Hey familia,
It was really
great to hear from you all. I’m doing very well here, but it is a very
different culture. I was very glad to get your email. It sounds like you are
all doing well, and having a good time. I got a little homesick like 2 days
ago, but aside from that, I am doing very well. Besides, after walking around
in the streets for a little, I snapped out of it.
So here is
what Nicaragua is like. The only way to describe it is different. The people
are different, the culture is different, and the country is different. So here
are my experiences so far in the country. The plane ride from Miami to Managua
was crazy. Everything was in Spanish, and I literally did not understand a
thing. The only thing I understood on the safety video was seatbelt. Pretty
crazy.
As we were
flying over Nicaragua, there were super thunderstorms and rain. Looking out the
window, all we could see was lightning. The lightning here is impossible to
describe. It is nothing like Idaho or Arkansas. It is really crazy, and super
loud. There were about a million lightning flashes as we were coming into
Managua. The plane landing was really, really hard, and it was raining super
hard. So the first day, we arrived in the airport, and went through customs and
stuff. We filled out the customs forms, which was difficult because it was all
in Spanish. The customs guy charged everyone 10 bucks, but I’m pretty sure that
he was just scamming everyone.
I had a huge bigmac, and it was good. The only difference was the Catsup, which tasted
like spaghetti-O sauce, and was almost black. Oh by the way, at McDonalds, they
sell gallo pinto. It was pretty funny, because the name of the drive-through is
called the auto-mac. All of the wrappers and stuff at McDonalds were in
Español. On another day, I ordered some fried chicken. It was good, but I found
the chicken spine with all of the bones and stuff. Pretty gross.
So we got to
the mission home, and went to bed on some mattresses on the floor. It was
pretty weird, and I was kind of out of it. It was like Belize, but more poor,
and more dirty. If you can remember what the streets were like in Belize
outside of the tourist part, that is what the nice parts of the streets look
like here.
Day 2. We had some orientation, filled our some
papers at the chapel, and had a good time. We went tracting on this day. I went
with some guy from Costa Rica, and we spent the whole day in the streets of
Managua. They are really dirty, and it was pretty interesting. Anyways, we
contacted a bunch of people, and the guy I was with did most of the talking. I
did a little, but the Spanish is pretty hard. I can talk alright, but I can’t
understand what they’re saying. It just sounds like gibberish. So we spent the
whole day on the streets, and went to some investigator and recent convert
thing. I had to speak, so I just got up and bore my testimony about why I came
here. There was some guy with a snake in the chapel, and after I told him that
I didn’t like snakes, he chased me around with it. Pretty goofy.
While I was tracting
in Managua with the guy from Costa Rica, this crazy dude came in and we taught
him a little. He was a super poor guy, and was literally starving. He didn’t
have shoes, and was asking me for shoes. I felt really bad telling this old
crazy poor starving guy that I didn’t have any shoes to give him. Anyways, we
taught him a little, and then we went and found a tienda and bought him some
food. It was really sad, and he couldn’t really walk, but he was really
grateful.
Day 3. We had
a mission conference, and they did all of the changes. I got assigned with
Elder Silva, who is really cool and goofy. He is from Costa Rica, and is pretty
cool. He is a really good trainer, and honestly is probably the best trainer in
the mission. He was an AP to the president
for 9 months, and is currently the zone leader of our zone. It is a strange
change, but the zone leaders are training Elder Daugherty and me.
Elder Silva has a pretty funny
sense of humor. He is really, really goofy, and is really easy to get along with.
He is literally probably one of the best missionaries in the mission, and
whenever I tell a different missionary that he is my trainer, they are always
really impressed. He loves the same type of music that I do, he plays
guitar, and he likes to long board. So we are pretty good friends, and he
speaks pretty good English. We will probably have a baptism next week, so I’ll
send you some pictures of that. Our goal is to have 2 family baptisms this
week. I think that we’ll be able to do it.
So we got assigned
to the Chinandega zone, which is about 3 hours west of Managua. It is on the
coast, and is super cool. After the
mission conference, we took a 3-hour bus ride (super sketchy) to
Chinandega. That night they loaded our
suitcases on top of a bus and it was super, super crazy. The suitcases on top
were about as high as the bus itself.
Everything here is a stick shift. The bus drivers drive like mad men,
and the semi drivers too. Pretty scary sometimes. We have to watch out when
were walking in the street, because the taxi drivers, which there are by the
millions, are super crazy. The drivers here lay on their horns constantly, like
literally, not exaggerating, constantly. It’s pretty different. Sometimes we
see horses pulling handcarts in the streets. Feels like were in the
1800´s.
We got
dropped off at the chapel, and walked to our apartment. It was pretty late, and
we went to the apartment and got ready. We went contacting later, and taught a
lesson to a woman named Isaura. On the way to the house, it started raining
really, really hard, and it was like someone was just dumping buckets of water
out of heaven. It was super wet, and the streets flooded pretty badly. We were
all really wet, and I got a puddle in my backpack, so my scriptures got a little
wet in the corner. They are a little wavy, but it is alright. My hymnbook is
pretty trashed through, because it got really wet. I can still use it though.
Funny stuff. I learned my lesson there.
There are probably 20 missionaries
in our zone. In our house, there are only 4. In our zone is Elder Daugherty,
and Elder Taylor tambien. So it’s pretty cool, because I get to see all of my
friends from the MTC like every day.
They next
days after this have been a blur. Anyways, I remember looking up at the ceiling
at the house on the first day (we live with a member) and I remember seeing
just a tin sheet metal roof, which was bolted to some pieces of wood. It is
pretty different, and the house looks really different than any house in the
US. It is probably one of the nicest houses in the neighborhood. Pretty cool.
We are blessed to have a shower, but it is pretty nasty. To quote Elder
McGregor, is has only one temperature. Cold. Elder Daugherty and I found a
cockroach in the shower the other day, and we squished the crap out of it. They
are really fast by the way.
The bugs are not too bad. I find
ants in my bed sometimes. Sometimes I find cockroaches, but never in our room,
only in the bathroom. Elder Silva said that he has never seen a big spider his
whole mission. It really isn’t as bad as I thought it would be. There are a lot
of little gecko lizards though that are fun to see. Sometimes in the jungle
parts, we see big iguanas.
For a pillow, I use my brown
blanket, and I folded it really nicely, and I put it inside my pillowcase. It
works really well, and I can’t tell the difference. I don’t think that I’ll
ever see carpet in my mission. It is all, everywhere, tile floors. It’s super hot here, so it all works
great.
So this week, we have been
contacting a bunch, and working hard. We have 4 progressing familias, which is
alright. We need more though, so we just contact all day pretty much, and
teach. I am getting better at Español, and I can understand sometimes. The
streets here are all cobblestone, they are really small, and the houses are
right one the street. Sidewalks are nearly nonexistent, so we just walk in the
side of the street. The streets here in Chinandega are pretty much the same as
Managua, except for a little dirtier.
There are about a million tricycles in Chinandega, and we use them quite
a bit. They’re super fun, and its cheap.
Each morning,
for breakfast, we eat at the tiendas (little stores in people’s houses) and we
get some juice in a bag called a yupi, and some sweet bread called picos. It is
super good, and is really cheap too. For lunch, we always eat with this one
member lady. She is really nice, but the food she serves us is pretty crazy
sometimes. Most of the time, it is just rice and beans and some weird sauces.
My second day in Chinandega she fed us cow tongue in this weird sauce soup
thing. I’m getting pretty good though at eating the food here. I just have
gotten into the habit of not asking what it is and eating. I get a little
freaked out though when they serve us some weird looking meat, because nobody
knows where it comes from. Anyways, the food here really isn’t that bad, but it
is pretty different. And for dinners, we usually eat with a member in the ward,
or at a tienda.
My first meal in Nicaragua was
Gallo Pinto. Love that stuff. With this first meal, I also had some drink,
which I forgot the name of. It’s basically oatmeal and water. Pretty bland
stuff, but whatever. I just eat and drink whatever they give me. I didn’t think
that I would be able to but when the lady gave us the cow tongue I just said a
little prayer and asked for help not to gag. I ate it, and it was actually
pretty good. Pretty funny stuff. See, I’m learning and getting a lot better at
eating different foods. It’s super offensive to not eat all of your food, so I
just stuff it all in my mouth and eat. With every meal, we have a few slices of
tomato, and a few slices of cucumber, and a few slices of a raw onion. With
every meal! So I’m starting to become like Dad, and I kind of like onion now.
Especially fried onion. They meat here is often mystery meat as I call it. I
just stuff that in my mouth and eat. It’s better when you don’t know what part
of the body it’s from. The lady who makes us food keeps threatening to make us
some stuff called Mondong. I don’t know what it is, but I hear it’s really
gross.
Anyways, like
I was saying, everything is really different. We do a lot of walking, bus
taking, or hitchhiking. It is pretty chill here. Oh something funny, on like
day 3 or 4 in Chinandega, Elder Silva sent me and Elder Aukema out contacting
for the day. The funny thing though is that Elder Aukema came here with me. So
two totally greeny missionaries are out tracting the streets of Chinandega. It
was cool though, and I learned my way around, and my Spanish improved a lot
that day, because I had to speak a lot. The word here for cool is Twanis, and
you hear it in about every conversation. Also, the people of Nicaragua speak
really horrible Spanish. They often don’t pronounce their S´s, so if someone said
Los Dos, it would really be said Lo Do. Kind of strange, but I am getting used
to it. Sadly, I am getting into the habit of saying Audio, and Buena, in which
situation both words should have an S on the end. Pretty strange.
The ocean in Nicaragua is really
pretty. I am on the Pacific side, and it is really warm like Belize. Today was
p-day and we went to the beach, Corianto.
We were waiting for a bus, but the bus never came. So we just hitchhiked
a ride off of a member from Guatemala. The beach is really pretty here. We were
just cruising down the road. I think that there were like 6 missionaries in
that truck. Pretty funny. The roads are pretty interesting in Nicaragua.
It was really cool in
Corianto. It reminded me exactly of the
Oregon coast and searching in the tide pools. EXACTLY the same. We went
fishing off of the rocks with a little stick, some massive hooks, some super
heavy duty line and some fish that a guy gave us. We bought it at a store for
like 3 bucks American, or 50 Cordobas. It was cheap. The guy in the store was
talking to me, and was talking about how America is Obama-land. Lots of people
say that about the US. We didn’t catch
anything, but it was fun anyways. The rocks were literally the exact same as
the Oregon coast. The crabs were different looking though. They were all red
and green
Well, I am
learning a bunch, and I am figuring things out.
Love,
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