November 23 2014- Happy Thanksgiving

Well hello family it’s been another week as I look back I cant believe that it’s been another week! Some days seem to go by FOREVER! But overall the weeks are going by way fast! But wow I can’t believe Cory is home... I remember her with her call at our house! That’s nuts. Tell her hello and I love her! Also tell the family I love them all and miss them to enjoy the Thanksgiving! The time is starting to speed up a bit! It’s weird actually I made a goal two weeks ago that I was going to take down all the pictures of the family I had on my desk and move them to my room and replace them with pictures of the savior and I feel like that’s really helped me! I have noticed that I am starting very slowly to understand what’s going on! Like slowly I’d say I am probably understanding about 60%, depends on the subject... but speaking on the other hand is not the best actually I am not good at it at all HaHa but I don’t know. I sometimes feel like I am heading home with Elder Schaffer its kind of weird because people are always bringing it up like Elder you only have 3 weeks and we have so many appointments for food because of that, so it like makes me feel like I am just heading out with him HA but obviously not close! I don’t feel ready yet I still have a ton of work to do here. But this week we actually got punted a but we had some lessons with a family named the Castor family and two of them accepted baptismal dates and we have three progressing that tomorrow if all goes as planned we will be giving dates to. We should have about 7 baptisms on Christmas which I’ll be baptizing like I’m excited but I don’t feel like I should be doing it. It should be Elder Schaffer! But it’s okay. I’m super excited for them to make that step! Let’s see, other than that we taught the first lesson to those families and that’s about it as work goes. We had a ton of hours about 58 hours of work but not a ton of lessons. We caught people at a bad time or something. They all came to church though we had 7 at church! That’s solid! Two great weeks in a row! So one night we worked with our branch president and he has this old jeep like from WW1 or something? I don’t know but its wayyyy old but anyways he took us to a couple referrals then after I was in the back looking up at the stars which are sweet here. Every night I pull out my yoga mat and look at them and stretch! But I was just overwhelmed with the feeling of how in the world did I get so blessed to have the life I have and these people I look at them and literally they have NOTHING I don’t think you all understand the level of poverty some of these people are in. And it makes me think sometimes who am I this spoiled kid to tell these special humble people to pay tithing when it was hard for them to pay because maybe I would be able to buy lunch one day instead of bringing a sac lunch ya know? I’ve just realized how blessed we are to have the lives we do. I have really been thanking the Lord for all the blessings that I have!! That’s about all for this week but I love you all!! Enjoy your Thanksgiving they don’t celebrate it here so the three of us white guys in the house are buying a chicken to eat:) yummmmm! Take the time this week to realize the AMAZING LIFE WE ALL HAVE! 

Love Elder Cuillard

Love Elder Cuillard

November 17 2014

FYI: So a week ago Elder Cuillard was thrown from motorcycle in a crash on his way into the city. He was lucky only a few bumps and bruises.

Hey Family and Friends:)

Well hello I hope you have all had a great week! I will be honest this week has been the longest week ever!! I feel as though it’s been like a year. I had to lay in bed all day for 4 days and I am feeling a lot better! I really thank you all for your prayers on my behalf. I have felt them this week as I have been trying to get better. But as for the week goes not much happened since I was in bed so I read a lot and watched a couple church videos.  I love /”The Lords Errand” it’s about our prophet. He taught me a lot about how I should be a man who follows promptings. I have been trying to develop that while I have been here but its been difficult for me. But I feel as I keep trying the Lord will bless me. President Monsen says at the end of the video, I hope when the Lord needs something, he calls President Monsen! It made me think ya know I want to be like that too. Even though I can’t speak as much as I’d like I have been trying to find other ways to serve people. We also worked only 18 hours this week and we had an all time high at church with 10 total investigators!  What do ya know? The Lord blesses those Elders who get in accidents:) hahah But it was awesome! We are planning on having some baptismal dates given to some of them this week. The stake is planning on having a white Christmas meaning they are trying to have 100 baptisms that day at the big church in the city and I am trying with Elder Schaffer to get five! That's the goal it’s going to be hard but we will keep trying!! Other than that we didn’t teach a ton this week it was mostly a recovery week. I had a lot of time to contemplate my life and think of ways to be better. I am grateful for the accident it’s made me realize how blessed I am to go out and work everyday! I am super excited to go out and work this week. Thanks again for all the prayers I love you all:)

Elder Cuillard

November 9 2014

Well this week had been a crazy week! It started off really well actually the NyNy (Grandma) we baptized a couple weeks ago is on FIRE. She has recruited her whole entire family over for lessons. It has been awesome. I am way tight with their family. NyNy is like my little mom over here even though their family is the hardest for me to understand because they speak NO ILLONGO. So it’s straight up “Calinog Kariah” (their own language) it’s way hard, but I love them so much. Also I am way tight with two of the teenagers. One of them is JP he is starting his medical stuff for his mission next week, so we help each other because I am way good at teaching the lessons in English because my trainer is an absolute stud. Seriously knowing he is going home is going to be way hard for me. But I try learn as much as I can from him because he is the best white kid at everything both teaching and the language and we are like brothers no joke! But the cousins of the family we are teaching are way interested as well. The family’s name is the Valdarama. Then the other family is the Doronio family but their daughter has been in the hospital for a while now. She has been sick with a heart condition and they can’t go to Iloilo because they are way poor. We visit her about three to four times a week, she loves us. She used to be way shy but now she talks to us and enjoys our visits. We gave her a blessing and she ended up getting better for a week and told us it was because of us that she got better for a while. She’s got some crazy faith. So here is our plan. We have been teaching them about Joseph Smith the last little while. We will start the plan of salvation this week. I just hope their daughter gets better. I would be so sad if something happened.  She’s like one of my best friends here. Well we have a baptism this Saturday. It’s NyNy Valdaramas daughter. We have been working with her to get married. Her and her husband have one kid, he’s a stud but the husband wasn’t a fan of us at first and wouldn’t listen but Elder Schaffer and I executed a plan boomerang, meaning we would start by just little talk. He drives around and sells ice cream and its gross, but every time we see him we buy ice cream and talk. Then before we knew it he started to join a little but would make sure his cross on his neck was showing:) HA! It made me laugh! But he’s now taking the lessons but has some serious wow issues but we got this. But Jay Ay is the sister’s name. Also we got two more Elders this week so now there are four of us in Calinog at the moment. I am not the youngest any more:)!!!!!!! Hallelujah!! There is a new white kid, he is so shy and a little quiet but I’m breaking him. His comp is a NATIVE Illongo speaker which is nuts, so I told Elder Schaffer and him to speak Illongo all the time and they do, and Elder Silvano wants to learn English so we help each other and the new Elder. I have been helping him a ton. He’s had a few break downs and I’m like brother, I got you!!  HAHA! But he’s way nice, his name is Elder Wright he’s taller than I am so we have three guys over 6'3” in Calinog and one Pinoy (meaning native Filipino) and he’s a stud so we get “hey Joe” ten times more now. "Kanot" means American. So everyone says “Kanot Kanot” and then I answer back “sino sa akon? Indi pinoy ako?” which means, “No, I am a Fillipino” HAHA! But that is what they say here. But that’s about all this week. Here is my little inspiration I have felt this week. Forget yourself and become a “Pinoy”. Which is what I am trying to do.  I am literally trying to forget home and life before this and become the servant the Lord wants me to be. It’s still way hard but I am trying to become a man of God. I know he’s got our back if we keep pressing forward in faith. I love him and am just trying to trust him and recognize I need to be chopped back so I can grow the way he wants, not the way I want. I am grateful to be here and hope you all have a great week! 

Love Elder Cuillard