100 days kuno...

Someone told me I only have 100 days left on the mission... really? Probably just s short email this week and the computer isn't letting me send pictures again. I'M SORRY. This computer shop is awesome.. *sounds of screaming rats in the ceiling and walls*

So we held a Emergency Zone meeting this week because we really wanted to tackle some problems that we saw in the zone. Our zone is still improving great but E. Cagampang noticed something that happens every month: Everyone plans their baptisms for the month and our vision of our mission is to have weekly baptism.Yes its hard but with the right planning and finding it is possible. But the problem that we saw was people had baptismal dates for their candidates for the beginning of the month but because they weren't completely prepared they would get pushed to the end of the month or get lost and maybe not even baptized. It's kind of hard to explain because I guess it's only a thing here in my mission but we tackled the problem and helped the other missionaries to understand about proper planning and finding everyday.

The next part of the week was Elder Cagampang's birthday! It's pretty hard to do anything here on birthdays but we still tried to make it fun. We went to 7-11 and got some food and that was basically about it. The sisters gave us some cupcakes so that was awesome.

The work was hard this week though because they have been preparing for fiestas in almost every area of the zone. Which means investigators are making floats, practicing dances and setting up the plazas which basically means less lessons because no one is home. But it was still could because it kind of forced us to find new people! And it is finally getting close to the rainy season it's been pounding rain randomly everyday. I love it. :/

The baptisms on Saturday were awesome. We had 2. One of them was Irian who is the daughter of two of our recent converts and we baptized her daughter Inovelyn last month. Our other baptism was Veronica who we actually OYMed and she just happened to be the sister of the second counselor of the branch he was able to baptize her! It was a great day and everyone was so happy and their testimonies at the baptism were great. The only problem was after the baptism me and Elder Cagampang went home to eat and we got sick like right after we ate. It was only for a day but man we got wiped out.

Hope everyone back home is doing great!

-Elder Warnick

Your Mom is calling you!

I almost didn't even send an email! Sorry! Hopefully this is a good one!

So me and Elder Cagampang kind of did an evaluation of what was lacking in our area/companionship we realized we are obedient but we could do better-being exactly on time for studies and praying more as a companionship. Little things like that, that make a big difference. Like we were able to see small things happening, little blessings.

We had exchanges this week with the APs. It was kind of all of a sudden kind of thing but it was good. Elder Derecho and Elder Cicon are our APs right now and I was looking forward to get to work in the APs area with Elder Derecho because I have never got to work in their area and It's always fun to get to work with former companions. But Elder Cicon wanted to work in our area with me, which was still fun because he is super chill and hes a great AP. WE FOUND SO MANY PEOPLE. A typical question leaders ask when they go on exchanges is "what do you want to learn?" I told him I wanted to get better at OYMing (open your mouth-approaching people and sharing a quick message and asking for a return appointment) and help with focusing on a new part of our area. We just talked to everyone we would just walk past people say hi and see if they would respond and if they would we would stop for a little bit and talk to them. The trick was to make them laugh or even in someway get them to do some kind of little service for you like let us in their house out of the heat or get some water. Because according to the APs people are more likely to progress and be baptized if they serve you (helps them develop christlike attributes) It was super fun. Elder Cicon is super chill, he's like a hipster kid from California! He's half filipino half american-we had a good time.

We finally got a referral! It's just not a very common thing for our area but we got one and it was super close to an area where we usually work. We went to there house and asked for Jerlyn and she came to talk to us she seemed super nice and really willing to talk! BUT as soon as she came over to us her old nanay who was showering at the moment (they shower outside with their clothes on haha don't worry) started yelling at her "your mom is calling you" was what she was saying and NO ONE was calling her.. so we were frustrated because the old nanay didn't want her to talk to us so we just gave her a pamphlet and left. BUT we are going back because yeah we still see some potential AND I had a dream last night that we were at their house teaching the whole family SO it's probably revelation or something. :)

But when we left that house we had someone come up to us and tell us her aunt wants to listen to us so we went over to her and she was speaking English! She is from Sacramento and her husband died a while ago but she is originally from here. She told us to come back so that we could teach her I guess she was taking the lessons back in America! So we will see how that goes!

Yesterday was awesome! We had a lot of people come to church and our 2 candidates for the 23rd got interviewed so they are all good to go. One of them had her husband come with her and he had a stroke a while ago so that was super hard for him to make it to church but he loved it!
We also had another FHE last night way up in the mountains it was fun and we walked all the way home again.

I'm tired but I feel good.
Thanks for everything!
Love.
Elder Warnick

BTW the picture is some native kids running around throwing carabou poop at each other. haha I love this place.

Kids throwing Carabou poop at each other

Stone steps in our area

You are worthy to rescue.

This week was pretty much the same as usual. We had MLC on Tuesday and it was great. I think the APs really tackled the problem of what the mission has been facing recently which is we aren't the mission we used to be and we need to come back to where we were at. We need to get better. All of MLC was great it just was super crazy hot in the apartment we stayed at.. It was probably the hottest night of my life so I didn't really sleep and I was super tired for the meeting the next day. But I didn't fall asleep!

After the MLC we were hoping to get back to our area and to be able to work because usually they go all day and this time they made sure to have it end early enough that everyone could go back to their areas and work. But Elder Cagampang had a check up for his side where they took out his appendix. We ended up waiting like 2 hours and then the check up was only 5 minutes. Go figure.

Zone Training was great as well! The APs decided that they wanted to attend ours and they gave a 15 minute training to the zone which really helped a ton. Basically all the things that we forgot to say or weren't able to get across to the zone they were able to deliver. The Zone is definitely improving. We went from "the worst zone" to according to the APs maybe the highest baptizing for this month! BUT the month is not over yet and it's pretty dependent on the next 2 weeks!

Part of the zone training was about becoming more efficient and not teaching non progressing investigators but letting them know that we love them we just can't hang around with them if they aren't willing to take those steps in their lives to change. So basically we only have half of the investigators that we used to.. it was hard but it's going to help so much more.

General Conference was great. It was my last one here in the mission. And it was a great one! We always have our general conference a week late. But it's still just as good! I loved President Uchtdorf's talk about how we all have been lost. He hit it. And he always has sick ties! :)

So we were able to have a Family Home Evening last night at the Deramas home. That's where 3 of my Recent Converts from this area live and we have been working with Tatay and Nanay's daughters and NOW there husbands to hopefully get them all baptized. It was so simple but so fun last night. We had a great lesson by their son-in-law who is an RM and then me and Elder Cagampang were in charge of the games. And they cooked a lot of food even though they are super poor! It was great!

Thanks for all the support! Hope everyone is doing great! If not, take a nice bucket shower to cool off! :)

-Elder Warnick

Fish Wallet

Fish Wallet

Eye to eye?

This week had it's ups and downs but through everything you can always see the miracles.

Truth is this week was just work, work and work. And my SD card broke. I still got all the pictures I just can't take any more with it. It's cool though we are going to Bacolod today and I will be getting a new one. But I did take some sick pictures.. I'm just not sure if I can send them.. I'll work it out for next week. Promise.

This week was a week of Fiestas. Which means less work because less people. BUT we got some sweet souvenirs from the "Banana Festival" haha how cool is that?

We started teaching the older sister of our second councilor. And she has been golden! Her husband had a stroke so he isn't really able to come to church but they love listening to the missionaries and sister went to church on Sunday she also accepted a baptismal date right away. :) We are still trying to find out a way that we can help brother get baptized as well even though he can't really get around. It will all work out.

After Baptizing Tatay and Nanay Deramas and most recently Inovelyn it really has made the rest of their family really want to be baptized! Inovelyn's mom has been coming to church and this April is going to be a good month for the zone and our area. Or we thought... for us but we had a meeting with our branch president which was supposed to be a good thing but he went all crazy on us and was concerned that our investigators weren't meeting the standards of HIS mission. We tried to explain that qualifications for baptism are different in our mission but he isn't going to let some people be baptized until next month..... patience...... he still is a good Branch President but sometimes it's hard to see eye to eye with RMs.....

Sorry I don't have too much write for this week because that was about it. The area is great we just need to do some more finding and the zone is amazing!

-Elder Warnick