Elder and Sister Whiting in the Philippines: Happy Pioneer Day!

Pioneer Day isn't even on the radar in the Philippines, and it's kind of sad. Elder Whiting remembers as a kid growing up in Charleston that it was the biggest day of the summer. Pioneer Day also seemed to signal the winding down of summer as our focus turned to back to school activities. We hope you will get to do a little celebrating and take some time to be grateful for our pioneer ancestors who sacrificed so much for the gospel's sake.

It's been another busy week. Tuesday we finished things up in the apartment in Cabanatuan, except we found a plumbing problem that the landlord needs to fix before the Dansie's come; which will be at the end of the week. Here's hoping. We had lunch, again, with both the Cabanatuan and Gapan Zone Leaders. We treat them to lunch, they choose the place.

Wednesday, we tagged along with Elders Fillmore and Lastierre to Dave and Fe Jensen, the less active brother and his nonmember wife, and we didn't get "punted" this time. It was a really good hour of teaching, and Elder Whiting got Dave to open up and share his thoughts about the gospel. The spark of testimony is still there, we hope we can help fan it back into a flame for Dave and ignite the flame in Fe.

Friday evening we had Sisters Evans, Gonzaga, Cutar, and Fosita over for dinner for the first time. Sister Gonzaga and Cutar, being Filipina, were worried there would be no rice. They were grateful that Sister Whiting had fixed rice. They are very good, obedient missionaries and were out the door on time to go to work after dinner.

We made two trips to Angeles to drop off and pick up orientation manuals for binding. When we went to pick them up yesterday, they weren't quite ready, so we took the opportunity to walk through a big Catholic church just up the street. In the process, we stumbled onto some local World War II history. Apparently in 1945, during the battle to retake Clark Field, a B25 was hit by flak and crashed into the church, killing the entire crew, and nearly taking out a Japanese unit camped there. The church has a plaque inside with the history of the event and the names of the crew members who perished. At the bottom, is a thank you to the Americans from the Filipinos for helping to drive out the Japanese. It was a pretty cool discovery.

Yesterday, before and after our trip to Angeles, we attended two baptisms. In the morning, we attended the baptism of a 60 year old sister the Assistants taught, and in the evening we attended the baptism of a 16 year old brother Sisters Evans and Gonzaga had taught. We love attending baptisms because of the abundance of the Spirit that is always there.

We had a couple of really strange experiences this week. Even though we are in the city, there are chickens and pigs and cows and goats roaming free everywhere. Going right through the middle of town is MacArthur Highway, a four lane busy road filled with big trucks and buses as well and the usual cars, trikes, and jeepneys. One night last week, traffic was stopped so a cow and her calf could cross the highway. Only in the Philippines.

There are many things the Filipinos do that we just don't get. There are so many cumbersome requirements and regulations that it takes forever to complete even simple tasks. Something as simple as parking in the mall parking garage is an example. We don't even know how to describe what happened to us the other night at the mall, because we are still not sure what happened. There is only one entrance and one exit to the parking garage, so there is no way you can sneak in or out. Upon entering the garage, security guards put an orange cone in front of your car to stop you so they can "search" it, looking with mirrors at the undercarriage and checking the trunk. Then you pay 15 pesos to get in and get a receipt with your license plate number on it. On the way out, they put another orange cone in front of your car and you must surrender the receipt to a different guard and he checks to see if the receipt belongs to the car. Huh? Why do they care? They got their 15 pesos! Well, on Thursday night, the parking attendant wrote our license plate number down wrong, so when we tried to leave they wouldn't let us. You would have thought we had robbed the joint! They pulled us over, detained us, and asked for Elder Whiting's drivers license and car registration--and we don't know why, or what they are going to do with/to us. Fortunately some Filipino members happened by and helped us out. Even though the security guards look official in their uniforms, they are not the police, just mall cops who wear holsters with no guns in them. We don't even know if they had any authority to detain us. If you don't understand what we are trying to describe, don't feel bad, we don't understand it either. The only conclusion we can come to is that it has something to do with the general lack of honesty in this society.

Today we attended the Dapdap Branch, one of our favorite places to attend. The upcoming week looks busy, then it will be transfers again, then zone conferences. It is time for Sister Whiting to order the October batch's travel, and for Elder Whiting to prepare September's rent checks. We will welcome Elder and Sister Dansie to the mission this week as well. Then July will be over with and we will have been in the mission 11 months.

We leave you with this quote from President Thomas S. Monson in the July Liahona:
"To be Latter-day Saint is to be a pioneer ... The path of a pioneer is not easy, but we follow in the footsteps of the ultimate pioneer--even the Savior--who went before, showing us the way to follow."

Mahal Kita,
Elder and Sister Whiting