Our wifi is unpredictable and temperamental right now so we're lucky we were able to put anything on here at all.  Next week hopefully will be better.

Just in case you have forgotten, here is a reminder.

We met a young man on the 17th at Stake Conference who had served his mission in Calgary in 2010-2012.  He was in Foothills Stake, our stake at that time, from April to June 2011.  He knows some of the people in our ward and lived in our ward boundaries for a few months.  His name is Arnie Mercado and he introduced us to his wife, Joy.  She's a teacher and speaks the best English of any Filipino we have met here.

Leslie's grandmother's maiden name was Love.  So she's thinking maybe she has some relatives in the area.

We hate to go on and on about the traffic but these photos that we took two days ago show how difficult and congested it can be.

This is a photo we took on our way to the church yesterday.  It shows a vehicle parked on the road, facing the wrong way, and completely blocking half of the road.  That's totally acceptable here.  All traffic laws that you learn in North America are in abeyance.  Almost anything is acceptable.

On Sept. 15, 2017 our mission and the Quezon City Mission had a joint conference with Neil L. Andersen.  This is a photo that was taken just before the meeting.  This is actually the other mission and we were onlookers and so could take pictures.  Shane Bowen, who is the Philippines area president, was also there. He is sitting just beside the Andersens, with a suit jacket on.  The gentleman in the shirtsleeves is President Koster from the other mission.  Both Elder Andersen and President Bowen gave excellent and inspiring talks.

This is a photo of our mission, except for the senior couples and mission president.  The gentleman at the front is Dennis, the professional driver of President Hughes.  He drove us to the meeting in the mission van and it was wonderful to have someone else deal with the traffic and parking issues.

Ken's birthday was on the 14th so we went to Chili's restaurant with the other senior couples and they gave Ken this ice cream creation with a candle on top to celebrate the occasion.

On September 9 there was a cultural celebration highlighting the 100th stake here in the Philippines.  Neil L Anderson was there and he'll tour the area here and on Friday he'll meet with our mission.  This is the fifth country in the world to have 100 stakes - U.S., Mexico, Peru and Brazil are the others.  It was a program like the church organizes for a temple dedication - with local historical songs and dances.  This is the link to the writeup in Deseret News:

 http://www.deseretnews.com/article/865688457/Filipino-Mormon-youth-celebrate-100-stakes-Upon-the-Isles-of-the-Sea.html

We had a Senior's activity on August 30.  We visited and toured the old walled city of Intramuros in downtown Manila.  It was built in the 1700's and has had several earthquakes, fires, typhoons, and a world war since then.  There was a lot of destruction over the years but it has always been rebuilt.

I've mentioned before how Christmas is a long celebration here and it starts in September.  It's true!  This is a photo from a missionary district meeting on September 4.  The closing song listed is "O Come, All Ye Faithful"

This is a photo taken this morning at S&R (a Costco-like store).  It is a video/karaoke home theatre.

We're living in The Redwoods apartments.  They're very nice and since we're on the third floor we tend to have less "critters and bugs" in our apartment.  It was almost worth the move.  The photo was taken at a condo celebration.  The sign is not always in the middle of the street.

This is a photo taken at baptism of Floren Caballero on Sept 9.  The gentleman in the blue shirt standing beside Leslie is actually our bishop - Francisco Bernadas of the Don Antonio ward.  Our assignment here is to search out the less-active in the ward.  We've been out several times with the missionaries or ward members (who speak Tagalog) and have found about 25 of them so far.  Of those 19 have moved and we have no record of where they've gone.  They're not active and so their new wards have not requested their records.

We moved on August 21 and now we finally have Wifi again.  So we can post more on our blog.  We're living in the metro Manila area along with 11 million other people.  They all like to drive on the road at the same time.  This is our new church building.  It's where the Don Antonio ward meets and it has air conditioning!
The tower is not actually coming out of the roof but is behind the church.