It's a Jungle out there~Baco Mindoro~Week 10

Hello family and friends,

First off here is my address... Send packages and letters here.

Philippines San Pablo Mission
Po Box 38 Barangy San Juan
Alaminos Laguna 4001
Philippines

So, yeah, I have a lot to talk about. I'll start from the beginning. So, I left Monday at 4:30 to the airport and an Elder forgot his passport lol.. but we got it worked out. We flew from SLC to LA. Let me say, LA was a zoo to say the least. The international terminal was under construction so the lines were twice as long, and it was twice as hectic, that,s why I wasn't able to call. But, anyways, I waited in line with like half of the Asian population and I felt so different from everyone, it was weird. But what was even weirder was the flight.
Ok, so, 15 hours on a plane is not fun at all, .. I was able to sleep tho, I bought ear plugs and sleeping pills at the MTC :).. But the flight was boring. It was so weird cuz it was an asian airline and they served legit asian food. Like for breakfast they gave me what they called "Rice Soup".. But in laymans terms it is sticky mush with some nasty tuna powder and some weird vegetable things. But that isn't the weirdest thing I have ate. I will tell you later. But, yeah, the flight was interesting. After we landed In Taipe Taiwan we had about 4 hours in the airport there. So we walked around and looked in all of the little shops and stuff. It was so tight they had a "relaxation area" where there was a bunch of plants and stuff and they had a bunch of massage chairs and you could sit in them for free. It was way tight! I loved it. I sat in a massage chair for like 30 mins lol. I will send pictures and videos home. But, yeah, then we got on the plane to Manila. We got to manila and it was so crazy there. Yeah, talk about an country with absolutely no traffic laws.. There are literally no traffic laws in the Philippines. I kid you not... you can drive in whatever lane you want and there are traffic lights but they dont mean anything. We got to the Manila airport and my amazing Mission President, President and Sister Anderson, drove us 2 hours to the mission home. We stayed in the mission home that night and had a nice homecooked meal. It was very,very nice there. It was actually modern. We had an orientation meeting about safety and health and what not, so it was nice. But I bet you are all waiting to hear where I was called to serve ok so here it is.
Baco Mindoro
Yeah, Mindoro is an island off the coast of the Philippines and it is literally something you would see on the Discovery channel. My apartment is the biggest dump I have ever seen and it contunually grosses me out. Every day I find something else that could give me a disease. Let me just say there is a 2 foot long poisinous lizard living in our kitchen and every night it makes really scary noises and my bed is like right by the kitchen. I am so afraid the lizard is gonna bite me. Like its a legit fear... cuz if it bites me I will be in the hospital or dead, I kid you not. But my filipino compaion, Elder Tuazon, doesnt seem to care that much. He grew up in the ghettos in the Philippines so the apartment is basically what he is used to . But for me it is freaking hard to sleep or do anything in my apartment when there are spiders as big as dinner plates in the bathroom... Oh dont even get me started on the bathroom. I would call it a breeding ground for banana spiders (yeah, google them). They are HUGE spiders that feed on mosquitos, which are also in my bathroom. But that's not even the worst part. The toilet is broken and its about 10000 years old. It has been there before sand was invented, I swear. It is all brown and to flush it I have to go fill a bucket with water and pour it in the toilet. And, yeah, it's bucket showers for me too. Basically I just stand in the bathroom and pour freezing cold, dirty water that probably makes me even more dirty.. My bed is a 3in thick foam pad on a wooden frame.. And termites are eating that away along with the rest of our apartment. Yeah it is so gross but the most scary part is that stupid Tukol. That is what that lizard is called, cuz it makes a high pitched "TUKOL" at night. It is so creepy. It feeds on smaller geckos. There are probably 100 geckos in our apartment too. No Joke... But, yeah, thats what you get when you serve in the middle of the jungle. Ok, so, about the work.

Yesterday ,Elder Tuazon and I hiked through the jungle for about an hour to find this tiny old nanay(lady?) who had a referall for us. We finally find her and she takes us even further through the jungle. We come out into a big rice field and there are little huts everywhere. Yeah, like Discovery channel style. So, we find this lady, Myrna, and she has 4 kids and her husband just died. We taught her the first 2 principles and told her that through the gospel families can be together forever. This lady was so humble and she asked how she could be baptized. We have to teach her all 4 lessons and she has to attend church 3 times and she can be baptized it was tight. Probably one of the few times I have felt joy since coming to this jungle. I dont call it a city, I call it a Jungle. It is on the outskirts of Calapan, the capital of Mindoro. But it is a frikin' Jungle. I am basically camping all the time here and it is so hard to find a routine, cuz there is something waiting to eat you around every corner. Oh, and speaking of eating, Yesterday, I ate a Monitor Lizard... MMMM NOT!! I had no idea what it was and I dry heaved when I had to eat some. Yeah, it was bad.. I still havent eaten balut, it's an underdeveloped chicken inside of the egg still. Yeah, I'm gonna hold out until an investigator offers it to me. Cuz it looks so nasty. But yeah, I see this as a place that Lindsey would love cuz she is very adventureous.
This has been the hardest week of my life by far. And the Lord is testing my faith and my health and everything else. I have read D&C 121 probably about 10 times cuz it gives me comfort. It is the only thing that doesnt want to eat me here lol.. But seriously, I just keep saying to myself, "I will leave here one day. ".. Its only for a small time. Then I might go back to the main island and teach in a place where there is civilization, lol. But it's all good. I am alive and that,s all that matters.
Well, I better get going. I have about an hours walk back to my apartment. SO yeah, Pray for me.. Fast for me.. Do anything you can for me. I need all the help I can get.

I love you all
Elder Hansen

Ps.. Sorry mom if this freaks you out. I am ok, I really am..
If I get bit my the Tukol they will send me back to civilization which is a good thing:)