A Busy, Satisfying Week!

Sometimes....you get just what you need.

We've had a chaotic, exciting week. We're exhausted (in fact today I'm still sitting in my room with the air conditioning going trying to catch up on correspondence, then laundry...gulp!) but feeling better about things.

I gave my first talk in Spanish last week and was well coached by Cindy, the Spanish Sister who was my Householder. She helped me work on my pronunciation and accent. It went off without a hitch and am told that it came across well. I simply felt relieved and had a measure of pleasure in having accomplished it and not given up despite the break in the week before.

The Sunday following this, we had a speaker come for the talk from Jinotepe congregation (where we originally thought we were being sent). An English Couple in their early 30's. They came with another couple here from England who are in Diriamba and a Visiting English Sister who has been in Malaysia for 3 years! Well, five Brits around our age, Gary was in heaven! He invited them all back for lunch (along with the Mosca's so we had 10) and then, as they wanted to do a little sight seeing, we invited them all to spend the night. It was a fabulous time (once all the beds were set up and made!). The following day we went for breakfast together at Kathy's Waffle House, popular with foreigners and then came back and chatted. They left around 1.30. It was chaos but a great deal of fun. So nice to hear all their stories (they'd also been to China) and feel normal for awhile.

This week, the Spanish Congregation is hosting the C/O & D/O for their circuit assembly. We were down to have them for dinner on Tuesday. They speak only Spanish! We invited them and the other foreigners in our group (again, it was 10 of us) for an early dinner before the meeting. I made Chicken Caesar Salad and Garlic Bread and Debbie brought a glorious chocolate cake for dessert. This may sound like a normal meal, but let me tell you, it was no small accomplishment! Finding ingredients here like trying to build a sand castle in the North Pole (okay it's not quite that bad, exaggeration for emphasis :D). They'd never had this kind of a meal before and from the speed they ate and from their comments, we think they really enjoyed it! We were able to communicate with great effort and many charades! It was a real laugh.

Then the next day, yesterday, we met at Bethel at 8 am to go into Managua to have our pictures taken for our residency. As is typical of Nicaragua, we are late getting them because immigrations camera was broken (!!) and then when we went yesterday, the camera was working but now the printer is broken! So we are technically residents but don't yet have our papers. The really great thing was that we were able to meet up with the two sets of Missionaries who were just sent here (they are in the latest picture in the mag) the Manzanares' who we were able to meet in the States before we arrived and the Titmas'. That was really nice, especially hearing how they are settling in and finding their assignments. Ajah had also had her purse taken on a bus and their missionary home has had a recent break in. Theft is simply a real problem here. Lucianna arrived not knowing any Spanish so she too is struggling with language. And no one can pronounce their names either :)

So today, laundry, dishes and a little R&R. Time to catch our breath and clean up. The heat is still scorching as the rainy season is dry (can you still call it a rainy season). We are taking life day by day! Really, what else can you do?