Nathan Gallion - Serving in the Philippines

Update – Spring 2009

2009-03-30T11:13:00.008+08:00

Dear LBBC Friends and Family,

The Lord has been incredibly gracious to Bing and I over the 10 months since we saw you last. Things have happened so fast that it's hard to believe that it's really been that long.

As you know, we spent our first few months in the US finishing wedding preparations, getting married, job hunting, and moving to South Carolina. During that time we found an apartment across the street from Bob Jones University (close to Edith & Maria!) and have begun to put some Filipino touches in it to make it feel more like home. I took a job as a 9^th grade high school history teacher and am reminded every day how blessed LBBCA is to have students who love the Lord. Yes, I remember well that they're far from perfect (sorry, guys!), but I often deal with students who are MUCH harder than ANY I ever encountered there.

Bing, on the other hand, is still looking for work.She occasionally has opportunities to babysit for some of our friends from church, but it's hard for her to do anything far from the house because she doesn't yet have a driver's license. We recently got her learner's permit, though – Pray for us and the people of Greenville!

Another way the Lord has really blessed us is through our church here in Greenville. When we returned to Greenville, Bing joined Heritage Bible Church. Because they were my sending church, there were many people who were very eager to meet Bing and we've made a number of new friends there. Shortly after she joined, we were asked to help lead a Sunday School class of young married couples. Right now there are about 20 couples in the class and it's still growing!

There was at least one major disappointment for Bing, though: The winter came and brought freezing temperatures (which Bing is NOT a fan of), but Bing didn't get to see any snow. We had almost entirely given up hope until early March when a major cold front blew through the South and brought freezing temperatures and SNOW! When Bing realized what was going on, she spent about an hour looking out the front window as the snow came down. It was bad enough that school was canceled the next day so Bing and I went outside and build her first-ever snowman. He wasn't very big, but we were proud of him!

So yes, we've had some great times since we've been back, but we really do miss all of our family there at Lighthouse. You all hold a special place in our heart and we look forward to being reunited with you as soon as the Lord allows. If you ask Bing, she'd like to bring a baby back to visit when we come. We'll see…

Thank you for your continued prayers and friendship!

Love,

Nathan & Bing Gallion

Proof that nerdiness is a spiritual gift?

2007-09-28T16:45:00.000+08:00

Okay, so I have a confession. I'm not only a missionary and a teacher, but I'm also a computer nerd. Yes, it's true. I spend many of my fleeting free minutes cruising the web for cool programs that will help me more effectively.

What you might not realize is that this is done with a purpose: To glorify God. (Sometimes more directly than others, I'll admit) Recently I've come across a few programs that are great assets to my ministry here. Not all of them are equally exciting for the non-nerd, though, so I'll just mention one briefly today: Paint.NET

For a number of years the only option available to nerds to manipulate photos was an extremely expensive ($699) program called PhotoShop. Yes, it's a great program. I, however, am a missionary teacher who doesn't feel like plunking down that kind of cash for a program I don't even know yet. Because I live in the Philippines at present I could always take a five minute ride to Pirates R'Us and pick up a copy for about $1.25, but I can't do that in good conscience.

There's great news for guys like me, though: Freeware.

At present there are at least two PhotoShop-like programs available for free download: Paint.NET and GIMP. It's true that they lack some of the advanced features PhotoShop offers, but for the $699 price difference, I'm willing to make the sacrifice. Personally, I've been using Paint.NET for a little over a month now and have been loving it.

Instead of giving an extensive review of the program, though, I'm choosing rather to share some images I've worked with recently. Take a look. If you're patient, a little adventurous with the computer, and need to play with some images, give it a try!

www.getpaint.net

Why You'll Be Thrilled to Meet Bing...

2007-09-11T20:39:00.000+08:00

(In case you missed it, a number of pictures of Bing are posted lower down on the page. Check them out if you haven't already, then come back and read this post!)

As promised: A second post within 24 hours (or so)!

And also as promised, it's about Bing.

I have to admit that when I first met Bing in 2005, I wasn't interested in her at all. Someone made a passing comment about me hooking up with the high school teacher as a joke right before I met her. When I actually did, I saw a very quiet girl who seemed very shy about having a random white guy walk into her classroom. (And at the risk of sounding extremely shallow, she had a haircut that wasn't my favorite. I have pictures to verify this so I remember it clearly.)

I've since learned that when I went back to the US that year, she got teased a lot by some of the people on staff at the school here about me since I was coming back to work in the school. She wasn't amused. In fact, she wasn't excited at all about the idea of marrying a foreigner. Why, they don't even know how to speak Tagalog, much less Ilocano! (Her dialect, in case you were wondering.)

When I arrived here I was teased a lot too, but still had no interest. So what turned things around? Simple:

I was assigned to work with her.

Bing and I were assigned to teach high school together. As most teachers can attest to, teachers see each other's real personalities. We see each other when we're nice, when we're upset, when we're just plain cranky, and everything in between. In addition to that, both Bing and I worked many, many long hours at the school. Sometimes we'd be there for 13-14 hours in a day working on various projects so we'd talk about pretty much everything imaginable.

During this time, I slowly started to realize that maybe there was more to Bing than I had originally thought. Yes, she was quiet, but there was a lot going on in her mind. In fact, she often disagreed with decisions that were made but decided some things weren't worth getting bent out of shape about. Had I mistaken silence for prudence?

I was also consistently amazed by her ability to remain calm and in control no matter what a student (or teacher, or administrator, for that matter) did. That in itself ought to win her some kind of award.

Bing would also even frustrate me sometimes with her frugality ,("What, you're only going to print on half of that paper?"), which is something considering that many of you have laughed at me about how frugal I can be.

In addition to these things, Bing was always kind, an amazingly hard worker, would always fulfill her promises, and was loved and respected by administrators, teachers, and students alike. Not to mention the fact that her hair had grown out.

Then one day I got a look at her and realized that she was beautiful in every sense of the word - both in attractiveness and in spirit. That was enough for me.

Obviously there was a little more to the process than that. For one, Bing had to get over the whole "dating a foreigner" issue, but I think that one is taken care of.

In short, I'm totally confident that if you know me well enough to be reading this blog, you'll thoroughly enjoy Bing. She's a high quality woman. Actually, I'd be more worried about whether or not I'm a high enough quality man for her. Now there's an entirely new question...

Thoughts? Questions? Comment away!

Bing Who?

2007-09-10T23:25:00.001+08:00

Bing.

Many of you know her name, and that’s about it. Some of you even know that we’re seriously looking toward marriage, but that’s about it. I doubt that many of you even know her last name (not that it’s going to be the same in a year). This is my fault, but it’s intentional. Let me explain.

I’m currently a short-term missionary with GFA which obviously means that I need to abide by their rules and regulations. One of their policies is that short-term missionaries aren’t supposed to date nationals. Despite that policy, I was given an exception in order to date Bing, but decided to keep things quiet due to the facts that 1) Not all short-termers are given this opportunity and I doubt mine should attract undue attention, and 2) It’s probably best to keep things quiet at the beginning of a relationship just in case things don’t work out. (I know that’s not a policy I’ve followed in the past, but I decided to err on the side of prudence this time)

Unfortunately, all of this means that there are some of you who have only just recently learned about Bing and are a little bit in shock to learn that I’m very near getting engaged to her. I’ve received e-mails over the last month or so saying things like, “Nathan are you sure about this?” While I really appreciate the fact that you’re looking out for me, the fact is that we’ve been dating for almost ten months now and we’ve spent most of our waking hours together since I’ve been here. (We put in some looong days at the school) I didn’t just run out to Vegas and get hitched to a girl I just met or anything.

So while I understand that many of you have been caught off guard by this, but I can assure you that you’ll like Bing. Maybe even more than you like me after pulling this one…

Feel free to e-mail me your thoughts or add them in the comments section below. I’m eager for input on this one.

Within the next 24 hours I’m going to post again to let you know why I love Bing and why you should too. See you then!

Pictures of Bing!

2007-09-10T23:03:00.000+08:00

Vacation Bible School = Another demonstration of the Grace of God

2007-05-20T16:22:00.000+08:00

Imagine for a second that you are holding a microphone at the front of a room filled with 140 sugared-up children between 2-12, only about half of which speak English. Now try to make an announcement - lead a song - tell a story. Sounds like fun, right? That was the fun I got to have over and over again last week during Vacation Bible School. And yes, you read that right. 140. Let me tell you, that was some hard work. We had a great crew of teachers and helpers from the church here for the whole week, but it was all we could do to stay afloat. God is good, though, all the time. We saw His grace again and again as we faced such challenges as:

Unscheduled construction being done on the rooms we intended to use
Lack of providers for snacks (a major problem with 140 kids!)
Occasional MIA helpers
Language barrier (for me, anyway)
The fact that I've never directed VBS before
Etc., etc., etc.

The best part of the week came on Thursday. The lesson that day was about salvation so when one of our girls finished teaching her lesson she asked her class if any of them wanted to know more about how they could be saved. Every hand in her class went up (except for the two kids from our church. Either that means they're already saved or we need to be doing a little better on the home front. I vote for the former.).

As you can imagine, having 25 kids deciding they want counseling about salvation put an immediate strain on personnel, but it was a great strain to have. In the end, 8 of those kids make professions of faith and we saw a number of our students show up this morning at Sunday School.

At the end of the week I had a massive headache and slept in late the next day, but it was a very profitable week.

By the way, I should publicly thank Calvary Baptist Church of Willard for sending us their VBS material from last year. They also sent us their VBS offering from last year which was used in its entirety to fund our VBS here. Their kindness was yet another demonstration of God's grace to us. Thank you all!

And yes, believe it or not, I do play guitar now. Sort of.

Interesting

2007-05-20T15:56:00.000+08:00

I ran across this online. It really doesn't have anything to do with the Philippines, per se, but I found this interesting.

***Your Linguistic Profile:***
55% General American English
20% Dixie
15% Upper Midwestern
5% Midwestern
0% Yankee

I am a little bit curious as to what living in the Philippines for two years will do to my linguistic habits. There are some rather unique ways of saying things here, such as:

"For a while" = "Hold on for a second"
"I'll just throw this" = "I'm going to throw this away, then come back"
"I'll alarm my phone" = "I'm going to set my alarm on my phone"
"They transferred" = "They moved (from one house to another)"

My personal favorite from this short (and woefully incomplete list) would have to be "I'll alarm my phone." I often laugh with my friends about this one by asking "Did you have to sneak up on it when you alarmed it?"

Language can be a really funny thing!

Mid-January Update

2007-01-21T17:10:00.000+08:00

I promised in my last mass e-mailing that I'd try to post more pictures and a message from Crossroads as soon as possible. Well, ASAP over here means something more like "I'll try to get to it within the next two weeks." I know that it seems impossible that I could actually have THAT much to do, but it's true. As I type this, my to do list is sitting next to me and has about ten things that I need to do and at least five of them are major projects. Makes me wonder how I'm going to adjust when I get back to the US. Guess I'll have to teach or something. That always kept me pretty well occupied... Anyway, since many of you are reading my regular update e-mails there's no reason to rehash all of that information again on the blog. You might, though, be interested to see more of the things I'm doing and people that I'm spending time with. Hope they're at least a fraction as interesting to you as they are to me.

Ah, yes. The finer things of life: Friends and Starbucks. Or maybe Starbucks and friends. One of those orders. Recently five of us here at the church spent two days in Baguio, which is a city in the mountains a few hours north of here. Because of the elevation, Baguio is much cooler than Manila so I was actually able to pull out my fleece. Not much call for that here, but I'm glad I brought it. Anyway, the two girls in this picture are Bing (on the right), and En-En. I teach with Bing at the school and En-En is a doctor at one of the local hospitals. Nice folks and good friends. And since both like coffee, we can fellowship together with no trouble.

While we were in Baguio, we toured around Camp John Hay, which used to be an American Army base. These days it's used as a tourist attraction complete with golf course, butterfly haven, expensive resort, etc. I'd have to say that it's pretty impressive overall. One of the amusing things we found there was the "Filipino-American Friendship Garden." Nice to know that we can be friends, I suppose. Rob & I figured we'd celebrate with a picture.

Yup. butterfly haven. Pretty cool. They actually put one on my nose and I got a picture of it, but the legs are really, really strange to feel in your nose and my face lets that be known. That and the fact that it shows a huge double chin both contributed to my choice not to post it here. (Don't worry, I'm not putting on weight here. I've actually lost about 15 lbs since I came. Sweating does that.)

Here's the mini-golf. More importantly, I should point out Jorge. Jorge is the member of the Gallion-Asuncion household that you're probably not familiar with. He is Robbie's younger brother (15) and will shortly be heading to Canada to be with his parents. There have been some paperwork issues they've had to face in order to get him out of the country, but it's been a blessing because he's a good kid and a lot of fun to live with.

And yes, I am still ministering here. Life isn't all coffee, butterfly havens, and mini-golf. Occasionally, they actually let me do some real work . This is a picture from the Crossroads conference (as you can tell from the banner behind me). The first night of the conference I preached a message entitled "Glorifying God in Trials" from John 11. (I know some of you are laughing about my John 11 message, but I promise that I reworked it!) Right now we're in the process of planning Crossroads '07. If you're interested, I'm sure we can find a way to use you here. Make your plans for December!

Until next time!

More Pictures...

2006-12-12T20:36:00.000+08:00

Well, it's happened. After doing pretty well for the first two months of being here, I've fallen extremely behind in my blogging. I suppose that this was inevitable because, after all, there are more things to do over here than there is time to do them. That being said, however, it is still my desire to keep in touch with those of you who want to keep in touch with me. It's true that you may not be quite as dark as most of my friends, but you're still my friends (and/or family) just the same.

There is plenty to write about, to be sure, but there's so much it's hard to know exactly where to start. Because of that, I'm posting a number of pictures this time around and commenting on them. Hopefully I'll be able to post (and e-mail) more information about life here soon.

One of the crazier experiences I've had as of late happened at the beginning of November. The high school was scheduled to go on a two day retreat to a camp a few hours away and the youth pastor of the church was scheduled to be the speaker. The topic of the retreat was "The Lordship of Christ" and the whole thing was designed to encourage our students to live their lives in light of the fact that Christ is Lord over every part of them.

All was well until two days before the retreat when Robbie (the youth pastor) came down with a serious stomach virus. Despite this fact, he decided that he was going to plan on attending and speaking until the day before we were to leave when he finally decided he felt too bad. At that point, the principal decided that I would be the (second)best man for the job and asked me if I'd be willing to speak at all three sessions. That led to a late, late, LATE night that involved a lot of prayer and caffeine.

Despite the limited preparation and the total change in plans, the Lord used that retreat in the hearts of many of our students. Many of them made decisions to get rid of things in their lives or to be more consistent in their walk with the Lord. God always knows what He's doing, even when it seems like things are totally out of control.

As most of you probably know, my primary reason for being here is as a teacher / troubleshooter at the school. This has kept me incredibly busy lately doing everything from speaking in chapel to counseling students to authoring documents related to school improvement. At times, all of this has been frustrating, but events lately have been very promising and it looks like I'll be able to help out a lot. Yes, I know that's vague, but I want you all to know that I'm really being given the opportunity to help without too many specific details. If you're really curious, you can e-mail me about this. I'll probably still be vague, but you never know...

Imagine that it's the middle of July and the temperature has consistently been somewhere in the 85-90 degree range. One morning you wake up to go to work and realize that your neighbor has put up Christmas decorations. Within a few days, the rest of the street has done the same and people are playing Christmas songs everywhere you go. Before long, you get caught up in the craziness and decide to join the Christmas cantata at your church even though the church will have to be air conditioned while it is performed.

That's pretty much the way that I feel right now. I know that it's December 21 today, but my brain can't accept that it's almost Christmas time. Everything is just...wrong. Now before you pity me too much, I should tell you that I am still celebrating Christmas and am doing just fine with this whole thing. That doesn't stop it from being strange, though.

My housemate offered to take me to a PBA (Philippines Basketball Association) double-header on Christmas day, but that would have just been a little too much for me. Instead, I'll be heading across Manila to spend the day with another missionary family (The Berreys, if you're reading this, Thad and Chaya) I don't know exactly what we'll be doing, but I'm sure it will be suitably Christmasish.

(By the way, the picture was taken after the Christmas cantata this past Sunday, in case you were wondering.)

Speaking of things that just don't seem right, the above picture was taken at a performance of The Sound of Music put on by - get this - a Filipino acting company. As I'm sure you are right now, I was intrigued when I heard about this. Imagine a musical that takes place in Austria in the 1930's put on by an entirely Asian cast complete with the accent and all. (Well, some of them still had their Filipino accent, anyway)

This may surprise you, but I have to admit that I rather enjoyed the production. It wasn't perfect and it was far from the Julie Andrews version, but it was also far from the worst production I've seen. (That honor goes to an all-white cast in an Ohio community theater. I blame the white people.) In short, I have to recommend that if an opportunity such as this one comes your way, you should take it. Now I'm waiting for the all-German version of Fiddler on the Roof...

Let you read all of this and think that I'm just sitting around and spending time with friends, going to musicals, and sipping coffee, I should take a moment to alleviate your fears. Let me say this clearly: I am totally swamped right now. I have more work than I have time to do it in. This week I've been at the church office until after midnight twice and there's a good chance that will happen again either tonight or tomorrow. Crazy situations come up frequently that nobody could have possibly planned for and threaten my time designated for the things I have planned for. Yes, I occasionally run out for coffee or something with friends, but not anywhere near as often as I'd like.

Still, even though these things are all true, I love being here. This is definitely where the Lord has called me to be and that fact encourages me daily. So yes, I need your prayers. Yes, your e-mails are encouraging, and yes, I still miss you.

If all goes well, I'll be sending an updated e-mail out shortly. It will probably cover many of the things posted here, but I want to make sure that you are all aware of what I'm up to. In the meantime...

Merry Christmas!

Pictures!!

2006-08-25T17:02:00.000+08:00

I'm in a bit of a rush as I post this, so I'll refrain from any long winded stories or descriptions of life here. (Don't worry, I'm sure those will return soon enough) Instead, I just want to post some pictures of various things that have gone on around here recently and comment on them. Hopefully for those of you who are visual learners, this helps you see a little better some of what's going on over here.

So without further adieu...

As most of you know, the main reason that I was asked to come to the Philippines was to help with the school. The school keeps all of us pretty busy, as you can imagine. We recently finished our first quarter and had an awards day where this picture was taken. Incidentally, Jemimah, the little girl in this picture has an incredible singing voice. She was trained by a girl from the church here who is currently finishing up her fourth year at Bob Jones University so if any of you in Greenville have kids you'd like to have voice lessons, I can tell you who to look for...

Every Wednesday night we have somewhere around 30 kids that show up for a 2 hour+ youth activity called En Fuego. Like most youth meetings, we sing, have testimonies, crazy games , and a Scripture lesson. Most of the kids who show up attend the church, but we've recently had a number of visitors from elsewhere showing up. As you can see, I tend to stick out a little bit, but there are a few other white folks who help balance me out.

One of the things I love the most about the Philippines is how sociable most people I run into are. I've always enjoyed sitting down and having a good conversation with someone and that fits in extremely well with Filipino culture. This was taken at a friend's birthday party where we talked that night until we finally realized it was 1:00 in the morning and went home. The whole thing was highly enjoyable. It's also worth pointing out that the other two short-term missionaries who are here show up in this picture. I won't tell you which ones they are, but I'd imagine you can probably figure it out. Robbie, my roommate and the youth pastor of the church is the guy in the white shirt and glasses on the right. His younger brother Jorge, who also lives with us, is sitting next to me on the couch. Both of these guys are great and all kinds of fun to live with. All of the folks here are really great people, but I'll spare you from having to read all kinds of information about people you don't know. Anyway, it would be better if you'd just come over and meet them yourself, right?

I love this picture. Some of you know that I didn't have time to get my Hepatitis B vaccination before I left the US. Fortunately, there are two doctors in the church here (and no, don't think that they're still using leeches or regularly hacking off limbs like in some Civil War movie - Medicine here is actually pretty decent) who are always willing to help out. This girl in the picture was able to pick up the vaccination for me and gave it to me in the church courtyard on Sunday afternoon. My personal favorite part of the picture is the sign reading "Science Lab" in the back. How great is that?

Yes, I do still frequently have the opportunity to eat foods that are... interesting. This particular one is called pork isaw, also known as pig intestines. It also comes in the chicken variety, which I'm told tastes much better. This isn't my new favorite food or anything, but I've had things that are worse. I also had the chance to eat pig's ears this same afternoon. Don't you wish you were here?

"So What's a Week Like Over There?"

2006-08-09T22:25:00.000+08:00

Well, once again it's been a long, long time since I've had the time to post anything to this blog. I apologize for that because I know that a number of you check this from time to time hoping to hear something new. This time, at least, you're in luck. I know that I keep going on about how busy I am and you're probably all thinking something along the lines of "Yeah, right. He's spending all his time hanging out with friends and buying cheap lattes at Starbucks" Well, I'll admit to doing both from time to time (and I highly enjoy it, let me tell you), but let me give you a little idea of what the last week has been like.

Monday - Friday: School from 7:30 to 5:30. No, classes don't last that long, but nobody leaves until everything is graded and ready to go for the next day. Occasionally I'm there as late as 7:00 doing school stuff. Those days aren't a lot of fun.

Tuesday night: Youth ministry activity planning session from 5:30-7:00. When meetings around here let out, they don't just end like they do at home. People ALWAYS hang around and talk for at least another half an hour. That's really great for getting to know people and growing closer to them, but it's pretty rough on any semblance of a normal dinner time.

Wednesday night: En Fuego from 6:30-9:00. This is our youth ministry that's just started up that has about 30 kids coming right now. Because of the length, we have to plan our brains out throughout the week so we have games, a devotional, food, and whatever else the evening calls for. This is the second year they've had this program, and it appears that the Lord is really using it in the lives of the teens here.

Thursday night: Bible study across town from 5:30 to 9:30. No, the Bible study isn't really that long, but it does take quite a while to get there with Manila traffic. I don't end up going there every week since it's quite far, but so far it's been about every other week. I'll be teaching the Bible study again tomorrow night so I'll definately be going.

Friday night: Men's Bible study at the church from 8:00-10:00. Again, the conversation thing comes into play here. I really like geting to know the men of the church here. It's amazing to hear some of their stories. One of the guys I talked to at the last Bible study used to be a member of the Communist party in the Philippines who made Molotov Cocktails. He was also a physics professor, lived in the Middle East for a time, and now has a family of nine that attends and is very active in the church. Wow.

Saturday: Inevitably, some activity will come up that will take up half of the day. This past week we had "The Amazing Race" (yes, like the one on TV) with the teens. I ended up manning a post in the middle of a field where I was supposed to sit for about three hours while I waited for the kids to show up. Imagine that - A random white guy sitting alone in the middle of a field near a relatively busy street reading a book for three hours. Yes, I got all kinds of looks. Fortunately, (or unfortunately, depending on how you look at it), a pretty heavy rainstorm blew in after about half an hour and I had to be picked up by one of the guys in the church. I got soaked. Saturday evening, I've got choir practice from 7:00-9:00. Great people there and I frequently get to sing songs in a language I don't understand much of. Interesting times.

Sunday: You can probably guess how Sunday goes. Craziness. Teaching Sunday School, overseeing Children's Church (that actually remains to be seen), having lunch with various church people, getting a quick nap, then going back for the evening service. By the time the day is done, I'm wiped. Pretty much every evening I end up preparing a chapel message, a devotional, a Bible Study, or a challenge for a teen activity. That takes up a lot of time too.

Now I know that some of you are thinking that this sounds like a lot and that I'm very likely to burn out sometime before my two years are up. Let me assure you that I have a blast doing all of these things. I get to work with and near all kinds of great people that know how to get a lot of work done while having a great time. Really. Even though there's a lot of work to be done, all of it is done with the mindset of ministering to people by pointing them to Christ. I love every minute of it. Well, almost every minute. To say that there are never any difficulties or frustrations would be lying, but it's far from the norm.

Do keep praying for me. I obviously need the Lord's strength to sustain me every day or I'd never even get out of bed in the morning. Still, He has been very gracious to me so far and I believe that will continue for the rest of my time here.

Frequently Asked Questions

2006-07-22T15:54:00.000+08:00

1) So how do you manage to talk to the people there? Are you using a translator?

Fortunately, I don’t have to use a translator. Now that doesn’t mean that I’ve learned enough Tagalog to get by yet, but Lord willing that will come soon enough. The Philippines actually has two official languages. One of them is Tagalog and the other, happily for me, is English. That doesn’t mean that everyone speaks English or even that everyone who speaks it does so well. It also doesn’t mean that it is frequently spoken at home by Filipinos. Most Filipinos blend English with Tagalog when they speak so I can frequently follow along somewhat, but in order to be as effective as I’d like to be, I’m going to have to continue studying. I’ve had people from 8 to 80 try to help me learn new words so at this point the language acquisition is helping me establish relationships. That’s always a good thing. Pray for me as I work at learning this. Time is necessary to learn a new language and spare time isn’t something I seem to have much of around here.

2) Where and how do you live? Do you have a dirt floor / sleep on a mat / live in a teepee?

Actually, I live with the youth pastor and his brother in half of a duplex about a block from the church and school where I’m working. It’s relatively small compared to the houses I’ve lived in back in the US, but it’s nice. The pictures included in this entry are of the house where I’m living as it looks right now. We’re still working on getting a little more furniture and decorating the walls to be a little more homey, but that will come in time. This evening a lady in the church is actually throwing us a housewarming party so maybe we’ll acquire some of those pictures and things that we need…

3) Who prepares your food? What kinds of food do you eat? Is it good?

As far as the food situation goes, I’ve really lucked out there so far. Robbie, my roommate, loves to cook. Up to this point, he’s handled most of the food preparation. I’ll help and try to learn what I can, but it’s going to be a while before I’m fixing entire meals by myself. I think I can cook rice now, but have yet to do it unattended. Last Sunday Rob was speaking in a church about 25 miles away all day so his younger brother and I were left alone for lunch. After much searching, I found a box of Rice-a-Roni (not anything like Filipino rice, in case you were wondering), some canned fruit, and a little bit of leftover chicken salad. That meal was enough to prove to me that I need to learn this cooking skill a little faster…

Then there’s the matter of what I’m eating. To be honest, some days I don’t really know. In the past week I’ve had sisig (cow cheek with a LOT of fat), kikiam (not sure what it was), crab (complete legs that I could have eaten if I wanted), papaya as a vegetable (don’t ask because I’m not sure how that works), and other things I never would have had back in the US. I couldn’t finish the sisig and didn’t really care for the crab, but the other two weren’t so bad. 50/50. That’s about right so far.

4) What’s the weather like there?

So far it’s been much cooler than I remember it being in the past. Of course, it’s hard to tell if that’s because it actually is cooler or if I’m just getting used to it after being here multiple times. Maybe both. It’s still extremely humid and I always manage to get hot and sticky and sweaty by the end of each day so “cooler” is a relative term. Generally I’m pretty comfortable so far. They tell me that 70 is about the lowest I can expect it to get here. When summer hits, on the other hand… That’s not something I choose to dwell on.

It is also the rainy season so at least once a day it will rail for a little while. While I was typing this up it starting coming down heavily but it only lasted for about five minutes.

5) How many attend the church services here? How big is the school?

Lighthouse Bible Believer’s Church runs somewhere between 150-200 on a Sunday morning. A decent number of them return for the evening service and are involved in other church activities through the week. The school right now is running about 80 students. Last year there were only 60 enrolled so that’s quite an increase. They’re currently looking at purchasing some property adjacent to the building to expand into for next year. That may be costly, but it might need to be done to allow for more students in the future.

6) Are you married yet? (No, really, I’ve had a number of people e-mail me and ask)

Nope. Believe it or not, that’s not the reason I came. Of course, I’m not opposed to it so I guess we’ll just have to wait and see what the Lord brings.

So anything else? I’m more than happy to answer any questions you may have about the conditions here or my ministry or even personal questions. You can e-mail them to me or comment at the bottom of this post to ask me.

Until next time – Ingat!

2006-07-17T18:49:00.000+08:00

Wow... For a blog that is advertised on my e-mails as the place to find "current information and pictures," I'm not doing all that hot. Needless to say, my work here in the Philippines has shot off like a rocket and leaves me with little time to do things like, oh, writing in my blog.

As you can imagine, though, that's a good thing. There's never a dull moment here. In fact, just as I started to type this one of the folks from the church stopped by and wanted to talk about some things that the Lord is doing here in the church and ask my opinion. I love those kinds of opportunities.

So if you're checking this you probably want to know what I'm up to these days. To save time I'll abstain from waxing eloquent and provide you with a bulleted list. Feel free to ask questions at the end. I am, after all, a teacher. So far the list goes like this:

Bible Teacher
Computer Teacher
Math Teacher
College Sunday School teacher
Weekly chapel speaker
Tutor
Video Editor
Junior Church leader
Bible Club assistant
Tagalog learner
Profuse sweater

There are some other things that I know are coming down the pike, but I'm trying to take things one step at a time as much as possible.

Even though I'm busy with a lot of different jobs, I'm enjoying more than anything else the opportunities I have to jsut spend time with people here. Folks around here take life at a little slower pace and ebcause of that value time in conversation more. If you know me at all, you know that's very much the way I am too so I fit right in. (Except for the whole being tall, white, and blonde thing. But you know what I'm getting at) The people here are very open to God's Word and I've already seen some people make some changes in their lives based on what they've heard preached or even what they've read from the Bible on their own.

I could write pages about some of the experiences I've had so far and hopefully will be able to add some of them in the near future. For the time being, however, this will have to suffice. Sorry about the lack of pictures. Since I've been here I've taken a total of zero pictures and, as such, have none to post. I'll work on that for the next time.

Until then!

Last Minute Thoughts

2006-07-01T13:28:00.000+08:00

Well, my time in the US is quickly running out. One week from today I should already be teaching something to a bunch of kids whose first language is not English. So what are some of the thoughts that are going through my head right now?

1) I'm going to miss worshiping at Heritage Bible Church. Over the past six years, the Lord has used Heritage in many, many ways to make me more like Himself. That's not an easy thing to leave.

2) I'm going to miss teaching at Berea High School. Really. I still communicate with a number of my former students and a lot of the people I have hung out in the last two years with are other teachers from there. I'm really, really going to miss the folks there.

2) Is it really a good idea to move to a country where the average temperature is somewhere around 85 degrees? I mean, I love the Philippines and all, but it's HOT! And I'm a sweater. (Not the kind you wear over your shirt, though) Can I really handle this?

3) Do I really know what I'm doing? Let's face it: Leaving your job and moving to the other side of the world is a pretty big deal. Am I really qualified to do this job? Do I really even know exactly what job I'll be doing? Will I make really good friends there like I have here? This is scary stuff!

4) That long, long flight: I fly out on July 3 and don't land until July 5. Even taking into account the fact that the Philippines is 12 hours ahead of us, that's a LOOONG time to be on a plane. Especially since I really don't like flying all that much. When I finally land I will have been traveling for 29 hours and it will only be 9:00 in the morning. This, friends, is what we call jetlag.

5) I know without a doubt that this is what the Lord has led me to. Even though there are some things that I don't see yet, I know that this is where God wants me. He has given me the desire to do this, He has given me the education that I need to do this, and He's more than provided the money that I need to do this. How can any of us say this isn't supposed to happen? God is good and He will take care of all of us no matter what part of the world we're in.

So What's it Like Over There?

2006-07-01T13:24:00.000+08:00

So a number of you have asked me exactly what type of living conditions I'll have when I make my big move to Asia this summer. I thought that this blog would be a great way to address your questions so here are your answers:

Okay, don't worry. By now you've probably figured out that I'm joking. I won't be bathing in the river. And to be fair, I won't actually be living in a hut like this one. They are in the Philippines, just not in Manila.

And yes, there are Muslim extremists there, but they tend to be in the southern part of the country and, Lord willing, shouldn't be wandering up into the part of the country where I'll be. It's like people in Ohio being afraid of terrorism in Florida.

As far as the fertilized duck egg goes, they're EXTREMELY popular there. Yes, I have had one, and no, they're not my favorite. Duck beak is a little gross.

And the tricycles? Probably the most common form of transportation I'll be using for the next two years. Definately not made for 6'2'' Americans. Oh well.

If you're all good I'll post some pictures next time of things that are a little more representative of what I'll be doing and where I'll be staying.

Where in the World is Mr. G?

2006-06-20T02:02:00.000+08:00

Over the past two weeks since school let out, I've gotten lots and lots of people writing and asking me how life is in the Philippines. Well, I'd love to tell you, but since I'm still in Greenville, I can't really tell you.

Yup, you heard me right. Greenville. No, I didn't change my mind about going to the Philippines or anything. I have one more week here until I go back to Ohio to visit my family and then I leave on July 3 for Asia.

I know that this isn't really all that exciting yet, and I apologize for that. No stories about eating strange foods or about terrorists blowing things up near where I live. If you'd like, I could go out back and take pictures of myself eating an earthworm to post on here, but that's not exactly my point with this blog. Sorry.

Keep checking here for updates. I can't promise anything exciting until about the end of the first week of July, but I'll try to do better about letting you all know where I am.