25 June 2023 Week #39: Another Project Passed and Grandbaby #23!!!!
Dear Family and Friends,
We spent the week here in Cebu, so we had a good week of exercise. Each morning was beautiful. We had quite a bit of rain this week but no rain while we walked. Things had begun looking kind of dry during April and May. During those months there wasn’t much rain, only a few mean thunderstorms. Now it seems to rain some every day or night. We supposedly have entered the rainy season. Also, the longest day of the year north of the Tropic of Cancer (23.5 degrees north latitude) is June 21st. I wonder if it is the longest day at 10 degrees north latitude. Do any of you know? The sun set here on June 21st at 6:08 p.m. I’m anxious to see what time it sets on about August 10th when it should be back straight overhead here. “…yea, even the earth, and all things that are upon the face of it, yea, and its motion, yea, and also all the planets which move in their regular form do witness that there is a Supreme Creator.” Alma 30:44
On Monday Clyda did a great job of presenting “My Bonita Home for Girls, Inc.” to our group again, HCM (Humanitarian Coordination Meeting). This time it passed our group and passed the Head Group, WSRC (Welfare and Self Reliance Committee) on Friday. So, it is a go! This project is to help a home for sexually abused girls ages from 12-23. The home can only house so many. It currently has 65 girls. It is run by Catholics with nuns. However, the program coordinator is LDS. The girls live in a dorm type building with a cafeteria. They are bussed off the mountain each day to school. Some are in college. They are watched as they get off the bus and enter the schools and then return to the bus after school to go home. All schools here have fences and gates around them with guards. Sad to say but most of these girls have been abused by relatives. Several counselors work with the girls. One counselor is LDS. They have 5-6 because there are a lot of girls with a lot of problems. The need here is to graduate some of these girls each year to leave the home and go out on their own without returning to their homes. So, they need to learn how to live independently. We are providing materials for the remodeling of a couple rooms in this huge building for a dorm room with 6 sets of bunkbeds to sleep 12 girls, with a CR (bathroom), (I am using the term bathroom loosely, a toilet and a shower, no room for anything else). Then another room is being furnished with a stove/oven, refrigerator, pots and pans, and the other things for learning how to cook. The girls will learn how to manage a budget, plan meals, shop, cook, clean, get along with roommates, etc. The room will be kind of a kitchen/dining/living room all in one. The dining table will be two tables put together so 12 can sit around it and eat. Then they can pull them apart for studying, playing card or board games, etc. There will be some other study tables against the walls also. The girls will need to pass off a set of skills, attitudes, and behaviors to graduate. Hopefully they can then join society, keep jobs, keep a place to live, and move on in life. This along with the solar project one at the Tres Reyes Elementary have been our two favorite projects.
All these projects must be entered into a system called CHAS, for Salt Lake to see. It takes quite a bit of time to enter names of everyone involved, their contact info, etc. We also must enter objectives and measurable outcomes for each project. It is like doing lesson plans all over again. Needless to say, I’m not real big on still having to do that kind of stuff.
Monday afternoon was a playday. Elder and Sister Strong from American Fork have completed their 18 months on Bohol as Member Leadership Support missionaries. We have gotten to know them quite well. They lived in Calape where we have a FAITH garden project. They worked with the Calape District. The Ubay Branch is in that district. The Strongs have spent time with us out on Tres Reyes and, with the financial support of their ward back home, paid for the construction of the outdoor covered stage for elementary performances and gatherings (shown in a picture last week).
We met at 1:00 at the patron housing with all our Senior FHE group from the Cebu and Cebu East Missions. Three single ladies and seven couples. We headed for the hills, went to Lake View Gardens, and then went to Top of Cebu for dinner. It was a good time and a good send off for the Strongs. Another couple will replace them in Bohol. Two couples come to the Cebu East Mission on July 12th. One couple comes to the Cebu Mission on that date also, and then another couple comes at the end of August. All four of these couples will be MLS (Member Leadership Support) missionaries.
On Tuesday we spent the day in the office. At 2:00 we headed to another school site where another group of youth volunteers from the U.S. are here for two weeks helping Rise and Rebuild build a nutrition site. We made it home through a lot of traffic in time for Clyda to make a delicious dinner for the sister missionaries. We only have one in our area right now, Sister Ramos, who was with the Oprra sisters. So, we had the Apas sisters over, Sister Simmons from Park City and her new companion Sister Valesquez. Transfers are happening and the Cebu Mission is giving up Escalante Stake to the Bacolod Mission on the 28th. So, while some missionaries have arrived, and some have gone home we are waiting for the 28th to include the 20 missionaries from Escalante into the rest of the mission. There are a lot of threesomes going on right now. The other trick is finding about 5-10 new places for the new missionaries to live. That is always a tough problem.
On Wednesday we spent a good share of the day on Teams (zoom) meetings with our counter parts in Manila. We chose not to go up this month for the monthly meeting. Elder Hayne did a good job of instructing us on some new protocol which will hopefully help us get things through purchasing sooner. We had some down time to work on our own projects. We had 3 trainings in the morning and one in the afternoon. Brother Kenneth Lee, one of our supervisors, did one training. Elder Hayne did one and Elder Slaugh did one on writing the legal documents, DOD (deed of donation) or the MOA (memorandum of agreement). I hate doing those. I wasn’t cut out to be a lawyer. Thank goodness 90% of each document is already done for us and we just have to enter the agreements we make with the other parties involved. Every project has to have a written DOD or MOA.
During one break we decided to enter some finances. We already knew we were in trouble because we had spent too much money on fabric. Now we had to enter our travel and motel rooms for us and the Harrisons while we were doing the Tres Reyes project. We had just paid for it with our cash, because we knew we couldn’t get more money from the bank yet. Well, we entered the receipts and ran into trouble. Everything is paid, although with our money. We just figured we could then draw the money out after a month and reimburse ourselves, because we are allowed so much per month. Well, it doesn’t exactly work that way. We are now non-compliant and in trouble. It is a good thing I have Clyda’s passport hid or she would have caught the next plane home. It was a tough evening. And we still aren’t out of the doghouse.
On Thursday we headed to Carcar to visit about a member focused initiative project helping a member with a chicken project. He lost all his chickens and coops when Typhoon Odette hit. He will get the first 2 batches of chickens raised and sold. He then will become the champion of a MWP (member welfare project) and help 11 other families start chicken projects.
After that we headed to Minglanilla to visit with a ward about a water project. Fifteen families need help getting water for their homes. They ask, “What can you do to help us?” I say, “Call the plumber.” I haven’t got a clue. This would be like me taking one of these Filipinos to Wyoming and having them head out on our range and brand a bunch of calves. Good luck with that one. I’m as helpless as a fish out of water. But, we will come up with something.
Friday was great as Clyda’s “My Bonita” was passed by the WSRC. We celebrated and had a Snickers! We have spent most of the last two days trying to get information entered as we are working on a project for a fire station and more schools. More requests keep coming in and it is a chore just trying to keep them all organized, and letters written saying contact us again in December because we are booked. Our bosses are coming down to take us to two more places on Tuesday. I’m interested in both of these, but pretty sure after our visit and all of it being spoken in Cebuano that I will be clueless about how we will work with them. These are two organizations we can partner with to help people. One is called Shelter Box and the other is the Department of Social Welfare and Development. We will see how it goes. I have read online about Shelter Box. They do some pretty cool things in emergencies helping people.
Today, Saturday, we took the Koyles and the Taylors to the open market in the parking lot at Marco Polo (a fancy motel up in the mountain a ways) to shop for vegetables. We got some good produce. The Koyles had told us about it. They found out about it from some of their temple cohorts. It was a good find. We then went to the office and worked on our monthly power point report. Then we went on a Habal Habal ride to Ayala Mall to price back-to-school materials, like notebooks, crayons, etc. for K-3. We want to do a project like that for last mile schools in August before school begins. We will see how that goes. The reason for the Habal Habal ride was because our date for the month in our packet of monthly dates given to us by Tessa was to go on an enjoyable bike ride. Well, since we don’t have bikes (Tessa didn’t know we would be here in the Philippines when she gave us the packet two years ago for Christmas, this is our second time around) we did the next best thing and took a motor bike ride. We stopped in at the Dairy Queen in the mall and had Chocolate Extreme and Chocolate KitKat Blizzards. They were delightful!! I am addicted to ice cream and chocolate. While devouring this wonderful treat I had a brain freeze, a good thing. Clyda didn’t, so I’m worrying about her.
As we visit with the Taylors and the Koyles, they and we are so impressed with people throughout the Philippines who have accepted the gospel and make great sacrifices to get to the temple. They see a few people each week that journey here to the temple all by themselves. They have no escort. They travel far and come alone to receive their endowment. Many are youth who are getting ready to go on missions and have no family support. Some are older and have joined without a spouse joining or they are single. They are impressed with each story. In the session the other day there were two young ladies sitting together. One was the escort and one receiving their endowment. Afterwards in the locker room Clyda visited with them. They are twin sisters. The one joined a couple years before the other. They both still look like they are 15 years old. Amazing! Impressive!
It has been a wonderful Sabbath Day. The Sacrament speakers spoke about goals. One young lady who has a mission call to the Cavite Mission spoke using real good English. Sister Ramos then spoke about the same topic. Then an older gentleman, our Habal Habal driver, Brother Pedroza, also spoke, but he spoke in Cebuano so we don’t know what he said.
A few highlights of the week. 1-All the interactions with our children. 2-The successful Ride for Clyde Rodeo with the proceeds going to help the Lane Skinner family as their 3-year-old is having cancer treatments. Thanks for all who helped Olivia and Tre with that huge undertaking. 3-Casey and Tami and their crew taking Chad and Susie with them fishing on Leigh Lake north of Jackson. They sent a lot of pictures, and it looked like a beautiful day. Everyone caught fish, so that made it even better and I understand Susie is now ready to start competition fishing because she reeled in so many. Thanks to the Parry family for taking Chad and Susie.
4-GRAND BABY #23 ARRIVED SAFELY TO TESSA AND JUSTIN. All are well and we are excited. I really have to keep that passport hid now!! While in the Celestial Room on Friday Clyda commented on how Jenna June has now crossed the veil to this side. What a great blessing to know and understand pre-mortal life, earth life, and life after death. We are extremely grateful for our Savior Jesus Christ. He made Heavenly Father’s plan of agency for all become possible for us here on earth. May we choose to use that agency appropriately and follow the plan. “Holy Habits” and “Righteous Routines”. Thanks for all of you for “Lifting Where You Stand.” We appreciate your examples and it keeps us going.
With love,
Dad and Mom
Grandpa and Grandma
Briant and Clyda
Week #39 6/19-6/25
We spent the week here in Cebu, so we had a good week of exercise. Each morning was beautiful. We had quite a bit of rain this week but no rain while we walked. Things had begun looking kind of dry during April and May. During those months there wasn’t much rain, only a few mean thunderstorms. Now it seems to rain some every day or night. We supposedly have entered the rainy season. Also, the longest day of the year north of the Tropic of Cancer (23.5 degrees north latitude) is June 21st. I wonder if it is the longest day at 10 degrees north latitude. Do any of you know? The sun set here on June 21st at 6:08 p.m. I’m anxious to see what time it sets on about August 10th when it should be back straight overhead here. “…yea, even the earth, and all things that are upon the face of it, yea, and its motion, yea, and also all the planets which move in their regular form do witness that there is a Supreme Creator.” Alma 30:44
On Monday Clyda did a great job of presenting “My Bonita Home for Girls, Inc.” to our group again, HCM (Humanitarian Coordination Meeting). This time it passed our group and passed the Head Group, WSRC (Welfare and Self Reliance Committee) on Friday. So, it is a go! This project is to help a home for sexually abused girls ages from 12-23. The home can only house so many. It currently has 65 girls. It is run by Catholics with nuns. However, the program coordinator is LDS. The girls live in a dorm type building with a cafeteria. They are bussed off the mountain each day to school. Some are in college. They are watched as they get off the bus and enter the schools and then return to the bus after school to go home. All schools here have fences and gates around them with guards. Sad to say but most of these girls have been abused by relatives. Several counselors work with the girls. One counselor is LDS. They have 5-6 because there are a lot of girls with a lot of problems. The need here is to graduate some of these girls each year to leave the home and go out on their own without returning to their homes. So, they need to learn how to live independently. We are providing materials for the remodeling of a couple rooms in this huge building for a dorm room with 6 sets of bunkbeds to sleep 12 girls, with a CR (bathroom), (I am using the term bathroom loosely, a toilet and a shower, no room for anything else). Then another room is being furnished with a stove/oven, refrigerator, pots and pans, and the other things for learning how to cook. The girls will learn how to manage a budget, plan meals, shop, cook, clean, get along with roommates, etc. The room will be kind of a kitchen/dining/living room all in one. The dining table will be two tables put together so 12 can sit around it and eat. Then they can pull them apart for studying, playing card or board games, etc. There will be some other study tables against the walls also. The girls will need to pass off a set of skills, attitudes, and behaviors to graduate. Hopefully they can then join society, keep jobs, keep a place to live, and move on in life. This along with the solar project one at the Tres Reyes Elementary have been our two favorite projects.
All these projects must be entered into a system called CHAS, for Salt Lake to see. It takes quite a bit of time to enter names of everyone involved, their contact info, etc. We also must enter objectives and measurable outcomes for each project. It is like doing lesson plans all over again. Needless to say, I’m not real big on still having to do that kind of stuff.
Monday afternoon was a playday. Elder and Sister Strong from American Fork have completed their 18 months on Bohol as Member Leadership Support missionaries. We have gotten to know them quite well. They lived in Calape where we have a FAITH garden project. They worked with the Calape District. The Ubay Branch is in that district. The Strongs have spent time with us out on Tres Reyes and, with the financial support of their ward back home, paid for the construction of the outdoor covered stage for elementary performances and gatherings (shown in a picture last week).
We met at 1:00 at the patron housing with all our Senior FHE group from the Cebu and Cebu East Missions. Three single ladies and seven couples. We headed for the hills, went to Lake View Gardens, and then went to Top of Cebu for dinner. It was a good time and a good send off for the Strongs. Another couple will replace them in Bohol. Two couples come to the Cebu East Mission on July 12th. One couple comes to the Cebu Mission on that date also, and then another couple comes at the end of August. All four of these couples will be MLS (Member Leadership Support) missionaries.
On Tuesday we spent the day in the office. At 2:00 we headed to another school site where another group of youth volunteers from the U.S. are here for two weeks helping Rise and Rebuild build a nutrition site. We made it home through a lot of traffic in time for Clyda to make a delicious dinner for the sister missionaries. We only have one in our area right now, Sister Ramos, who was with the Oprra sisters. So, we had the Apas sisters over, Sister Simmons from Park City and her new companion Sister Valesquez. Transfers are happening and the Cebu Mission is giving up Escalante Stake to the Bacolod Mission on the 28th. So, while some missionaries have arrived, and some have gone home we are waiting for the 28th to include the 20 missionaries from Escalante into the rest of the mission. There are a lot of threesomes going on right now. The other trick is finding about 5-10 new places for the new missionaries to live. That is always a tough problem.
On Wednesday we spent a good share of the day on Teams (zoom) meetings with our counter parts in Manila. We chose not to go up this month for the monthly meeting. Elder Hayne did a good job of instructing us on some new protocol which will hopefully help us get things through purchasing sooner. We had some down time to work on our own projects. We had 3 trainings in the morning and one in the afternoon. Brother Kenneth Lee, one of our supervisors, did one training. Elder Hayne did one and Elder Slaugh did one on writing the legal documents, DOD (deed of donation) or the MOA (memorandum of agreement). I hate doing those. I wasn’t cut out to be a lawyer. Thank goodness 90% of each document is already done for us and we just have to enter the agreements we make with the other parties involved. Every project has to have a written DOD or MOA.
During one break we decided to enter some finances. We already knew we were in trouble because we had spent too much money on fabric. Now we had to enter our travel and motel rooms for us and the Harrisons while we were doing the Tres Reyes project. We had just paid for it with our cash, because we knew we couldn’t get more money from the bank yet. Well, we entered the receipts and ran into trouble. Everything is paid, although with our money. We just figured we could then draw the money out after a month and reimburse ourselves, because we are allowed so much per month. Well, it doesn’t exactly work that way. We are now non-compliant and in trouble. It is a good thing I have Clyda’s passport hid or she would have caught the next plane home. It was a tough evening. And we still aren’t out of the doghouse.
On Thursday we headed to Carcar to visit about a member focused initiative project helping a member with a chicken project. He lost all his chickens and coops when Typhoon Odette hit. He will get the first 2 batches of chickens raised and sold. He then will become the champion of a MWP (member welfare project) and help 11 other families start chicken projects.
After that we headed to Minglanilla to visit with a ward about a water project. Fifteen families need help getting water for their homes. They ask, “What can you do to help us?” I say, “Call the plumber.” I haven’t got a clue. This would be like me taking one of these Filipinos to Wyoming and having them head out on our range and brand a bunch of calves. Good luck with that one. I’m as helpless as a fish out of water. But, we will come up with something.
Friday was great as Clyda’s “My Bonita” was passed by the WSRC. We celebrated and had a Snickers! We have spent most of the last two days trying to get information entered as we are working on a project for a fire station and more schools. More requests keep coming in and it is a chore just trying to keep them all organized, and letters written saying contact us again in December because we are booked. Our bosses are coming down to take us to two more places on Tuesday. I’m interested in both of these, but pretty sure after our visit and all of it being spoken in Cebuano that I will be clueless about how we will work with them. These are two organizations we can partner with to help people. One is called Shelter Box and the other is the Department of Social Welfare and Development. We will see how it goes. I have read online about Shelter Box. They do some pretty cool things in emergencies helping people.
Today, Saturday, we took the Koyles and the Taylors to the open market in the parking lot at Marco Polo (a fancy motel up in the mountain a ways) to shop for vegetables. We got some good produce. The Koyles had told us about it. They found out about it from some of their temple cohorts. It was a good find. We then went to the office and worked on our monthly power point report. Then we went on a Habal Habal ride to Ayala Mall to price back-to-school materials, like notebooks, crayons, etc. for K-3. We want to do a project like that for last mile schools in August before school begins. We will see how that goes. The reason for the Habal Habal ride was because our date for the month in our packet of monthly dates given to us by Tessa was to go on an enjoyable bike ride. Well, since we don’t have bikes (Tessa didn’t know we would be here in the Philippines when she gave us the packet two years ago for Christmas, this is our second time around) we did the next best thing and took a motor bike ride. We stopped in at the Dairy Queen in the mall and had Chocolate Extreme and Chocolate KitKat Blizzards. They were delightful!! I am addicted to ice cream and chocolate. While devouring this wonderful treat I had a brain freeze, a good thing. Clyda didn’t, so I’m worrying about her.
As we visit with the Taylors and the Koyles, they and we are so impressed with people throughout the Philippines who have accepted the gospel and make great sacrifices to get to the temple. They see a few people each week that journey here to the temple all by themselves. They have no escort. They travel far and come alone to receive their endowment. Many are youth who are getting ready to go on missions and have no family support. Some are older and have joined without a spouse joining or they are single. They are impressed with each story. In the session the other day there were two young ladies sitting together. One was the escort and one receiving their endowment. Afterwards in the locker room Clyda visited with them. They are twin sisters. The one joined a couple years before the other. They both still look like they are 15 years old. Amazing! Impressive!
It has been a wonderful Sabbath Day. The Sacrament speakers spoke about goals. One young lady who has a mission call to the Cavite Mission spoke using real good English. Sister Ramos then spoke about the same topic. Then an older gentleman, our Habal Habal driver, Brother Pedroza, also spoke, but he spoke in Cebuano so we don’t know what he said.
A few highlights of the week. 1-All the interactions with our children. 2-The successful Ride for Clyde Rodeo with the proceeds going to help the Lane Skinner family as their 3-year-old is having cancer treatments. Thanks for all who helped Olivia and Tre with that huge undertaking. 3-Casey and Tami and their crew taking Chad and Susie with them fishing on Leigh Lake north of Jackson. They sent a lot of pictures, and it looked like a beautiful day. Everyone caught fish, so that made it even better and I understand Susie is now ready to start competition fishing because she reeled in so many. Thanks to the Parry family for taking Chad and Susie.
4-GRAND BABY #23 ARRIVED SAFELY TO TESSA AND JUSTIN. All are well and we are excited. I really have to keep that passport hid now!! While in the Celestial Room on Friday Clyda commented on how Jenna June has now crossed the veil to this side. What a great blessing to know and understand pre-mortal life, earth life, and life after death. We are extremely grateful for our Savior Jesus Christ. He made Heavenly Father’s plan of agency for all become possible for us here on earth. May we choose to use that agency appropriately and follow the plan. “Holy Habits” and “Righteous Routines”. Thanks for all of you for “Lifting Where You Stand.” We appreciate your examples and it keeps us going.
With love,
Dad and Mom
Grandpa and Grandma
Briant and Clyda
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