Monday, January 28, 2013

I Have Been Transferred to San Carlos City Pangasinan

kamusta po (hello)
Nalipat ako sa san carlos city brgy palaris, pangasinan. (I have been transfered to san carlos city pangasinan). Natanggap ko and package ni uncle aaron. (I received the package of uncle aaron).  Thanks for the letters. Babers made it very clear she does not like going to jacksons practices and jackson doesnt like watching her dance haha i remember those days getting drug to watch ballet dancing. haha  So mom there's some tagalog haha. Well so yeah we got pulled out of agoo 3 luckily only shot gun pull out so yeah only temporary. I talked with the missionaries who are going in one's a mexican the other american. I'm really good friends with the one american. Elder Kauer from idaho. Great missionary. He's younger than me in the mission, but its funny because we both started training at the same time and now we both have been called to district leader. When we got word we were both pulled out i was devastated. We were obedient. We had great relationships with the members, so i thought maybe because the numbers are low. But agoo is the lowest and most challenging zone if we look at stats alone. The people are nice but yeah just not open to the gospel. I really thought i had done something wrong maybe i wasnt as productive as i should have been. So we got on the jeepney and headed to urdaneta for transfer meeting. I thought i was going to follow up train or just be senior because the call to train again never came a week before. So we sat in the meeting i really wanted to talk to president monahan why i was pulled out. Then one of the zone leaders said... elder barney president wants to talk to you. I was so scared when I entered the room there was a 3 other elders. They said it was the district leader/zone leader training meeting. I laughed i didnt believe them. president monahan and president mortenson entered and said well thanks for accepting the call to be district leader and zone leaders. I sat down and was thinking i never accepted any call i dont know what he's talking about. Then he looked at me and said elder barney is still contemplating the call. His level of spirit is so high like ammon he can discern thoughts its scary, but of course dad taught me we need to always be ready to receive a calling and ready to be released from a calling. So now I'm a follow up trainer and I'm a district leader my new companion is elder rabanes from cebu. I'm in a real ward san carlos 2 ward. Bishop cancino is the bishop and he's sharp and very service based. I still need to get used to ...the word bishop and ward mission leader because i keep calling him president and branch mission leader haha. So yeah this month there will be a lot of baptisms here 7 in the month of february because the ward mission leader is a past missionary and he's way good. The area is exploding around the temple and bayambang zone is definantly feeling the spirit. Not many elders but in march my district will get really big because like 60 missionaries will enter the mission. There are no sisters in this zone which is great for pdays. We can play football and basketball and ultimate as a zone and no one will get mad. So im in the boys zone. There was four missionaries in our apartment which means its more dirty but it also means its more fun and loud and more food at the house and the chance is higher that one of them knows how to cook. They are all filipinos and they have taught me so many new words its great. I thought I could be a cleaner missionary in my last area. I thought i had room to improve on my arrival here. I'll let you know i have come a long way. When i arrived at the apartment i was shocked. I thought of the second law of thermodynamics ...in a closed system right everything will move towards disorder and confusion. these missionaries had a closed system ...the house. They let the natural forces of nature run their course. The result was bad. There werent any rats or or cockroaches so that was good. Well i like it here. It will be challenging but there is a lot of cornfields and it reminds me more of america sometimes except for there are no mountains here. (and no ocean but thats fine). We helped build a house last friday. I wanted to nail things and help build a bed. Filipinos really think that americans have no clue how to do things like that or do hard work. It bugs me sometimes but i helped tie the bamboo to the bed together. So yeah thats my life here. I finally got to eat mcdonalds because they have that here. I hope i answered your questions oh by the way they are not ilokono here. I'm having the hardest time here because their pangasinan speaking. I actually picked up a lot of ilokono i got pretty good at it. So i know english tagalog and hopefully I'll pick up some other dialects here. Tagalog by the far is the most smooth and its nice to listen to. Ilokono sounds more tribal like jungle language sometimes and so does pangasinan. Yeah mom we can watch 17 miracles but we cant watch anything we want but occasionally president will make exceptions according to our obedience to the rules. If we are faithful with a few things we will be given more things if we follow the spirit of the rules. I love you all be safe and read helaman 15: 7-9. I think it is the process of conversion...it's great!
`Elder Barney

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