Happy Birthday Dear Taylor

Cutting young coconuts and getting the water and meat. MMMMM good!

Dear Taylor, here we are in a far-flung place, missing you, missing your family, musing on you and your birth, wondering if we can come up with a post to equal that of your wife (which was not only our most widely read post, thanks to Anne’s link form her blog to ours, but also I think our most powerful post because it linked her and her history with the culmination of our mission work up to that time), and it occurred to us how grateful we are that you and Tanner made the effort and sacrifice to come see us here, to make our experience here more real, more tangible. And so, for your birthday we will document the visit of you and your brother, remind you of some of the highlights and some of the lessons learned and the people you both connected with.

 

Wilbur, is that You??

First of all a caveat to those who are not the birthday boy:  It looks like we might just hang out all the time, since this blog is a ton about beaches, and waterfalls, and since the blog post a couple weeks ago had a beach p-day/b-day included, but remember, we have saved these pictures from way back last April, just after Tanner’s birthday actually. SO, though this blog is to Taylor, it records events long past, and it is a shout out to Tanner too, since they were here together.  Oh we loved having them here.

 

Sige (rhymes with figgy--it is likely the most used word in the Visayan Islands—it means “go ahead”, “ya I gotcha”, “all right then”, “continue” or a host of other affirmations. Often it is said really fast twice or thrice, like affirming what’s been said, as in “ya, ya, ya, got it”) Taylor, lets reminisce about the grand old time we had while you two were here. You and Tanner had that business trip to China, so decided a hop down here to our island was in order. You guys didn’t seem phased by the trip, though it is no small hop—even if you are just talking about the last few legs from China to here, but  . . .

Two generations of Nunezes and two of Croppers

You arrived!  We had no idea what you would want to do, but were very gratified when you were happy to spend most of the time here visiting and connecting with the people we have taught, worked with, and loved.  We wanted to enrich their lives, by having them meet you, and we wanted you to be lifted by knowing them, so that’s mostly what we did, fitting tons into every day, seeing people and places and doing things that we have loved and others we had never experienced.

Looking for seashells

 

We will let the pictures and the captions speak for themselves, but remember how great it felt to meet with the people we had been telling stories of—a branch president who has grown into a faithful and spiritual leader, a family preparing for the temple, a family strengthened by their return to participating together in the gospel, a cheerful man who regained the path to becoming worthy of advancing in the priesthood to the office of Elder, and several others.

Lost in the crab field.  Crabs love chicken legs!

 

Teacher's quorum president with his catch of fish!

Look closely, there are about 25 fish.

Sister R with newborn and the boys

Maybe the most profound object lesson Dad has learned while here was one you and Tanner experienced with him.  He told the story at Grandma Cropper’s funeral, but I will retell it here for the record.  Remember when you went out to the home of Brother and Sister R?  They are squatters on a spit of land between a tidal lagoon and the ocean.  Granted, the surf is not high here, but the tides vary greatly, hence their home is on stilts. As we walked up to their house, one of the sons walked in from fishing with their unique fishing contraption with a bucket, and Dad asked him what he had caught.  Then you all looked in the bucket and there was nothing visible except water, Dad said, oh, too bad, you got skunked.  But the son answered yes,, I caught fish.  He said there are about a hundred fish in the bucket.  You all looked at one another questioning his response, wondering if he had understood the question.  Dad looked again and there was nothing and stated the obvious, “but there is nothing in the bucket but water.”  That is when the lesson came.  The young man explained that he had been fishing for the tiny hatchlings that can only be seen by looking very closely with a trained eye.  “You have to look for the tiny black dots. Those are the eyes.”  Once he had explained and you understood what to look for, all of a sudden you could see that there were indeed dozens of sets of tiny eyes squiggling around.  They had always been there, but you had not seen them until you were taught to look with different perspective, and you were willing to look again.

Brother R catches these tiny baby fish, takes them to a man who has a tidal fish pond.  He sells them to the guy who will then raise them and sell them again when they are grown, about 12" long.  Brother R taught a great lesson that day, and Dad connected it to our missionary work.  We teach people every day, including brother R’s parents and siblings, about things they could not at first see.  But, if they are willing to be taught what to look for, if they are willing to look again, the gospel appears before their spiritual eyes—very real and quite evident.

Dinner by the pool at the end of the day.  MA is in Utah with Sara and Isabelle

 

We are so grateful that you and Tanner chose to come see us.  I know it’s a stretch, but for us, your visit made our work here more real.  We’ve been out fishing, day after day, and by your coming to look in our bucket for real, it made our work matter all the more. 

Thank you for your work at home that contributes to our ability to be here.  Thank you for coming to visit and share with us this amazing place and our amazing experience. Thank you for loving your wife and teaching your children and staying connected with your siblings and magnifying your calling and on and on.  Your life is a reflection of the blessings of the Gospel Jesus Christ when we choose to live it fully.

The Amlan branch president and his wife with us

Which one is Tarzan??

About an hour away from our house

This is really cool!!

On the way for a little fishing.  The teachers quorum president out fished us this day.

What if we sauteed this in butter with a little salt?

This is a jungle

Can I swing over the river???

Members and friends in the neighborhood

At the Taoist temple in Cebu City

Taoist temple having fun

Rain and shine and weaving

Banana Leaves Make Amazing Umberellas

 Just when we thought it was safe to go outdoors—as in we haven’t had a natural disaster in, what? weeks?—we had two days back to back of being out for way too long in way too severe of weather.  One day it was rain and mud, the next brutal sunshine and humidity.

Yet, as always, we got to know why.

Remember we told you of a man who found a tattered Book of Mormon on a river bank, read it, prayed about it, had revelatory dreams regarding it (ya, sounds like a church video, I know) and finally sleuthed out what church it belonged to and asked if he could join?  Well, if you remember in that story, when we met him to invite him to speak in district conference, we started talking to him outside on a bench, then moved, due to rain, onto his front porch, then had to move, due to leaks, to his inside sala (front room, but picture no furniture, just a bamboo floor), then had to move again, due to torrential leaks, to his bedroom (picture no furniture, but a hook with clothes and a rolled up mat). Here we stayed and recorded his story.  The ubiquitous leaks continued to try us, but they were fewer. The sound was deafening, but we huddled down and listened to his story.

126 stairs then 1,463 steps up into the wilderness--we counted

Well, his wife was about to be baptized this week, and on Friday the missionaries in his congregation organized a service project to help repair his roof.  So, the zone missionaries, 12 of us, drove in our truck (6 in the cab and 6 in the truck bed with canopy) to their town, up a mountain, then we got out and climbed up a mountainous staircase, then hiked higher into the mountain to where we gathered coconut fronds, cut them down the spines and wove them into a thatch.  It is not as solid as nipa leaves and the weave they do with the nipa, but apparently it will suffice.

Roof Weaving 101

You don't learn this in school

It was actually great fun learning to weave the fronds.  The trouble was the rain.  It was raining when we gathered at the church.  It was raining harder while we drove up the mountain.  It was pouring (now really think of that word—imagine a pitcher, pouring water out) by the time we got to the shelter in which we would weave the fronds, we were soaked to our skin.  But, dauntless we acquired the new skill we’d come to learn, and got even more muddy than when we arrived.  I must say, the sister who taught the technique magically produced a product that was certainly more water resistant than some of our attempts, but even ours would be a blessing to our Filipino version of Lorenzo Vincente.

A spoon made out of Coconut husk for eating the meat.

Climbing the tree for fresh coconuts. 

We cracked open a few young coconuts that a guy threw down to us from about 80 feet up.  Elder Cropper was especially glad he had carried his bolo knife all the way, ‘cause now he had a use for it. You can make a little spoon by shaping a piece of the husk. We drank coconut water, scooped out the soft flesh, loaded up our woven roofing and headed back down the mountain.  Can you picture 12 muddy, soaked, sweaty missionaries in a truck? With thatched fronds on the roof?  See below.

many hands make light work

It was now too dark and too late to deliver the goods up to Bro. O’s house (another climbing feat), but we were happy to know they would get delivered by members, and soon brother O and his family would have more than just a corner of their house dry in the coming wet months. Brother O baptized his wife on Saturday.  On Sunday, he used his Melchizedek to confer upon her the gift of the Holy Ghost.  They had a much drier house to go home to after.

It works just like a shingle

Kanding (goat) one day old

We are so happy to have a truck!

 Next day, Saturday,  sun.  The R.S. Pres in our branch organized a 1-day-mission where all the sisters met at the church, divided up the people who needed visits and off we went to find folks.  Elder Cropper and the zone leaders did the same, but in the air conditioned truck.  I went with a young sister in the morning, we all met for lunch, then I went with 3 other sisters in the afternoon.  Let me tell you about hot.  The clouds were gone.  The sun was merciless.  We walked for big chunks of the day, and when we were not walking, we were confined in tight spaces with precious little air flow, or were riding in pedi-cabs designed for Filipinos—ya, even tighter spaces.  Elder Cropper had driven off with my umbrella, so I got my first really bad sunburn of my mission.  Plus, after the rains of the day before, the ground was literally steaming for much of the day—the humidity was droopifying.  It just soaks the energy out of you along with the sweat.  I am not usually as affected by the heat as my companion, but this day was way beyond uncomfortable. I was begging for mercy—knowing we still had 3 serious appointments that evening.

We all met back at the church, and reported on our visits.  Everyone was positive about the people they had found and the invitations they had extended, but you know how that goes . . . People mean well.

Then came the miracles.  Again.  The people really did come.  The sister who always has a million excuses—and very real they are— could not any longer use them, after hearing testimony from her R.S.  Pres. of her own trials in bringing her family of 6 to church by herself, while her husband drank himself into a stupor and now she has 4 returned missionary sons and her husband in the branch presidency. And the sister who left the church in her 20’s after getting pregnant, then married, then separated, and now living with another man, was given a blessing in the afternoon after sisters found her ill in the morning, and she showed up at church today with her live-in boyfriend and the son he is helping her raise.  She had been ashamed to come before, because of her circumstances, but she was loved, then healed, and now she remembers what it feels like to belong to the flock.

Elder Cropper was in the comfort of the truck, but he did have rough roads to drive and long distances at that, and he and the missionaries also had their miracles—a baptism set, a blessing for the sick sister, a lesson taught to a new mother.

Happily engaged in the Lord's Work!

So, rain and sun aside, the miracles continue. By Sunday night it was pouring rain hard again.  We happily pictured the O family under their new thatch.