Baby Snakes

So if the title of this alarms you. It should. Because I literally found baby snakes in my bedroom this week. And I testify that missions change people because I literally didn't even freak out I just texted the elders "What is the best way to kill baby snakes and how do we keep them out of our apartment?" and then they called us and asked the situation and took a 30 minute jeepney ride from their area to come check out house for us because on the phone call I said "yes elders, they are only babies now but where do babies come from??" and Elder Cameron says "a mom" and I go "yes exactly. there is a mama snake hiding in our walls somewhere like in harry potter!!!!!!" so after that they came real quick and our whole neighborhood got worked up about it and it was crazy. They didn't find anything but they said they thought it was in the attic. So I basically live in fear every night when i go to sleep. But don't worry about me, i'll be fine. It mostly was just a funny story because my last apartment has rats and this one has snakes and i don't want to know what the next one will have haha. 

After that experience, the week went pretty normal. Life is really good here in Ligao. I'm super happy. I love the people I teach, the members, my companion and the scenery. I love getting lost in the work here even if that means getting lost in some random rice field. I love being a missionary. I feel happy all the time now! The spirit is so amazing. It can turn any situation into a good one. We had exchanges with the STL's this week and I was companions again with my followup sister Vi! Oh man it was so fun we had the best day. I miss her and she goes home next week! Tomorrow is my 11 month mark and that is freaking me out but I just want to keep working my hardest and trying to be a good representative of Jesus Christ here while I can. The time goes so fast. I sure don't want it to end. 

I love you all and I hope all is well! Thanks to everyone who emailed me! And thanks for the prayers because I can feel them all the way over here. 

Have a great week!

Sister Turner:)

The Emerald City

So this week we had zone training, and zone cluster conference with a bunch of missionaries. It was in Legazpi and I always refer to legazpi as the emerald city because they have a mall and the sisters apartment there is 100% green. it was good to see all the missionaries and learn from the presentations.

I'm just going to send some pictures this week. we had some amazing miracles in finind and teaching this week but i dont really have time to write it all. 

These are pictures from:

1. Branch service project where i found this HUGE CRICKET.

2. holding cricket

3. sister siilata and i waiting when we went to legazpi for the hospital when she had a tissue infection in her arm(dont remember if i told you about that. it was a few weeks ago)

4. my district plus the zone leaders. please ignore how awkwardly close i am sitting to that elder hhaa

5. saw my child sister snyder again! i miss her:)

6. the family history training in legazpi with the apes, and some other crazy elders i know.

7. me and my kasama she is from somoa and she is teaching me somoan.

8.  zone training with the whole ligao zone. we had a surprise birthday party with donuts and it was great:)

9. my two kasamas. sister vi and sister siilata. imma poly now:)

10. the sisters!

11. my trainee sister snyder and I:)

12.daraga sisters and us

13. always reach for the stars!

14. we were waiting for the zl's for a jeepney and we got one first so this was us leaving them on the curb as they waited. haha they are the best. 

15. when i got sick this week and had to come home early and literally pasted out on the floor and my companion freaked out and didnt know what to do so she texted sister guanzon and said "sister. i dont know what to do, sister turner is in a really bad mood. please help me" and the mission presidents wife responds " try to resolve this among yourselves. pray. forgive each other" because apparently in somoa "in a bad mood" means really really sick and once i explained it to my companion she was like "oh no!" and texted backand we were able to get the medicine i needed and stuff. haha its funny now but at the moment i was prett sure i was going to die. #culturaldifferences 

16. we met a challenge from the apes to read the entire white handbook in one week and we did it and we took silly hat pictures to document it. 

lov eyou all have a great week! 

Sister Turner:)

Holey Shoes

Hello! How's everybody doing?

This has been a kind of crazy week. I'll sum up the things that happened and some things I learned in bullet points.

1.My old companion sister Vi had to go to the MRC and they didnt think she would make it back so the Apes drove her to our apartment so i could say goodbye(i owe them bigtime because they are pretty kind to us). But then she did get cleared to come back and they brought her by for me to say hi again!

2. The apes called us randomly to say we were getting a new companion and would be a trisome

3. We were yelled at and almost run over by an angry trycee driver (he was cussing at us in tagalog daw)

4. Two of the sassy elders i am friends with from daraga came over to deliver supplies for our house and when they asked my companion where the fire alarm was she said they had taken it down because it went off when she curled her hair and was "annoying". (dont worry mom they got us a new one..)

5. I found out that our new companion sister Buban was getting another new companion who is sister Deguzman who if you don't remember was my first housemate and stl in my mission! She went home to help her family and came back to finish her mission. she is awesome! 

6.We had probably the worst and most brutal rejection of my whole mission this week. ALL DAY EVERY DAY. This is a hard job sometimes but it's still worth it.

7. Sometimes people(even other missionaries) will hate you for doing whats right but at least you know you are doing right in the Lord's eyes.

8. It's really hard to always be the Christlike example in a bad situation

9. Sometimes it's hard to love people like Jesus would when they lie straight to your face. But you should still do it anyways.

10.We had a really great Family History program in legazpi on saturday and i got to go back and see everyone and have sister snyder tell me all about my old area and it was so great!

11. Some elders in my district were emergency transferred and its sad:(

12. My shoes have holes again and the mud and water gets in now and it's super gross and there are no sizes here for me in ligao so it's a test of endurance now haha

12. There is one Recent Convert we have whose husband has never really listened to missionaries and he isnt super interested because everytime we invite him he just blows us off. But my mission has taught me the importance of diligence and never giving up on anyone so everytime we go there we still invite him to listen. Anyways, one night we had literally been punted ALL DAY and walked about 3 hours straight and we were just dead tired so we decided to visit this family and honestly I was just thinking how they would probably let us in the door and we could get some water but then once we were in the door I asked the little boy to invite his daddy again and he did and brother listened to our message for the first time and he accepted a date for baptism! It was such a miracle. And in retrospect, i realized that if we hadnt had so much rejection and had such a hard time that day I probably would not have gone there but the Lord knew he was ready that night so he prepared his missionaries and guided us there. Sometimes the Lord works in mysterious ways but it always is for our best. 

I love you all so much!

Keep building your faith in Christ every single day little by little. I know true joy comes through personally knowing our savior Jesus Christ and he is here for all of us if we just choose to come unto him. How will you come unto him this week?

Mahal Kita,

Sister Turner:)

Just a Short One

sorry im out of time so I'll just forward part of my letter to president to yall so i send something. sorry it's just missionary talk and maybe boring but thats my life haha

Hello po President!
This week we were very blessed and had alot of success here in Ligao. We have been very diligent in our tracting and seeking referrals to find new investigators. This week we got 13 new investigators which is double the amount we had when I got here! I know the Lord will continue to bless us and lead us to the people who are ready to receive the gospel as we continue to work our hardest and strive to be exactly obedient and follow all the mission directions and rules. Another blessing we had this week was member presents. When I got here, I noticed the members and leaders did not have a lot of trust or respect for the missionaries because of past experiences they had had with missionaries. Their enthusiasm wasn't too high to work with us or to give referrals. Sister Siilata and I have been making an effort to build their trust in us as representatives of the savior and as missionaries. We have been doing lots of planned and unplanned service and also trying to improve missionary conduct. I shared with sister siilata that I truly believe as we strive harder to have Christlike and professional conduct always and love the members and investigators and less actives as he would, we will slowly build back the trust and respect that was lost for missionaries. It has already shown amazing results. Another thing I implemented first thing when I got here was trying to be bold and always exactly obedient even if we stand alone. I am grateful or my companion who has a strong desire as well to be obedient and has willingly made the necessary changes with me. I feel like I am improving in standing for whats right even in hard situations and also improving in correcting pasaway behavior in a more Christlike way. I still have along way to go but I'm grateful because I really see I have improved in my ability to do those things. Another thing we have been working on is focusing on Tatay. When I got here I noticed we had many less active and recent convert sisters whose husbands had never been taught by the missionaries. So we jumped on that opportunity and in my first few visits with the families we were able to OYM Tatay and show him the respect as head of the household and with many of the families we are now teaching the Father with his family and they are all progressing together. I see lots of potential in this area for completing families in the gospel so that they may go to the temple and receive all the blessings Heavenly Father has for their family. So I am really excited about these new part member families we are teaching! As well as the couples and families we have found through our own tracting efforts. Although the work here in Ligao is definitely not easy and we have faced plenty of trying moments, we are trying to find the positive and all things and I know that the field here is white all ready to harvest, we just need to keep searching until we find that right field. I've also seen the blessings of focusing on the true needs of each less active with our visits instead of just a "weekly check up visit". We have been boldly inviting then to keep commitments and make changes that they really need in order to come back into full activity. Many miracles and progress have come from this new mindset towards our less actives here in Ligao. There is a lot of work to do to get this are to it's highest potential but I know that we can do it with the Lord's help and of course with patience and hardwork.

Love you all, I hope you have a good week! Sorry this is not really a real email I had to report alot of stuff to my mission president this week and it took like the whole hour. The above is just a third or my letter haha but the other is confidential so I didn't include it. Keep the faith!

Sister Turner:)

A Whole New World

Hello Everyone!

So this has been a pretty crazy week. Last week I was so stressed about getting everything done for transfers and saying goodbye to everyone and getting sister Snyder ready to lead the area that I basically didn't sleep for about 3 days. I was just so hyped up and had really bad insomnia. So then it was Monday night and I had to pack and get all this stuff done but I was so tired I tried to go to sleep so I could wake up and finish packing in the morning but then as I am having the most unrestful sleep ever I hear the phone ringing and stumble over to answer it and saw it was the AP's calling in the middle of the night and when I answered, they said they were outside our house and asked us to please come open the door. They were there to drop off some sisters who had traveled from the islands for transfers. I was so dead tired and my body was so weak from not sleeping I was literally like shaking and just going going going I walked downstairs thinking I would just open the door and leave before anyone saw me looking like death itself but as soon as I open the door, I see Elder Akins standing right there with this big grin on his face and he says "good morning sister!" and I just stare straight at him like "why didn't you tell us you were coming" and they tried to talk to me but I was pretty stupid sounding from no sleep so they gave up ahhaha the funniest part is that after all that I turn around and i'm talking to the sisters and I realize that I am wearing my ugliest pajamas and I wasn't wearing a bra and so that's pretty embarrassing. Good thing they're just Elders. and after that experience I was pretty grateful to transfer haha. 

So here's the big news. I got transferred to Ligao. (about 1 and a half hour from daraga by jeepney) I am follow up training one of the sisters who came in with sister snyder. Her name is sister Siilata. And she is from somoa and so awesome! Her catch phrase is "it's up to you" haha so is so chill and I can tell we will have alot of fun together. I really like my area. It's where sister Mccoard and Sister Vi both served and I've actually met alot of the members because of sister vi and them visiting her in daraga so that's pretty great. Everyone is so kind. It's a ward not a branch but it's nice. It's really different here. our area is so huge. It literally takes us a good 45 minutes in fast walking to get to our area but it is such a beautiful view it's worth it. It's really different here because we teach mostly less actives and not as many investigators. Also our apartment has no water during the day and there is no restaurants. We are focusing more on strengthening our branch. There are a ton of things I am working to implement here to increase our success and help the branch and area grow. I've learned a lot in Daraga and I'm excited to apply it here. I'm just so ready to work really hard and help the people here. I love them all already. I don't have time to write everything because so much has already happened but I just want to share one very special experience I had yesterday. 

We went to pick up one of our recent converts sister marina. She is 22 and has severe disabilities. She cant walk or move other than her head. When I met her I just immediately fell in love with her. She has the strongest faith despite the really hard circumstances she is in.We went to her house and helped her into her wheelchair, then we faced the task of trying to get from her house to the main road which is about half a mile or so. It's a really narrow pathway that is very bumpy and has alot of brush so my companion and I decided it would be better to carry her so we lifted up her wheelchair and started hiking through this field carrying her and then I had the impression to ask what her favorite hymn was. We started singing primary songs as we walked and it was such a spiritual experience. When we got to the main road I was able to push her and we started the 45 minute walk to the church. When we got alittle closer we only had 5 minutes left till sacrament started and I knew we needed to be there on time because it was my first sunday and I didnt want to make a bad impression on the leaders so we ended up literally sprinting the last mile. We walked into the church just as it was starting and I was literally dying cause we had done so much and it was so hot outside I thought I was going to pass out and then the elders lean over and whisper "sister turner, they want you to give a 7 minute talk, we forgot to tell you" and by this point I'm pretty used to last minute speaking so I went up there and it went fine. As I was pushing Marina to the church I just kept thinking how grateful I was to be able to help her. Like I kind of surprised myself. I wasn't thinking "oh man this is so hot or we have so long to go". But rather I thought of my calling as a representative of Jesus Christ and how I knew that if he were there right then he would have done the same exact thing for her. There have been times in my life when I felt paralyzed. By fear, by trials, by others. But in those times I have felt the savior lift me and carry me and in that moment I was so glad to be able to do that same thing for someone else. I know the Lord loves each one of us and he is always here to help push us in the right direction if we only choose to give our lives to him. Oh man I just love it here. This is going to be a great 6 weeks and hopefully I will be here a long time too so I can really know everyone here. 

I love you all so much. I pray for you all and I know Heavenly Father is looking out for each one of you. Keep the Faith!

Mahal Kita, 

Sister Turner:)

Transfers!

Hello everyone.

Well...it finally happened... I will be transferring for the first time tomorrow. I don't yet know where I am going to go but i'll update you next week. 

It's been a challenging but good week. I have such mixed feelings about leaving here in Daraga. On the one hand I really feel I have done everything I possibly could have for this are in my 9 months here and I feel ready to go onto to help new people ad hand off this work that i've been taking care of but I also feel really sad becaus eI love it here and I love the people and we are all so close and I know it will be hard to start all over.But that's okay because we can do hard things,right?

Anyways, on sunday I spoke and the reaction of the ward when they heard I was leaving was pretty heart touching. I felt like Sally fields saying "they like me! they really like me!" haha Too bad I don't have time to write everything that happened this week but I'll journal it and fill you all in when I get home.

Bascially transfers are really stressful and I dont know how i'm going to pack and do all the things I need to before tomorrow morning but I know with God , no thing is impossible haha. 

Sorry this is short but i will attach pictures of the ward and a banana leaf we used for our boodle fight they had for a goodbye party for me at the apartment. 

Love you!

Sister Turner

Standard of Excellence

Hello Everyone! 

I really wish I had more time because every week before I email I write out this really long list of things I want to mention or talk about and then I end up with like 5 minutes to write this thing. Sorry if it's a little scrambled. 

Sister Snyder and I had a really great week this week.  My testimony this week really was strengthened on the power of setting goals. I feel that when we set goals as a missionary, we really are demonstrating our faith in the Lord. We trust in him that if we work our very hardest, striving to be worthy of the spirit and strive to be exactly obedient to the mission directions and rules and guidelines in the white handbook and Preach my gospel, he will allow miracles to happen for us. He will truly allow us to become his instruments. One thing I feel has really become a strength of mine is OYM'ing. We always joke around that I am a "Lean,mean OYM'in machine". This is literally one of my favorite things to do as a missionary! I want to talk to EVERYONE about the gospel! I had this thought that we should contact the zone leaders and ask what the record for number of OYMs in one day was and strive to beat that. I wasn't trying to be competitive or beat others but I thought it would really help sister sndyer and I to be motivated to work even harder and to push ourselves. We found out the highest they had heard was 41 oym's in a day so this week on Thursdaywe did 51 oym's in one day. It was such an amazing experience. We were able to meet our goal, and receive many return appointments and potential investigators as well as new investigators that came from that. I really saw the Lord's hand in that day and I felt that I was really fulfilling my purpose as I literally invited everyone I saw or met to come unto Christ. I want to always do that! We also had some amazing experiences with new investigators being so ready and prepared for the gospel! The Lord has really blessed us so much this week I really can't even explain. This week we reached every standard of excellence for our mission(which I have never been able to do before) except for church attendance which was close but hey, agency. I've also been having some really great experiences with working with members and trying to build up the ward. We are now working closely with a lot of the leaders of the ward and hopefully will continue moving forward in this direction.  

Some crazy things happened this week like we worked with some sisters from masbate and went on splits and I was with two sisters who were in training and as we were walking home, a drunk motorcyclist hit one of the sisters! She was okay and he only bruised her arm but we were all a bit shaken up and I called the AP's trying to be all mature on the side of the road and deal with this crazy situation and ask what we needed to do (go to the hospital, office etc.)but I probably sounded freaked out because they insisted on picking us up and they were kind enough to take us to the office to check out her arm and gave her some ice cream as a "sorry you got hit by a motorcycle" gift. I felt so bad. But I am really thankful she was okay. Another weird thing that happened was unexpected exchanges which is when the STLs randomly show up at your house to see if you are doing what you should or not and luckily ours went really well and I was super happy we are exactly obedient missionaries so i didn't have to be all chastised. haha

We also had interviews with the mission president this week and it was really great. I always learn so much from talking to President Guanzon! He gave me a blessing and it really helped me. 

I am learning so much each day and just love being a missionary. Even when it's hard, I love being a missionary. I would never give it up for anything and I am so grateful for this opportunity. This week especially,I feel like my body is really tired and getting worn down but I believe the Lord can give me the strength to push on. I will sleep for a very long time when I get home, but for now I am on the Lord's errand.

I love you all very much!

Sister Turner:)