Yooo! Happy New Year!

Hello! hows it all going?! How was Christmas! Mine was pretty sweet! Wierd though, they just shoot off fireworks for like every holiday! But Christmas was good we spent the day working and visiting everyone we could, then we were able to have dinner at the Pongyans, they are great people super strong in the church. Their 18 year old son works with us like 3 times a week all day! He is awesome. They live in a little bit nicer of a neighborhood out of the area. We ate dinner with them then on the way home we stopped at this elementary school, that had a homemade huge light up star! and in the middle was the nativity scene! It was really beautiful! Then we just went home! But good Christmas! Defiantly the best one, and the best part was talking to you guys! Awesome! Well this week was good, we did a lot of less active work this week! and the Gutierrez family is good! We had to push thier baptism back though, becuase we felt they were not prepared. But we have another really progressing investigator named Julieta, who is 60 and shes awesome, shes friends with a less active, and we are getting them both to come to church! Shes very spiritual, and she expressed how much her life is getting better because of this! Its so awesome! Well tomorrow is New Years Eve! We have to go home at 6 oclock because its gets crazy here. Im not sure if its as crazy as Peru but I was told people like to use their guns as their fire works haha! Im stoked! Its going to be sweet! I am feeling so much better! Im not fluent yet! But life here is okay now, I feel like I am used to being a Filipino, and every time I fall Heavenly Father picks me up and dusts me off. Love this place! love you all happy flippin new year!

Elder Collins!

Maligayang Pasko mga Kapatid!!!

Hey everybody! How's everybody Christmas season?! I keep forgetting its Christmas because there is no snow outside haha Well this week has been a good one! The Gutierrez Family is doing really good! The father is still struggling with the word of wisdom, he likes his dubies, and coffee. But he told us he is improving. Their biggest struggle is reading the dang book of Mormon, we have been teaching for 3 weeks now and they are still on 1 Nephi ch. 1! At one lesson we were so disappointed because we thought they were finally going to do it! But they didn't...:( So we just decided to read with them to get them started, and we decided not to go on with the lessons until they started. So we just shared our testimonies on how important it really is, and how much it has blessed our lives. We visited them again and Sister was in Mosiah 13!!! she said after we left she stayed up till 1 reading! haha I was speechless, this family is hilarious! But Jan. 11 is coming up and im excited! And we also have been teaching this older lady and her less active friend, and they are doing so good. She will also be baptized in Jan. We had the Ward Christmas party this week, which was super good! I was so surprised, everyone we invited showed up! haha cause every Filipino likes a good Christmas party. It was a good way to show our investigators that its not all serious all the time, but we are just normal people .Haha one funny thing about Filipino's is that they are always late! I swear they don't keep track of time! The party started at 5:00, so as missionaries we show up on time, and no one showed up till 6:30 haha and its just normal! It was way fun. Well this Christmas has been pretty hard and different, but when I am working I just forget its even Christmas! The thing about these people is that they don't really remember Jesus Christ other then Christmas time. I am so grateful I get to remind them how much he loves us, how important it is to apply the hymn "I need thee every hour" to our lives daily. Being on this mission made me realize how much I know that I have a father in heaven, who listens to every prayer. He knows me personally and knows just how to help through these struggles. I know that Christ is my savior, and his atonement is for us and through him, I will return to his kingdom. I know that the charity and love that Christ showed in his life is one we need to apply daily, not just at Christmas time. Being here with people calling you names, laughing at you, kicking you out of there house, its hard to have love for them, but the more I just smile and laugh, the better I feel, because this gospel is happy. And I am grateful to show other that happiness. I hope you all have a very Maligayang pasko! Mahal ko kayo! Stay sweet.

Elder Collins


                                                   Pics Of The Ward Christmas Party

 

 

 

 

I'm Done!!!!! With Training Ha Ha

Transfer Day! And I'm officially done with training! heres my stats for the 12 weeks!

Number of times getting called joe: 1,000,000 

number of times getting yelled at Amerikano: infinity 

number of times i heard duuude!: 12,000,000

number of times ive been asked why im wearing blush: 1 billion 

hahaha just kidding but really. And I did not get transferred! So 6 more weeks in Bulihan! But word on the street is im getting called as a trainer next transfer because elder Kesler will be going back to his old mission! Scary right?! Oh and sorry I'm emailing Tuesday! We had our Christmas party on Monday so they switched our P day for the week! But this week was sweet! So we finally taught that family the word of wisdom! I was super scared, but it went so well, and they committed to living it! Then the next morning the dad calls us and asks us to meet somewhere cause he had a problem, we were way nervous, and turns out he's having financial issues, and asked us for money. But its bawal, we cant give money away, I felt so bad cause he bearly has enough to feed his family. how easy it woulda been to just slip him a 5 hundred, its 10 bucks. But I couldn't,  we just offered our advice and service, we told him if he kept the commandments of god he will provide. Well after that, he got sick, and he kinda started avoiding us a little bit, cause we think he was embarrassed. But finally on Friday we sat down with them, their whole family was sick, and the spirit just was not there, He didn't really wanna listen because he was so sick, so I offered him a priesthood blessing. That was so cool. After that we left, Then Sunday they didnt show up to church, so we were pretty mad cause they commit and don't come. We visited them that Sunday night, and we started to share more with them, then like a light bulb just shot off in the fathers head haha, he was like, " we need to go to church......we need to go to church!....WE NEED TO GO TO CHURCH! it was hilarious, then he told me that night after his blessing he felt so much better! He started going off about bible things and stuff, telling us he is going to tell people he's a Mormon! and how who knows one day he will be like us, points to his pocket where the name tag would be, then grabs his Book of Mormon and does like a superman pose.  But then this week we had little success on finding people to teach, we went 2 and half days without teaching! Because no one wanted to hear from us! Well then Saturday night, we were way discouraged again and we were just walking home going another day with nothing, and just randomly this guy stops us, says hey you wanna come inside and talk, were like a heck yeah! And we go inside and teach him the 1st lesson, he is awesome, he believes that whatever god tells him to do through discerning his thoughts is right, and he's a reader, so he was more than willing to start reading the Book of Mormon, so dope again! We also had our Christmas party! It was way fun, got to see my batch too! Well love you family and friends! Keep it real!

Elder Collins

 

 

 

 

 

Pretty Good Week!

Hey errrybody! hows agoin?! Well this week was a pretty good one! No sicknesses so we got to work! ya! This week went very good our family is progressing talaga, but they need to come to church so we pushed there date back for Jan. 11 so hopefully we will have the first baptism of the new year! That would be sweet! And we have done a little more finding and came across a few new investigators! We also had district conference which I was able to witness our district become a stake! That was way cool to see it for the first time! Elder Ardern of the 70 came to speak. Ive had a lot of good experiences this week but ill just share one cool one because of time! sige! So we had had a good week so far getting in about 3 to 4 lessons a day. which is not bad, then we had weekly planning on Friday so we didn't go out till like 430. So we went out and got NOTHING haha no one was home! No one would listen to us we spent all night just proslyting! It was tough! So it was about 8:30 and were just alking down the street getting ready to go home pretty tired and discouraged. Then just randomly this couple just came sprinting up to us yelling elder elder! And they looked at us and were like do you know Tagalog? And usually I just say "conte lang" which just means a little bit. But I decided to just say yes! I know Tagalog. So they started talking to us, and they told us that their sister was mormon living in New York and that she told them they needed to find the missionaries so they could bless their family! So they thought she literally meant "bless" like laying on of hands haha but what we determined is that she meant bless their families lives haha it was sweet and all in Tagalog! Funny thing about it was elder Kesler was just talking about how he wanted to buy a big 2Pac shirt, and the husband was wearing a 2Pac shirt hahaha! ( 2Pac is a rapper) But it was just so cool how when you know you have worked hard and nothing is working  how the lord blesses you, and knows what you need! He works in wonderous ways and im grateful for the gifts he blesses me with, especially the gift of tongues. So cool! Well I want to thank everyone who has sent me stuff and the stocking was dope! I signed it and have been reading the letters, they really mean a lot! Everyone of them! Im struggling to only read one a day! I wanna read them all! haha but thank you! you are the Pinakamabuti!

Love,

Elder Collins

Dressing Up For The Holidays! 

                                                            I Didn't Fall I Promise!

 

 

Happy Thanksgiving!

Yo! hello family! haha nice try mom, soo close but its Kumusta no A haha but yeah it just means whats up how are you pretty much like como estas. haha Well this week was alright! Elder Kesler is better, but guess who isnt! ME! haha I got sick Wednesday and Thursday! Just had a huge migrane, and stomach pains. I think the stomach pains are from the water and food sometimes  but whatd ya expect? I'm in the Philippines! Haha but im better now, the migranes come about every other day, and I dont know where they come from! But im just pressin through them. So thanksgiving here was just me resting  and my awesome Thanksgiving dinner was JolliBee haha Pretty sweet Thanksgiving dinner huh? Well other than that we had my first zone conference, that was pretty fun! I got to see elder Christensen again! and a few other from my batch! Well the work here is going okay, we struggle to teach sometimes because of the language barrier, and im not the best trainer, cause I havent finished my training yet?! haha But I'm studying hard, its funny my comp will start teaching in Tagalog, then just switch to Cebuano with out even knowing it so ill have to do my best to translate it or something! haha So we continue to teach that family and they are really doing good, we visited the other day and found her reading the book of mormon on her chair! It was dope! Never seen her do that before! One problem is they have a huge problem with the word of wisdom! The dad likes to smoke some dubies and the mom likes to partay. shots shots shots!  We had an appointment with them one time and we went and no one was home, then we found her at her neighbors house partying and singing karaoke? Well here every one offers you a shot! People will just be sitting in the middle of the street with some homeboys with a big bottle of something and they go Hey Joe! wanna shot?!  But we are planning on teaching them on the word of wisdom!  We have been trying to find more people to teach, which is tough but with the spirit, we are both able to converse with people. So crazy! I wonder what this language sounds like to Americans? I forgot, just sounds normal to me now. Well that was this week, as Dad requested I tried to take more pictures of my area! Thanks for everything! LOVE YOU ALL! MERRY CHRISTMAS! (its been christmas here for like 3 months now)

Magpagmahal,

Elder Collins

 

Half Naked Man Waking Down The Street?

   Fat Tie Friday So We Had To Take Pics!

(Also I Got My Shirts Pinoy Fitted)

Got A Little Hungry On Fast Sunday......

Sunday Best!