Change is in the Air

I'm going to add a few photos from a recent trip to San Carlos, which is about four hours north of Dumaguete, into the narrative of this blog post. The pictures won't always match the narrative, but since we drove into the mountains to see the Kanlaon volcano on the way home, I thought you might find the pictures interesting.

Now, on to the recent changes!

In November, a new senior missionary couple arrived from Bataan (a city on the northern island of Luzon) and the office assignments were shuffled around. Sister Cutler and I are now responsible for missionary housing, and I retain responsibility for technology and travel. It's an exciting change because it means we will be in charge of all fifty-four missionary apartments, making sure they are safe, comfortable, clean, adequately equipped, and located within the assigned teaching areas. We will also open new apartments as the mission grows, and close old apartments that no longer meet our needs.

Most apartments house two missionaries (each missionary is assigned a companion, so two missionaries living in a single apartment is the most common situation), while a number of apartments house four missionaries. A few larger apartments have room for six missionaries, but having three companionships assigned to one teaching area is uncommon.

Sister Cutler and I are leaving tomorrow morning to travel to the northern-most zone in the mission (Sagay) and then work our way south. We hope to visit all fifty-four apartments before Christmas, which would be easy if we were just planning to "drop by and say hello," but we plan to provide supplies, replace broken furniture, appliances, etc., and solve as many existing issues as we can during each stop, so it'll take some time this first go around. Future apartment tours won't take as long since we'll mainly focus on the standard monthly inspection, designed to encourage missionaries to keep their apartments clean and safe.

Whenever we travel, and now even more so since we've been assigned to manage apartments, we deliver packages from home, teaching supplies, and other items to the missionaries scattered around the island. I can also fix phone issues and other technology problems more easily in person than I can from the mission office, so we pack the truck with lots of "stuff" to be as prepared as we can be.

When we are not traveling, it's been noisy and festive here in Dumaguete. Every weekend, loud music plays at full blast until 11:30 PM or so, although it usually stops at 10:00 PM on weekdays. There are food vendors and temporary markets all along Rizal Boulevard, which runs along the ocean about 300 meters from our apartment. Yesterday, there was a big parade up and down the boulevard, and it's tough if you're caught out in traffic when things get crazy. You can't really move forward or backward for quite a while, so we just try to enjoy the craziness. They say that Christmas is an all-day party that never ends, so we'll see what happens!

These final two pictures are of a cemetery. Since the water table is so high in the Philippines, people are buried above ground in concrete crypts. This cemetery is one of the most colorful ones I've seen because normally the crypts are just plain concrete or else they are painted white.

We're really enjoying our time here, although it's not always easy. Our fellow missionaries are trying their best to serve the Lord, and the local members are so kind to us. We are always busy (which is good) and keep promising ourselves to do something fun on one of our preparation days, but so far, the fun has been in the day-to-day activities of this large and dynamic mission.

We hope everything is going well for you and we wish you all a very merry Christmas!