Walking on Water and Getting Stoned.

Kumusta po kayo!
This week has been CRAZY. This is not an email you're going to want to breeze through - just throwing that out there.

First! All the rave here is that Charice is on Glee! That's awesome! I'll never forget Glee. Winter Semester at BYU, all of the girls in my ward got together for this huge girl-watching party every week for Glee. Sarah Kron was like the leader I guess you can say. Anyway of course, if all the girls were there, my friend Mike Swindle (who I'll be living with) and I were there too because it was, well, a jackpot? Anyway we ended up liking the show so it's awesome that a Filipino super star is on there now!

Well, the week started out slow. My companion got sick with the weather change so we were in for two days. He couldn't even get out of bed. The typhoon came and went but we were okay. It was only a Signal 1 here in my area (of a scale to 3). It was a waste of two days but I got a lot of studying done and cleaned the house. The funny part is right when he got over his cold, I got one.

Heard of Dengue fever?

Wikipedia it.

It has to do with getting mosquito bites. The funniest part is that I didn't know I had it. At Bishop's on Friday, I told him all the symptoms and Sister Jen started getting really worried because she knew I had dengue. So she, being the our second mom here, gave me all the medication I needed and took care of me, thank goodness for Sister Jen!

This weekend we finally got back to work.

Monday, I think the typhoon like came back or something. As we were walking to our dinner appointment it started to rain... and then it started to RAIN. The drops were so thick and it just kept on coming down! By the time we got to our appointment, the water was up to our knees! I couldn't believe it! I just washed those pants! (Yeah, that's what I was thinking of, washing pants is hard work!) Luckily, they live on a hill so their house was dry. It was definitely an experience to walk through a flood. It died down and we somehow made it back to our apartment. Too bad we can't walk on water eh?

Yesterday was a really special day. Sister Cecilia, who I mentioned was able to stop smoking a few weeks back, had her interviews and is cleared for baptism. She will be my first baptism this Saturday that I get to be the baptizer. I am so honored. She has seriously been amazing and cares about us so much. This past Sunday she surprised my companion and I with her famous cassava cake. She's such a great person. Her grandson is a convert and helped her come to the church and was just so happy when he found out that she is now able to be baptized. She's so strong and she is breezing through the Book of Mormon; she will finish it before I do! I can't even explain how happy I am for her. After her interviews, she treated us all to lunch. When she put my food in front of me I got really teary-eyed because, as much as I tried to refuse to let her pay, she insisted. She is poor and lives in a squatter house. She can't afford much, but she wanted this much to be able to give back to us for changing her life she said. She will be baptized this Saturday as I said and the whole ward is excited. The mom's (adult-women-people) of the church love her a lot and are putting together a special musical number for her baptism. I can't wait to tell you all about it.

We also had a pretty crazy experience yesterday as well. We were of course, tracting, when a group of kids carrying wooden planks and rocks came towards us. They wanted to fight. They were about 14-15 years old and there were 18 of them... I counted. The best we could do was walk away, so we turned the opposite direction and began to walk. They of course, tried to provoke us by cussing at us and throwing rocks at us. It took every ounce of me to not turn around and beat the crap out of each one of them and use the karate which I learned so long ago, but I just had to practice patience and faith. My companion turned around when of the rocks hit me and yelled at them, but they just kept coming. All I could do was pray. Eventually they stopped and went away.

As we came to a corner we sat down and I shared a scripture from the the Book of Mormon with my companion. I've been studying patience this week and it was truly a trial of mine. I shared with him what dad wrote me the other week, how these kids don't know any better. We will go home after two years but for them this is home. We said a prayer in closing and carried on our day.

We had success and were blessed as we found new people to teach.

Anyway, my time is running really short so I'll have to end here. As for this transfer, Elder Jennings and I will stay together for another six weeks. I'll explain more of that on Monday. Hope you all are well. Miss you tons, pray for you always, love you tons.

Nagpapasalamat,
Elder Corpuz