Letter From Ryan #9 04.14.14

WHATS UP WORLD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This week was definitely another learning experience. I’m finally starting to follow the conversations in lessons and participating more and actually teaching. This week I fell in love.... ha-ha No, but I did, it’s with this family and THEY ARE SO AWESOME!!!! Just for the record Philippino children are absolutely the cutest things in the world. On Friday we had our English class and we printed out about 200 fliers.  We were giving them to everyone.  We went around this one corner and these kids were playing basketball and then the ball bounced to me.  I thought this is my opportunity to totally show these kids what an American can do.  Because kids always make fun of Americans here, for whatever reason.  So, I grabbed the ball and only having one hand to shoot because I had fliers in my other hand. I grabbed the ball and shot it. “Swish”, they gave me the ball again and I made it five more times! When I missed it, they were all shocked, we gave them fliers and they said they would come. Before the class we bought snacks and stuff for everyone.  The class started at 5 and so five comes around.... no one comes....5:30, still no one. Then 5:45 and a sister from the branch came. Since it was just her we couldn’t teach her because we can’t be alone with her. We gave her some snacks and then she left.  Don’t worry; we'll turn this area around!

One thing about the area is that it’s so big. The members are so poor and they can’t afford to come to church.  It’s not because they don’t want to but they can’t afford it. The members here are so awesome. They love the gospel and church so much but sometimes they don’t have the means of getting to church. This week we went to visit a member, his family is super poor, we walked into the house and they had no lights.  They pulled out a candle so we could read scriptures. Honestly, it was probably the coolest thing ever! I couldn’t understand really what they were talking about at all but it was still probably one my favorite lessons.

This week is called Holy Week here in the Philippines.  I guess it gets pretty crazy here so we'll see what happens. Yesterday was the Manny Paqueo fight... THEY ABSOLUTELY WORSHIP HIM HERE! His fights are like the super bowl here, the entire country shuts down to watch him

One thing that has happened since I got here is that.... my appetite has returned... Like the bottomless pit .... ever since they gave us bikes.......I don’t think I’ve ever eaten so much rice in my life.  We found this little bakery here.... it is AMAZING! Everything here is super cheap.  You could eat like a king for 5 dollars. They have these little donuts, and they cost 2 pesos each, which is one cent in U.S... for one U.S. dollar you can buy about 45 donuts...... all I will say on the matter is that the ladies that own the bakery know us very well now!  haha.

I love you all so much.  Until next week.   EAT AT JOLLIBEE!  There is one in Sacramento. Every time we have to travel anywhere we always eat there. It’s like the McDonalds here but it’s so good. Get the C7, so GOOD, but love you all so much. The weight I gained at the MTC is lost.

 Love you all!!  Your Elder Hernandez