Kamusta Kamo!!!! So i have officially been in the Mission for 2 months now and have spent a week in the actual mission field and i love it so much here!!! The first two days i got here i spent in Iloilo City because my trainer actually got called to be District Leader! so i leave in the same house as my DL and ZL isn't that something ;) haha but those first two days were so amazing even though i wasn't in my area yet i got to go out and visit some less actives and members in the area and to teach my first Investigator which was really amazing and we actually helped the Missionaries in that zone get a baptism date set with her! so we will see how that goes! So a little bit about my trainer and first area, my trainer his name is Elder Cobabe and he is the DL now and our area is called Roxas City it is a 4 hour bus ride from Iloilo City and is near the top of Panay which is our island. So me and my companion have about 7 like small areas in our area and it's just the two of us that cover it all, so we have some people that live in the city of Roxas and a lot that live out in the Bukid(mountain) Which is pretty awesome because we just get to go hiking almost everyday to go teach these people :) I absolutely love it and the people they are just the best and helping them out feels so amazing and i love that my companion is always wanting to help someone out with like pumping water into the tub so they can do laundry or help take things back to their house's which by the way the houses are so so tiny majority of the time and it's so sad to see but i love seeing them smile all the time because it is one of the best feelings to have when you can help put a smile on their faces or they are always smiling even when they don't have teeth they have such a big grin and it just makes your day! :) so we are teaching quite a bit of people right now and just yesterday on our way to go visit a less active family we stopped and talked to some people and we actually were able to give away 2 B.o.M's to two families that were there and made a dinner appointment with one and to come back and talk a little bit more about the Gospel with them :) and my companion being as amazing as he is looked over at me and set you got this and handed my Lesson 1 which is the Restoration and pointed with his lips to the people and i didn't want to give a brief summary of it cause i was nervous and am still very shy.... but i was able to explain it to them and summed up the whole lesson in 3 minutes for them in Ilonggo which totally surprised me cause i didn't think i could do it or think they'd understand me but i did really good and was able to go for it and we ended up giving that to them and so we are hoping they will read it cause they all seemed super interested and wanted to learn, Also cool thing that happened that has never happened here is a guy referred himself to Mormon.org and turns out he is in our area and went to Church last Sunday and wants to go again and so we are gonna start teaching him this week so i am super excited about that! also we wen't and taught this less active family and they have a son who isn't Baptized yet but when we went and visited them he told us that his sister and him are ready to get baptized this month and that they have been following everything and so i might get my first two Baptisms this month :) but we also have an investigator family that all want to be baptized and know the church is true but they won't go to church.... so we are hoping that they will come and realize how important it is and we have one of the family members still not sure about baptism even though she believes in the church and the B.o.M so we went and taught her about it and how to be in tune with the Spirit so she can know when she gets her answer about baptism cause she has prayed about it but is looking for a really really big sign that she should but hasn't gone to church yet to help try and find her answer but anyways I am so freaking happy to be here and to help out all these people and to help bring the Gospel to them and to help bring happiness to their lives and help and watch them grow and to become even more amazing people! so a little bit about the Philippines is it is hotter than hot here so i'm super thankful for my Mission President letting me to wear short sleeves out here! but these people eat some weird things haha i've already tried duck here and i know i haven't really eaten a whole lot of weird things yet but at the same time i have... but a lot of it is really good! like coconut water, not good at all in the states but here it is so Namit(delicious) but oh my gosh the fruit here is so amazing cause it is just fresh all the time and they will always pick it off a tree and give it to you on the spot so it always tastes amazing but almost everything here is fresh... meaning also the pork and chicken you eat here... and they will feed you all of it and i mean ALL OF IT! My companion and i had a dinner appointment and the family made some chicken curry and fried chicken which was really good but my companion ended up getting some curry and i had a little of it too but he got the worst of it... he ended up eating a chicken head with the beak and everything in it.. which he almost puked but i also ended up trying a little bit of chicken feet... Wasn't expecting that at all... :/ i am starting to get used to the sleeping habits here and the showering habit here because you have a tub with a plastic pot thing and you fill the tub up with water in the bathroom and you use the plastic pot to pour the water on you and that is how you shower and you do the same thing to flush here. So it's really fun to get used to haha :) but it's so freaking worth it!!! even dealing with all the freaking spiders in the house. I can't begin to tell you guys how bad it is out here. but it's all worth it in the end at the day after a good long hard days of working! I can't wait to share more with you all and let you know how everything is going and how our Investigators are doing next week Palangga Ko Kamo!!!!! Halong Kamo!!!! :):):):)

Palangga,

Elder Spencer McKay Merrill