Week 9 May 2nd, 2016

I did it. I ate belut. It was actually alright. We were at a ward member's house and he had it all ready when we got there. Apparently there are actually a few kinds of belut. Brother De Juan said that a lot of Filipinos are mean to Americans and give them the "freshest" kind -- as in one, maybe two days before they hatch, so there's bones and feathers. He said he actually doesn't even like that kind. We had belut that probably still had 5-6 days to hatch -- no bones or feathers. It actually tasted pretty decent. The whole family actually explained how to eat it. You crack one side and peel that part of the shell off, then you suck/pour the juice out, then you peel the rest of the shell, and then you eat it. I don't really know how to explain it, but the closest (but still not completely accurate) description is a texture kind of between scrambled eggs and just normal boiled chicken. The taste is kind of similar to the white part of a fried egg, and chicken. I would probably get it again if we went back to their house.

We had lot of good lessons this week. Brother John (ward mission leader) and Brother Gregg (2nd counselor in bishopric) each came with us a couple of times. Brother John actually just got back from his mission in Cagayan de Oro about 6 months ago, so he speaks Tagalog, English, AND Cebuano. He says that he's the ward mission leader now because he probably wasn't the most obedient on his mission and the Lord needs him to do more. He really does work hard with us, and he's pretty funny.

We had a few investigators agree to be baptized this week!

Edwin - lives across the street from Bishop)

Fabian - lives aroun the corner from Bother Rodemark who is a ward missionary, and a friend of Fabian

Mark - lives across the street from Brother John

Most people here actually speak English. People always say to me "What's up man?" "Hey! Bro!" "Hey there, Joe!" I'm a celebrity here. They love Americans here. Church is actually 50-50 English/Tagalog. Half of the people have scriptures and Sunday School books in each, and the hymns are in English. The Church encourages english for them because it's much easier to get a job if you speak english. In elders quorum and sunday school, they usually write on the board in enlgish, and speak tagalog. It's pretty crazy.

Elder Bagtas is awesome! He still always helps me with tagalog, and always compliments my skills. He's just fantastic.

For P-day today, we got to have a district P-day, so we had a boodle fight (I don't why it's called that.) Basically you put a bunch of food on a banana tree leaf, and you eat all of it. Then we played a bunch of games, and took a bunch of pictures. Elder Retig thinks that he is a model and that he should be on billboards and commercials for food. He's pretty funny. He also made some "sunglasses" out of some spoons because he felt left out.

Nagkaroon kaming isa pang mabuting linggo sa paglilingkod sa ating Panginoon!

Elder Justin Farish

Philippines San Pablo Mission