Fw: Howdy

 

Hey!  :D

I'm totally jealous.  :P Fine.  Go to the Seattle Symphony without me.  Be that way.

None of the pieces they played sound familiar by just the name, mostly since most classical pieces are like, "Concerto in Bb," or whatever, but I'm sure it was great.  Jealous ako.  :P

Anyway, it's not like I've been totally deprived.  Last weekend was the dedication of the Cebu Temple ("Hosanna, Hosanna!" :D ), which was maganda.  There was, of course, the feeling of, "Dude, there's a prophet of God in the Philippines right now.  How cool is that?"  We saw a slightly different side of President Monson when he went outside the temple to seal the cornerstone.  He was making all kinds of jokes, and he even stopped by the piano that was out there and was like, "Hey, let me play a little number for you."  He plunked out a little ragtime diddle for a little bit, but kept kinda messing up.  After a little while, he was like, "...I quit."  It was amusing.  The night before that, there was a Filipino Cultural Event that was broadcast across the Philippines, with music and dancing.  It was really cool.  That one is probably on Youtube, actually, if you want to watch it.  My favorite number, I think, was, "Gusto kong lumipad tulad ng agila," or, "I want to fly like an eagle."  It was cool. :D

Glad to hear the weather's been nice there.  It's been on and off here.  Sometimes it's rainy and cool, and sometimes, it... well, feels just like May again.  Hot.  :P  Yesterday was really nice, though.  It rained Monday and cleared a lot of the pollution out of the air, so it felt nice, like a nice, sunny day back in Washington.  With a lot more "Hey Joe"s.  :P

I've been focusing a lot more on my listening skills lately.  I've decided that what Elder Holland said is true:  "More important than speaking is listening."  If I really want to be able to help these people, I have to be able to better understand them, more willing to really listen and try to understand what they're saying.  It's getting better, but boy, it takes every ounce of focus and concentration I've got to be able to really understand.  I've been finding myself totally wiped out mentally at the end of each day.  Pambihira.  I'm hoping it'll get a bit easier as I get better at it.  What's cool is by the time I get home, I'll be a master at listening, English or Tagalog.

Only 1 1/2 more weeks of school, huh?  And the trek's coming up soon?  Good luck, Richelle.  :D  Hope you like walking.  A lot.

Say hi to Mr. J. for me.  :D  HIII!!!  And good luck and congratulations to all the graduating seniors!

Ah, and I've decided that "Waterfall" is going to take me a considerable amount of P-day time to learn.  Like.  Wow.  This might even take me my whole mission.  In a number of ways, it's even harder than the "Root Beer Rag."   Thing's a beast.  D:  But I'll get it if I spend enough spare time practicing it.  A lot of spare time.  And just think of how much of a beast I'll be by the time I learn it, too.  :D

I haven't asked about buying a horn over here yet.  I think it might make it hard on transfer days to get all my stuff from one place to another if I have a lot of extra stuff, and I haven't asked yet what is or isn't allowed in that respect.  Plus, there's always the matter of getting it back home after the mission.  What I've thought about doing is asking if I can rent an instrument during my last transfer or two just to try and get back up to speed in time for that BYU audition that January.  We'll see what happens.  In the meantime, I've gotten into the habit of buzzing my lips every time I get on a tricycle (as opposed to when I'm just walking around, because people look at you funny when you do that.  Especially my companion..), just to try to keep myself in shape.

By the way, thanks again for the package you sent.  The candy and cookies are masarap.  :D  And I really appreciated the pictures you sent (Richelle, that's scary).  I'd actually appreciate it if you guys sent more of those (they're not bawal, as long as they're appropriate).  Like, even in emails; they don't very long to download, as long as they're not huge.  I really enjoyed them.

Anyway, I think that's it for this week.  Salamat, at good luck sa inyong lahat!  Mahal ko kayo!  Ingat lagi.

Love,

Elder David Jones