Week 17-October 17-24, 2015

 Tom and Garnalee at the Manila, Philippines Temple on Wednesday, October, 21 with the other senior couples as part of our senior activity.
Tom was asked to be an escort for a member who was receiving own his endowments. His name is John Thorpe who is originally from New Jersey. He joined the Church four years ago.

 all of the senior couples attended the Manila, Philippines Temple. Left to right: Tom and Garnalee Harrington, John and Connie Rogers, John and Marjorie Broadhead, KC and Chris Jones, Doug and Jacquelyn Swift, Mary and Robert Brady, and President Kim and Sister Jennifer Bertin.

In front of the Manila Temple with one of the many spires in the background.

 Before going to the temple we gathered at the Mission Home for some Family History instruction given by us. The instruction included how to register for a Family Search account, editing features on Family Tree, and adding Memories.

A visit to Krispy Kreme found Garnalee leaving with a few Halloween donuts. They were delicious!









There was wind and rain all Saturday night from Typoon Lando. When we arrived at the meeting house we were told that church had been cancelled but since there were a few members who had already arrived the bishop decided to go ahead and hold Sacrament meeting. The power went off shortly after the meeting started but since there are windows on both sides of the chapel going ahead with Sacrament wasn't a problem. Tom was asked to give a short talk since the speakers hadn't shown up.

Tom's cucumbers have been beat by the storm. He is hoping they will recover and still produce cucumbers.

Because of the storm, coding was lifted on Monday, October 19. It was nice to be able to go home a little earlier in the afternoon. Tom was out with Elder Broadhead checking a new apartment in Meycauayan and didn't get home until 8 PM. Garnalee was really concerned about them because the rain was really come down for a few hours in the afternoon.

Zone Conferences continued this week on Tuesday and Thursday for Montalban, Malolos, San Jose Del Monte, and Fairview. Garnalee is grateful that the work load for her is a little lighter this week with the extra load of Zone Conferences.

Tom is continuing to hassle with replacing rent checks for several of the apartments. Missionaries sometimes forget about the rent, the check is lost, and then it has to be replaced.

Thursday, October 22,  Tom spent a lot of time doing his cash register in preparation for printing out the monthly statement of operations. He received an email earlier in the day stating that his Church VISA 1 credit card had been frozen. It seems they don't like you to continually take money out of the account without telling them where you have spent it.

Friday, October 23, was our monthly planning meeting where we go through the calendar for the upcoming month. Tom also went with Elder Broadhead to checkout another apartment for missionaries. Garnalee spent time doing some a variety of jobs. We had a real scare when Tom couldn't find his wallet. He had checked Elder Broadhead's car but no luck, and he decided he had left it home. When we got home, no wallet. Garnalee said a prayer that the wallet would be found. Tom called Elder Broadhead and meet him down by the car. Elder Broadhead went to the passenger's side and Tom went to the driver's side. Tom immediately saw his wallet. It had slid down between the seats but hadn't been visible when he had checked earlier from the passenger side. The prayer had been answered.

Tom has spent several hours this week working with Elder Campbell, the former finance secretary, on doing monthly reports and getting everything all caught up.

We went to dinner on Saturday evening at a new place, Burgoo. We had a great dinner of Manhattan Salad, a salad with romaine lettuce, apple, pineapple, and candied walnuts, and ribs, shrimp, fries, and corn on cob.

Week 16--October 11-16, 2015

 Missionaries serving in the Quezon City North Mission that are all from Blackfoot, either currently or grew up there: President Kim Bertin, Elder Tom Harrington, Sister Garnalee Harrington, Elder Jake Goodwin, and Elder KC Jones.

 President and Sister Bertin, Elder and Sister Harrington, Elder Goodwin, and Elder and Sister Jones all who can be claimed as Blackfoot-ites.

 Elder and Sister Harrington working with the youth of the San Ildefonso Branch with family history on Saturday, October 3.

Some of the youth from San Ildefonso we had the opportunity to help create Family Search accounts and enter family names into Family Search. Each youth was hoping to find five family names they could take to the Manila Temple on October 24, to perform ordinances for. We were able to help them find some names. With the new policy from the Church on permission from the closest living relative of the deceased for ordinances to be done, some of the names we found have to cleared for the work to be done.



 We had the opportunity to watch the remaining two sessions of General Conference on Sunday, October 11, at the stake center. We left the meeting feeling spiritually fed. We both were impressed by Elder Durrant's talk on "Ponderizing" the scriptures.

The job of leases and rent payments is going to be a big part of Tom's responsibility which he is finding to be challenging. When a person deals with 200 missionaries housed in 70 apartments and keeping everything running is a big job. Out of the 70 apartments there are always a half dozen or so where the missionaries miss place the rent check. That creates a huge problem for Tom in trying to track down the check and/or to request a replacement check. That process can take weeks. He is currently working on leases for four new apartments so apartments have consumed a large portion of his schedule each day.

Garnalee has fallen into a routine with her responsibilities and is not feeling so overwhelmed. She has taken over the filling of the mail run orders to free Tom from the pressure, and so he can focus on other things.

Sister Bertin had a can of pumpkin brought back for each of the senior couples from the US by Elder and Sister Bowen when they went to General Conference. Pumpkin is one of the items that can't be found in the Philippines. We will save it for Thanksgiving. Garnalee is hoping she might be able to make a pumpkin pie. She has only been able to get the oven up to 350 degrees so a pie might not happen.

Last Saturday after watching General Conference Garnalee made an Apple Crisp. We both wanted something that meant fall.

Week 15--Oct 4-10, 2015

Sunday, October 4, was Fast and Testimony meeting for us instead of General Conference. Because of the time difference we always have General Conference a week later. It also gives those countries that need the talks translated the time to get that done. Tom gave the Sunday School lesson, and they have asked him to do it again.  He is an excellent teacher, and they are going go utilize his talents while we are here.

After being overwhelmed last week, Garnalee is feeling better this week. She is able to schedule each of the tasks she needs to do and keep them up to date. She even found time to help Tom with a couple of items.  Tom is feeling better about his responsibilities also.

When we arrived at the office on Friday morning, Garnalee checked the emails and discovered three missionaries that are VISA waiters had been assigned to our mission. They will arrive with our November batch that is now setting at 29 new missionaries. That is the largest new batch we have had since we arrived. Several apartments will have to be opened to house them.

We watched the Saturday morning session of General Conference at the Mission Home with President and Sister Bertin, the Broadheads, Elder Welch, and Elder Algar, We watched the Saturday afternoon session at home on the IPAD. We loved all of the messages.

Another busy week and nothing photo worthy.

Week 14--September 27-October 3, 2015

 An updated photo of Tom's cucumbers. They are really growing. Amazing to Tom is that a garden can be planted anytime of the year.

A missionary that had served in the Quezon City North Mission sent a box of items to be distributed. In the box were some handmade tops that had been made by a member of her home Ward. The children loved the tops.







We have discovered this week how busy we are going to be with our responsibilities. We went to the office for a couple of hours on Sunday after Church to try to get caught up. Elder Campbell, the former financial secretary, came to help Tom with some financial tasks that needed to be completed namely MSF which is Missionary Support Fund which has to be every done two weeks. To thank  Elder Campbell for all of his hard work we had him and his companion, Elder Lorenzo, over for dinner.

Monday was a long day. It is our code day so we didn't arrive at the office until 10:30 AM but we didn't get away until 8:30 PM. We had to do mail run for three zones. Mail run includes sorting the mail that has come and filling orders for proselyting pamphlets, boxes of Book of  Mormon, reporting sheets, name tags, fans, rice cookers, DVD players, stoves, etc. Garnalee also worked on letters that needed to be sent to bishops and stake presidents about missionaries coming home.

Tom went to the Philippines Area Office for training with the financial director on Tuesday. The distance is about 25 miles, and it took him an hour and 40 minutes to get there and an hour and 35 minutes to get back. Garnalee stayed at the office and worked on inputting baptism records until she had to give up that computer to the young missionary who comes in on Tuesday afternoons to work on maps and graphs for the Mission Leadership Council. She then went to her other computer and sent out welcome letters to the new missionaries coming in a few months. tom dropped Garnalee off at the office at 7:30 AM, and we didn't leave until 6 PM.

On Wednesday, Garnalee started working on the rest of the baptism records that needed to entered. She has entered 65 baptisms in the last two days. She sent out letters to the stake presidents about missionaries going home and printed the release certificates. Due to unreliable the mail systems, we send the release certificates home with the missionaries in a sealed envelope. Tom went with Elder and Sister Broadhead to one the apartments that houses sister missionaries. The sister missionaries were moving to a new apartment. Tom had to meet with the landlord to give him an additional 6000 PHP because the new apartment is more expensive.

It was a busy day but not as productive. MLC was held today so there were missionaries around wanting things. We had to pick up the lunch for the MLC which cuts into our work time. However, Garnalee is glad that we only have to pick up the lunch. Sister Bertin shared that a friend of theirs serving as the office couple in Canada has to prepare the lunch for MLC. Garnalee did get the cover sheets and folder labels created for the new missionaries that are coming. Tom spent a lot of time on the phone trying to get things working correctly on the computer. Tom had to go to the bank to get money for a landlord and cell phone load so we left at 3:15 PM.

We start off our Friday with the office weekly planning meeting. Tom got the cell phone load ordered and completed some IMOS tasks. Garnalee finished the last of the tasks that were on her to do list for the week. So to celebrate we went out to dinner.

Saturday was a trip to the San Ildefonso Branch to the north. We are helping with a Family History activity with their Branch. As we arrived in Bustos, we got stuck behind a funeral procession. The deceased is in a white Rolls Royce hearse that is decorated with white flowers on top and white and purple balloons. The mourners walk behind the hearse to the cemetery. Cars are not allowed to pass and even if we could pass there was another funeral procession coming from the opposite direction. We followed the procession for about 3 kilometres that took about 30 minutes when they turned off into the cemetery. Consequently we were about fifteen minutes late to meet with the Jones' landlady to pay her the rent which made her late for work.

Week 13--September 20-26, 2015

 The September batch of missionaries who went home this week. They have all served faithfully for 18 or 24 months.

One of the departing missionaries, Elder Joshua Biggs,  worked with us in the office and trained us on some of our responsibilities. We are going to miss him. One of the activities for exit day is a testimony meeting where each of the missionaries has the opportunity to share his/her testimony with the group. It is very humbling to hear the powerful testimony each missionary shared. As we were driving home we marveled that we get to do this 10 more times before we go home.

We attended Stake Conference on Sunday, September 20. Elder Ardern, Philippines Area President, spoke. A couple of things he said really impressed us. He told about the disciples being on the sea and a storm came up. We all have storms in our lives when we have trials. The disciples were frightened and turned to the Savior to calm the sea. We can also turn to the Savior to quiet our storms and bring peace. He also spoke to the youth about the one great lie of Satan. He used the letters of the word one. He gave the youth examples for each situation.
O--Only time I'll do it won't hurt.
N--Nobody will know
E--Everybody is doing it

The matron of the Philippines Temple spoke. She told us that the Temple had just reopened after a six week closure. On Saturday morning, Sept. 19, at 5 AM there were 500 people waiting in line for the Temple to open so they could attend a session.

When a batch of missionaries go home, we get a new batch the next day plus transfers happen also. That can make for a very stressful couple of days. Monday is our code day. We usually arrive a little after 10 AM and leave at about 2:45 PM but not today. We had a lot to accomplish so we stayed until 7 PM.

Tom was hoping to go unscathed in the car while here. However, while returning from the bank and attempting a U-turn a motorcyclist that was counter flowing clipped his driver's side mirror. It didn't break the mirror but broke the lens cover of the turn signal mounted on the side mirror. He was in the left lane and making a legal U-turn, however the motorcyclist told him he couldn't make a U-turn from that lane. It was just trying to cover up for his illegal pass.

A new batch of missionaries arrived on Wednesday morning fresh from the Philippines MTC. Tom and Garnalee each had do a presentation to the missionaries. Tom's was on finances, and Garnalee's was on receiving and sending mail.

One of Garnalee's responsibilities now is to record the weekly baptisms. There were 41 baptisms last Saturday in our mission. This is going to be a big job as there are several things that have to be done with each baptism.

When we arrived home Wednesday evening there was a message from Jennifer that the Toyota had been wrecked. Lots of  damage and not driveable. It sounds like that insurance wants to total the car and pay her what it is worth. She will never be able to purchase a replacement car that will be as reliable as the Toyota for the insurance settlement.

Friday evening Tom received a phone call from President Bertin after he received a call from one of the new missionaries. The new missionary had spent 1400P of his 1500P support money the first day in the mission. He called to find out what he should do. He must not have listened very closely to Tom's presentation on budgeting. The President directed him to come and explain to Tom why he had been so foolish. Feeling sorry for the missionary, Tom went to the grocery store on Saturday and purchased peanut butter, a loaf of bread, and 1 1/2 kilos of rice. Hopefully that will tide him and his companion over until October 1 when they get their next support money.

Saturday was the Family Day Event for the Stake. We presented the medley of children's songs we have been practicing for the past several weeks that had dance steps with each song. We marched onto the stage like the Von Trapp Family Singers instep with Tom's whistle. It was a fun event but typical of Filipino schedules, one time is announced as when something will begin and when in actuality it begins much later.

Week 12--September 13-19, 2015

We had a Senior Couple outing on Wednesday, September 16. We traveled to Philippines Ocean Park located in Manila. We had a fun day viewing the exhibits and enjoying the bird, sea lion, and Symphony of Lights shows.

They had an enclosed area of Brahminy Kites. They are a coastal raptor found in the Philippines.

 Tom and the Brahminy Kite. I hope he doesn't end up with anything on his head.

 After going through the aquarium, Garnalee visited the fish spa. The fish nibbled on her toes, ankles, and legs. She said it felt like someone was tickling her toes.

There was a large jellyfish exhibit. This is an example of the Moon Jellyfish.










Tom went Home Teaching on Sunday with Brother and Sister David. They visited several homes and he helped give a Priesthood blessing to a sister who was sick.

Each Monday we call all the kids. Sometimes we catch each one and other times we talk to only a few. At least we are able to leave a message, and they know we are thinking about them. Tom started creating a book vault to put valuables in. He will use it at the training next week when he teaches the incoming missionaries about budgeting. It was created because their have been several break-ins at missionary apartments lately. We are looking for a way to help them keep their money safe. President and Sister Bertin said their son used a book vault when he served in Mexico several years ago.

Each week the missionaries go to a computer shop to send and receive emails from family and to submit their weekly letter to President Bertin. The letter is submitted through the Missionary Portal. Sometimes due to problems at the computer shops the missionaries can't get into the Portal. So then they have to send the letter in an email to President Bertin. When that happens, President Bertin forwards the emails to the office and Garnalee has to place each letter in the missionary's electronic folder. Last week there was an unusually high number of letters that had to be individually placed in folders. She later found out there was a Google update that caused some of the problems. Some of the problems come when there are two computer shops side by side, and they share the same hub.

We are fully immersed in Ward activities. The last week in September is Family Week in the Philippines. The Stake is doing an activity on the last Saturday, and each Ward has been assigned to do a presentation based on a family song.  Mimicking the Von Trapp, Elder Harrington blows a whistle while marching onto the stage with the "children."  Our Ward's assigned song is "The Family is of God" but are adding other songs to create a musical. Practices have made for longer days.

Elder Biggs, the mission secretary, and Elder Campbell, the financial secretary, both leave the office next week. Elder Biggs is going home and Elder Campbell will go back to the field. Their responsibilities are being turned over to us. So much of the week was spent working closely with them making sure we know and can do all of the tasks.

Tom had to present the financial report at the monthly planning office meeting on Friday. He tried to get out of it, but Elder Campbell wanted him to do it as it will be his responsibility from now on.

We finally received the shipment of pills and test strips that Jen and Chad sent on August 14. We thought that they might have been lost. They were sitting at the Post Office and no one had sent a card notifying us that the package had arrived. After Jen checked with USPS and found out the package had arrived had the Manila Central Processing Center on August 26, we decided to ask about the box at the Post Office.

Finally P-Day (Preparation Day) arrived but it turned out to be as busy as any other day. We had laundry to do, apartment to clean, and go grocery shopping. Tom got a haircut ($1.02) and made late additions to mail runs for Caloocan and Valenzuela. We went to our musical practice. Tom revamped the financial presentation that the he will be giving on Wednesday and sent it President Bertin to put on his computer.

Week 11--September 6-12, 2015

 Part of Tom's responsibilities will be to give a presentation on finances and budgeting to the arriving missionaries. He wanted to use a program from Dave Ramsey where you have an envelope for each expense category. You put your budgeted amount in each envelope and take money out as you need it. When the envelope is empty then you can't spend any more money from that category. Hopefully, it will help the missionaries learn to budget their money.

 We had Xavier and the missionaries to dinner on Sunday. Left to right: Xavier Henry Zamora, Sister Pader, Sister Talalima, Sister Harrington, Elder Harrington. Picture taken in the atrium area of the Redwood Apartments where we live.

 When we arrived in Bustos on Saturday the Jones took us for tour of the area. Bustos is a rural, agricultural area in the Philippines north of Quezon City. This man was leading his batangas (cattle breed closely related to Brahmas) down the road and stopped to let us take a picture.

 Instead of rolling fields of grain there are fields of rice. A beautiful picture.

 Is an-n-n-n-y body home? The goat was on the front porch of this house and appeared to live right there as there were goat droppings all over the landing.

We stopped at one house that had several bacas staked beside his house. He was kind enough to let us take a picture. There was a mother with her new baby. Tom started to walk toward the mother and she quickly let him know to stay away from her baby.

 This carabao is a domestic water buffalo found in the Philippines. The rope is put through the nostrils of the carabao so it can be controlled by the owner.

This is the home of two families in the Bustos branch surrounded by rice fields. The two families that live here planted the rice and later will harvest it.  It is ninety days from planting to harvest. A very humble home.

The two families who live in the home above. They share common outside walls with a wall separating the two homes. There are twelve people who live in the two homes. They get to Church by all of them loading on to the trike that is owned by one of the families. The man on the right and his two children were there visiting when we arrived.

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As we drove around we saw many bacas in the fields. The white birds are cattle egrets which eats the ticks and flies off the batangas.

We stopped at Jollibee for dinner. A first for us since arriving here. Jollibee is a Filipino multinational chain of fast food restaurants headquartered in Pasig, Metro Manila and is popular here in the Philippines. They serve spaghetti with hot dogs that is a typical Filipino dish. You can also have chicken with rice but they do serve hamburgers with fries.
Left to right: Sister Jones, Sister Harrington, Elder Harrington, and Elder Jones. By the way: Elder Jones grew up in Blackfoot.

A picture of us with Jollibee.

Saturday evening we helped with a Family History youth activity. There about 15 youth plus several leaders. We helped them sign up for Family Search accounts. It was a very successful evening.

There are some pots with soil on our balcony so Tom has decided to try his hand at gardening. On Monday, he planted cucumber seeds and by Friday they had already come through the soil. This picture was taken on Sunday. They got a great start, but there is so little sunlight on them each day we still don't know how they'll do.





Monday, Sept. 7, we walked to SM Mall to purchase a few things at the grocery store. There was Christmas music playing. Christmas here goes on for four months. Tom visited with President Bertin and he has decided that he is not going to have Tom not do all the tasks he had originally been assigned. Tom is going to focus on finances and make sure he knows all the tasks that are involved there. In the evening, Tom decided to go back to the office to finish printing the envelopes Sister Bertin uses for going home medicine for the missionaries. The medicine is a precautionary measure against any internal parasites that the missionaries may have picked up while serving here. The office is only about three miles away but due to the heavy rain and flooding the traffic was especially dense and slow and it took him over an hour to get there.

Tuesday we attended the Fairview Zone Interviews meeting. We discovered that you can't rely on "Sister" Google to give you the correct directions. President and Sister Bertin each gave a short message to all the missionaries and then he started the interviews. While the interviews were going on  the APs, Zone Leaders, and Sister Training Leaders each conducted a workshop.  It is amazing to watch these 19-21 year old missionaries teach. The future of the Church is good hands. After returning to the office, Garnalee received more training on the baptism records. It is important to have several checks to make sure that each baptism is turned in and recorded. An interesting side note: While reviewing missionary orders Tom ran across a name tag for "Sister" Algar. The only missionary we know with the name of Algar is an Elder who is an AP to President Bertin. When asked him if there had been a mistake in the order he quickly said, "No, it was to be Christmas gift for his younger sister." When Elder Algar's older brother returned home from his mission he gave his name tag to Elder Algar hoping to motivate him to go on a mission. It worked! What a great idea.

Wednesday, was another day Garnalee spent working on baptism records. Tom spent most of his day working with Elder Campbell on receipts and reimbursements.

Tom had some follow-up financial training with the Area Office Financial Director through Web-Ex on Thursday.

Friday Tom found a new favorite place to buy chicken. It is called "Chooks To Go" that sells a whole rotisserie chicken for P210 which is $4.48.  We traded cars with the Broadheads, who were coding today, so they could take some fans to the repair shop. Tom worked on his first mail run order with Elder Biggs. After we arrived home we walked to the mall to buy some things. When we came out of the store there was a heavy down pour. We decided to go see "Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials." We had recently watched the "Maze Runner" on TV and thought the sequel would be good.

We drove to Bustos on Saturday to do a Family History activity with the youth of the Bustos Branch. Again we discovered that "Sister" Google's directions are not the best. We drove along on a narrow road at a turtle's speed for an hour before we got to the North Luzon Expressway (NLEX).  It took us two hours to go 35 miles. We followed the directions Sister Jones had emailed to us after we got on the Expressway and the trip went much smoother and faster. We followed Elder Jones' directions back home. All went well until we missed a critical off ramp for Mindanao Street. In the US when you miss an off ramp you simply get off at the next off ramp, cross over, and get back on going in the opposite direction. Not so in the Philippines. Off ramps are infrequent  and overpasses almost nonexistent. So the adventure began. It was dark and raining hard and we both got disoriented. A trip that should have taken under two hours took three. Final analysis, our day was both wonderful and dreadful!