we had to go to Roxas the next day anyway for the baptisms. So that takes us to Saturday, we were back in Roxas for the baptisms. Almost all the missionaries in the zone were there. There were 7 baptisms total which was really good for where we're at. It was way happy the whole time which was awesome! All the people that were baptized were super happy and had huge smiles on their faces. Definitely the highlight of the week this week. The baptisms started late just like last time so we were still here in Roxas at night again. By the time the baptism was finished it was pouring rain so we sprinted like 100 yards at a time looking for places to wait under until we got back to the zone leader's apartment. It rained pretty much every evening this last week. It would be super hot all day then around 5 to 6 the clouds come in and within a blink of an eye it is pouring rain. Luckily, we found a ride back to San Pedro Saturday night since no one likes to tricy in the dark and in the rain. Got home Saturday night and put all our stuff up to dry.

 

Church was pretty good but there wasn't very many people there again. Elder's quorum and Relief Society were combined and that is what we talked about. Why the last two weeks there hasn't been anybody at church. By the end of the class we had established a couple meetings to start having to be more organized and be able to look over the branch members. Right now there aren't any meetings that happen in the branch. Hopefully this won't fall through and will last more than a couple months. On the good note, the Lajo family that we reactivated my first cycle here finally came to church again yesterday. Also one other less active nanay came to church also yesterday. Hopefully they will continue next cycle and keep them here. Also Elder Pawin and I had to give talks. They decided not to give much of a warning this time. I just shared about studying the scriptures. Nice and simple that could last a decent amount of time for a talk. Also got a dinner appointment with a member so that'll be awesome! I miss having dinner with the members. Get to save money and it normally tastes better than the usual tomatoes, onions and eggs at the house. 

 

Alright week overall this week. Stayed busy with different things and it flew by. Hope everyone is well back home and I love you all!

 

Love Elder Haacke

 

 Walking to lunch from district meeting.

 

 Elder Lavelua, Brandon and I at district meeting.

 

 When we split with the ZLs and were walking to go pick up the fellow shippers.

 The baptism on Saturday.

 

Riding back to Roxas with Elder Iuli, Latu and Cruz.

Two Weeks Gone

Well it's been two weeks since I last sent an email home so I'll try and sum up the last couple weeks. First I gotta wish mom a Happy Birthday for this Thursday! Hope it's a wonderful day for you mom!! 

 

Last week was an alright week. Nothing special happened I guess but it was still an alright week. Friday last week we split with the zone leaders. One of my most favorite things to do since I've been here in Roxas. I'm not a fan of the area I have so when I get the chance to go on splits and work with one of them in their area. The part of their area we went to was really far and straight rice fields. Most of their area is more city like and neighborhoods but they have one part that is straight rice fields and that's where we went. We spent half the day out there then came back to Roxas for the evening. We got 6 lessons together which I really liked since we never get days like that back in my area. But we get the transfer list a week from today so maybe I will transfer! At church last Sunday we had the most members there on time that I have seen since I have been in the area so that was great! Still no investigators at church so I guess nothing new there. Last Tuesday we had zone meeting so I got a week off from teaching a district meeting. In zone meeting we just went over a lot of things that missionaries should be taking a little more seriously like the way we look and stuff. Also we went over qualifications for baptism which was pretty good also. Last p-day we went to Santiago so I could say bye to Elder Poulter since he is leaving in like a week. We said we'll see each other again in about 15 months! That's pretty much it from the week last week. 

 

This last week was another alright week. Had a couple problems with one elder in my district. He's kinda turning on the entire zone and says everybody hates him but nobody has a problem with him so I don't know where he is getting that from. He's not exactly all there though so we just had to be patient with him. He's doing better now but still has a problem with a couple others in the zone. Maybe transfers next week will solve the problem for good. He didn't want to come to Roxas last Tuesday for district meeting so my district meeting was very small. As in me, my companion, the sisters and one zone leader. My district is already small and without them there it got even smaller! But it was good though. We had a nice discussion as a district on things we struggle with then help each other figure out new ways we could do it. We talked about stuff like language study and teaching skills that we all do differently. I liked it since it was more of a discussion than normally. So do you remember our investigator Dominga Cantor from a while ago that I was pretty excited about? Well we haven't been able to contact her forever and this week we finally saw her. We sat down and talked for a little then asked if we could share a message. She told us no because she already knows everything. Pretty good excuse huh?? We'll still follow up with her when we see her but as of now she doesn't want to continue with the lessons. 

 

A few evenings this week it down-poured like no other! It was a perfectly fine day then out of nowhere a storm comes in and rains super hard. Well since both Pawin and I don't carry umbrellas, we got soaked a couple times this week. We were running for cover and when you're in an area of flat rice fields, sometimes cover is further than you would like. Sadly, we are still not able to progress with anybody. I don't know what the problem is. What made it worse was church on Sunday. You know how the week before was the most I had seen? This week was the least I've ever seen. After church, the Elder's Quorum President came up to me and talked to me about it. I told him we will visit some that weren't there that we noticed but he wanted an answer why there was nobody at church. Felt like I should of just asked how his quorum is doing on home teaching but I didn't feel like making the conversation longer than it needed to be cause I didn't know what to tell him. I guess over all I'm hoping I am going to transfer. Not to sound like I'm giving up on the area but I don't really know what else to do. We're still praying that something will turn for the better. Hope you all have a great week this week!

Love Elder Haacke

 

 Picture of me and Elder Cruzit at zone meeting.

  

 Picture of my zone (above and below).

 

Filipino Time

Another month passes by and it's already May! Feels like I was celebrating New Year's was just a week ago. The week was alright this week. Pretty much the same old work wise but still a fun week. Before the week though, I don't think I'll be able to match Sam if she skypes at 6 a.m. but if it is more around 7:30 our time I will be able to get to the net shop most likely. Hopefully it will work so we can all talk! Also hopefully the net shop is all good and will work well. We will finalize it today probably. 

 

So start the week with district meeting on Tuesday. Another lesson down. Still not a fan of teaching but it is a lot easier than it's ever been. I taught about Christlike attributes and the importance of having them since we are representatives of Christ and his church. The sister training leaders came from Cauayan zone and attended since we don't have STL's here in Roxas so it was nice to have another person in district meeting since the district is super small. After district meeting we did the usual lunch at Chicboy then went home. 

 

Wednesday, Thursday and Friday were normal working days. We still are only teaching to pretty much the same people as we did last week. Don't have any new investigators that will continue more than a couple lessons. Sometimes it feels like this area is missionaried out. I know that's not possible and there is always more people but that's the way it feels sometimes. We ran into the caravan of Jehovah Witness' missionaries again this week. They go around in groups of like 6-10 so we see their caravan pass by every once in a while. We dropped by one sister's house and she was telling us how she doesn't really like them and she memorized the time they always come by so she can hide haha. Makes us feel a little better since she doesn't hide from us. She is less active but is kind of returning right now. She came 2 weeks ago but wasn't there yesterday. She just had a baby though like a month ago. I think she is kind of coming back because she wants her baby blessed in church which is great so hopefully she will continue after the baby is blessed. Pretty much all the others we were able to share with this week were the same drop-by's as normal. 

 

So Sister Rochelle that I interviewed last week for baptism was baptized this last Saturday. I was asked to baptize her so that was fun for me. That pretty much took the entire day on Saturday. There was a baptism at 2 that we were going to be a part of so we came to Roxas and it ended up getting cancelled. The baptism of sister Rochelle was supposed to start at 4 but didn't end up starting until 6:30. That is Filipino time for you. They say something will start at 8, you show up at 9 and you're still the first ones there. But sister Rochelle was really happy after the baptism so that made it a good evening,even though the water was really cold. Luckily we found a ride back out to San Pedro since it was night time and there aren't any rides at night time. Got home Saturday night, ate dinner and went straight to bed. I don't think I've been that tired in a long time. 

 

Sunday was the day everyone had been waiting for for months...the Pacquiao fight. Church first though. Haha it made me laugh though...church started like 30 minutes late (Filipino time again) so that made some members upset since they don't want to be late for the fight. Then it was testimony meeting right? So the testimonies...about Pacquiao. That probably makes you think they all were but there was just a few that mentioned Pacquiao. So after church, turns out we heard the wrong time for the fight. It was already the 11th round when we heard about it. We went straight to Roxas after church to split with the zone leaders then do choir in the evening. Splits was a ton of fun. I really like working in the zone leaders area because we always are able to teach more lessons in a day than we ever get back in my area. I worked with Elder Lavelua and we also had two fellowshippers with us from their branch. We had a blast on splits and teaching was great! So Elder Lavelua and I were both born in the same area in Bambang. We had the same first area. He is almost exactly a year ahead of me in the mission though so he goes home soon. So do you remember the Chikino family from Bambang? They were like my favorite family there. Anyway, the missionaries in Bambang were at their house and they called Lavelua's phone. Lucky for me I was on splits with Lavelua so we both got to talk to the Chikino family! It was awesome! Finally somewhat old enough in the mission to have people to contact from past areas and stuff. So that was a highlight of the week. Later that night we went to choir and let's just say they could use some help. We'll see how it goes in district conference next week. 

 

Overall it was an alright week this week. Oh, it was insanely hot this week also. Hopefully summer will pass by quickly! Hope you all have a great week! Love you all and family...talk to ya next week!!

 

Love Elder Haacke

Soaking Rain

Dad that was an interesting way to start out the weekly letter this week! I ruined it for myself though since I always scroll down to the pictures first so I saw the p.s. at the end so it was the first thing I read. This week went by super fast. As I have been thinking about what to summarize for the week I haven't been able to think of many things to write about. Transfer day was on Wednesday this week but not a whole lot changed in my zone since only two people were transferring. Elder Brandon if you remember from Bambang, came and took Elder Frank's place and a Sister from Bambang also came to my zone so I knew both the missionaries coming in. Something I look forward to every transfer day is meeting new missionaries but that didn't happen this transfer day. Since it was transfer day this week we had district meeting on Thursday instead of Tuesday. I taught about "Our Purpose". Teaching district meetings have gotten way easier for me since the first one. Now I just write down a few notes and just talk from that and have some activities and role plays then the time is up. I thought it would take me forever to get used to teaching district meetings since teaching has never really been my thing but I actually got it down pretty fast. 

So Tuesday for work we went to one of the furthest areas, Maligaya, since we had scheduled a dinner appointment with our branch president there. At about 6, clouds started coming in super fast then pretty much within a blink of an eye it started pouring rain the hardest its rained since I've been here. We ran to Presidents house and just decided we'd have dinner a little earlier since we had no more appointments and it was pouring rain. While at dinner we sat down with President and talked about some less actives that he knows that we can contact. He gave us a couple names to find in the area Marcos but we weren't able to go out there this last week. Well the rain never stopped while we were eating and we had a 40 minute walk ahead of us. Elder Pawin left his umbrella at the house and my umbrella broke in my first cycle in Bambang and I haven't gotten a new one. We were soaked to the core once we finally got home.

Saturday I had my second baptismal interview. This one was a lot better than the last. It also helped that this person was 20 instead of 11 like the last one. During the interview, she knew the questions before I would even ask them! Once we finished I was talking to the Sisters that have been teaching her and they said they went over the interview about 7 times with her so no wonder she knew all the questions haha.

Still didn't progress with any investigators this week and we are still trying to find new ones that will progress further than the first two visits. We did have two less actives at church so that was really nice to see after all the bad luck we have been having the past weeks. One of the talks given in church on Sunday I thought was really good. Pretty much the first time I've really stayed focus on a talk during sacrament meeting since I've been here since normally they just read straight from the Liahona. But the speaker talked about the priesthood and she talked about how she has her own doctor right at home because of the priesthood he holds. She specifically mentioned how she doesn't have to rely on the missionaries to give blessings which is the part I liked. Of course we always will go when we are called but the members here rely way too much on the missionaries. We are always the go to people even though there are elders quorum members as their neighbors and we are like 30 minutes away. 

Overall this was a pretty good week and a little more successful than the past weeks we have been having so we were happy with it. Hope everyone continues to do well at home. Love you all!

Love Elder Haacke

Some old pictures:

 Went to KFC on transfer day (last transfer day in March).

 

Decided to have my district meeting outside this week since all the fans didn't work inside the church. That is my district except for Elder Latu who is taking the picture.
 

Elders Iuli, Lavelua, Latu, Frank, and I in the back of the AP's pickup when Iuli came and visited district meeting.

Iffy Week

Before I start, got the Easter package this week. Thanks! I downed the Sixlets! Tried to make them last but it didn't work very well.

 

But another cycle down! Scary fast! Got the transfer list earlier today. There are only two missionaries in my zone leaving. One of them is because he is going home so that was a given. My district will be the exact same for next cycle so I won't be losing or gaining anybody. I really like the Elders and Sisters I have in my zone right now so I'm not disappointed at all. The week this week was another iffy week. Not much luck but we did what we could.

 

Tuesday, we had the last zone lunch after district meeting. Went to Chicboy again. Getting sick of that place...but it's always fun with the entire zone! We knew that Elder Frank was going home so it was the last one with him and we didn't know who else was going to transfer. Lunch was pretty good then we went straight into splits. I was going to have to go to Elder Latu and Elder Cruzit's area later that day for the baptismal interview so I just decided to make splits out of it since I hadn't split with them yet this cycle. I worked with Elder Cruzit and we had a pretty good day! We dropped by one members house that had a referral to give to us and they also told us that Sister Weber (a teacher from the MTC) was coming back to Cauayan Mission the first week of May and going to visit them. They were super excited about that. After a few appointments we went back to where the interview was going to be. I've seen interviews be an hour long and I've seen interviews be like 6 minutes so I wasn't sure how it was going to go. The interview went well which was super nice for my first interview. Lasted about 15 minutes maybe. Always nice to get the first one over with. I think the next ones will be a lot easier now. 

 

Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday were normal days of work. Didn't go the best either. We got a referral that sounded promising. It was a family that had been waiting to listen to the missionaries for over a month. Would have been nice if we would have gotten the referral a month ago huh? Well we went to go contact them the day we worked in that area and they weren't there. We'll probably go back there tomorrow so hopefully they will be there. The people that we were able to teach this last week wasn't anybody new. Nobody we teach wants to progress. It feels like people will just listen to you because they don't want to say no. It seems like that with less actives and investigators. So normally that would mean find new investigators right? Well we find new investigators then they only want to listen to the first couple because they don't want to say no then they give you an excuse to stop listening. I think almost a month now it has felt like that here in this area. But also it seems like it's almost always like that here. I don't know if I said this before but even the members know. They always ask us how the work is and before they even let us answer they say "There's no progress right? Difficult here in San Pedro. There's always nobody progressing." So it's like the members already know what it's like but they still don't want to help at all. But when it comes to stuff like that you can really just worry about yourself and try and kill the work and get some success. We keep praying for it and hope it comes soon. 

 

Saturday morning we had a service over in the ZL's area. We did more weeding but it wasn't as bad as the last one with the chili plants. Having a service assignment is always fun to switch up the week a little bit. Finished the service around 11 so we thought we'd hit lunch real quick with Elder Frank before he left. Just some of the Elders that we are close with. I heard a lot about Elder Frank when I was in Bambang and I finally got to meet him when I came here to Roxas. I had a good couple cycles with him and it was cool to say bye. 

 

This week went by super fast even though we didn't get the success we wanted with the work. Hope everyone has a great week this week! Love you all!

 

Love Elder Haacke

Love Being A Missionary

Good to hear from everybody again! Seems like everyone is doing good and Sam is absolutely loving the mission! I am too! Even though some weeks are tough (last week) the Lord's work will never stop!

This last week flew by since we had conference for two days. Work was alright this week. No progress again with any investigators that I have talked about in the past so that was unfortunate but it still feels like we had a good week this last week. On Wednesday we went out to a part of the area called Marcos. Elder Corcuera and his companion here before me stopped going to the area because they said it was too far and not worth it. I never went there with Elder Corcuera since he never wanted to but with how the work has been going lately, we decided we should go back out there and try it again. We had no idea where we were going and some farmers we passed on the way just looked at us and said we have a long walk ahead of us. Actually, the walk wasn't that far at all. About a 30 minute walk was all. Kinda weird since the other part of our area that we have always gone to is like a 40 minute walk and Corcuera always told me Marcos was way further. We got to Marcos and just did finding the whole time since we had no people to contact there. It's not a huge area but there are enough houses to make the trip worth it. We made a loop on the way back to the apartment and went by Nanay Dominga Cantor(Inv), Brother JunJun(recently returned LA), and Tatay Cabading(LA) who all were not there. We didn't get many lessons but we contacted a lot that we can follow up with this week.

Thursday and Friday were alright days. Just usual days of work. Still had no luck with the Investigators in the area but we tried our best. I was supposed to have my first baptismal interview Friday night. We went out to Mallig (different elders area in my district) to do the interview. We met up with the Elders and went to the investigators house and she wasn't there. We waited for about 20 minutes and she never showed up so we just told the mom we'll reschedule it for this coming week. 

Saturday and Sunday was awesome. Absolutely loved General Conference! There were a ton of talks centered on the family on Saturday especially. Saturday night after the Priesthood Session, Elder Brandon called and we talked about conference for a little bit. He's still up in Tuguegarao but I think he'll transfer next week. Speaking of that, transfer week is next week. How fast was this cycle! This is the last full week of the cycle then its transfers again! Can't believe it! I don't think I'm going anywhere so I'll probably be the same for another cycle. 

After conference on Sunday since we were in Roxas we just went on splits so we didn't have to go back to San Pedro then come back in the morning. I went with Elder Lavelua and Latu. We had a ton of fun and taught 3 lessons which was awesome for the short time we had. One was a little over an hour but was an awesome lesson to their investigator. Two of my favorite elders in the zone and we got to split together. It was super fun teaching together. Then we had dinner with a family in the Roxas branch at night. They were a sweet family! We could've sat and talked all night! Maybe it is because of splits that my week feels better than it really was. Got to end the week with an awesome splits! 

Being a missionary is such an amazing opportunity. We were talking about it on splits yesterday. Just about how awesome it is to meet all the people we do and build relationships with them and see them change and find a happiness you can't find anywhere else except for in the gospel. I have come to know without a doubt that there is no better work than sharing the gospel of helping people come closer to our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. Hope everyone has a great week this week! Love you all!

Love Elder Haacke

 Service from last week:

 Another service from last week.

A harvested tobacco field. They hang it up to dry in those tents. First time I've seen a tobacco field is here in Roxas.

The family we had dinner with while on splits.