Last Days in Cebu

Last days in Cebu
We left Cebu and the Temple on October 26 to return home after a marvelous, inspiring 18 months serving with wonderful, humble Filipino brothers and sisters and fellow temple missionary couples.
There are so many people we intended to invite for dinner that we have not, but we tried to fit in as many as we could this last week before leaving. Jodi and Wilson invited us for a luscious farewell chicken enchilada dinner when we finished work on Saturday. We invited Wallace and Shauna Cummings for Sweet and Sour meatballs on Friday evening. Monday we went to dinner at O Georges with Bringhursts, Ganirs, Baileys and the new office couple, the Ernstroms. She is Filipino and grew up in the same town as Wilson in Hawaii. They have served in the Philippines before.
Wednesday night we invited Alex Arquiola and his family for dinner. They were so delighted to be asked. They commented that we were the first missionary couple to invite them for dinner. Alex has done a wonderful job keeping the Patron House spotless. He was a bishop in Iloilo before coming to Cebu to work on the temple complex and was just called as a counselor in the new Capitol Ward bishopric. His wife is a restricted ordinance worker and their children are delightful and friendly, always coming up to greet us when we visit Capital Ward or when they come to do baptisms for the dead. They brought their 12 year old son, 15 year old daughter and an older college age daughter and their adopted older son.
Thursday Elder Holland visited the temple before speaking to the missionaries of the Cebu Mission and the Single Adults in the area at two firesides. We knew he might make time to do a tour of the temple but never dreamed that we might see him. We knew we could not attend the firesides since they would be held during our temple shift time. I had been called out of initiatory to help at the veil because there was a large group of sisters on the 1 o’ clock session. I had just walked down the hall towards the balcony when Sister Preciosa grabbed my arm and whispered, “Elder Holland is coming up the stairs with President and Sister Mortimer!” We stood together anticipating his arrival. He took time to shake hands with each of us. Sister Mortimer guided him to a man who was sitting on the couch who had just received his own endowment and Elder Holland talked to him for a minute. Others in the group shook hands with us also. Elder and Sister Callister and President and Sister Teh accompanied Elder Holland and were most cordial. The body guard followed behind and didn’t crack a smile, but his eyes took in every detail from the tip of our heads to the hems of our dresses, to the number of people standing down the hall, to the size and location of the pictures on the wall. While we were standing waiting to go into the veil, Elder Holland’s group appeared again, giving several of the priesthood brethren including Larry the opportunity to meet him personally. He asked, “Are you happy?”, then paused and said, “I’m here to see that you are happy!” How often do we get to meet an apostle of the Lord personally?
As we finished at the temple on Thursday evening we met Rejen Batican (rejen_batican@gmail.com) who had given me the purse made from zippers months before and whom we had met at Danao Ward. She was with her boyfriend, Marlon Deiparine (deiparinejr@gmail.com) whose mother is a lovely temple ordinance worker (she came from Mindanao leaving her husband and daughter behind so she could work in the temple—they are soon joining her) and we invited them to share leftovers with us even though it was late. We had a delightful visit and discovered they are planning to be married in a few months.
Friday evening we invited Henry and Russel Patalinghug (russel_quima@yahoo.com) and their beautiful one year old daughter Danielle for dinner. Henry has been shopping for our eggs, vegetables and fruits for the full time we have been in Cebu. He always delivers the best every Monday. Henry was recently called as Bishop of the First Ward and will do a wonderful job. He was a counselor and often had to take over since the Bishop was out of town with his work a good deal of the time. They brought his relative, Blossom Patalinghug who is a temple ordinance worker and their nanay who takes care of Danielle during the day while Russel and Henry are at work. I ran into Katherine Agreda, a lovely young returned missionary, (kitso72801@yahoo.com) at the temple and asked if she would like to join us for dinner too. We had met her when she was Young Women’s President in Arlington Ward and brought her youth to do baptisms for the dead faithfully. But she had moved to Negros to go back to school and we hadn’t seen her for a long time. It was the end of the semester and she was drained and stressed with finals and projects. She had come to the temple to feel at peace and be rejuvenated. She told us of her experience in the temple on Thursday. She had no ideas that Elder Holland was visiting in Cebu. She came early for the 3 o’clock session and was sitting quietly by herself in the first endowment room with her head bowed. A man approached her and greeted her. She looked up and saw Elder Holland. She was dumbfounded and speechless! He shook her hand, smiled and moved on. President and Sister Teh, the Area President, were with the group and stopped to talk with her too. By then she had recovered her tongue and was able to express her wonder and delight at being able to meet an apostle in person.
Before Henry and his family left, he opened a bag of gifts he had brought for us—lovely necklaces and a caribou belt. We were overwhelmed with their love and generosity, as we have been with so many who have given us gifts as we depart.
Saturday evening we invited Lea and Edmun Garcia, Lea’s mother and two daughters Edlynne and Ria, for dinner along with the Ganirs. They had just flown in from Manila before coming to our apartment. Edlynne just graduated from college with top honors and will be looking for work in Cebu since Lea is moving her family to Cebu now; Ria will enroll at one of the colleges nearby. The whole family are dear friends.
Sunday was Stake Conference for Cebu Central Stake. I awakened early realizing that I must color my hair on Sunday or it would not get done before leaving for home. I accomplished the task in record time and felt a lift from a “new” me. Conference was a spiritual feast. President Balledos recognized the service given by the about to depart temple missionaries. We stayed after for almost two hours taking pictures and saying goodbye to so many friends.
Sunday afternoon President and Sister Mortimer came to visit and talk about our release. Sister Mortimer gave us a distinctive nighttime photo of the temple and President Mortimer gave us our release papers as ordinance workers, telling us they would take effect after we finished working Tuesday. We expressed our love for them and the temple. This has been a unique and blessed experience.
Diane and Allan Bringhurst, our dear neighbors across the hall, invited us and Ganirs for a barbequed ribs Sunday dinner. The six of us have had some memorable times together and will be eternal friends.
We felt we needed to see Nelie one last time before leaving and so invited her to have lunch with us Monday. It was difficult to say goodbye. We have seen so much light come into her life since she has become reactivated. We hope with an opportunity to finish school that she will have doors opened to good jobs. She shares the Gospel with so many she comes in contact with now. She brought us a very creative card that she had made, expressing her thanks and love.

Larry made one last trip to Guadalupe to visit Gina and Pablo and their children. This is hard for him to leave them, especially with Gina expecting a baby in the next month. I don’t know how they will care for their family. Pablo’s only work is picking up tennis balls for less than 100 pesos a day.

Monday afternoon the cookbooks I had worked so long and hard on were delivered. I had them in time to pass them out at the last pot luck dinner that President and Sister Byram had organized. They flew in from a week-end assignment just hours beforehand but had made assignments ahead of time. The ham was delectable and the many side dishes everyone brought were soooo yummy. I used my last cans of blueberry pie filling to make our family favorite—blueberry-pineapple cheesecake. We met the new ERC missionary couple, the Calls from Idaho Falls (guess Cebu will still be “little Idaho” since there are so many missionaries from there). I’m sure with all the eating we have done this past week that I have gained 5 pounds.

Tuesday was an emotionally draining day. It started out like other early temple days. Up at 6 to get ready for the temple. We had a special assignment in the baptistery with youth who had traveled 18 hour, s with their leaders to come to the temple. We had worked with the group last year and remembered some of the faces. I did not realize how hard it would be to leave the temple for the last time. When the sisters gave me hugs, tears flowed freely. Several gave me gifts as I left.

We had not really started packing and had much cleaning to finish, so when I got home I changed clothes and began the unwelcome tasks. So many came to visit through the afternoon that it was difficult to accomplish what needed to be done. Wolfs called from Dumaguete to wish us Bon Voyage. Brother Bonin who Larry worked with and trained came with gifts of food. One of the most touching visitors was Brother Enriquez who brought us several of his comic books about the Plan of Life. He had challenged me to memorize The Living Christ and wanted us to recite it together which we did—with me stumbling since I had not reviewed it for a few weeks. Because of his arthritis he has not been able to serve at the temple for several months and we have missed him. He has a wonderful, efficient wife who has done a great job as coordinator, and they have lovely children. We did pack one last box with gifts we had been given for Larry to take to the post office. We cleaned out all the cupboards, arranging boxes and cans of food on the table. About 9 pm I called Ganirs and Bringhursts to bring a bag and a spoon so they could “shop” at our “store” and eat the remainder of our blueberry dessert. They took some of the food to Neos along with our little step stool that I had promised her. Sister Neo had more jewelry for me. We decided that Lea Garcia should get the rug rather than just leaving it for the next apartment missionaries. Finally at 2 am we crawled into bed exhausted, finally deciding to take an extra bag and pay for it, figuring it would be cheaper than mailing another box.

Morning came way too early. Even at 6:30 am people were knocking on our door to say goodbye. At 7:15 we loaded our bags into one of the missionary vans. Several came to see us off. Lea and I had an especially hard time. Byrams were treating us to breakfast at the Pancake House but Larry wanted to drop off a bag of dried mangoes to the people at the post office so we rode with Joey Asuncion with all the luggage and the other three couples went ahead. Everything seemed like a dream. Were we really leaving? We arrived at the airport in plenty of time, gave last hugs to the Byrams and walked into the diverse world of the Cebu International Airport. Larry took time to change his Filipino money into Hong Kong dollars and American dollars. We did not have to pay anything for the extra bag! An hour later Mike and Vonnie Asher, Wallace and Shauna Cummings and Larry and I were boarding our Cathay Pacific plane, leaving Cebu and the beautiful, gentle, humble people of the Philippines behind. Our hearts were filled to bursting with wonderful memories. We were the pioneers of the Cebu Temple. No one else would have the same experiences as we did with the Open House, feeding the General Authorities, participating in the Dedication, working long tiring hours to ready the temple for its first patrons, sewing wedding veils, training the Filipino ordinance workers, and welcoming the worthy Saints into the House of the Lord. WE had seen miracles and we had been a part of the miracle! What a glorious, marvelous experience. How much we had come to love the people, the Temple and The Lord through these eventful past 18 months!