Hear ye children, the instruction of a Father
Happy Father's Day!
We were opening the door to head out and go to our lessons, when all of a sudden, a spider that was a couple inches long jumps through the open door and sits on the floor. I then grabbed our broom to quickly sweep it out the floor, and I missed it, so the spider then scuttled over to Elder Gernale's desk and hid underneath it. So yeah, that was fun lol. Anyways, we then tried visiting several people, including John Raven, Edward, and Christine/Queenie, which went alright, just none of it went according to our plan haha, that's just how it goes sometimes. We also had a family home evening with a part-member household, which was good, and after that I was just planning with my content team for our upcoming Father's Day post and trying to get everything ready. Later that night, I just had a zoom meeting with some of my social media team to brief them on their roles/responsibilities before heading to bed.Wednesday was a little crazy. We spent most of the morning packing our things for our trip today, and then we went to the Bambang apartment for a zoom district council since some of our new district members (like the new trainees) were still in Cauayan. That went alright, and we then began our travels to Cauayan for the day. About halfway through our travels at Santiago (where we normally go for zone conferences), we ate a late lunch at a large mall (with three floors 
), which was quite a shock since I've been in the much more rural Almaguer/Bambang for a few months now, but it also made me feel a lot more like I was in the US at the same time haha. After our late lunch, we began our travels to Cauayan, where Elder Gernale, another Elder, and I would be staying at the same apartment I was in last week for MLC (the others went to different apartments). Because of transfers yesterday, Elder Herrman (the other US missionary who lived with Elder Harrison and I at the Manila MTC) now lives in that apartment as a new zone leader, so that was a fun reunion with him haha. It was evening when we arrived there, so we just got some dinner together and headed to bed.
Thursday was a bit long but pretty good. We woke up early to get ready and drive over to church next to the mission office for our devotional with Elder Renlund, which was great. While President and Sister Craig had a meeting with him, all of us got ready for a picture that we would take with him (I don't have the picture yet), and after the picture, he surprised us by asking if he could shake each of our hands before we returned back to the chapel, which was pretty neat. In the devotional, we then heard from President and Sister Craig for one final time (they leave on July 1, but we won't see them before then, very sad), Elder Wakolo (a Seventy and the Philippines Area President), another Seventy and his wife, and finally from Elder Renlund. He gave us some advice about missionary work and how to be more effective servants of the Lord, but he told us at the beginning and at the end that the main thing he wanted us to take away was that an Apostle and two Seventy members were there to thank us on behalf of the Lord for our willingness to accept a call to serve and to serve faithfully, which was pretty neat. After the meeting, we started the long drive back to Bambang. Oh, we also received a brand-new American Elder (straight from the MTC) this transfer, so I saw him for the first time at the devotional, and he's actually staying in the same apartment as Elder Harrison, so that's pretty neat haha. We first stopped at Santiago at the same mall as yesterday to get some lunch, and on our way from Santiago to Bambang, I was just so exhausted (we all were lol), so I actually got some sleep on the bus ride back haha. We finally got home around 6:30pm, and we visited John Raven to help him prepare for this Saturday. And our next-door neighbor (the branch president's mom) surprised us with food, so miracles all around! Lol
On Friday, we had a meeting that morning for the trainers and trainees (in their first or second transfer) to talk about this new program that our mission has been chosen to pilot. It's a Canvas course for us to use in our extra hour of companionship study for our trainees, which includes podcasts, mentors, and a bunch of other resources to help trainees (and trainers lol) adjust to missionary life and learn the necessary skills they need, which is pretty cool. After some studies and fixing some issues for the social media team, we had some weekly planning later and headed to the west to visit Ariane and Rosalinda. Hermie (recent convert) joined us for the whole day, which was pretty cool; he actually reached out to us and asked if he could join us haha, he's doing great so far, and he's excited to serve a mission in a year. At some of our visits, Elder Gernale tried to learn Ilocano (the local dialect) from Hermie and the others who were there, so I just sat there like "????" whenever that happened lol. The lessons went alright, and to end the evening, we had a lesson with Hermie and some of his family to review the Plan of Salvation before having some dinner with them.
On Sunday, John Raven was confirmed today, which was great, but only one of the other people we are teaching came to church today, everyone else was busy or out of town haha, so that was unfortunate. Then, for the Gospel Principles class (for new/returning members and those we are teaching, held 1st and 3rd Sundays), the usual teachers weren't available, so right when we got into the class, we were told that we would be teaching it instead. Yikes haha
The lesson went well, and Elder Gernale did a great job with the lesson and engaging everyone. Afterwards, we had some branch mission coordination, lunch at a member family's house, and started to visit several people. Unfortunately, all of them were busy or unavailable, so we weren't able to teach anyone today, but Elder Gernale and I still felt great and satisfied with our work for the day, and we even were able to take some pictures haha. We also visited another member family for dinner and had an object lesson with them, which went well, and me and the social media team were able to finalize and publish our Father's Day post, so I'm glad that all turned out alright and that the stress/craziness from that post is gone lol.
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