Despite all the rain and floods, we still had another great week last week. Last week, we really focused on building relationships between our investigators and our active members. We were able to introduce most of our investigators to some active members in our ward, that we thought would be good fellowshippers for them. Not a whole lot of our investigators were able to attend church last Sunday due to the typhoon, but they are making plans to come to church this upcoming Sunday.
So last week, we had a decent size baguio or typhoon hit the Philippines. Things started to go a little hectic last week when I was on exchanges. Elder Diso and I were out working and it was about 3 o'clock in the afternoon. It started to rain so we hurried and went to one of our investigator's house. Right when we got their house the rain just started coming down in buckets. We could hardly hear our investigators. But we still taught and had a really good lesson. We left their house ( it was still raining really hard) and went outside. The little market area had flooded and their was about two to three feet of water in the market ( the market was kind of in a low area), but that was no big deal. So we avoided the flooded area and walked around to the main road. But when we saw the main road it was completely flooded. There was a river below the road, but the water is usually very low. But the water had risen 20 or 30 feet, so now the river was completely filled and the bridge and road was completely washed out. There now was a huge brown flood river. Not only that, the water was moving quickly. It had to be at least class 2 or 3 rapids plus all the floating debris.
So my companion and I walked around another way to another bridge to see if we could cross. Same story. We then figured, that we might as well start finding people to teach. But everyone started panicking because the water kept rising and it was flooding their houses, and not a single person would listen to us. People started yelling, shouting, and crying because they could not find their kid, or something important got washed down stream, or they could not pick their kid up from school because they could not cross the huge river that was above 7 feet deep.
The problem in this story is that we could not get back across the river, and everything we needed was on the other side of the river; our car, house, our companions, so eventually we needed to get on the other side.
I felt like I was on the Titanic because these houses just started flooding and the water was getting about 5 or 6 feet deep. All their belongings were just floating in the water. People were getting trapped in their houses. Crazy stuff.
This was the condition we were in for a few hours. But then finally, the rained stopped and the water started going down. Around 8 o'oclok at night we were finally able to cross the flooded road. The water was still moving quickly but it was only about knee deep. The rescue squad had ropes to hang on and the whole 10 yards. It was quite the experience. In the end, 2 kids died. One drowned because the water rose to high in his house and the other one was washed down stream. Apparently, the big dam at the very top of the river overfilled because of all the rain, so there was nothing to stop the water from flowing down river.
And after all is said and done, that was just the warm up typhoon. Apparently there is a bigger and stronger one coming this week. So let's see what happens!
And that is all I have for my weather report here from the Philippines. The work must go on. The area is still really progressing despite the rains. (Pictures hopefully next week)
And a big shout out to Miss Adelaide May! Happy Birthday Addi pants! You are getting so old! And you are growing up so fast! Hopefully your body is the only thing growing and not that little attitude of yours ;) But thank you Addi for all your little sarcastic jokes and all the funny things you say. You keep our lives a little more comical and humorous. I still don not know where you get it from.. probably Erin, but your jokes are a lot more funnier than hers.. joke lang ;)
Also Big Landino, you have a birthday coming up this week! ( I am such a good brother in law for remembering... p.s Erin did not mention anything.. joke lang )
At lastley Little David Boy. Well, I still haven't meant him. But he seems like a nice guy in his pictures! ;)
Take care Fam bam! And Mom and Dad watch out for the Peru quickstep!
Mahal ko kayong lahat
Elder Nielsen
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