Great question, Mom, about the Christmas package. My pants are going to need replacing soon so I could use some money for that, as well as a new towel and a couple other things. Other than that... Chocolate is always a favorite of Filipinos since there is not any good chocolate here. It's always a blast to share that with them. I definitely want some more pictures of you guys, and maybe a stick or 2 of Old Spice: Swagger deodorant. There are some more cool souvenir things here in my new area too so a little spending money would be awesome so I can get all of you some Christmas presents too!
We baptized Mike Acero last week, right before I transferred. It was a great service. Lots of people showed up and showed support. We combined it with a couple of children of record. (Children that are getting baptized whose parents are already members of the church.) I'm attaching some pictures. Mike is the younger man and the older man is Bro. Sandoval, who baptized the children. It's funny here because every single person who puts on the baptism jumpsuit comes out of the bathroom making ninja noises. Filipinos are such children at heart, and even the older ones crack a joke or too about being promoted to black belt at the next baptism. So that is the reason for the ninja picture.
SO! Toledo Zone! First, being a Zone Leader is awesome. This is my favorite calling by far. Our zone is great. It is filled with really good missionaries who are all doing amazing work. We are seeing tons of success in this Zone. We got to interview a couple of the District Leader's baptismal candidates on Saturday, who were then baptized later that day. We also went to ZLC (Zone Leader Council) yesterday in Cebu City. All the Zone Leaders from the mission meet once a month with President Schmutz to receive instruction, and discuss the zones and needs of the mission. We also get fed a home cooked meal from Sister Schmutz, which was real Italian spaghetti, garlic bread, and cake and ice cream. SO AMAZING... You don't know how blessed you are to eat real food every day over there in America. I had forgotten how good real food tastes! Tomorrow we are holding Zone Training where we will relay information and teach our zone the things we learned and discussed in ZLC. I love teaching workshops so I'm very much looking forward to that tomorrow. We also have Leadership training in the CIty again next Friday. Elder Barcellano and I are also in charge of keeping everyone safe and happy in our zone, which means we buy them new household utilities when they need them, reimburse expenses, and travel to different areas to conduct exchanges and interviews when they are needed. The life of a Zone Leader is super busy, but it is such a great satisfaction to get to work with and help so many missionaries.
So like I said, my companion is Elder Barcellano, from Bicol, Philippines. He is in my batch to go home so we are at the same point in our mission. We were in the same district back in Pilar, so it is cool to be with him again. We are assigned in Toledo 1 which is bukid again, but it is more city-ish than any other area I've been assigned in before, so that's cool. We have a mall near us and we always have rides to our appointments whenever we need them. We also live literally 4 steps away from a carenaria (eatery) so we never have to cook. We just open the front door, sit down, and eat, then go back in for studies or head of to work again. No cooking is awesome, because it opens up more free time in the mornings to study. Our house is also AMAZING. We live with two other Elders, Elder Verano and Elder Rose. We have an air conditioner, and hot water. What? Yeah, you heard right. So awesome.
I'll have more news on the work here next week. It's been a pretty busy last week, full of meetings and whatnot. Good luck to all the girls in school!
I love you!
Elder Garver
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