The big news this week was that Trump won! We were about to be turned down from a house until the man saw that I was American, so he ushered us in as he said Trump was my new president. People here love to talk politics, and apparently there are a lot of relations/politics between Philippines and USA right now. But since we don’t watch the news, we (missionaries) don’t know anything except what we hear from other people. Everyone wants to know who I wanted to be president and what do I think of Trump, which is honestly not a lot. I usually just say I hope I can get back into my own country after two years, and that the flag is still Red White and Blue, not Orange White and Blue.

This last Thursday we did a service project in the area of Tubau, halfway up the mountain to Baguio. It was at the house/workshop of a woodworker. The Baguio mission ordered about 200 jump rope handles as a Christmas gift from the mission to every missionary. Our job was to write on the handles Philippines Baguio Mission all neat and spaced out, for the guy to etch later. He let us personalize a pair with our names and mission years on them! When we get them I'll take a pic for ya. Included is a picture of Captain Moroni and Joseph Smith. Some of the different carvings he does. 

   

The other pic is some more service, helping Sister Normal to spread her rice out for drying. It made me think of the joke that Tongans spread concrete with their feet, well this is how Philippinos do it. Reminded me of playing in the sand at the beach :) 

Do you have a cell phone? Ipad? A cell phone, and pen and paper. Basically everyone here has a phone.

If they (packages) get here on the 15th, tomorrow, I'll have to wait until next Tuesday to receive them, since the couple missionaries here pick up packages and bring them to our district meetings on Tuesdays. 9 Boxes?! Are they big? I'll have to carry them all from our church into a trike, and then to our house, I'll take a pic of the trike stacked with packages. One of the pictures included is of Elder Beck carrying his package from his parents. He's 6’3” And with the box he stood about 3 feet taller than all the Philippinos around him. Inside was 25 smaller gifts for Christmas, pictures, probably more things.

Showed this picture before but Hahaha and those dogs are just outside our house. Whenever they are chained up like that they jump straight against their ropes\chains and bark like crazy. One time the grey one actually got loose and ran into our apartment. Elder Gamboa jumped up onto our couch, after slipping around on our tile floor for a second, she found her way outside again. They seem scary but she was just happy to run free.

At our Christmas Conference there is a "My Four Words" campaign, where every missionary submits a picture accompanied by 4 words related to missionary work, or the Gospel. At the Conference they'll all be combined into a montage with music and distributed to all the missionaries as a remembrance.