August 25, 2012

This has been a wonderful week. We taught a workshop Tuesday and have been working to compile data about the participants who are 150 days past due with their loan payments. We are very concerned for many of them.  We wonder what we can do to help them.  Friday we drove to Sipalay.  On the way we stopped in Binalbagan to help President Cobing with the Planning for Success there.  We had had so many problems with the computer application and the internet and amazingly the same problems occurred while we were there.  Now we have witnesses to our problems.  We were there for two and a half hours trying to get one young woman registered and begin her application.  The computer screen was projected on the wall so all the participants could see the forms. When the participant got to the first page of the application,  and tried to input her phone numbers. The application asks for area code in one box and phone number in another box.  We entered the numbers the way it is supposed to be.  The application denied the number.  So we put the number with the nation code first and The application would not accept that number either.  We must have tried at least ten different ways.  We tried to call all the numbers for the people we know in Manila.  We tried to call several leaders here in Bacolod other than President Cobing who was with us.  We tried to call the help desk in Salt lake City and Dan went outside to try to get our phone to work better.  When he came back inside he was inspired to log out of the computer and start again.  Amazingly, when the young woman logged back in  and reentered her information the program took the phone number the first time, the way we had tried many times previously to input.  I was so discouraged and yet the participants had faith and said we should just keep trying and eventually it would work.  I am so amazed at their simple faith and their endurance.  They stay positive even though things look impossible. 

The drive to Sipalay is four hours from Bacolod.  The roads are full of pot holes, unpaved stretches and of course people, dogs, water buffalos, chickens, roosters, cats, pigs, motor scooters, jeepneys, large trucks  and one or two cars so the speed is slow and precarious.  On the way down we saw an accident between two jeepneys.  I had been surprised that we had not seen many accidents with the driving  and crowded roads. The two jeepneys had crashed head on I am sure because one was either passing someone, or driving in the wrong lane (a regular occurrence).  On the way Dan had knocked the handle bar of one tricycle because they just think the whole lane it theirs and do not pull over for faster vehicles.  No one was hurt and we both just drove on thankfully.  When we got to Sipalay we checked into the hotel (The Sipalay Suites.  The room was so small with twin beds and maybe four feet of walk space.  The bathroom was not as wide a my arms outstretched,  but we did have warm water.  We decided to drive out a bit and look for the only geocashe on the island. It started to rain and gradually got harder and harder.  When we got to the part of the road that was not paved it was too muddy and rutted to continue and raining so hard we could not hike in to find the cashe.  So we turned around and went back to the hotel.  The roads were flooded and we were a bit nervous about getting back, but we did.  We had dinner in the hotel restaurant with the Bevans, and President Cobing.  We had pizza. One of the pizzas had fried egg on it and it was ok.  The bed was uncomfortable and the room's air conditioning  did not work so needless to say we were very uncomfortable all might.  We did not have a very good night sleep needless to say.  We attended the District training and completed our responsibilities.  Dan taught the priesthood about PEF  and I taught about preparation using the parable of the ten virgins. After the meeting, I was approached by two young women who had many PEF questions.  They both had loans and were 150+ days late and had dropped out of school.  They both want to become current and get back to school.  We were so excited to meet them and one other participant.  We also met the teacher of the Planning for Success Workshop who just received the calling. She is nervous and asked if we could teach the third session and we readily agreed.  We were so excited to meet participants and leaders and be able to make connections in Sipalay.  We were planning on staying in Sipalay that night also, but due to the rain and uncomfortable surroundings decided to head home.  We had lunch with President Colbing and then headed home.  After we got home we were so tired we went to bed for some real rest.  Today was our Ward Conference and it was very nice.  I was so thankful to be home and able to go to our own ward.  The weeks are rushing by and I wish we had more energy and time to fulfill our responsibilities.  I hope the lord will excuse out weaknesses and strengthen us in our efforts.