Visiting With Music Alumni, Friends and Family - 2
- Mission of Hope Farm
- TastiHealth Vegetarian Buffet
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Mission of Hope Farm Project
AUP Eastern North America Chapter (EASNAC) Alumni Foundation. The 5-hectare farm that sits on leased AUP property was started two years ago under the direction and supervision of Ed and Teresa Quirante of Tennessee, U.S.A. The project aims to benefit working students; consequently, the biggest expense of the farm consists of working students' wages.
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| North Gate Main Entrance to AUP on the Santa Rosa - Tagaytay Road |
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TastiHealth Vegetarian Buffet across the road in front of the North Gate of the Main Entrance
to the Adventist University of the Philippines |
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| Retired AUP Elementary School and Education Dept. Faculty Cording and Bayani Agnazata at the Tasti-Health Vegetarian Buffet . He presently serves as president of the Adventist Frontier Missions Philippines. |
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| Mission of Hope Farm - Eastern North America Chapter (EASNAC) volunteers Prom and Norma Amoguis of Tennessee, U.S.A. entertaining visitors at the Guest House that serves as a temporary residence. |
Note: Tribute to Academy Teachers by AWESNA Archives Committee
Sept 29, 2018, Loma Linda Filipino SDA Church
A Letter to Miss Ester G. Manalaysay
By Norma Tulio Amoguis
My dearest Miss Man,
I am writing you this letter so that the world would know what an amazing and wonderful woman you are. You came into my life when I was learning to make choices that would affect me forever. You have mentored me to become the woman that I am now. I praise God for bringing you into my life.
I met you when you became the Dean of Women at North Hall, the ladies’ dormitory, at PUC in Baesa. You spent time in talking to each of the girls and I was very nervous when it was my turn. However, you put me at ease by looking at me in the eye and smiling at me. You asked me questions about my needs and gave me suggestions regarding feminine hygiene. I surely needed that because I had lived away from home 10 months of the year since 1st grade because my parents were doing evangelistic work in Central Luzon Mission. I was surprised that you were a good surrogate mother even though you never married and had no children of your own. You were very strict and made sure that we adhered to the rules and regulations of PUC. However, you explained the rules whenever I had to be punished. There’s one thing that I have neglected to ask you: “Why did I have to be punished (campus-bound for 2 days) when you and the faculty members made a surprise raid and found a love letter in my locker? I did not think that it was my fault that a young man placed a love letter in one of my books without my knowledge.” Grudgingly, I took my punishment even though I did not agree with you. And, I will have you know that I did not even like that young man and would not have accepted his love letter had I known about it.
I do not remember what your academic accomplishments were and what your major course was. You held many positions at PUC and you were the Registrar when I was a senior in high school. Not only did you teach my high school physics class for a few months but also college physics for a semester. You taught me not only the principles of physics but also their application to my Christian life. To this day, I remember the illustration that you gave regarding the elastic limit and that God does not allow us to have trials that we cannot bear. Your illustration came to my mind and I remembered you when I had to go through the trial of having breast cancer in 2004. Praise God, I trusted the Great Physician and I am healed!
One-on-one meetings with you became sporadic after you left North Hall and did other things when I was a freshman in college. However, I did seek you whenever I needed to have someone pray for me. My mother, a prayer warrior, taught me that prayer has the power to change anything in my life. You re-enforced all her teachings and I sought you whenever I needed to pray with someone who understood my struggles in life. During my freshman year in college, I got sick with Hemorrhagic Fever and was hospitalized for a couple of weeks at Manila Sanitarium and Hospital. The doctors told me that H-Fever had caused numerous fatalities in Manila area already. My fever raged on even after I was transfused with 10 units of whole blood. However, I was encouraged when I received a note from you assuring me that I would get well because you and other faculty members were praying for my healing. Sure enough, I was healed!
It was a great blessing to me that we communicated often when I went to the United States in 1960. Your letters helped me to adjust to a different lifestyle and culture but still in keeping with the Christian principles that you taught me. You never failed to send letters through friends who came from PUC to USA. I treasure your words of wisdom when I informed you that I was getting married to Prometheus Amoguis. You reminded me that Jesus should be included in any relationship and especially in marriage. It was you who started Prom and me in helping working students at PUC/AUP. A couple of years after we were married, you wrote and asked if we could help a Theology student who needed financial assistance. You said that he was struggling and getting discouraged and if we could help him with his tuition fees, he would be able to stay at PUC. We praise God that Prom and I responded to your appeal and we helped that young man. He graduated from PUC with a BTh, went on to get his master’s degree in Theology and then got his D.Min. later. He has served in South-Central Luzon Mission as a district pastor and later as president of the mission. He is now serving as a Sr. Pastor in one of Filipino churches in California. Soon after we helped this young man, you asked us to help a nursing student and then a secretarial student. They were our first 3 scholars. You were right in guiding us to help those students because they have become dedicated workers in God’s vineyard. Since then we have been blessed to work with the PUC/AUP Alumni (AWESNA and EASNA) and have helped many working students graduate from PUC/AUP. You will be happy to know that we have been married for 51 ½ years now and we are still helping working students. We divide our time each year between AUP in Putting Kahoy, Silang, Cavite and Tennessee where our children and grandchildren reside. Prom started a Student Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) at AUP in November 2014. We employ between 17-20 students who are growing vegetables and fruits in a 5-hectare farmland inside the AUP campus. We give free fruits and vegetables to working students who are on the Self-Cook Program. We distribute rice also on a weekly basis at 2 kilos for each student if they volunteer to work in the SNAP.Farm for 2 hours a week. Once again, the PUC/AUP Alumni, through EASNAC, is giving us their support. Thanks to the leaders of the AUP Alumni organizations who are my life-long friends. The relationships that I have built while at North Hall are still strong because of the Christian foundation that you have laid.
Thank you for being a surrogate mother, teacher, mentor, encourager, and most of all, a dear friend. You have been one of the greatest blessings in my life.
Love,
Norma
Philippians 1:3-7 (NIV)
“I thank my God every time I remember you. In all my prayers for you, I always pray with joy because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now, being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus. It is right for me to feel this way about you, since I have you in my heart”.
09/02/2018
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In the background are some of the mango trees that were planted in the 1980s
as a Philippine Union College Alumni of Western North America (AWESNA) project.
Income is shared 50/50: 50 percent goes to Student Aid while the other 50 percent stays with AUP. |
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| Stairs leading to the Mission of Hope Farm Office Headquarters |
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View from the Guest House of the Abelardo Gensolin Music Hall
with smoke rising in the background from a Triplex Apartment blaze on campus
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| Triplex Apartment fire, 31 July 2018. |
