Hello from Laoag (Again)

So this is the second time in one week being in Laoag haha. We're here now for a mission conference before President and Sister Barrientos go home after next week. It's going to be awesome but I'm sure it'll be hard for them. I'm excited to see the changes and the new mission president come in! It'll be interesting to see what ends up changing in the mission. Right now, we have some of the strictest mission rules in all of the Philippines but also some of the most successful K.I.'s. It'll be interesting to see what ends up happening. 

But speaking of the mission, there's a lot changing already. We had one of the highest baptizing missions in the Philippines last year but we've dropped A LOT lately. Like it's been not too good of work recently here. I'm not too sure what the problem is, we're working hard, but we do have some problems within our missions but it'll be okay. When I first got in we had about 200+ missionaries but after the October batch there will only be about 140 missionaries in our missions. I really don't know why it's dropping and changing so much, maybe it's just to get ready for the new mission president but it's been a really substantial drop so far. It'll pick back up though :)

But as for the week, it was a lot of fun! You learn a lot from training. Training is DEFINITELY the best calling as a missionary. You have so much fun doing it and you learn to build the greatest relationships with the members here because of it. It was a weird adjustment having to do EVERYTHING in the area for the first few days, it was hard but it was a lot of fun. Now it's getting better and it's fun being a trainer :) I love it :)

My companion's name is Elder Pongyan and he's from Bacolod, Philippines. He didn't go through nearly the changes I had to go through but he's doing good. It's hard right now just because he's just kind of socially awkward but it's fun still. I enjoy it :)

We have a baptism this coming Saturday with Sister Precious! It has been amazing to see the miracle in her family's life to going from completely less active to VERY active within a span of a few months. She'll be baptized and Elder Pongyan is the baptizer which will be good for him for that experience :) Hopefully we'll have more with some other investigators but we're going to start proselyting an area in SITE which is the housing projects in our area, I just felt last night that's where a lot of the prepared investigators are, so we'll go with the revelation and start going there now :) 

It's been fun so far in the mission though. Brother Bhong declared me as one of his type 5 favorite American missionaries and if you get to know Brother Bhong, it's an accomplishment haha! Man it's been fun working though! I'm just being myself and loving to teach and to go to investigators houses and find new people. I actually dislike coming home at times because I wanted to just stay out and proselyte longer. I love it so much! It's crazy to see just how much my faith and teaching skills have grown throughout the mission because of my studies though. It's been the most amazing thing to see. Miracles just continue to happen in my life and in the lives around me :) I'm so happy to be a part of this work :) Everything will be going great now in the mission and in our area :) I'm so excited for what the future has for the Philippines and specifically the Laoag mission :)

I love you all! I'm excited to talk to you again next week :) Love you!!

Love,

Elder Oslund