Hello!
Well I have a few stories to tell from the last few days, it will be fun.
Where to begin? Alrighty, Tumarbong sounds like a good start. After
church on Sunday we needed to catch a ride home by flagging down a
vehicle, we ended up getting a truck and hopped in the back and sat
down in a safe/unstupid manner. The air re-circulated into the back
and we got dusted so much. The tired ended up going flat and we hopped
out for a bit to wait for them to throw on the spare tire. Out of no
where, (actually out of the truck cab) came a white man named Miles,
as in miles away from home. He was from England and had been living on
Palawan for 20 years. (Which is equal to the lifespan of an Elder
Munk). We talked with him for a little while and he told us great
stories about Volkswagen beetles, Afghanistan, and the Mormon
Tabernacle Choir. (With a little bit of banana farming mixed in). He
used the word see-loo-bree-us which I am not able to spell, he used a
negative marker along with that word to describe the previously
mentioned country.
On Saturday I received a call telling me I would be transferring to a
different area, and leaving my companion in Quezon (Trainers/Trainees
are usually together for 2 transfers not one). On Sunday I figured out
I would be going to Puerto, but I was not sure where or if I would
have a specific assignment. I received a call yesterday from President
Stucki who told me I would be assigned as a zone leader with Elder
Hyde (whom I love). I am really excited, and the zone is going to have
a very productive December, and we will do all we can to keep it up. I
also have stores in my area and some restaurants which I will enjoy,
but not too often. My companion has been assigned a follow up trainer
who has been out in the field for only 4 months. That puts their
combined months at a little more than 5. They are both Americans.
President Stucki has a lot of trust in Elder Smith to follow up my
kasama Elder Halterman. I trust him too, they will have great success
down in Quezon.
Well, I do not really have many other stories yet, I will send some
pictures soon. I am learning already that I will have a lot of
responsibilities as a Zone Leader, and will even be flying to Manila
every month. I will be sleeping in the mission home, and that means I
get a hot shower! Unless the other Elders use it first. But the
mission home in only for the Palawan Zone Leaders. :)
I am super excited for Devin, he will be fending off things just like
his older brother. Devin, I know how you feel.
Also Kaity! Happy Birthday! I hope you had a great birthday, and have
fun being old. You can drink as of 1 year from now! And buy handguns.
I know you are not a huge fan of drinking, and you are definitely
(most-likely) afraid of guns.. So I will not worry about you :)
Sorry if I forgot to answer your questions, but my time is running
short. Keep me in touch with things that do not really matter! I like
having a big smile on my face, so you should all continue to write me!
Love, Elder MunkNovember 21st Letter
Hello!
This week has been pretty exciting, we have experienced a lot of miracles and a lot of.. well other things. We had great success in inviting people to be baptized, many of them said yes, and we have close to 20 who say they will get baptized on December 24th. Unfortunately it is a lot easier to say so than to do so. We did see a few of them at church, but most of them chose not to come.
We discovered a few new areas in our area that were formerly undiscovered, we were led in that direction through referrals we had received and we tried to contact them. One of the ladies in named Sister Garcitos, we asked her children, who were playing outside, where their mother was. They when inside and asked her, she told them to say she was not home. The kids came out with smiles on their faces and said she was asleep, we could see her through the hole in the door. We asked if they could tell her we stopped by, they said no, because she was in the bathroom. And one kid just flatout said, she is inside! Than another kid said she was asleep in the bathroom, and knowing Filipino bathrooms, I doubted that anyone would sleep in a place like that. They than started saying she was in Narra (1.5 hours away) and we decided to come back another time, we ended up seeing her later and talking to her for a bit, she did not want to talk with us that much though. As we traveled farther back into that area we came to realize that everyone would hid, and that none of their kids could lie very well. We decided to talk to someone walking down the street and ended up walking back to his home with him, through a "shortcut" up in the mountains. We taught them and gave them a baptismal commitment about 20 minutes after we met his family, they accepted, and we will see what comes of it in the coming weeks.
We also had a successful day on saturday and the Ramos family was baptized, Riza, Sherwin, Rose and Kenneth, along with three individuals Mera-mae, Nilda, and Ronie. All of them made it on time, and were confirmed yesterday at church. The Ramos family is awesome! Brother Ramos was a fisherman, he would work from Monday-Friday being out on the ocean and be home from Friday night to Monday morning and go back out to work. The basically live from hand to mouth (they have enough to buy food for maybe a few weeks with no work.) but Brother Ramos took the whole week off so he could be baptized, because of a storm the ship was delayed and he would not have made it back by Saturday. He was visited by a friend, while his co-workers had already taken off to sea, and he was offered a job on land, which will give him Sundays off, every week, and is a better job. Their family also makes it to church early and sets up the chairs, before most members arrive.
We also visited a waterfall earlier today in the Narra area, because we have a meeting here tomorrow morning, so another day of Preparation away from home, three weeks with no real time to do laundry puts hair on your chest. At least from what I understand. But my understanding is also a bit skewed more often than not.
Also, I am not sure what Alivia did to her knees, but I want to let her know that I love her and wish her a speedy recovery after her surgery. I will tawagin ang aking kapatid na lalaki to take special care of you. :) Devin is good at that.
I am also grateful for the responses sent in about the concern I had asked about last week. I will do what I can! I think I will be teaching a pastor this week, I do not plan on arguing with him, if he decides he wants to than I will politefully tell him to stop talking and do something effective with my time. He was one of them throwing dirt on the church before. So I am not exactly sure what to expect from our visit. But I do plan on baptizing a pastor sometime before my mission service in up. Better sooner than later.
I love you all, and am excited to hear from whoever wrote me for Christmas. We do not have snow here, although there was a hailstorm in the Philippines once.. We are still planning on having a white Christmas :) But I will let you know more about that in the coming weeks.
And, no I have not picked out any Palawan Natives to marry yet... I am helping them get married to each other. I figure though, if I can become as good as a missionary as Ammon, sooner or later I will have someone offering one of their daughters... But I will also let you know more in the coming weeks.
Love,
Elder Munk
November 14th Letter
Hello!
I do not really remember a lot of what happened in the last week, I am pretty tired and my brain does not seem to be running at full speed but that's alright. It is preparation day, so I get a little bit of time to not but fully with it. I think this is why we have preparation day. I think it is a little bit funny when reading through the Ten Commandments about how we are given 6 days to finish our work and we are required to give one day to the Lord. For 2 years it is the opposite, and I love it. We are going to have a successful week if everything goes well, we will have a baptism this Saturday, of a truly converted family, they are great. The day we found them we talked to a whole lot of people and got rejected flat out by everyone except them. But we could not teach because there was no other males there, so we came back and started teaching, we gave them baptismal dates right away and things have gone well since than. Yesterday they were the first people to church (And some of the only because Manny Paquio had a boxing match) and they set up all the chairs in sacrament. Usually the members should set up the chairs, but we are excited when the investigators do it.
Everything is going really well, I think I am going to end up marrying a Palawan Native.
We are working hard to find new people to teach here. We run into a similar concern with all people, that all churches are true because they all worship Jesus Christ. It seems simple to me that if every church teaches something different than they cannot all be true. That is an obvious truth that is outlined by the Bible, the Book of Mormon, and really Elder Munk's common sense. We teach many things to try and resolve this concern, which most of the time does not lead anywhere. Except in the case of a couple people who we are teaching, who seem to understand. I have developed a twitch every time I hear someone say, "isa lang ang Panginoon natin." Or we only have one Lord. Because I know it will lead directly into this same concern. If you have any insights on a way to clearly address this concern I would like to hear from you. If you have no idea, you can still email and say hi :)
Also, yes Jon Chin, I met Elder/Brother De Guzman, I actually met him at the members house who you mentioned. I do not think they are dating, because she says she is going on a mission.
I am going to be heading down to Rizal in a little bit, with Elder Gillette (my BYU mission prep classmate/MTC buddy) because I get to interview 2 candidates for baptism in Rizal. I hear it has the most beautiful sunset in the whole Philippines, but not every night, so I am hoping for good things tonight. After the 2 hour shuttle ride.
I am also learning how to cook, I am cooking things based on what they look like because I have no recipes. Everything has turned out alright. I also think it is a bit funny we have a bag of pure MSG sitting on top of the fridge... I do not use it though. But I end up eating MSG about everyday, it is in everything here.
When I said I am going to marry a native, I left out a little bit, I am going to help marry a couple, they do not have a marriage license yet. :) Do not worry Mom, I am not getting married at for at least a month after I get home.
I love you Family, I also love who ever else is reading this, and maybe even some people who are not. And I really love the Galbraiths. Give them Hugs and Kisses from me, especially Stew. :)
Byebye!
Elder Munk
November 7th Letter Hello Family! And friends. :) This was an interesting week, we had built up a lot of potential in the last few weeks and were excited for everything to happen. A lot of things fell apart in the past few days, due to people being out of town, moving, and not coming to church. We are still working hard, and doing what we can to find new potential, and trying to do what we can to keep our current investigators moving in the right direction. Everything will turn out alright, we have high hopes and know a lot of good things are in store. Elder Ardern of the Seventy came to say hello, as well as teach the missionaries on the wonderful Island of Palawan. He taught many very good things, and told me to share an experience with my family, so I think I will reserve it for them :) If you want to know you can ask, I just do not want to put it up, on my ever so popular missionary blog. He did ask for Dad's email address so you will probably hear a little bit from him soon. Or at least once Dad returns from his trip. Going to the meeting involved a three and a half hour drive, with a three and a half hour return trip, we enjoyed the seven hours in the shuttle. We talked with a few people, including a very outgoing 5 year old girl named Hannah Joy. She was really funny. Hinda nga! While we were riding to Tumarbong for sacrament yesterday a lady tried to secretly take a picture of us, we caught her, and she just lifted up her cellphone again to take a picture so we threw out some big smiles and talked to her about the gospel, we left her with a pamphlet and invited her to church, she read the whole pamphlet in about 10 minutes and said thanks. We tried to get her to come with us to the Tumarbong sacrament but she was trapped between a "bag of palay and a really fat man" as my companion explained it, the bag of palay was there, but the man was pretty skinny, either way she was trapped, so hopefully we will see her next week. I have a new Cars notebook, I am pretty excited about it. I know missionaries do not use slang, but I do not know another word for punk, so I guess I won't say anything, but I love the Galbraiths even if they are a slang work :) I will come visit you someday! I appreciate the emails, and I am glad Devin is wearing my clothes, the way that I would proudly wear them. Except Devin is way more muscular than Elder Munk, this rice is slowing me down. I love you Family! I am bummed Daddy is gone, and I am excited to hear from him soon. Elder Munk PS the pictures may be fuzzier than real life.
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