It's nothing what I expected but more than anything I've hoped for!

Hey Everyone!

We had a great week here in Makati! Elder Duero and I got quite a bit of work and we are really starting to see success in our area. To let you know, Everything went as planned last week. Sister Rose-Mar and brother Zaldy were both baptized last week and it was just really amazing. The 1st Councillor, Brother Art in the welcome speech said that he saw a physical change in Brother Zaldy when he was baptized. In fact, I specifically remember him saying that he looked like he was baptized in water full of Tide. Haha. It was kinda funny. Brother Zaldy is gonna be such an amazing future leader. He already wants to start working with us and he has a bunch of different ideas for finding people. He is awesome! This week we might have a baptism or we might not.....It depends if April can or not because she is pregnant and is due this week. So yea. We don't necessarily think that she will be fully 100% ready. Haha. She was intervied last week though and passed but yea. Well. We will just see what happens...

Last week we also taught the Saberola family and they have been taught for a really long time. They haven't been to church once yet. They are really receptive though and yea. Anyways. Last week we had a lesson about the word of wisdom and we found out they have a bit of a problem with that. But they committed to it and I think they will do good. About 3 days after we taught them we had another appointment with them. They weren't there but I felt that I should write them a note. So I did and just left it there. The next day we saw all 3 of them at church! I was super happy! It was just a little note. I think it was a nice note though. haha. Elder Duero and I were both really happy to see them there. :)

We also began teaching someone new who is the boyfriend of an inactive member, his name is Kennedy. He is also really kool and he also came to church, With his girlfriend. We were really happy to see that. We have our second appointment with him on Thursday so we will see how things go! :D

Something that was kinda disappointing though was we had been working with this inactive family, the Morales' and we had a really spiritual lesson about the Book of Mormon and it was super amazing. We thought for sure we would see them there on Sunday. But we didn't so yea. Hopefully this week. We're going to keep working with them. They have really strong testimonies and I know they want to come back. We have been working with a few less actives here. This week we should have 2 coming back to activity, which means they have come to church 4 times in a row after being inactive. Actually this person we're teaching gave us a few people to teach who we plan on visiting this week and she might even work with us. So hopefully all that goes well. :)

Oh yea, I also went on exchanges this week. Every week we have to go on exchanges, last week I worked in the Mandaluyong 1B area. I worked with Elder Koochin who is a district leader. He is also one of the 4 Canadians in the Manila mission! It was a good exchange. He seems to be doing alright. We did some finding, I did a baptismal interview and we taught a family who is getting ready to be baptized soon. And that was it. :)

Elder Duero is one of my favorite companions, we are getting along great, the Makati zone is also doing great. For the last 3 months I think we averaged about 3 baptisms for month for the whole zone and so far this month in March we have 6. So things are going good with that. Also there's this new thing called the green zone and what it is, is it's the standard of excellence for the key indicators listed in chapter 8 of PMG+4 more made by the area presidency of the Philippines. So we have 11 key indicators that we can have standard of excellence on and of course the goal is to have all of them green, or to achieve all of them. It's pretty hard. The week before ZLC we had 24% in the green zone. But last week the zone went 38% Green which is really good. This means as a zone we achieved 38% of all the standards of excellence. It's a bit harder for Makati zone because we have the APs and the Office elders and they don't get to work a whole lot. But we're really happy about going 38%green. We just have to keep going up and up. :)

Oh yea, and also to answer your question, Cebuano is also going good. It's just a bit different. :) I'm still learning though.

And that is about it for this week. I don't really need a whole lot. Everything I need I can get for way cheaper here in the Philippines. I guess if there is anything it would just be Ringolos. I miss those. I don't really need a whole lot of candy. I get enough of that at members houses actually haha. But yea. I can get almost anything I want here and for a lot cheaper... So yea. I plan on buying shoes soon. Because both the pairs I got at home are wrecked. I left one of my pairs on Palawan and actually I had a pair of rubber shoes that a going home missionary gave to me. So I used those for a while but then I gave them to Mike in STA Monica because his shoes got wrecked from working with us everyday. So now I only have one pair of shoes. But I can buy shoes here for really cheap and they are good. All in all I don't really need anything. (Maybe money?) I don't know how my accounts are doing. So yea. I'm probably going to buy shoes next week.

So yea. For my birthday, all in all, maybe just a few letters with pictures. That's really all I want. I don't really want a package. Just pics with letters. That is all! :D

Speaking of letters I'm actually sending one out to Ben today. That's cool that he also just became a Zone leader. I thing he will do great!

Anyways, that's about it for this week. I hope everything is going great at home. How is Justin doing with his mission prep? How is Derek doing with his mission prep? Who is is preparing to leave? It would be cool if someone from home got to serve here. Philippines Manila Mission is the Best! I love my mission so much! It's nothing what I expected but more than anything I've hoped for! I Hope you guys have a great week!

Mahal ko kayo!

Elder Chris Gagnon