Home Sweet Home! Welcome home!

Home Sweet Home! Welcome home!

To the rescue!

To the rescue!

After the storm

After the storm

P-Day Hike

P-Day Hike

All wet!

All wet!

Flooding

Flooding

Bagio, Tropical Storm

Bagio, Tropical Storm

A day to remember!

A day to remember!

Zone or General Conference

Zone or General Conference

Elder K and gummies

Elder K and gummies

Street sitting

Street sitting

Jogging on the beach

Jogging on the beach

Elder K 21st Birthday

Elder K 21st Birthday

Birthday Mango Icecream

Birthday Mango Icecream

Elder Verzo - Big Boss!

Elder Verzo - Big Boss!

Elder Verzo new comp

Elder Verzo new comp

Mission Tour

Mission Tour

The Best Zone Ever! My comp circled

The Best Zone Ever!  My comp circled

Teaching with Elder Misbach

Teaching with Elder Misbach

Leganez w/Pablero Family

Leganez w/Pablero Family

Zone Leaders Conference

Zone Leaders Conference

Iloilo Zone

Iloilo Zone

Filipino Smile

Filipino Smile

Elder Misbach's back

Elder Misbach's back

Elder K face

Elder K face

Big pig!

Big pig!

Clothes dryer on the beach

Clothes dryer on the beach

The Seduco Wedding!

The Seduco Wedding!

Hookey bobbin in the Philippines!!

Hookey bobbin in the Philippines!!

Three Iloilo kids

Three Iloilo kids

Iloilo lil boy

Iloilo lil boy

Happy mug shot

Happy mug shot

Digging it

Digging it

Grocery Shopping

Grocery Shopping

Airport scene

Airport scene

Iloilo Trio!

Iloilo Trio!

Yum yum green and all!

Yum yum green and all!

The Fearless Duo

The Fearless Duo

Hiy-ya!

Hiy-ya!

A little out of focus, but happy!

A little out of focus, but happy!

Heleman Warriors?

Heleman Warriors?

Baptism Rhea, Geneva & Dave

Baptism Rhea, Geneva & Dave

Me and Elder Booth w/face paint

Me and Elder Booth w/face paint

Sheryl's Baptism

Sheryl's Baptism

Baptized in July

Baptized in July

Basking in the Light

Basking in the Light

Thursday, March 31, 2011

Wk 73 Elow March 28, 2011

Elow                    
     Well first things first. Elder Misbach is now in a place called Mandurriou. Yeah he transferred. On transfer day we located our package and divided the goods up. Haha. He took the peanut butter I took the wheat thins and cheese. As of now everything has been eaten. I munched the Wheat Thins and Cadbury eggs within the first 24 hours of getting the package.:)  I am super happy to have a camera again. I have been taking more photos already.  And I am not sure but I think I might use up my SD card and burn it on a CD, then send it to you. That way I don't get any viruses and it all works out. Thank You so much for the camera!
     My new companion is Elder Hadry from Idaho. He is a super cool guy and we get along great. He is way good at basketball, knows the language really well, including Tagalog, so I will start brushing up on my Tagalog again.  It will be a good transfer.  I think we can learn a lot from each other.
      We have been working with a father lately. He is the father of four awesome kids, all of them members including his wife. They have been members for a little over a year now. We decided we needed to help him see the blessings of stopping smoking. So we sat with the whole family and wrote the blessings if he quits smoking.  It was cool to read what the kids put down on their paper like; a happy family, it was good. He has been someone that has been in my prayers lately.
      I enjoyed reading the excerpt from Elder Groberg.  About understanding the people. I have decided I will now sleep on the floor, and stop eating McDonalds. Haha nah, they actually sleep on beds.  But I do agree that that is essential to helping the people. I will try this week to see how I can be more understanding. I think I am also learning a little bit more of how much you have to be thinking about the people you are trying to help.
     Well, I am loving my mission more every day. Too bad time is going so fast.   I’ve got to go for now, but just want you all to know that I love you. Talk to you all again next week.
-Elder Kirschbaum

Wk 72 March 21, 2011 Give it up for the Wild Men

What’s up Family?                    
      Man a mission is hard. But it is sooo rewarding. I feel like it is going by too fast and needs to slow down. Something like 9 months left...what? Hope you don't mind me saying this but...I am not quite ready to come home.
      So hear is the news...Elder Misbach will be transferring. I am going to miss him, and the humor. We had two pretty unforgettable transfers. I was pretty excited for another transfer with him... but not so. I think I have learned the most from Elder Misbach. He is what you call a Wild Man. Super Christ-like...haha and etc... He has helped me learn how to be more of myself I think. Hopefully some of his Christ-like attributes have rubbed off on me.   I am a little bit nervous of who my next companion will be. But who ever it is, it will be good.
      Last time we went to the (Ombions) the father wasn't there.  So we hoping that he will continue listening to us. Their fellowshippers are awesome though. The Democritos. He is a convert to the church with a super awesome testimony of the Book of Mormon, and the church. He has been helping us out a lot.
     Eric is doing okay. He was at church this week which was good.  We are just trying to help him get a testimony, hopefully nothing else gets in the way. His sister wasn't able to go to church again because she is close to graduation and has to work alot with her job as a nurse.
      Well. I think I am going to cut this letter a little bit short. But Love you all and I will remember you in my prayers tonight.
-Elder Kirschbaum
Mother we haven't received the package yet. Me and Elder Misbach will open it together at transfer announcements on Friday. We are excited.
Philippino Fact of the Week:
Instead of knocking on doors you yell, "Tag Balay!" That would be like shouting. "Owner of the House!" in English.  In Tagalog it is "Tao po" which means "People!", in Kinara-ay it is "Tag Baray".

Monday, March 14, 2011

Week 71

 
Week 71

~Hello Family!
     So we are still plugging along with Eric and Zhar. Eric still has a desire to quit smoking. The other concern is their mother is out of the country working. Me and Elder Misbach are praying for them and the ward is also helping out alot with them. We have being trying to have the ward visit them the days that we can't go to them. That way they can check up on their reading, prayer, and any other questions they have. Zhar is doing awesome. She is still reading really well in the Libro ni Mormon. We are going to try to prepare them to be ready to be baptized and are very excited.
     Yeah about the Enriquez. I get an update of them every once in a while. They still come to church which is awesome. That is about all I know about them.
I am not sure if I told you but a family we found in our last area, Molo, the Tanamans. The mom and dad are less active and the kids weren't members. Well all they all got baptized after I left and are now passing the sacrament and have the priesthood. Cool HUH? I was able to go back to my area for one day last month and work. I got to see everyone. Micheal Seduco the guy that we help get married is now baptized also and will be getting the priesthood this next week. It is super exciting to hear all the good things happening in that area.
     Some things that happened this week....we finally had some fruits from working with the members. We had a good lesson with a family called the Democritos. We taught her sisters family and the lesson went way well. We will be going back to them on Wednesday and are excited for that.
     We had leadership training this week. We spent two days in the city getting trained on leadership and "The Fundamentals of Preach my Gospel; Teaching more effectively". It was a good experience. Transfer day is next week which means Elder Misbach will...might be transferring. He has been in this area for a while. So this might be our last week together.
     I am sorry to hear about Wayne. That is really sad. I hope that Shirley and their family is doing okay. Tell Jacob Congrats on his call. California here Jacob Comes! They better watch out. Jacob will be an awesome missionary. It is pretty crazy that he is going pretty soon.
     Yeah so we met with a Jehovah Witnesses. It was a pretty interesting experience. We are actually going to meet with him again tomorrow. I will try to tell you a little more about it next time. But for now I am going to get.
     I love you all. Have a good night, and a good rest of the day for us here in the Philippines.
-Elder Garrett Kirschbaum

Monday, March 7, 2011

Week 70 Dasig ba!

Hello family,
     So I am trying to think of what happened this week and I am having a super hard time remembering anything. I think maybe it is because this is the first week that something crazy hasn't happened to Elder Misbach and I.  It was actually an almost fully normal week.
     We had Zone Leaders Counsel this week which was a good learning experience. I think something that really stood out to me was how much more we needed to be involved with our zone; know when the baptisms are, who, what,  and where. Me and Elder Misbach have been working on working with our district leaders, and getting them excited to help their district. Every week we call them and talk to them about the district and what things they are struggling with and what they can do better. It is pretty fun. We went on exchanges this week. I went on an exchange with Elder Gunnel, the elder that was our comp for a few weeks. He is a really fun guy. We had fun karate chopping a huge mass of little kids that attacked us.
     Let’s see...well Elder Misbach and I have finally seen some fruits from the members. We have received a bunch of referrals now from a few families. So tomorrow we will be contacting those people. We’re pretty excited. We were a little bit bummed this week on how we were kind of struggling getting the work going in this ward. We had a pretty tiring day one of the days last week, and just stopped what we were doing and sat down at the edge of the highway and just kind of unwound...while the cars flew by us, and Filippino people scream "hey Joe' at us....:) It’s super easy to get caught up with the day to day stresses, trying to balance everything and making sure that you are as diligent as possible.  It was nice taking a step back and thinking about our missions like it was a movie and adventure (which it is). When all is said and done, we are not going to remember those poopy days but we will remember the good experiences we had.
      We have been going to Eric and Zarr's alot. They are doing awesome. Eric is a soldier with is addictions, and Zarr is eating the Book of Mormon....not actually eating it.. but reading it like crazy. They both have baptismal dates right now for April. We were pretty disappointed that they didn't come to church last week though. Our other prospective baptism this month is a man named Leonard. He is a friend of Eric's and part of that group that we have been teaching. He has been at church for awhile now.  We just have had a hard time teaching him because they have always been at church activities. That’s a pretty good excuse though. We will be giving him a baptismal date for the end of this month if he keeps progressing like he is.
      I think our ward is getting more involved with the missionary work here. We have set up times for our ward missionaries to visit our investigators on days we can't visit them. And last Sunday they visited them without us even saying anything.
      Oh yeah, we have been having a lady in our ward teach us the language every Saturday for an hour! She is helping us with our "slang" or accent in the language. For some reason if you have an accent here they say that you have "lots of slang". They kind of got that English word mixed up.
     Well I am going to end this letter now. I love you all! I enjoyed reading the story you sent me mother. I am excited to hear your missonary experiences.
Love you,
-Elder Kirschbaum

The Random Filipino Fact:
Let’s see...
Some areas here flood very easy when the rain comes. Our house is conveniently located at a spot where if it rains we have to take off our shoes and socks roll up our pants and walk thru water to get back to our apartment at the end of the day.