So I'm finally in the Philippines. It's pretty interesting. It's made me realize how much I have in the States. I miss the luxuries of life :) Today we went to the temple I love going because its a place to relax your mind for a couple of hours.
This morning we woke up at 4:30am to go play basketball with the district before it got too hot. But I am way tired now. I don't want to get up that early again, but my companions like to go. It's way good exercise. It's way hot here and I'm constantly sweating. It's some good times. If you couldn't tell by the pictures, I gained a ton in the MTC but its all good. I predict that I will sweat those off. haha...
We went to teach this woman who has a Catholic background. And on the way we passed by like 8 little kids and they all greeted us with "HELLO" and wanted to shake our hands. They were so cute they shook our hands and did the sign of respect by bringing our hands to their forehead. I do this thing called alom pulos where you poke the back of their heads and say alom pulos and they laugh or look up at you annoyed. Haha. Its fun our teacher in the MTC Brother Christensen taught us that game.
Elder Holley is in my district here. I am in the Talamban District. It's in the Cebu city zone. He was in my district in the MTC. its nice to have a familiar face around. In the city it's not too different you can still get a lot of American food and such and they have a mall. I would send pictures but I forgot my cord I will send them next week. The camera I got takes really good pictures. I am scared to use it though in public because my companions make me all paranoid but I guess you just have to be careful with your belongings here.
We live in this three-story house and the stairs are super narrow and the bottom floor we just use as a room for our shoes and a work our room then upstairs on the second level is the kitchen we have a toaster oven and a refrigerator and a hot pan a sink and that's about it. We also have a kitchen table and three chairs their all plastic. We have two wooden desks to do our studies on. On the third level we have the bathroom and a closet with pop up closets. Then we have the bedroom with two beds. We are in a threesome Sister Williams, Sister Ramos and me. Sister Ramos is my "mom". We have a mattress on the floor. Sister Williams is sleeping on until they get us a third bed sometime this week.
It's not too bad living here. The only problem I have is not being able to understand the language. It's so frustrating. I am studying and yet I still don't understand. I can remotely communicate ideas and wish I was fluent in this language. They speak super fast and super soft.
I thought I would get away from music and TV and such but actually they blast American music all day long outside with the bass and it always seems to be blaring during a lesson. They listen to all American music here mostly hip hop. The music I would listen to at home. It's hard not to listen when its blasting everywhere. They also watch American TV shows so when we are at a house usually members' houses they are watching TV.
I am trying not to be discouraged but the language is hard but besides that it's not too bad of a place.
Love you all!
Annika
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