Thursday, October 31, 2013

October 20, 2013

Pamilya!

It has been such an eventful and fun week... and although weeks seems to go by really fast, this one seemed to go by especially fast. Literally, yesterday I was sitting in this computer writing you all. 

Week Recap:
Tuesday- We had the earthquake! We were in the middle of our personal studies, and then it started shaking. I look up at Sister Bendoy, and we were like, "It's an earthquake!" and then she basically runs outside. It didn't last too long but I felt like I was still moving for the rest of the morning. It wasn't big enough to do any damage in Bacolod but it was definitely what everyone talked about at every lesson we had later that day.

Wednesday- Mission Tour! Four sisters slept over at our house who live farther away from the city so Tuesday night we had a sleepover, and it was especially fun trying to get eight girls showered and ready before 7 in the morning... but somehow we did it. For mission tour, President and Sister Nielsen visited. We had breakfast, then a separate sisters meeting with Sister Nielsen while there was a leadership meeting with President Nielsen. Then we had a combined meeting for the rest of the morning and afternoon. For the past month, we've been studying the talk "In the Strength of the Lord" by Elder Bednar, so President Nielsen expounded on that. It discusses how the Atonement of Jesus Christ gives us not only redeeming power, but also enabling power. That we can rely on the Atonement to not only be cleansed from sin, which is the redeeming power, but also to strengthened as we try to become better and more Christlike through the enabling power. It's a really good talk (read it!) and it gives several examples of stories in the Book of Mormon that help us understand how we can utilize the enabling power in our lives more effectively.

Friday/Saturday/Sunday- I'm trying to think if anything especially exciting happened the past couple of days... but I think it was just mission life as usual. We're still teaching A and his baptism is planned for this Saturday! We're also still teaching J, and she is just a doll. She's one of our first investigators where I can truly see her desire to learn. Just the other day during our lesson she had a highlighter out, marking her Book of Mormon. She truly has that desire and it's spiritually gratifying seeing someone come closer to our Savior. It truly is a blessing being a missionary and I'm excited I still have over a year to learn, to grow, and to teach and help others come closer to Christ. 

Sunday Night/Monday Morning- So yesterday, our water stopped working... and you don't realize how much you use water until it's gone. So, we wash our dishes from dinner from our bucket of rain water that's been outside for who knows how long. We texted the landlord... but no response. So then we wake up this morning, we still have no water so we can't clean, we can't eat, we can't wash, we can't shower... and we're still sweaty and smelly from yesterday. So basically we're just sitting around until 8.. when we are supposed to start studies. Then finally, the landlord texts us and basically tells us they can't fix it today. So, we ended up taking bucket showers from rain water we filtered through a shirt.... oh the joys of mission life. I'm just hoping we have water soon...

I'm glad that everything is going well at home! Have fun all of you together in Phoenix this week! Enjoy the sun and know I'm sweating too, just half way across the world! Transfers are this week and we should find out tonight if I'm staying in the area, or if Sister Bendoy is... I think I'm okay either way so I'll have to let you know next week what happens!

love you all! 
xoxo,
Cami

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