Fun Facts on Manila

Located 800 miles from mainland Asia is Manila, the capital of the Philippines. Because it is very close to the equator it has a tropical wet and dry climate with very little change in temperature year round. The humidity is also extremely high (90-100%) making it feel hotter than it really is. When we first asked mom how she felt about being called to the Phillipines, she would say, "I'm going to die of heat!"
20 million people reside in Manila. These occupants inhabit 38.55 sq kilometers making Manila not only the most densly populated city in the Phillipines, but in the world as well. That is a lot of people in a little place! When we would first ask dad how he felt about getting his call to the Philippines he would say, "There are a lot of people!"
The main religion is Roman Catholic which isn't a surprise when you consider that the Spanish helped to settle it. In September of 1984, President Hinckley dedicated the 2nd temple in Asia. The Philippines, Manila temple. It is an interesting story on the trials that arose while trying to dedicate it. The following is taken from LDS.org:
The days prior to the dedication of the Manila Philippines Temples saw several natural disasters in the Philippines including two typhoons, the eruption of Mayon volcano on Bicol Peninsula, and an earthquake in northern Luzon. The temple remained unaffected.
The Manila Philippines Temple was dedicated in nine sessions by President Gordon B. Hinckley, Second Counselor in the First Presidency.
On Sunday, December 3, 1989, the grounds of the Manila Philippines Temple were overtaken as the last rebel stronghold in an attempted military coup to overthrow the government. A planned attack by royal troops that evening was miraculously called off. Nevertheless, prior conflict had left the patron housing facility extensively damaged, the temple annex with minor damage, and the temple proper unentered and unharmed except for a single bullet hole at the top of the highest spire. Six mortar or rocket shells had exploded on the grounds, some even passing between the spires.

Dad and mom's mission call letter said that they would be speaking English. They both seemed to be relieved. A week later they received a phone call from the MTC asking them if they could come down and pick up books and training information so they could start learning Tagalog. What a suprise! They went and got their books and CD's, set up a skype account, and scheduled times to meet with their online tutor. Dad keeps saying over and over, "this is nothing like German." Mom says, "I didn't have to learn a language when I went to Minnesota." They are both doing well and thank their tutor Brother Sypher for meeting with them 2-3 times a week!

Mom & Dad's Mission Call!

Where to is the question???? We all knew that they wanted to go and when they could go, so the only other question was where. I pulled out an inflatable globe the Sunday before they were to receive their call and had everyone guess. The guesses were as follows....

Grandpa- Sydney, Australia......... Jon- Germany/Austria

Grandma-South Africa .................Tamina- Taiwan

Grant- East of the Mississippi ......Adam (6)- New Mexico

Kelli Ann- Scotland/Britain ........Ari (4)- North Africa

Noah (7)- Canada ......................... Sarah (1)- Egypt

Kim-Mexico ....................................Chris- Norway

Brady-Phillipines/Amazons .........Jen- China/Tibet

Isabel (4)- East Africa .................Nara (5mo)- Tonga

Benjamin (2)- Chile

We used an inflatable globe that had animal pictures representing each region. Most of the kids picked a place that had picture of a cool animal on it, like a zebra or camel. When I first told Adam and Noah that they needed to guess, Adam looked at a map and said, "what is that place called (pointing to Canada)?" I told him it was Canada, and he said, "that place looks like there would be lots of people to teach, I should guess there." I asked him if that was his guess and he said, "no, my guess is New Mexico." Noah promptly guessed Canada. I told the kids that the person who guessed right would get a candy bar. Noah looked at me and told me, "well, we should all get a candybar because we all did a good job guessing!" Because Noah said this, Grandpa made sure that the winner got a king size candy bar and everyone else got a miniature candy bar...cause it was hard work to guess! Dad had us all come over so we would all know at the same time. Grant recorded it, so here it is!

(The sound may get ahead of the video a little on slower internet speeds. You can also view the video on youtube)