I Love my Area! And Farewell to President and Sister Revillo :(

Our last STL picture  with sister revillo :((

Heeellllllooooo!!

I just wanted to start off this email by telling you all about a miracle I had this week...I found out I love my area!!  It sounds weird because as a missionary we should (and we do) love all our areas and I've already been here for awhile now, but I was struggling to love this one.  It's so polluted and there's barely any progress in our work and I don't like working in the squatters areas and it's so hot and sometimes I just get excited to go home and relax in the air con instead of having to go out and walk and sweat like a pig all day (well, there's my mini rant haha).  So I've honestly just kind of had the attitude of "enduring to the end" and working hard until I finish, but my heart wasn't really in it.  Which is unfortunate, because it's hard to be diligent and "finish strong" and do all that stuff when you're heart's not in it.  But we have one less active that I've really grown to love.  His name is Mar and he is 18 and we're trying to help him gain a desire to go on a mission.  His family doesn't usually have money to pay the fare to go to church, but the last couple of Sundays he's been able to come.  After on of our lessons this week with him, I realized that I love this area because I'm really growing to love the people here.   We've seen a lot of progress with him, and even though he wasn't able to make it yesterday we're really hoping that as we work with the ward we'll be able to help him to be stronger in the church.  We didn't have any baptisms last month and we might not have any this month, but I think in little ways Heavenly Father is showing me that even though we're not achieving all of our goals, there's somehow small progress that is still happening, and I'm sure that as we continue to help the people here feel our love and feel Heavenly Father's love we'll really be able to help them 

Last Wednesday, President and Sister Revillo scheduled an activity for all the pauwi missionaries leaving in July.  Since every STL companionship has one companion going home, we also scheduled our final STL meeting with Sister Revillo.  Towards the end, she basically gave what was a mini farewell speech that had all of us teary eyed.  It's hard to see them go.  But I was able to have my "final interview" with President Revillo and talk about my plans after the mission and get some advice from him, so that was wonderful.  I got a last picture with him (but I can't upload it cause I forgot my card reader ), and if both of us hadn't been wearing name badges I would have given him a big hug.  I'll miss them talaga.  We meet our new mission president and family, the Koster family, on Wednesday.  They're from California, and I'm not quite sure how much Tagalog they understand.  I don't know if there will be a language barrier   (It's actually really hard if I try to text someone in English haha).

 Funny story of this week:  We had a meeting with our Ward Mission Leader Saturday night, but we had just finished another set of exchanges so we were rushing to get back to our area on time.  As we were walking out of the sisters' neighborhood, Sister Gican slipped and skinned her knee.  She got some first aid treatment once we got to the WML's house, but I kept teasing her that we would have to chop her leg off.  It was the WML's mom who applied the first aid to Sister Gican, and then when she was done his dad walked in carrying this huge butcher knife and with a completely straight face said that it was time for her leg to go.  She yelled and almost ran out of the house while the rest of us just laughed at her XD best moment ever haha.

Doctrine and Covenants 88:125  And above all things, clothe yourselves with the bond of charity, as with a mantle, which is the bond of perfectness and peace.

Lost time is never found again.  --Benjamin Franklin

Love you all!!  Have a great week and don't lose time!

XOXO

Sister Pectol

P.S.  HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY!!!!