Pilgrim in an Unholy Land

Kamusta Po!

Well, the last eight days have been crazy. I bid farewell to Elder Jennings and the folks in Nottingham on Tuesday and departed Wednesday morning. I talked to Brooklyn at transfer meeting! She is being trained by Sister Linnford who served in St. Albert in my district. She came out a transfer after me. I am serving with Elder Pring, who is a native from Manilla and he is a happy fellow. The apartment is probably the nicest I've been in yet, or at least after I cleaned it. I've already spent probably five hours cleaning, when I need to be studying this crazy language. The kitchen and bathroom were kind of gross. And soooo much darn Tupperware collected by missionaries and never returned. Hauled a dozen small bags of garbage out to the trash and I'm not finished. Elder Pring is a good sport and he's going to start being more cleanly.

The Millwoods area is in kind of the hood, or at least half of it anyway. There are tons of East Indians and Middle-Eastern people who don't know hardly any English. They used to have an elder here who learned some Hindi and was able to teach people here. He went home two transfers ago.

Working with Filipinos is a different kind of missionary work for sure. They are all so busy here, and it is typical for any Filipino individual or parent to have 2 or 3 jobs. They can never give you a set time to come back for a visit and they never answer their phones. Usually they say come back in a month or in a few weeks. It's frustrating. We cover a whole stake so we do a lot of driving and stop by a lot of random potential investigators, who usually aren't home except in the evenings. Elder Pring and Elder Walker did have some success with a couple however and they will be getting baptized this week. But no one else seems to have actual time to commit to anything. A couple and an individual agreed to be baptized within the two weeks before I came, but when we came by this week, they changed their minds or said they were too busy.

I am trying to learn this language out of old text books and missionary material. The new Assistant to the President, Elder Walker, was here before me in the same situation, and he learned mostly out of the text books, by studying all the time. I am currently having a difficult time wrapping my head around this stuff, but I'll keep trying and praying for the gift of tongues.

Thank you for all the prayers, advice and encouragement! I have felt a strength beyond my own in this experience and I have been working very hard to learn this language and this area and clean my apartment. Please continue praying for me and I will keep working to fulfil my responsibilities, wherewith I have been entrusted.

love,

Elder Higginson