saan ba ang umpisa?

[rosaleeluann]

As per Jade, some of you may be wondering what on earth Rosie was doing for the 18 months she was absent from the internet. I haven't attempted to tell it yet because, seriously, where do I start? I have NO idea. There is just too MUCH

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[rosaleeluann]

Favorite things? Like food and stuff? Buko and buko juice and gata and pandecoco and...basically coconut in all its forms. I'd say my favorite ulam (which is just something you eat with rice) would be ginagaang lanka (I'm told the english for lanka is 'jack fruit' but I'd never heard of it or seen it before), or anything ginataan (which means that it's got coconut milk in it.) Favorite dessert is buko salad. I loved fresh sweet bananas and banana-que and pandan ice cream and rambutan and lansones and halo-halo and fried tilapia. I loved meeting new people and speaking with them in their native language. I loved meeting people who wanted to have us teach them the gospel and see how it helps us all improve ourselves. I loved coming home after a long, hard day of good, effective work. I loved--love--getting news from old companions about whats happened in my old areas since I left. I loved being a missionary.

Least favorite things? Hmmm. White discounts. (Meaning, they see you're white and quote you a higher price because they think you can pay it/don't know what the real price is.) Filipino Spaghetti (its disgusting. The sauce tastes like ketchup, but sweeter. Ugh.) Unripe guava (its hard to chew and bitter, even when you put salt on it.)

Was the climate a shock? YES. I remember my trainer often saying those first few weeks in her accent, "Sisder, you are swetee!" I was pretty sure I was gonna melt those first few weeks, but I got over it. And I did see cool bugs and thought of you! (see mention of HUGE SPIDERS above) I wouldn't be able to name the ones I saw (another category missing from my vocabulary) but I saw quite a few. I remember talking to my companion about bees. "How do they even produce honey here?" I said, pointing out that the honey in the store was supposedly local. "I haven't seen or heard any hint of any kind of bee since I got here!" My companion (a Filipina) replied that she had seen one once, maybe. No BEES? Nope. I mentioned this to other missionaries, they hadn't seen any either.
Plenty of mosquitoes, though. And roaches. And small crawly, wriggly things.