What a Week

On Wednesday April 22nd Sisters Darby and Murry, Jenee, and I headed out for another adventure    north to the city of Liloan to find the Amara resort for our ward Relief Society retreat.  

Liloan is one of the Stakes that is in our area of responsibility so I to meet with President Tanner, the Mission President over the Cebu East Mission at the mission home, which is within the resort.  I scheduled a meeting with him at 10AM.

When we got our mission call it stated that we would be assigned to the Cebu Mission but after arriving here the SRC Director assigned us the responsibility of providing Self-Reliance support for  the Cebu East Mission which is the northern part of Cebu and the island of Bohol.

As usual trying to locate the resort was an adventure; and after taking far too many left turns I concluded that we were lost. I flagged down a motorized tricycle and offered him P150 if he would take us to the road leading us to the bridge that would get us heading in the direction of the resort.  Yup, we were lost and after some backtracking he got us where we needed to be, finally arriving at 9:20  at this beautiful gated residential ocean resort.

 

Resort Entrance

Resort Club House

The girls met up with the ward and I waited until 10. Then Jenee and I walked across the street to the Mission Home! .




Mission Home

Elder & Sister Halladay / President & Sister Tanner

The first thing President Tanner said to us was that he was embarrassed that they had such a luxurious place to stay and he wasn't kidding!

Upon our arrival we were not only welcomed by President & Sister Tanner but also by Elder & Sister Halladay, MLS Missionaries for the island of Bohol.  They were originally assigned to do SR on Bohol but found it far too confusing and difficult so they requested to be changed to MLS.  We spent about 30 minutes with the four of them when Jenee was summoned and had to leave to participate in the RS function.  I remained for about 2 hours where we discussed the SR needs on the island of Bohol as well as in Bogo, another area in the Cebu East Mission. 

The President and Elder Halladay were so elated that someone was here to assist in the Cebu East Mission in relation to the Self-Reliance Program.  The SR program has been in Cebu for about 18 months and while there is some good success in some areas, sadly a lot of confusion concerning its implementation still exists. We tentatively laid out some plans for Bohol and with the Halladays' help contacting the District/Branch Presidents we hope to arrange some re-training in the very near  future.  We may end up staying on the island for several days at a time if this all works out. President Tanner offered a vacant missionary apartment for our use while on the island.  We will just have to see how all this develops.

After a long HOT and HUMID day we left for home and finding our way home was much easier and I did not get disoriented this time. We arrived home tired ready to sleep.

Thursday at 4 PM we headed out for a place we had not yet been to and really had no idea how to get there.  We were just directed to drive to Noga (40 minute drive) and then head west across the mountain towards Toledo to a place called Lamuk, another 40 minutes. We were to look for Elder & Sister Hall (MLS Missionaries) in their white Ranger Truck along the side of the road.  After a slow and winding drive up the canyon we found the Halls waiting; we followed them another 30 minutes of remote, tight mountain dirt roads to the location for the conference.  Along the way we stopped so Elder Hall could show us the Lamuk Branch building.  There is was, right on the side of the road with a sign hanging on the fence.

We just could not believe our eyes, out here in what seemed like the middle of the jungle, if I can use that term in the Philippines, in what seemed like a shanty town  was a branch of the church. Elder Hall gave us the fascinating history of the area. .

After driving for approximately 30 or so minutes through the beautiful countryside and several little townships or villages along the way we turned the corner and there nestled along the mountain side was this incredible and out-of-the-ordinary resort. Here in the middle of nowhere a place so beautiful and pristine.

Our bungalow

We got checked in to our bungalow and then were invited to have dinner which consisted of rice, cooked cabbage & vegetables and deep fried fish, a real traditional Philippine meal and really quite good.  After dinner we attended the youth talent show put on by the various branches.  Each of the 8 branches presented a dance from various parts of the world with full colorful dress and music.  They asked Jenee, Sister Darby and Murry to be the judges for the event, I took pictures.

                                                                                                         
                                                                                                         
It was late by the time they finished so we set off for bed.  Friday morning we were up at 6AM for breakfast which consisted of rice, cooked cabbage and vegetables and scrambled eggs, the traditional breakfast meal for the Phlippines. Then we went to the room that was prepared for our youth conference presentation on the Self-Reliance program which began at 8:15AM.  This was our second attempt at this and I think it went off rather well. The kids seem to love the 2 games Jenee does with them with a purpose: Paper Plates Stepping Stones, and Trust Circle Sit. The kids also loved the music video "Get an Education" featuring Filo singers. Quite hip.

We finished at about 10 AM, packed up our things, said our good byes to everybody, then set out for home. Elder Hall got us headed out in the right direction but insisted that along the way he showed us to the new chapel that was being built.  The local saints called it the Lamuk Temple - out in the middle of nowhere will be this beautiful building which is to be finished in August.

We headed out once again down this narrow road of rocks and dirt and occasional pavement.  The road was barely wide enough for two small cars in most places.

We hadn't driven 500 to 600 yards when we came around a corner and in the road (the narrow section) was an accident blocking traffic both ways.  A small mini truck hit a motorcycle. Unknownst to us, in this country nothing is moved until the police inspect the accident.  Problem is that the nearest police station was 35 - 45 minutes away and who in their right mind wanted to sit there, certainly not us.  I got out and surveyed the situation which was not all that bad, nobody was hurt, just a tire on the bike bent a little.  After some prodding and coaching I finally got 4 male bystanders to help me pick up the back end of the mini truck and move it to the side of the road so we could pass by.  Well, we got it moved quite easily and with not an inch to spare we got past the mini truck and headed bumpy bump down the dirt road.  Where is the 4x4 when you need it? Too bad we didn't get a picture! But just glad they feared us Americans or something, to let us talk them into moving the truck. We didn't stick around, but we were all guessing they moved it back when we left.

Arrived home exhausted and ready for a good nights sleep.

 

 

 

Trip to the Island of NEGROS and Dumaguete

Wednesday April 15th at 7:30 am Sisters Darby, Murry, Jenee and I headed out for Dumaguete located on the island of Negros.  We were told that it was a 4 hour drive of which I quietly questioned since it was only 143 KM.  What I did not know was that to get there we had to travel on a two lane road through numerous little cities which slowed us down considerably.  As we passed through each city we encountered a myriad of tricycles and motorbikes which occupied the streets as we tried to pass by.  We had to slow down to almost 10 MPH in many cities - that is why it TOOK SO LONG to get to our destination. We really did not let that bother us as the sights along the way made the drive both interesting and worthwhile.

We arrived at the Liloan Port at about 11:10 AM and discovered that the Maayo Shipping Ferry left at 11:30AM so I hurried and got our tickets as well as the ticket to transport the car over to Dumaguete. Roundtrip was 1800 pesos (abt. $40.55) for all of us and the car.



Maayo ticket office

Jenee onboard the ferry

Maayo Ferry

Liloan Port

We got off the Ferry at Sibulan Port, ahead of our planned schedule which meant that we had time to perhaps see a little of Negros during the afternoon.

Sibulan Port Area

After departing we had about a 20 or so minute drive to Dumaguete and the C&L Bay View Hotel where we had reservations to stay that evening.  This hotel reminded Jenee and I so much of the hotel we stayed in when we took our kids to Cape Town. It was small, but very nice and very colorful.

 

After getting settled in the Sisters decided they wanted to go to the mall to shop and to get lunch.  So we boarded the tricycle and off we went.

The Sisters on a Tricycle

We finished with lunch and shopping at the smallish Robinson's mall and returned to the hotel for rest before we headed out for dinner.  At 5 PM we met and decided to take a walk along the Rizal Boulevard which was along the sea side.

 

 

 

We decided to follow the recommendations of some missionaries for dinner at Don Atilano's. Not anything resembling Italian and the lettuce salads were warm.  We decided we could no longer go on missionary recommendations.  Only Sister Murry enjoyed her dinner.  My steak was tough, Jenee's lasagna was flavorless noodles in a little white sauce.
After dinner we headed back to the hotel for a good night's rest and there in the grass area along the waterfront we heard loud music and noticed a lot of people dancing. Yay, we joined in with the 'zumba in the park'! It was so fun dancing.

After dancing for about 20 hot minutes decided we best get some rest as we have a big and busy day ahead of us.  We discovered in talking with the lead dancer that the local government had set aside Wed - Fri evenings for this exercise for another month or so.

Thursday is the day for our Stake Youth Conference  presentation.  This activity is being held in Dauin a beach resort about 30 minutes away at The Private Resident VIP Resort and Spa.  We were to be there by noon so after breakfast we decided to travel to Valencia to see one of the local recommended spots, a water fall.  It took us some time to finally find the place since the road signs here in the Philippines leave something to be desired.   Finally after about 40 minutes we located the falls.

In talking with the caretaker we learned when the Typhoon of 2014 came through the islands, there was a flash flood in this canyon that all but destroyed the area and downstream 9 people were killed.  This area was still being repaired as well as repairing the roads to and from the falls.

From there we headed for Dauin since we needed to be there by noon.  We thought it would be easy to find the resort but the resort sign was not as visible as we thought and it took a bit of backtracking and maneuvering to finally arrive.  We arrived and were met by the Stake President and treated to lunch and then we went to the assembly hall and set up for our presentation to 130 youth.  The resort was very clean and quite beautiful.

Our presentation was to introduce the youth to the Education for Better Work and the My Job Search programs available through the Self-Reliance program. Since this area is assigned to Sisters Darby and Murry they were in charge of planning the program;  Sister Darby put together a program that involved playing some meaningful games about "MY FUTURE LIFE PLAN" with the youth and they did enjoy the activity.  The game (Jenee's responsibility) was followed by some brief power point presentations (my responsibility) followed by another game led by Jenee.  After that Sister Darby concluded the activity which in all took about 1 and a half hours.

Upon conclusion we packed up our things and started back for Cebu, at the ferry by 4:00PM and set out at 4:30PM.  From there we drove back to Cebu in the dark which was something you just could not even imagine.  In every little city along the way we ran into those tricycle and peddle bikes but this time it was in the dark and 90% use no lights. You would be heading down the road at 60 MPH when all of a sudden you would come upon one of those motorized tricycles or peddle tricycles or a Jeepnie.   It is a miracle that these people are not killed in this traffic. With cars and motor bikes passing and weaving in and out of the traffic you just put your life in the Lord's hands and hope you didn't hit someone or get yourself killed.

We finally arrived back in Cebu at 9:30 PM exhausted and ready to hit the bed!