Every Day is a Good Day . . . even with feels like 38-40 C (100-104 F)

Every day is a good day here in the Cebu City Philippines Temple.  That's what my fellow workers always say when I ask how they are.  Or they say, "I'm happy because I have the Gospel of Jesus Christ."  Or, "I'm a child of God . . . so every day is a good day!"  That last sentence was said in a slow Texan drawl by a Black American from Texas who is married to one of our Filipino workers, who by the way, speaks very good English and not with a Texan drawl at all.  I'm not sure how that's possible when she live with a Texan!

Yes, every day is a good day . . . even though it's feeling hotter and hotter as we experience a heat wave.  Daytime temperatures are about 32 C (90-91 F) but with the 60%+ humidity, it feels like 38 C (100 F) or higher.  The nights cool down somewhat to about 30 C (86 F).  We have stopped walking in the evening even though it feels cooler when the sun goes down.

The heat hasn't stopped patrons from coming to the temple.  There are weddings every week and sometimes multiple weddings in a day.  And as it is summer holidays right now, youth groups sometimes up to 70 come daily to do baptisms for their dead ancestors.  For information on baptisms for the dead, go to
https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/comeuntochrist/article/baptisms-for-the-dead?lang=eng

Talking of weddings . . . our oldest granddaughter was married this past Saturday in the Orem Utah Temple.  Would have been nice to have been there.  But we are happy for her from afar.  

In August 2018, on our farm in Grassy Lake, Alberta, Canada, our weather station shows a temperature of 40 C (104 F).  That's the hottest I had ever seen in Alberta.  In 2016-2017, we had seen those temperatures in Mombasa, Kenya and in Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania while we were on our Kenya Nairobi Mission.  And now we are seeing it in Cebu City, Philippines.

The majority of Filipinos do not have air conditioning, and even if they do, they rarely use it.  My friend Ruby finds it hard to sleep at night during this heat wave, and she can't afford to run her air conditioner, so she uses an electric fan for a bit each night.  But my knowledge of central heating tells me that an electric fan in high heat just becomes . . . a furnace!

Our daughter, Heather, and her husband Vince; their daughter Hanna and her new husband Yedam; Hanna's brother, Joseph on the steps of the Orem Utah Temple.  Hanna and Yedam met on their missions in the Micronesia Guam Mission.  Yedam is from South Korea where his parents joined the church when he was very young.  His parents and siblings had already planned a trip to the US, so the wedding fit nicely into their plans.

My apologies to the many Conrad and Torrie relatives who live in Utah who did not get notice of Hanna's wedding.  Strictly my fault for not being on the ball.

It's easy to feel like a millionaire here as our wallets are stuffed with high sounding bills.  1000 pesos, 500 p, 100 p, and 50 p.  At current rates in Canadian dollars, that is $22.30, 11.14, 2.23, and 1.11.  We use a lot of 50 p bills to pay taxis and grab cars.  100-200 p easily pays for a taxi, including a tip.  We like to tip generously because the cost of fuel here is so high and the government has capped how much drivers can add to their normal rates.
Love the colored bills.  Reminds us of our Canadian beautifully colored bills.

Tried taking pictures out of the taxi windows.  It's a very different world out there than the world we live in in our guarded, gated, peaceful "Temple Square" compound.

Another street scene from the taxi window.  We also saw a man, without a shirt and with sweat running down his torso, pushing a cart full of wood up a little incline in the heat.  Reminded us of similar sights during our Kenya/Tanzania mission.  These people work so hard.

Hard to capture this crazy 5-street intersection that we go through every time we go to the Ayala Center Mall.  There's no stop lights and rarely a traffic policeman to guide the traffic.  You just nose in and go when you can.  It works amazingly well.

I was so surprised to see durian fruit on sale here in Cebu.  We learned about durian in Thailand, where it is banned in hotels.  In fact, you can't enter a hotel if you've eaten durian because they can smell it on you.  According to google, "durian is considered the most disgusting fruit, due to its pungent, lingering odor, often described as rotting flesh, sewage, or gym socks, which leads to it being banned on public transport [and in hotels] in parts of Southeast Asia. Despite the smell, many appreciate its creamy, custard-like taste."  Hard to believe anyone wants to eat durian.

For more interesting information about the durian fruit, see the following video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UbngFA0ByE0

We found a new restaurant in the Ayala Center Mall called Yakinabe.  We love Japanese food, so tried out this all-you-can-eat buffet.  Delicious!  Yaki means grilled or fried.  Nabe means cooking pan.  You can actually cook your food at your table yourself, but if I am going to a restaurant, I want them to cook for me.  After all, that's why I am going to their restaurant.  (Some of these types of restaurants actually do cook it for you, right at your table).

We're finished our delicious meal but I wanted you to see the cooking area on the left where you can fry food, and the boiling pan on the right.  No, we did not cook our own food.  We just ate the many already prepared items.  So good.  Our new favorite restaurant.

Filipinos love lechon -- basically pork.  Here's the Japanese version of serving lechon.  There's the pig's head and the cut up pieces of pork, which were delicious.  Sometimes Filipino lechon is very fatty.  This was just right.

The maki was delicious, especially the fruit and vegetable maki on the left and the California mix on the right.  Seaweed is very good for you.  By the way, we usually call this sushi, but I have learned that sushi is a broader category which includes maki (rice, seaweed and fillings), and sashimi (raw fish only), and nagiri (rice and raw fish).

Another Japanese restaurant.  We've been here quite a few times and this fellow, Chan, always serves us.  He remembers what we like and what we don't like.  He gets us a table when there is no table.  We have shared the Gospel of Jesus Christ with him and he always remembers that we are missionaries.  It's so nice to talk with Filipinos about our beliefs and the joy those beliefs bring us.

Now for a treat for those of you who love artwork.  This is artwork of small and sometimes mammoth proportions (see website).  And it all comes down to working with driftwood, or "long dead wood," as the Filipinos calls it.  James Doran-Webb is British but lives and works in Cebu.  Check out his website:  https://www.jamesdoranwebb.co.uk/

We loved these "long dead wood" sculptures.  Click on the photos to enlarge to see an owl, and eagle, and a hawk.

Close-up of the eagle

Close-up of the hawk.  Love those talons clutching the stump.

The main attraction in this outdoor flower market was the life-size carabao (the Filipino work animal) pulling a balsa (a raft, traditionally made of bamboo for floating on the river for fishing and transportation).

The long dead wood gives the carabao a striking appearance.

Frontal view of the carabao pulling the balsa.

That carabao (pronounced care-a-bow, as in to bow your head) is looking right at us.

Talking about artists . . . remember our Snowy Owl Rabbit creator from Sweden, Per Rydberg, from one of my earlier posts?  Well, Per (pronounced pair) has sent me a link to a 3 1/2-minute video he has created about how each year for the past 10 or so years, he has kept a bit of snow from each snowy owl creation, and put it in the freezer as "seed" for his next year's creation.

Per is wearing a Swedish high school student's graduation cap.  While high school graduates in the West wear the mortarboard caps, high school graduates in Sweden wear what looks to be a sailor's cap.  The remains of the 2026 Snowy Owl Rabbit creation are being scooped up to put in the freezer for next year.  At least assuming there will be enough snow next year.  Some years, there has not been, which is hard to believe, as, after all, this is Sweden, the land of ice and snow.  But actually, when we lived in Stockholm in 2020 and 2021, it wasn't as cold as it gets in Alberta in the winter. 
See the video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RQm0FXCjuW0

Now for my final photos . . . which won't mean a lot to most of you because they are of our Filipino friends.  But really . . . people are what's important.  People are the reason we are here in the Philippines.  I will try to make the captions somewhat interesting.

First, just a few comments about people.  Canadians are generally known for being friendly and polite and saying sorry frequently.  Americans are generally known for being less formal, and louder in public.  Filipinos are generally known for being warm and kind.  But . . . I have also found Canadians who are not polite, and Americans who are quiet in public, and Filipinos who are not easy to get along with.  People are people wherever you go.  But we are all children of the same God.

At the end, I will put a couple of humorous happenings . . . just to keep you going!

I have nicknames for some of the sisters I work with in the temple.  This is Sister Flower Girl because she often wears flowers in her hair, but not this night.

This is Sister Beautiful White Hair, aka Sister WH (since Filipinos love acronyms).  She and her husband have moved in across the hall from us.  They are our age, which is nice, since so many are younger.

Here are our fellow "foreign" missionaries from the States, the Stirlands and the Andreasens, with our temple president and his wife.  We're gathered Sunday evening for a potluck supper and Family Home Evening, as we do every Sunday night.

Love the Ongs and the Gisons (pronounced he-sohns).  The Ongs are Temple President and Matron and the Gisons are 1st counselor to the Temple President and Assistant to the Matron.  They are dressed more casually than we usually see them in the temple.

These are "my girls."  I have spent many days training them.  I call them my tall one and my short one.  My tall one's name is Myrna, like my real sister Myrna.  The short one is just three years younger than me.  They are from an area where people speak Waray-Waray.  So English doesn't come so easily and because there are over 30 dialects in the Cebu Temple area, English is the common language in the temple.  It's been a huge learning curve for these dear sisters who have had such hard lives.

I hardly recognize Sister Arcayan (pronounced are-kie'-un) without her mask, which she always wears in the temple.  She's probably smarter than I am because she never gets sick and I seem to more than I would like.  But she doesn't wear glasses.  It's so hard to wear a mask when you wear glasses because your glasses get steamed up and then you can't see.  I was Sister Arcayan's trainer so we have a bond.

We call this brother, Brother Apron.  His name is actually Arpon but he answers to both names.

Now for the humorous happenings I promised:

#1:  LeRon was recently astounded to be asked by a clerk in a store, "Are you here to find a Filipino wife?"  He laughed and said that he was happily married, thank you, and that he was a missionary here with his wife.  He gave her a pass-along card and told her about the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  I wonder if she was looking for an old, western husband herself!  We see so many, mostly young, Filipino women with old white men.  Even some old men with canes or ones who are hunched over and can barely walk.  Maybe they think the old man won't last too long!  And now I realize that LeRon is looking more and more like an old white man!

#2:  First, the back story.  Since my bad car accident 2 1/2 years ago, I tend to startle easily at loud noises.  I am getting better at not startling but sometimes I can't help it.  It just happens.  I jump and throw my arms up and emit a shriek.  Well, the other day, in the temple, some of the men and women were in a room waiting to begin some ordinance work.  One of the men in the back let out a very loud "achoo".  My startling went into action with no help on my part.  Everyone laughed and I did too.  But one of the men asked me, "What is the English word for what you just did?"  I said, "I startled."  That's the only word I could think of.  It would have been embarrassing if the people had not been so kind.

#3:  Now an interesting happening:  We met a temple worker outside the housing where we live.  He was distraught because he had lost his motorcycle keys.  We asked if he had retraced his footsteps and he said he had.  Then I said, "Have you prayed about it?"  That was LeRon's mother's go-to for situations like this.  And her faith always produced results.  Today, we learned that this man did pray and he did find his keys.  God is interested in the tiny details of our lives.