p-days are my favorite cause I get to email the greatest people ever!! YAY!
So the Philippines is seriously insane. that's all i can say. Everyday i say, only in the philippines. cause its true. this happens no where else i am pretty sure!! especially on sundays. church people come in jeans, sweats and no one cares. no one wears ties here. they all just wear white button up shirts. haha My companion is still the greatest. Okay so everyday I have cried. It's hard because our morning we wake up at 6:30, then get ready and personal study, companion study and language study and then lunch. We dont go out til 1 so the mornings are hard cause all i think about is how homesick i am, and how bad i miss that cute elder brevard. I like it here, but its just so different. I know i can adjust. Food is fine, very different and everything just tastes "off" but its all good. I will be fine. The less I eat, the skinner I will be right?? haha
So there was this one day, i think tuesday where i kind of just had a freak out. all morning i just bawled. so homesick k! then we left at 1 and we had like a million appointments and we were sitting in this one ladies house, ok not a house, a shack and we were teaching her and it was going great, then i see mice on her KITCHEN countertops. Don't worry she has babies. So i see them and tears just fill my eyes..because i HATEEEEEE mice. so after keeping my cool kind of, i walked out of the shack and just bawled to my comp. she was like you are so humble (thats all she ever says to me haha) and sweet sister. but i wasn't crying cause i was humble i was crying cause i was grossed out and hate mice! haha so then i just decided to laugh about it. Now seeing mice in lessons is common and it still freaks me out don't worry. oh lizards too. they are everywhere and in people's houses.
so we teach like 6-10 lessons a day. which is so awesome cause the days fly and it really helps my tagalog. my comp is seriously so good! she goes home in 5 weeks I AM SO SCARED for my next trainer. PLUSSSSS i have to LEAD this area!! aHHHH i want to freak out. i don't know this place there are so many back ways, streets. houses i have to memorize. oh well i can do it!
this cute old lady nanay rems does our laundry every wednesday YAY i dont have to do it! we pay her, and she is a less active so its sweet! our clothes take forever to dry here though.
okay so one night i was talking to my housemates and companions about things we have in america. they loooovee hearing about america! So i asked them if they knew what a dishwasher was and my companion goes "ya ME!" oh she was dead serious..i laughed so hard. i said noo..so i explained to them what a dishwasher was and they were SO excited! hahaha and i told them we have washer and dryers, theater rooms, and everyone drives cars here. my comp goes,"ya your life is so easy there" haha i was like "ya i guess it is, americans just are lazy"
so we had a baptism saturday 4 people so amazing! we have baptisms everyday satuday in april. its pretty amazing! people are so great here. i just loved seeing those little kids in white. one of our baptismal kids is 17 jayson i just love that kid. he is so strong. he bore his testimony after he was baptized and cried when he talked about me and my comp and how we have helped him so much! he wants to serve a mission to utah so i told him i would help him with his english first! so amazing!!
so let me tell you this, every house we go to people invite us in. they love the missionaries here. its so amazing. we sit on the floor of these houses (with ants crawling up our legs) and teach these wonderful people. we are in these horrible shacks and yet are singing hymns bearing testimony and telling their kids how much their heavenly father loves them. its kind of cool that you can feel Heavenly Father's love in this tiny little shack in the philippines, and these wonderful people can feel it too. i love it!
so i havent been cold the whole time i have been here, except in the shower. i am frozen! then the minute i turn the water off i am sticky again. no joke! but i sleep good! except for this stupid dog next door that seriosuly doesnt shut up. its always worse when i go to bed like 30 minutes early. dang it for obedience. haha but you go to sleep sticky, wake up in the middle of the night sticky and hot, and wake up early in the morning hot and sticky. loveee it. not. i shower twice a day.
so Heavenly Father works in crazy ways. i now know why i am here: there is an actress in the philippines who is white and her name is..ann curtis. everyone thinks she is my sister so they just love me!! haha every time i meet someone they say "are you related to ann curtis" (i think they say that-who knows all i hear is ann curtis) and i say..ohh ya i am! she is my cousin and they are so happy then i tell them no and they just laugh at me.
one lesson i was bearing my testimony in tagalog (trying to) and i was like k i am done so i started speaking in english and i know no one could understand me. then i look around and everyone has tears in their eyes. they said they had goosebumps. it was a great feeling knowing their felt the spirit and even though they couldnt understand me they felt the spirit and thats the universal language.
one lesson this week we taught some kids and every time we teach kids i teach them...marriage and THEN babies. cause everyone is freaking pregnant here and they are so young. and no one is married! so i am teaching the kids while they are young. i make them repeat it like 5 times to me. after we taught those kids, we taught their mother. she just bawled to us and said she was so happy we were there helping her and her kids. for the first time in my mission i realized i was at the right place at the right time. she was so grateful for us.
everywhere i go people stare at me. it kind of gets annoying, then other times i just say hello! and they laugh. haha they think i am SO beautiful its crazy to me!!! when i am with other american missionaries they do the same thing! they are so shocked when they see us!! little girls touch my skin and hold my hands haha and alwayssss take my hair our and play with it. its fun! except when they use their own combs i get scared i will get some disease haha
well i have gotten SO many emails and i promise in time i will email back all them! just be patient with me. tell everyone i love all the emails and keep them coming!!
i miss america really bad ha ha i miss the little things that everyone and i have taken for granted! so enjoy everything you have here. people ask me all the time if i can adopt them and take them back to america. isnt that so sad?? i tell them all yes. so i may come home next year with like 100 philippino kids! hahah i love you family!!
xo
Sister Curtis
