Week 17, Sapang Palay, Philippines

Hey Family!

So transfers are tomorrow and yesterday we found out who's staying and who's going! So I'm staying here and Aue will be leaving and my new companion will be Elder Balili (He's Filipino). So tomorrow Elder Balili he'll arrive and Aue will leave so next p-day I'll send some photo's :D

So I'm extremely excited, sad and nervous ahahaha. So Sad that Aue is leaving :( Excited that I have a Filipino Companion and nervous because he won't speak much english and I now have to lead in the area, so that's knowing where everyone is, knowing who to see each day and stuff like that!

So I'm really excited that he's Filipino as he'll be able to help me with my Tagalog a lot more than a foreigner. So my plan is for when he's around is Tagalog out in the field, during weekly planning and during comp study then the rest in English (so pretty much breakfast lunch and dinner). So hopefully he'll be able to teach me a lot when I'm with him :)

Today we went bowling, sorry no action shots but it was only AMF bowling anyway :) We went to this cool as burger place where aue tried to do this burger challenge! It wqas a 2 pound burger and 300g of fries, if he could down it in 10min it was free. He only got through the burger before time was up and then he went and threw up hahaha

Sorry for the lack of photo's i actually lost my charger cable so i can charge my camera until I buy a new one which will probs be next week tuesday but i can upload by taking out the sd card :)

Here's Dad's 3 Questions too

1. What does it mean to you to be a good companion?

Being a good companion is recognizing your comps flaws and then filing them or helping them to fill them, a lot of people will just recognize a flaw or weakness in someone but a good comp will try their best to fill it. So it might sound a little weird or even hard to understand but every person has a weakness and your job as their comp is to help strengthen that weakness into a strength, which will in turn form a strong unity between you and your comp. And strong unity is key in success, as we've been called to teach in 2's

2. How does the Lord direct you day to day?

I guess the Spirit is key in that, as in it's all through the spirit. So in DC 50 is the scripture that bases the entire PMG off (the title is in verse 14). In there is talks about the spirit being the only way to preach the gospel. As a missionary it's key not only in a lesson but at all other times of the day. Literately everything is down by the spirit, we actually don't really do much, it's all given to us through the spirit, that's why its best to be obedient so that you get the spirit.

3. What tender mercies have you been blessed with this week?

I think i would say my language, this week I received an ultimate compliment from Elder Baylosis (Filipino) when he said that he really liked my accent when I speak Tagalog saying it sounds much better than most Americans. It was a really cool thing to hear as accent is something I've been working on for a while. So i guess the way the language has been explained to be by Filipinos is that they say words slowly but join them together i guess, in other words, it sounds like their words don't stop or start. And these last weeks I've noticed that I am more able to speak more like natives do, obviously I'm not close to perfect but I am improving daily :D

So love you all and hope you guys have an awesome week!!

Love Elder Holzworth

Week 16, Sapang Palay, Philippines

Hey everyone!

So next week is transfers which means that Elder Aue will most likely get a transfer as he's been out in the mission for a year and this is only his 2nd area so he's been here a while. However I could transfer too but it's not likely but I guess we'll find out :)

Anyway, Skyping was really awesome!!! It went really really quick for me! It was really good to see and hear you guys!!! Even though time has passed really quick for me it does feel like it's been ages since hearing you guys.

Our plan for this week is tons of FHE's, it's a ward goal and seeing that Aue will probs leave he kinda wants to say goodbye to all the families as well, but right now we 5 set up for this week! Some are even at LA's houses.

Also I'm gonna try and talk to Sister Bertin (the Mission Presidents wife) about getting a Skype call set up for Emma's Mission Call opening too which should hopefully be all goods to do :)

Also I think I might try to set a package to send home with some cool souvenirs as well!! Plus I'll send home my SD card as well so that you can watch all the Video's that I've taken as well, like me eating Balut :)

So mostly likely next email I'll know who my next companion will be :)

Dad's Q's

1. What are some of your goals?

Always to be more obedient, you can never be perfectly but I'm always striving to be "Exactly Obedient" D&C 130:21 Blessings are through obedience. And another goal is to be able to talk more tagalog by transferring all that I say in English into tagalog, so both conversation tagalog and  gospel as well. So hopefully that'll help drive my tagalog skills up :)

2. How is the heat there and does it impact you?

It's really hot over here all year round but it kinda the same as Australia except they don't have A/C and we wear collared shirts and long pants :(

But is doesn't effect us too much, we just need to drink lots of water to keep hydrated. Some days it does get really bad and it's kinda hard to think but it's all good :)

3. How has the Lord blessed you this week?

It's the obvious one but the Skype Call! It was a huge blessing to hear from you guys at home and to talk with you! 

Anyway that's all for this week! Hope you all have a great week!

Week 15, Sapang Palay, Philippines

Sorry about the late email :( Yesterday was temple p-day and we got home later than expected so no emails until now :) but I don't have too much time to email to this will be short.

Temple P-day was crazy it takes us around 3.5hrs of travel to get there from were we are. But the temple session was really great, so the travel is definitely worth it. We get to go to the temple about every 3 months.

This week was Aue's Birthday too but it was on fast Sunday which was really sad but we got to go to a members house and we had a celebration for him there. We had whats called Budo Fight basically there is a table full of food and everyone fights for food. hahaha it's fun :)

This is all for now but I'll talk to you all on Mother's Day

So 6pm Brisbane time (4pm over here in the Philippines)

I love you all, 

kita-kits tayo sa Mother's Day