Oct. 10, 2022 Week #2: Arrival in the Philippines

- October 19, 2022

Dear Family and Friends,

I was going to send you a long email of all our activities but it has taken this rookie 2 hours to try and get a list of email recipients. This would not allow me to import my file of contacts from my old book of contacts. After trying several different things I finally gave up and just created all new cards for you in this gmail account. Oh baby!!

We have had a busy second week on our mission. We had a lot of training at the MTC in Provo on Humanitarian Aid. It was like trying to drink from a firehose. It was all really good but real overload. The presenters were all excellent, going at a good pace with things so we could understand it all, but no way could we begin to retain it all. We have a flash drive with all the info on it. I don't know when we will ever have time to look back at the flashdrive. I'm sure when we get to our apartment, with the Huskinson's gone, the people we are replacing, and we then don't have a clue what we are doing, we will then pull out the flash drive and try to figure it out.

On Wednesday evening we had a break at the MTC and had a chance, so we took it, to go out to dinner with one of my Alaska missionary buddies, Dave Clark and his lovely wife Lisa. They live close to Heritage halls in Provo. We had a great time. I, we, have stopped a few times as we have been to Provo to see Livi and Tessa. It is always good to see them.

We finished up at the MTC on Thursday at noon and did our laundry there. Soon after, Livi and Tessa and babies made it down here to join us at the Creamery for kids meals. It was great as always, except they didn't have any Bishops Bash ice cream. That is my #1. I was mad but tried not to cry in front of everyone. We then went to our motel, we stayed the first week at the MTC, but the second week they kicked us out and had us stay at a motel. They had to make room for all the new senior missionaries coming in. Clyda ironed my shirts, and we finished up some things, then went back up to campus and took a two hour walk about campus. We dropped in on Nathan, our nephew, at the Richards building. He is in charge of the Young Ambassadors. They were busy practicing and that was fun to watch. We had a great stroll around campus on a nice path about half way between the bottom of campus and upper campus, through the trees. It was wonderful.

We went out to dinner with the girls and their babies and then they headed for Marlene's to spend the night. We went to bed early and got up at 2:30 a.m. to catch a 3:15 shuttle to the airport. At the airport we ran into Emmie Barnes, she is a girl I coached in high school. She is playing basketball for Snow College. They were on their way to Denver to play in a pre-season jamboree. It was fun to see her at 5:00 a.m. in the airport.

We flew to Seattle, had a two hour lay over, flew to Seoul (a 12 hour flight), had a four hour lay over, then flew to Manila (a 4 hour flight). We have been here since late Saturday night. We are fourteen hours ahead of you. It is now 7:00 p.m. on Monday night for us, and 5:00 a.m. Monday morning for you. We have been in a training all day here. We have another day tomorrow and then head to Cebu on Wednesday. Our training was right by the Manila temple and Manila MTC. We have made so many connections these past two weeks. Today we met James Teichert's first mission president. When he saw our nametags he was excited to hear about James. It was fun to brag James up, but with every bit of bragging we did, he one upped us with a brag of James as a missionary. That was fun. He loved James. The mission president was President Reeder, from Perry, Utah. He is now back here as a church liason between all the missionaries and church headquarters back in Utah. (some kind of responsibility like that, but don't quote me on it, my head is still spinning from all the info today)

We are struggling a little getting our time clocks adjusted. We are awake at night and sleeping during the presentations during the day. I'm sure we will get adjusted soon.

This is a great work. If we are able to do any good over here, then you can all rest assured that our God is a God of miracles. All we are going on right now is we know this is His work and we get a great chance to be a small part of it. Hopefully we will soon know what we are doing so we can become a part of something great. We want to serve in some small way.

With love,

Dad and Mom

Grandpa and Grandma

Briant and Clyda

P.S. Aren't you glad I didn't send you a long email.