Are you goats?

Sister Avancena got a new companion this week (Sister Wheat. She is a brand new missionary from the Manila Philippines MTC. She is from Draper, Utah and she is just 19)

So now me and Sister Ocampo are back again to just the two of us in our area. I love my companion and we have fun as we work hard together. 

Even though I have been here in the Philippines for a whole five months, I'm not perfect in Tagalog (far from it in fact). Here are some funny mistakes I made this week:

There were two seven-years-olds at a lesson we taught. I meant to ask if they were kambals (twins). But on accident I asked if they were kambings (goats). It took me a couple seconds to realize why my companion and our investigator were laughing so hard. 

We were able to teach some young teen-age less actives, that we haven't been able to teach for a long time. They hadn't meet Sister Ocampo yet, so I was introducing her to them. I was trying to tell them how good she was at cooking (mag-luto) but I accidently told them she was really good at bathing (mag-ligo).

Of the 11 zones in my mission, our zone (Tarlac Zone) is one of the biggest with 12 companionships. But what makes our zone even more unique is that of those 12 companionships, 6 of them are Sisters. Crazy stuff. Below is a picture of most of us at transfer announcements and celebration)  

I know that the work that we are doing is not our work. It's God's work. And we cannot fail.

Mahal ko po kayo!

Sister Abish "Magaling sa Magligo" Curtis

The Rains Came Down and the Floods Came Up

Now that it is is moving into rainy season, it rains just about every afternoon. No big deal. Expect once this week it rained really hard and a street near our house was flooded up to my mid-calf. (See the picture below) It was a great little adventure. But as quickly as the flood came, it left. When we came home by the end of the night the street was completely dry.

Speaking of water, I want to speak of water that is way cleaner than the water that flooded our street. Not only is this water clean, but it has a cleansing effect. I am speaking of the waters of baptism. This week we had a baptism!!

Lito is the name of the 26 year old man that was baptized this weekend. We have been teaching him for several months. We have seen his ups and downs. A lot of the stories that I have told thus far, are actually stories of him. It was his house that we moved. He was the one who wanted to know if he needed to bring soap to his baptism. It was during a lesson to him that the Jehovah Witness missionaries showed up. There are many more stories about Lito, but the greatest one is that he was baptized. I am excited to see him continue on his journey of conversion.

A great little side note: This week my companion reported to me that I have been talking in my sleep again. This time I was teaching a lesson in Tagalog. Hand motions included.

Kapayapaan and Mahal!

Sister "Baptisms make me happy" Curtis

First Day of School

Today is the first day of school for a lot of the kids here in the Philippines. Happy first day of school!!

This week has been a good one. It started with a Parade on Monday celebrating Tarlac Day. Then on Tuesday we had a zone service project where we helped a school clean up and get ready for the first day to start. Afterwards we got to go out to McDonalds!! It was nice to have some American food. (I actually get "American food" pretty often.

My dear sweet new convert of a companion was not able to get her Patriarchal blessing before her mission, so I got to be with her as she prepared to receive it this week. I wasn't in the room when she received it, but I felt the spirit, and have reread my own blessing with more perspective.

I want to tell you a little about one of our new investigators, Bengie and Nick. One night as we were walking home we passed by Bengie holding her almost one year old daughter Jenel. We stopped to talk to her for a second and told her about who we are as missionaries, what we do, and if we could come back sometime to teach her. She said we could and pointed to where her house was. We set up an appointment, and a couple days later we returned hoping she would still be interested in hearing from us. She was! And so was her husband Nick. We taught them about the Restoration of the gospel and other eternal truths. The lesson was cut short a little because little Jenel was cranky and ready for bed. We have returned a couple times and they are always happy to let us in. We taught them about prayer, and how to pray (Though both claim to be Catholic, they have never really gone to church or prayed) At first neither of them were comfortable with praying in from of us. But they promised they would next time. When next time came around, they were both pretty nervous. But they both did so good. Bengie had even prepared by writing down the things she wanted to say in the prayer. So cute. Saturday night we spent some time explaining to them what church would be like so they would now what to expect. We were super hopeful that they would come. But come Sunday we didn't see them. We are not giving up on them and we will continue to help them progress, even if it is just a little bit at a time.

This week I was reminded of how great the commandments are. Every commandment has a blessing attached to it. When we are obedient to a commandment we get a certain blessing. We are so lucky that there are so many commandments because that means there are so many blessings available to us. Especially as missionaries we have so many 'rules' but really they are the greatest blessing ever.

I love you all!!!!

Sister Abish "McDonalds" Curtis

Picture: Me and Sister Avancena (my first name twin)