Up early to get prepared to head out for Calepe on the island of Bohol one of our favorite places, to attend a My Path Devotional. We are taking with us a large suitcase full of manuals, pictures and one of the computers from the SR Center.
The computer from the Model Self-Reliance Center had to be personally deliver and presented to the District President and the District Self-Reliance Specialists to receive and sign off for it. The suitcase with everything in it had to weigh 90 pounds if an ounce. But we got it on the ferry and delivered in one piece - thank goodness.
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| District President - Saballia |
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| District SR Specialists - Lorzonio |
We enjoy going to the island to work with the members and our good and dear friends Elder & Sister Halladay. They have been such a support to us picking us up and driving us everywhere we need to go. We stopped at our favorite beach restaurant for lunch before making it to the Devotional.
Calepe held a "My Path Devotional" today and as SR Missionaries over this area we were invited to attend and participate as and where needed. As usual it was small and as usual conducted in Cebuano making it difficult to both understand and communicate effectively. But, we do our best under the circumstances.
After we concluded the devotional and Jenee taking care of some other administrative matters we made our way back to Tubigon to catch the 5PM ferry back home. It rained all day while we were on the island which makes it an even more enjoyable trip.
Sunday, August 2nd we attended the Mandaue Stake Bishops Council and had a most wonderful Self-Reliance Training session. Jenee and I were able to present various aspects of the improved program which we feel makes the SR process and program for the Bishops more meaningful and workable. With the new Self-Reliance Initiative built around being priesthood driven we were anxious to get the new support programs out to them.
Mandaue Stake is one of our strongest stakes and we are so impressed with their efforts past, present and into the future. They are making arrangements to open a second Self-Reliance Center on the island of Lapu-Lapu. It is quite a distance for members to travel to make use of the Stake Self-Reliance Center in Mandaue so this new center will fill a void for the members on the island. They are moving forward with their third Self-Reliance Graduation and are arranging for a YSA Conference in October entirely dedicated to teaching Self-Reliance to the young adults. We have been invited to attend and participate in the conference and so look forward to that opportunity. We have participated in three Youth Conferences since arriving as well as one YSA Conference all which has been highlights to our mission.
Friday Aug 7th up at 5 AM to get ready and leave for Bogo. We need to be there by 9AM to meet with President Caprioso and Elder & Sister Bock. We are going to spend the morning visiting two piggeries. We are gathering information to give to Tony San Gabriel who is the AREA SR Manager diligently working on organic piggery development.
After visiting the piggeries we went and visited a family who is willing to provide some of their vacant land for piggery farm development. This family is growing vegetables organically to both sell and to use as food. Behind the shack they have about 3 acres that could be used for a piggery.
After making our visits Jenee and I invited everybody to lunch before we departed our ways. Elder and Sister Bock then escorted us to our hotel the Queens Island Hotel and Golf Resort. After a lot of looking this was the only arrangements we could make. We discovered from the Bock's that this is where President & Sister Tanner stay when they travel to Bogo.
Upon our arrival I knew I was in heaven when I saw the golf course and how beautiful it was.
After we checked in we spent a little time wandering around the grounds to admire the beauty. Then we took a short rest period before we headed out for dinner prior to our 6PM District Bishops Council Meeting. We had 100% attendance and covered a lot of items relating to Self Reliance. The Bogo district has a district conference coming up on Sept 12th & 13th and we are hoping to hold their Self-Reliance Center Grand Opening at this time.
After a good nights rest we got up, had breakfast and then took our time returning to Cebu. We took a different route traveling back on the west side of the island. It was a new adventure for us and the drive was peaceful and the scenery was wonderful.
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| 9 passengers |
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| Costal shore and beach |
While at a construction stop Jenee noticed this family ahead of us with 9 people crammed inside their tricycle. She just had to get a picture as you just will not believe how the locals manage to stay alive with the way they travel.
It was our plan to arrive at Sogot which is about half the way home and stop at Borussia one of our favorite restaurants. We got there at about 12:30 PM looking forward to our German schnitzel lunch. This place is right on the coast and is owned by a German gentleman who married a Filipino lady. They are always so friendly and welcomed us back with opened arms. The Missionaries and Mission Presidents always stop here when traveling so they are quite familiar with the church and our purposes on Cebu. Nice people, we always look forward to visiting with them.
Monday August 10th was Career Workshop for 20 returning missionaries. We always look forward to this event as it is great to be among the elders and sisters.
Sunday evening we received a message from President McCurdy that he wanted to meet with us early Monday morning as he has received word about our request to serve in the Cebu Temple. We meet with the president at 7:30 AM and was informed that the Area President, the Temple President and President McCurdy all approved that Jenee and I could serve as ordinance workers in the temple one or two days a week. This will certainly help us get closer to the saints as well as the other Sr. Temple Missionaries. We are so excited to be back serving in the temple as that is where our real love is. It will also help us fill our week days now that we are working out of our apartment since little SR work is done during the week. We provided to the Temple President the e-mail address for Bishop Hatch and President Olson. The process is a little difference than what it was in South Africa. Now an applications has to be initiated by the Bishop, sent to the Stake President, then to the Cebu Temple who will make a formal request to the Temple Department. They in turn will review the request and either OK it or say No. Now we just wait to hear something. We are hoping that process does not take long.
Wednesday we got a call from the Temple President saying that there was a problem with calling Jenee as an ordinance worker. In their efforts to clear us they discovered that Jenee was still registered as on ordinance worker (organ player) in the Salt Lake Temple. She was to have been released last February prior to our coming to the Philippines. Thursday morning I called the Salt Lake Temple and spoke to the Presidents Secretary. She looked the matter up and told me that Jenee was just released on July 15th and apologized for that error. I then called the Ceby Temple President back and gave him the message. Bishop Hatch notified us that he received the authorization from and signed it so I assume it went to the Stake President then will go back to the Temple Department for final clearance. We will just have to wait until the system does its thing,
August 15th we attended the Stake Self-Reliance convention for the Consolacion Stake. In attendance were all 9 bishops, 4 facilitators and 4 members of the Stake SR Committee. The meeting took 3 hours. The Stake President who is also the Area Self-Reliance Manager spoke for 1 hour followed by his wife who is the Stake Self-Reliance Specialists. After they concluded the remainder of the time was given to Jenee and I for our presentations, Jenee spoke on Bishops "Identifying and Inviting" concepts as well as the new Leadership Guide. I followed by presenting the PEF-TOF and Organic Farming (piggery) program. There is much interest in this subject among the members of the church in many parts of the Philippines, especially here in Cebu and the surrounding islands.
All in all it was a very successful and fruitful meeting. From that meeting we received invites from 4 wards and 1 branch to visit them to make our Self-Reliance presentation to their ward and branch members. The Branch is on the island of Camotes which is an island that we have not as yet visited. We are looking forward to going there since the Stake President informed us that we most likely will not return once we see the beautiful white sand beaches and resorts on the island.
This week (the 20th) we will be attending our first Mission Tour here on the island of Cebu. The tour will be attended by Elder Hainey of the Area Presidency. Elder Hainey hales from San Diego via Bountiful Utah. He attended Bountiful High and graduated in 1973.
Elder Hainey has served as a Bishop, Stake President and Area Authority prior to being called to the Seventy. He is an attorney by profession.
Thursdays meeting starting at 10AM for the missionaries from the islands of Negros and Siquijor.
At noon we took a break for lunch. The lunch was catered and quite good. There was one unique fruit they provided that caught Jenees curiosity.
After lunch and before we reconvened they had their traditional birthday celebration giving out birthday cards and a Snickers Bar.
The conference was spectacular and we all thought Elder Hainey did very well. He has only been a Seventy for a few months but very qualified and provided a top notch training session.
At 6 PM the Senior Missionaries attended a dinner (at 6 PM) hosted my President & Sister McCurdy at the mission home. After dinner we sat around the living room as Elder Hainey explained the development and calling of the Seventy which included stories of Elder Packer and Elder McConkie who were instrumental in reading and interpreting Section 107 of the D&C. After that Elder Hainey took questions which lasted until about 9:30PM. All in all it was a wonderful evening being with Senior Missionaries and listening to Elder Hainey's stories.
Friday at 10AM Sister Darby, Jenee and I headed out for Lamok to attend a YSA Convention that we got invited too three days ago. At first we were going to decline but Mary Ann our SR Manager was a bit disappointed in that decision so we rearranged our schedules to make this event. Even though we have been to this resort back in April we missed the turn off and had to backtrack to finally find the turn off. We arrived only to find that nothing was set up and that the event was one hour behind schedule. Elder Perez the Area Authority who was their devotional speaker prior to our presentation was there looking for the venue. We all finally found the spot and a discussion pursued as to time limits remaining. We all concluded we would just go forward with no delays.
After Elder Perez concluded we open the Self-Reliance portion of the conference. After a short scripture presentation by Sister Darby and Jenee we split into three groups for our individual presentations which would be 3-20 minute rotating sessions. Each of the three groups had a different activity built around Self-Reliance. I presented a brief introduction to the Self-Reliance Program and the optional program made available to them. We all had fun being with the YSA and the interaction was perfect. After that we gathered as a group to watch our closing musical video and shared testimonies. During the video we all sang, danced and the youth were waving their hands and clapping. You always wonder if you made an impression with the youth at these conferences but by the reaction of all the youth I think we could say we were a hit. After the closing prayer we were inundated by youth wanting to take pictures with us. We felt like celebrities being surrounded and having pictures and selfies taken. YES, even with the delays and concerns about time the three of us set out for home elated at the outcome we accomplished.
Sunday the 25th. We attended a My Path Devotional at the Pojo Ward on the island of Lapu-Lapu. We had approximately 35 candidates in attendance. The Ward & Stake SR Specialists (the Daclan Brothers) conducted the devotional which lasted approximately 1 hour and 40 minutes. There were a lot of questions to be answered and this time we spent more time in working with each group to instruct them as what to expect and to insure that the members were in the right group before moving forward. We ended up with two groups, one doing Education for Better Works and the other doing Starting My Own Business with a good number wanting to pursue PEF-TOF which I took some time explaining.
We meet a lot of great people who are moving in the right direction toward Self-Reliance. During the meeting we discovered three who are currently raising pigs (on a small scale) who are very interested in Organic Piggery Farming. We will plan a future meeting when we can go back to the island, visit their small operations and see how we can help them to grow.
Monday August 24th FAMILY HOME EVENING with the Temple and Family History Missionaries. Tonight we were invited to a members home for a good old fashion USA BBQ. Hamburgers and Hot Dogs with all the fixings. The members home was not far from the Temple Grounds but as usual you had to drive through the poverty to get to a small section where a few nicer homes were located.
We met to welcome two new couples who had just arrived to serve in the Cebu Temple. Elder and Sister Knorr from Arizona and Elder and Sister Scofield from Idaho. We knew the Knorr's were coming as Elder Knorr is the brother of our dear friend back home Kenton Knorr.
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| Elder Knorr & Sister Darby |
At 7:30 we cleaned up the patio then loaded up the vans and cars and made our way home. A good time was had by all.
Thursday August 27th we went to the temple to attend the 11AM endowment session. It is so nice to be this close to the temple approximately 2.5 miles. However with the horrific traffic here in Cebu it takes us almost 30 minutes to get to the temple.
After the session Jenee had to visit the Family History Center to pick up a package that the Knorrs brought over with them. I went to the Mission office to see if we had any mail. Sister Nelson gave me three letters one for Jenee, one for me, and one for Sister Darby all from the Missionary Medical Department informing us that our medical premiums were going up $5 in October. While there President McCurdy, from his office, saw me and waved to me with a piece of paper in his hands and called me into his office. When I entered he handed me the letter that was in his hand. HURRAY this was the letter from the Temple Department that we have been anxiously waiting for since August 12th giving approval for the three of us to serve as ordinance workers in the Cebu Temple one day a week.
Jenee and I happily thanked President McCurdy and immediately returned to the Temple to see if we could meet with the President and give him the good news. He was not in but his Counselor asked us to return in about one hour when the President would be in the temple. As we were walking out of the temple the President was entering. He stopped to greet us so we informed him of the good news. He was as excited as we were. He asked us which days we would be available and we indicated Wednesday or Thursdays. He said that he would look at the schedules on those two days and determine where we could best be utilized and would call us tomorrow to come in and get set apart. We are so excited to be back in the temple serving as ordinance workers here in the Cebu Temple. This will now be my 7th temple that I have served as an ordinance worker and it will be Jenee's 3rd.
This will certainly help is in filling our time during the week. Now we are waiting to see if President McCurcy and President Tanner will assign us a day to work with the full time missionaries if and where their might be a need. Everything seems to be falling in place - we are happy campers!
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