It’s the End of the World as We Know It. . . .

And we feel fine . . . . (well, no, not really.)

As many of you know, we are returning to the States this coming Saturday. As a result of our finances, we see it necessary to go home and replenish a bit. We are pretty sad about leaving, but we’re looking forward to seeing our friends back home as well. More on all that in a moment. For now, take a look at what we’ve gotten ourselves into since we spoke last:

We were surprised during the circuit overseer’s visit that our new C.O., Aaron Perkinson, is a fellow Chicagoan. (David & Kathy: Aaron says hello!). It was very interesting to see what a small world it is in the truth! Most of our conversations, however, always tended to drift towards the “leeks, onions, and watermelons” we left back in Chicago; in our case it was “Giordano’s Pizza, Chinatown, Portillo’s, and Lalo’s”. Ah, Chicago food!

But the visit was a ton of fun!







Immediately after the visit we were invited to visit our old assignment in Santa Teresa, basically to say good bye to everyone. Before the meeting we managed to walk by our old house to see how things were faring, and saw that the old Pepto-Bismol look was still in style, only this time it was on the outside, so that everyone could see it’s proud stance for regular bowel movements and overall good digestion!



It was a pleasure to be able to see everyone again. This was the first and last time that we went back after moving to Granada.

After the visit we went right back into our usual routine, but broke it up with one day on a wonderful hike up to Mombacho Volcano, which overlooks Granada. We started out in the morning (with a guide), and most of it was just a hike up a steep paved road. And by steep, I mean steep! At certain times it was like we were walking straight up. The guide suggested that, to make it easier on our legs and knees, we walk up in zig-zag fashion. It did make things easier, I’ll admit, but I’m sure we looked like total idiots bumbling around up the volcano.

When we reached the top, it was wonderful!



The top is literal rainforest, complete with moss-covered trees, mossy stones, many different kinds of birds, monkeys, and thick vines hanging down from all angles, not to mention some very beautiful and strange insects.



At some points it was like the sun was blocked out. On many trees we saw a dozen different plants growing (the guide explained to us that the constant moisture up there makes a type of soil on the trunks and branches of the trees, and other types of ferns and plants grow on the trees.) So it was like a wall and carpet of green everywhere you looked. It was really breathtaking. My favorite part of the whole trip was a place called “The Tunnel”, which was formed during an eruption supposedly thousands of years ago.



But it was, I think, the most beautiful example of the natural world that I have ever seen in person.

The walk down was murder. We again walked down in the old zig-zag fashion, but it was so hard on our knees and we were much, much slower than we were on the way up. Any talk was pretty much ceased.

A couple of days afterwards we discovered that as a result of the steep climb down, one of Marlene’s big toe-nails died. I mean it. It is black and she pulls on it and it looks like it’s going to fall off. It’s terribly disgusting.

I am trying to convince her of the seriousness of this impairment, and am trying to prepare her for the worst, that it may get infected and her big toe may fall off or have to be surgically removed. Of course I’m not an expert on this, but it seems fairly cut and dried to me. She attempts to conceal the hideous deformity with pink nail polish, and it does fool everyone. But I look down at it, and I know . . . . I know.


PIONEER SCHOOL!

Soon after our Mombacho trip that proved to be very costly as far as body parts are concerned, we had Pioneer School! I have to tell you, this was the highlight, the crowning glory, of our entire year in Nicaragua! I just cannot express what a treasure it was to be a part of it. Our two instructors, Luis Balladares and Ben Evans, were excellent in their efforts to make it fun and extremely interesting. Brother Balladares is a long time servant of Jehovah, and shared many experiences with us of the time that the work was banned in Nicaragua. Accounts of secret projects in which hand-written copies of Watchtowers were made in sound-proof rooms underground and brothers running through forests being chased by policemen kept us enthralled. And brother Evans had a lot of very interesting ways of getting us to discuss deep subjects related to God’s Word. For example, one day we were discussing the subject of the conscience. How it’s God’s law written in the hearts of men, and it accuses or excuses our conduct, right? So the question put to the class was: Does Jehovah have a conscience? This provoked a long, excited conversation among the 26 students. (The question is much more multi-pronged than it first appears, and I won’t tell you the conclusion we all reached, but it’s quite interesting!)



All in all, it was a huge mental storm of studying 4 to 5 hours a night for 2 weeks straight, but we have learned extremely valuable things that we’ll hopefully put to good use in the ministry and in our congregations. It was such a privilege!








THE ENGLISH CONVENTION

Immediately after the last day of Pioneer School we had our English District Convention. It was very satisfying and really charged us up. The drama, again, was so beautiful and it was very heartwarming to see how merciful and loving Jehovah is towards the young ones in his organization.

A very cool treat, as well, was that a new museum was opened the very weekend of the convention, on Bethel property. It relates details about the work in general since the early 1900's, and in particular regarding Nicaragua during the ban in the 80's and early 90's.





The picture below was especially interesting, seeing as how creative and resourceful the brothers in prison were!



It was fun meeting many brothers and sisters serving elsewhere in the country, some in cities like us, others in rural areas, and still others in the middle of the jungle in the RAAN section of the country. No roads, no running water, no electricity, and still they work, work, work. It’s amazing to see the selfless spirit of the friends that serve here.

I wish I had more to write about the convention, and there really was a lot more, but our heads are still buzzing from the 2 weeks plus of Pioneer School and the convention program, and I’m just drawing a blank. The thing that stands out in my mind (and this is a very telling thing) is the beautiful spirit of togetherness and camaraderie that exists among the fellow needgreaters in the country . . . . . . . It’s very easy to feel alone wherever you are serving, and that you’re not really doing anything well, but then you see the hundreds of others who are busily working in their own assignments, and you are all so thrilled to see and talk to each other, to just share that knowledge of common struggles and blessings, and you feel like you are a part of something so special that will never be repeated. You are just so grateful to be here and now, serving where the need is great, together with myriads and myriads of brothers.

Wait a moment. I just have something in my eye.



DOGGIE WORK

After the convention, we knew we had less than a week to go before our departure, and so we got busy working. Well, almost. We took the Monday after the convention to go to Montelimar, the beach resort on the eastern coast. We just felt we needed a break in between these huge life-changing events. It was a nice day just the two of us, taking in a bit of relaxation.

The next couple of days was a complete nightmare in terms of getting through red-tape with the doggies. We went to the vet’s office to get the paperwork, and then rushed it all to the Continental terminal at the airport, and were told that we had to have the doggies seen by the Customs department. Unfortunately, it was closed at the time.

So we ended up taking the dogs again out to Managua the next day to the Customs department, where I spent 2 hours getting one piece of paper saying I paid $10 for the right to export 2 dogs, and the “customs inspection” consisted of the agent looking out the window at Marlene sitting with the two dogs on a bench and saying, “Okay, I see them.”

In between all of this mess, Marlene and I managed to get our respective hairs cut. And I managed to get lost in Managua about a million times. One thing I have realized is that I HATE driving in Nicaragua! Almost as much as I hate those disgusting little green balls of slime called peas and getting my teeth worked on.

During the day, it’s a hassle to get anywhere because the roads are backed up with a million cars. There are no signs ANYWHERE, the streets have no names, and if you ask 4 people for directions, they will give you 4 wildly different answers, and it is very, very likely that they are all wrong. At night, every single person drives with his high beams on, there are no reflective strips on the road so you have to hope you don’t smash into a curved wall or deep rugged potholes in the dark while you’re blinded by oncoming traffic, and there are no street lights. If you hit a person, a dog, or a herd of cows, oh well. It’s ridiculous. So yes, I very much hate to drive in Nicaragua.

But on foot, it’s all beautiful!

LASTING BENEFITS

So our time in Nicaragua, for now, has come to an end. Our funds have dried up, and so like many others have to do from time to time, we need to return home.

As we look back over the time we’ve spent here in Nicaragua, we come away with the feeling that it was definitely worth all the challenges we faced (although Molly and Savannah may not agree). We’ve gained some very precious memories that will be with us for a very long time.

Looking ahead to our return to the United States, we can really appreciate that we have been in a very unique situation, and we are very grateful for it, and we will miss it terribly. Don’t get me wrong, we are looking forward to being with our much loved congregation back in New Mexico. But this truly is the end of the world as we’ve known it for the past year, and we don’t feel very fine about it.

There are some things we won’t miss, of course. We won’t miss the freezing showers, or the unbelievably hot sun baking our heads, or having every inch of our bodies covered in sweat the moment we walk out of the air conditioned bedroom, or the mice, tarantulas, scorpions with millions of babies riding on them, or even the R.O.U.S’s. We won’t miss stepping over drunks lying on the street, or seeing bloodied horses and dogs roaming the streets.

But we will so terribly miss the keen interest on the faces of our Bible students. We will miss the companionship of the local brothers and sisters who offer so much when they have so little. And we will miss the wonderful sense of common struggles and triumphs shared by other needgreaters, missionaries, and special pioneers that seem to be as plentiful here as trees in a forest.

Will we return to Nicaragua? We have an intense hope and desire toward that end, and we really believe that we will. A plan is even now taking shape in our minds. But for now we are so excited about going back to our good friends in our congregation Vista Hermosa, and working together with them in our territory, which also has a big need. We’ve learned a lot of invaluable lessons here in Nicaragua, and we hope that they have refined us a bit.

And we know that no matter where we are, the truthfulness of Deuteronomy 28:3 will be proved:
“Blessed will you be in the city, and blessed will you be in the field.”

In other words, we know that Jehovah blesses all of us, no matter where we are serving, as long as we do it whole-souled.

On a final note, Marlene and I really appreciate the comments, emails, and prayers that you friends have offered on our behalf. They really helped us through some struggles and put many things in perspective. We know that many of you have the goal of serving in a country of great need, and we hope that our experiences have revealed a little bit of what it’s like. It hasn’t all been roses and tea, but most of it has, and every single day of it has been extremely valuable to us.

May Jehovah continue to bless us all as we work down towards the end and into the New World.
- Matthew 24:13, 14

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ONE YEAR!

Yesterday (September 25th) was a special day, as it marked 1 full year of life here in Nicaragua! This past year, as you have seen in previous posts, has been very exciting for us. A few experiences have had to be endured. Many, many more have been enjoyed, but it’s all been very exciting.

We are presently as busy as we have ever been since we got here, which is not very unusual. But, as usual, some unusual things have occurred. Or something like that.


BUSY SEPTEMBER

This month has been very busy since a new service year is upon us and we are trying to get a good head start on our hours. We’ve been a little bit sidetracked by colds and other unexpected necessary things, but it’s not looking too bad. The weather plays a big part sometimes, because you are literally just too exhausted and burned out by the heat that you can’t do any more. (The average weather this past month in Granada has been a heat index of 104 degrees with 98% humidity during the day. The nights have been very refreshing, though, at a burr-inducing 97 degrees.) The lack of rain during this rainy season has been a huge blow to everyone. Incidentally, the lack of rain has affected all the bean and rice crops, has resulted in less vegetation for cows and stuff, and so the food situation is getting more expensive (Marlene and I were shocked to discover, after some calculations recently, that we are actually spending more money on groceries here than we did back home! And we ate more back then!). We’re hearing talk of a declaration of a hunger emergency early next year.

SPIDERS GIVE MARLENE BAD DREAMS,
SPIDERS HEAR MARLENE'S LOUD SCREAMS.
SPIDERS MAKE HER FEEL SUCH DREAD,
AND I MUST KILL OR ELSE BE DEAD.

(Yes, the above does sound rather creepy, doesn't it? But I promise you that I'm not typing over the keyboard, staring off into space with wide eyes and drool dripping down my chin, a curious full-toothed and red-lipped smile painted on my vacant face. . . . .I save that for when Marlene accuses me of doing something.)

The other night I was doing something in the living room when Marlene screamed for me to go in there. I got my handy R.O.U.S.-killing sandal ready, but she told me that there was a TARANTULA in the room. Molly had spotted it first and had barked at it, which made the tarantula actually jump and run. (Very strange, I didn’t know spiders could hear, but I guess they can.) When I came in, I could very clearly see it crouching against the wall. It was quite big and furry, with alternating black/brown and yellowish streaks. It had two little black eyes. (Well, I guess they could be hundreds of eyes, I don’t know, but they looked like two little black eyes, and it was looking at me. I think if it had eyelids, it would have narrowed them at me in hostile suspicion. But it didn’t, so it merely looked at me either in extreme hostility, fear, curious interest, or total indifference. I can’t really say.)

Anyway, I’m not ashamed to say I was somewhat frightened (they are poisonous, you know, and quite large!), but I took my usual three practice swings and finally smacked it. As is usual in these strange-creature killings, I didn’t get it right away and it squirmed away and ran. I chased it on all fours, my mind not really thinking anything through, and I finally clubbed it about 5 times, churning it into a disgusting greenish/brownish gooey thing. It was very, very disgusting.

Marlene was quite congratulatory. She may have even clapped her hands. I think I blushed a little. It felt pretty good.

However, the very next morning (!), I pulled a pair of socks from my usual open-air socks container/basket/thing in the corner, and put them on. Immediately I felt a very sharp pain on the instep of my right foot, and I felt something moving quickly across the arch of my foot. I quickly stepped down very hard and felt something go squish. It turned out to be a little furry spider. I very strongly suspect that it was related to the tarantula I had killed the night before. It was similarly furry and dark colored, and it had 2 black eyes too! The way it bit and ran, I don’t know, it just seems to me like it was intentional. The spiders know that I grab some socks from there every morning. And they were the gray ones, my favorite ones (they’re quite comfortable).

I can imagine that upon seeing the disgusting, gooey carcass of a mother the night before, perhaps taking in the scene from a dark corner of the room, they decided to exact a little bit of revenge. I don’t presume to know how that particular spider got to be picked. Perhaps they cast lots or perhaps he was the most angry and hotheaded one of the group. But regardless, it had sneaked into my sock, waited until I had put it on, and then bit and ran. His fatal mistake was that he had waited too long. If my sock had not been put fully on, perhaps he would have had an opening and could have made it out. But the sock was tightly on my foot, and there was no escape. Although I have to imagine that he knew it was a suicide mission all along. That this one was “for Mother”, as they say. It’s quite heartbreaking, really.

Well, the unfortunate result was that my foot began to swell up during service that morning until I eventually got home and put ice on it. It was really a nasty little attack.


ISLETAS ADVENTURES

Last weekend we had the nice privilege of being invited out to the Isletas again. This time we were able to take along three other companions: Edith, Cindy, and Fransisco (Cindy's younger brother), all very good friends of ours who support the English group. Neither of the 3 had ever gone out to the Isletas group before, and after the September issue of the Watchtower that includes an article on the group and the floating Kingdom Hall, they were very excited to find out that we could take them along (space on the boat is limited, but we managed to squeeze everyone in).



As is the arrangement for guests to the group, it was a whole-day deal. Service starts at 8:30-ish, lunch is at noon, and the meeting is at 2pm.

The water was a little rough that day, but the sun was shining and it was a little cooler out on the water.

Danny (a brother from the group), Francisco, and I were assigned to tackle the mountainous area that my parents preached in when they visited us back in February.

It was a little bit more arduous this time around, since the 2 younger brothers seemed to be having an argument along the road as to who was the fastest among them. At least that’s what it appeared to me. Either that, or I am getting old.

Anyway, we got to preach to a few houses, and time really flew by.

One pretty funny thing was that at this one house, we came upon a man in a hammock underneath a little shady booth. He sat up to receive us, and we quickly began a very lively discussion. At the same time, the daughters were pulling up little stools for us to sit on while we talked. One daughter pulled one up and Francisco promptly sat down. In my tired state, I almost admonished him for not giving the seat to me, his older companion, but I thought better of it. Then after a considerable period of time, another daughter pulled up a stool on my right, and Danny quickly sat down. I tried to give him a look, but I couldn’t really manage it well. So I just stood there. And stood there.

After a time, I started to look around, wondering when my seat would appear. But it didn’t. Then I noticed the daughters looking at me strangely, and when I would catch their stare, they would quickly look away. But, for some reason, it wasn’t that "Oh-my-he-is-so-handsome-I-can’t-meet-his-eyes" stare, it was more of a "What-a-weirdo" stare. Then I looked down at Danny and Francisco, trying to fix a disapproving look on them, but they looked at me funny too. Finally, the man in the hammock said, “Well, aren’t you going to sit down?”

“Well. . .” I said, looking around. I backed up a bit and almost toppled over a stool that had been placed directly behind me about 15 minutes before, when all the stools were being handed out. I think I was drinking some water at the time and hadn’t noticed it. I quickly sat down and pretended to reorganize the magazines in my backpack.

Time really flew by and all of a sudden it was time for lunch. So we three brothers picked our way down the mountain and met up at the floating Kingdom Hall, where the other group had already arrived and were busy cleaning the hall of loose leaves and stuff. The elder who is assigned to the group, a missionary named Mark (his wife’s name is Allison), tied the Kingdom Hall to his boat and towed us out to a rather secluded, shady area of the lake. It was very nice, although the water was still a bit rough. But we were out of the direct sunlight and there was a nice cool breeze coming off the lake.

We were all having a nice conversation and I asked Allison if anyone had ever fallen into the water. She mentioned that one brother had fallen in a long time ago, but that no one had fallen in a very long time. I nodded my head and continued eating my sandwich.

A short while later we heard, of course, a very loud splash. Mark had been trying to hop from the boat onto the Kingdom Hall, but because the water was so rough, the hall bobbed to the left at the last moment and he missed his footing and fell in!

He was soaked from head to toe, although he fortunately didn’t hurt himself. He quickly went out to an isolated place in the rocky hill above us to wring out his clothes. The humidity didn’t help him dry out very quickly, but he was much better when he conducted the Watchtower study a while later. I was privileged to give the talk, although the undulating waves under the Kingdom Hall made it quite unsteady and I had to suddenly grab onto the podium a few times to keep from falling backwards into the water, and I also got a bit queasy at times. I heard once that smiling stifles the urge to vomit, so I might have appeared to be smiling at inopportune times during the talk.

After the meeting, there was some work to be done in cleaning the surface of the hall and locking up the chairs and podium. After that we dropped everyone off at their respective islands and docks and finally made it back to the main dock. At this time everyone was dead tired, it was about 7pm or so, and we eventually made it back to the missionary home.

When we arrived, we were invited to stick around, as they were having company. We all eventually went out to a pizzeria in town. It was kind of a neat experience being with so many full time servants at one table. There were 2 missionary couples, 2 circuit overseers and their wives, and another needgreater couple serving in nearby Masaya. All in all, it was a wonderful experience and we laughed harder than we had in quite a long time. We were also all able to share certain experiences which were very encouraging.


TREATS AHEAD

We are having a lot of activity coming up. We are really looking forward to this weekend’s meeting in Spanish, since Frank (the elder from Teresa) is coming up with his family to give the talk at our congregation. I’m sure we’ll get to catch up and have a nice dinner with them or something.

Then next week will be very busy since we have the circuit overseer’s visit. The new circuit overseer’s name is Aaron Perkinson, and we got to meet them at that dinner last weekend. They seem to be very nice and enthusiastic. Many in the congregation are a little nervous about the arrangements to work with them in service and show them hospitality, since no one knows them and they want to give off a good first impression. The couple seems very down-to-earth, though, and I’m sure they will be very comfortable.

About 2 weeks after the circuit overseer’s visit we have Pioneer School. We are looking forward to that so much, and we are ticking off the days left before we can go. We are just really excited about it. I think that will be the highlight of the year for us.

The weekend after Pioneer school ends is the English District Convention, so that will be a nice treat as well.

(As you have probably noticed, there were barely any pictures this time around. The reason is that our camera broke! But we are remedying the situation, so the next post should be picture-filled.)

So, that is it for now. I will most likely post again after the English District Convention to catch everyone up to speed on how it went. In the meantime, we will continue to have wonderful super-heated fun in the sun!

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Bulls, Water Nazis, and Cat Pee!

A harrowing account in which we are almost mauled by bulls, where we meet a Water Nazi, more adventures with power outages, cat pee, and theocratic gems! (Yes, really!)

This month has certainly been a busy one, but it has been quite colorful and exciting, as usual.

INVASION OF THE BULLS

A few Sundays ago was some giant pagan party in Granada. They were celebrating the birth of some saint, and they expressed their adoration by lugging around mannequins dressed as 16th century maidens with faces full of thick makeup, followed by 5-piece bands tooting their horns all over town. Ah, but the real action would begin later that evening, with the annual “Running of the Bulls”, an adventure very similar to the one in Spain that you always hear so much about.

After the meeting (English) that morning, some of the brothers told us to be careful, because at around the time of the Spanish meeting (5pm), they would be letting the bulls out and it would be dangerous to be on the roads at that time. Seeing that we’d have to come from all across town to attend the Spanish meeting that evening, we had to be even more vigilant. We didn’t really think about it much, though. I remember that I was starving to death and was more concerned with lunch than with any pesky getting-gored-by-bulls business.

Later that evening, however, we got a small taste of the weird craziness in Nicaragua, yet again. We were walking down the street, in our usual route to the Kingdom Hall, when at the end of the very narrow street we saw a bull tied up by some people, who were standing a good 10 feet away from him and holding the ropes. One man would very courageously dart towards the bull and smack him on the nose and neck, with a long rod, to get him worked up before they’d let him go.



Of course I seethed at this, seeing the poor bloody state the bull found himself in, and shook my head and commented to Marlene how amazing it is that certain people can actually function biologically without even a tiny minuscule brain in their heads, when the bull finally had enough and burst forward a bit and knocked the man down (the man on the right side of the photo above).

The bull sort of stood over him and lowered his head, and all we saw were some jerky movements from the bull, doing who knows what to the man below. (We later found out that the man was seriously injured. I tried a little bit to feel sorry for him, really I did, but it didn't work very well.)

Anyway, while all of this was going on, we heard a loud collective cry come from the crowd around us, and we saw that a different, larger bull was running down the street, dodged the first bull trying to murder his not-so-smart victim, and was charging toward us! People started fleeing down the street, and as we saw the bull running toward us, I grabbed Marlene and jumped into an open doorway lining the narrow street along with about a half-dozen other people. It was thrilling to see the bull run past the doorway, but not the good kind of thrill. More like the “I-can’t-believe-how-close-we-got-to-getting-the-business-end-of-those-horns” thrill.

The next day we learned that the bulls that had been let loose had seriously injured 14 people and had killed a horse.

Now the horse, I felt sorry for.


THE WATER NAZI

Living where we do now has been so convenient in certain respects. We have two little “ventas”, little shops that are actually peoples’ homes where they sell different goods. Soft drinks, soap, toilet paper, cookies, etc. The one directly next door, our neighbor, is where I would buy my nice little returnable 2-liter Coke bottle from. The one next door to that was kind of ignored, until a couple of months ago when they started selling the 5-gallon water jugs. (Before this, I’d had to go to a store about 4 blocks away and lug the water back, which is no big deal if it’s not 105 degrees out, but unfortunately it usually is.)

Anyway, once I found out this neighbor was selling water, I happily went to her for all of our water-drinking needs. At first, I got a very hearty welcome from the lady, whom we shall now call the Water Nazi, because that’s what she is.

She smiled and said, “We’ve got many more things, too, so come back for whatever you need!”

I took that as a nice little customer-service pitch, smiled, and went happily on my way. I didn’t know at the time that she had, in fact, issued an order.

About 2 weeks ago, I suppose, she finally had enough. She spotted me buying my usual Coke from next door. I went home, dropped off the Coke, and took the empty water jug to exchange at the Water Nazi’s place. As I walked up to her window, she LITERALLY said, “No water for you.”

“What?” I said, cocking my head to the side in confusion.

“We don’t have water for you,” she said. “All we got is Coca Cola. But wouldn’t you know, you already got it from the other store, so I guess you don’t need to come here.”

My mouth opened and closed a few times. But nothing really came out. She saw my hesitation and plowed ahead.

“There’s something you don’t know,” she said, pointing at me. “Your neighbor? The one selling all the Coke? She’s a thief.”

“A thief?” I asked.

“Yes. A thief. She sells her Coke for 21 cords, and I sell mine for 20, but you wouldn’t know that, would you?”

Now at this I started to get a bit upset. Number one, because she was talking to me like some idiot, and number two because she was flat-out lying.

“No she doesn’t,” I said. “She charges me 20 each time I need one.”

The Water Nazi just snorted in disgust and looked away. “Maybe she charges YOU 20, but she charges everyone else 21, and that isn’t right.”

“I see,” I said.

“So,” she said. “If you want to buy your Coke from me, then I’ve got plenty of water. But if you don’t. . . .”

“All right,” I muttered. “I’ll buy the Coke here then.”

“What?” she said.

I frowned, trying to figure out if she had really not heard me or if she just was having a little fun.

“I said, I’ll buy my Coke here.”

“I heard what you said,” she said.

I just looked at her for a moment. “Can I have my water then?”

“Simon!” she barked over her shoulder. Immediately a pudgy little boy came forward with a jug of water. “You can have your water,” she said.

I paid for it and left.

Am I ashamed of giving in to the Water Nazi? Perhaps a little.

But you try lugging that 5 gallon jug of water in 105 degree heat with 98% humidity, not even being able to see because of the sweat pouring into your eyes and making your hands and arms all slippery. Not to mention the very likely possibility of stepping into one of the thousand holes in the street, falling, and making yourself look like a moron, lying in the middle of the street with a broken jug and water splashing everywhere!

So the Water Nazi must have her way, don’t you see?


MORE SWEATY, MOSQUITO - FILLED FUN!

Yes, we’ve continued to have the wonderful, exciting experiences of not knowing when the power will shut off as we lie down to sleep. It’s a lot of fun, really. You start to hesitantly put your head on the pillow, peering at the light that tells you the air conditioning is on, willing it to continue. And then finally, you close your eyes, slowly let out a sigh of hoped-for relief, and then the world blinks out. And you lie there, amazed at how fast the room gets hot, not even being able to imagine what air conditioning feels like. Putting the thin sheet over you feels like you’re wearing a bear suit in the middle of the Sahara. So, you get out of bed, crack open the door to perhaps have a bit of a breeze through the night, and hear the ticking of the clock in the next room as the minutes drag by. You finally, FINALLY drift off to sleep, and practically at that exact moment the electricity comes back on, which wakes you up to a nice surprise.

“Ah!” you say, and you hastily get out of bed to close the door and to turn the fan closer to the bed so that the whole family can get maximum air flow (yes, the doggies just LOVE to cuddle when the electricity goes off! Never mind their 100 degree little furnace-like bodies!), and you lie back down, a smile on your face as you wiggle in bed, trying to get the most comfortable position for sleep, the wonderful, cool air washing over your body, thinking that bedtime is the nicest part of the day, licking your lips as you think about dreaming of nice pizzas and frolicking through fields of wild flowers, and then. . . .

Blink! The world turns off again. And you want to tear your hair out from the roots and scream. And so you get up again to open the door, finally drift off to sleep, and wake up with a dozen bites on your legs and arms, and they don’t all look the same.

But that only happened a few nights.

Right now we’re good.



DOGGIE HEALTH

As you know, this has been an ongoing issue. The poor dogs are always biting and scratching at themselves, the poor things. We really shouldn’t have brought them with us, but we didn’t want to give them away permanently, and we couldn’t see just “lending” them out for a year or more. There are limits to how much we will milk our friends and family, you will be happy to know.

But Marlene, who’s been experimenting with all sorts of drugs and potions for them, has recently found that fish liver oil is helping them out quite a bit. (Yes, she’s gone through so many trials and errors that she is now at “Fish Liver Oil”.) It’s good for human skin and, we’ve found, good for doggie skin. They don’t have nearly the same amount of hot-spots they used to, and the skin irritation is going down little by little, with occasional flare ups. There are some other things Marlene puts on them, though, that are essential, but we’ve just run out. Her brother is working on sending us some stuff, which is fantastic.

A strange thing, though, was that a few nights ago, during the nightly before-bed Tick Inspection, we found two ticks on Savannah. Now, finding 2 ticks on her is rather unusual in itself, but the weirdest part was that they were on top of each other. Now, I’m not one to impute bad motives on anyone, but it really did seem like they were copulating on top of our poor little doggie. Either that, or they were involved in an epic, desperate fight for death and glory, Tick style.

Either way, they both ended up being uprooted from their wild hairy world and flushed down the toilet, where they met a watery end.

In other animal-related news, we have this really annoying cat that likes to jump across to our roof in the mornings and pee on it. Then it scratches at something, dirt or leaves I guess, to cover it up like a litter box or something. We know it scratches because we can hear it. And by “we”, I mean all of us. Savannah goes nuts, staring up at the ceiling, growling and barking, trying to climb up the walls. On several occasions, unfortunately, the pee has leaked into a corner and run down the wall, which makes for a very stinky and disgusting environment. Marlene has done a great job in getting most of it out, but you know what cat pee’s like. Or maybe you don’t. In any case, it’s really, really bad.

On one occasion, the stinky pee got onto one of my ties that had been hanging up and touching the wall, and we took it to the drycleaners here in Granada. When we went to pick it up, I pulled it out of the garment bag and carefully sniffed it. The counter person looked at me very strangely, and so I said, “It’s just that it was really, really smelly.”

The look on her face got a bit stranger, but she didn’t say anything.


HOST VISIT

This past week we had the wonderful privilege of being the host visit for both the Circuit and District overseers and their wives. Actually, both brothers are district overseers normally.

There are only 2 districts in the entire country, and these two brothers are the 2 district overseers. There are currently not enough brothers in the circuit work, however, so the district overseers have to do circuit overseer work parts of the year. At this time, brother Luis Balladares was serving as the circuit overseer while brother Arnoldo Garcia was in his normal D.O. capacity.

This is just one example of how urgent the need is for qualified elders to be here. The branch is doing a wonderful job with what they have, but they really don’t have as many tools to work with as they really need.

The week, as you would expect, flew by really fast. We had the privilege of hosting the two couples for lunch on one of the days, and it was really nice because here, the lunch hour ranges from 12 noon to 2pm, so you have plenty of time to get to know them. The nice time cushion is very much deserved, though. The traveling overseers here in Nicaragua have such a huge job, and not a lot to do it with. They don’t have cars, unless they buy one themselves, which most of them can’t afford, so the majority of them travel by bus, boat, horse, and feet to get to where they need to go. And the circuits are very expansive, with congregations either being nestled into a nice sized city, or a 10 hour trip by horse and boat away.

The two couples were so nice to be around, very down to earth and humble, and not afraid to get their hands dirty in service, walking and sweating along with the rest of us. We had a ton of support in service, too, the majority of the publishers were out the whole week.



PIONEER MEETING

As you know, there is an annual pioneer meeting for all of the pioneers in the circuit right before the circuit assembly. This one was wonderful!

We had an attendance of 194, which included regular pioneers, special pioneers, and missionaries.



The thing that stuck out the most to Marlene and me was how much they emphasized that we have a dual role as pioneers. One is, of course, taking the lead in the preaching work and setting an example of zeal and skill in our teaching. But even MORE important, we were told, was our other role of strengthening our congregations. Working with the brothers and not just with other pioneers, attending the meetings for field service whenever we can, even if we have other arrangements. And working with the group in door-to-door work and not breaking off to do studies or return visits after only a short time.

The whole meeting was very encouraging and was very direct in asking us to evaluate how we are doing in our work of encouraging our brothers and sisters, if they feel refreshed by being around us. It also emphasized always being positive and upbuilding, and not negative or having a complaining spirit.


CIRCUIT ASSEMBLY

The next day, of course, was the start of our Circuit Assembly, this past weekend. We got to ride in a chartered school bus with the rest of the congregation, which was a nice way to get to know everyone a bit more, and it was impressive to see everyone working well together in our cleaning assignment. This time around our congregation was assigned to the cleaning of the bathrooms. Which is definitely NOT anyone’s favorite assignment, of course. But everyone showed such a willing, enthusiastic spirit and we finished it in a short period of time and it was done very well. It was really a great example for us to see.



The program itself, of course, was extremely encouraging as well. One aspect that was particularly encouraging was that, although many people take discouragement and become bitter and angry because of it, we need to conquer the evil with good things. Keep working for Jehovah, letting your faith be tested and proved by endurance. Jehovah puts very little value on untested faith. But when we are tested, and we endure as we depend on him for strength, now THAT is valuable to Jehovah, like refined gold. Because he knows then that our obedience is not just there when it’s convenient, and that our serving him isn’t based on mere emotion or because everyone else around us is doing it. But that we serve him out of genuine love, and when he sees that we won’t stop, no matter what, he is moved to help us even more.

That is very encouraging for us, because there are certainly many, many challenges that can frustrate us and can make us desperate. At times we need to wait for Jehovah to fix a certain problem that we can face here in our assignment, but sometimes we are tempted to just take it into our own hands and fix it ourselves, because we want it fixed NOW. But if we do that, what have we really endured? What patience have we shown? What dependence and trust in Jehovah is there?

So the program really encouraged us to just keep praying about the matter and leave certain things in Jehovah’s hands, and to be confident that, once Jehovah is satisfied that our faith has been proven, he’ll do something. And that all of this is a golden opportunity to prove to Jehovah what our motives for serving him are.


A SPECIAL EXPERIENCE IN OUR MINISTRY

I saved this for last because it’s really something extraordinary.

As you know, Acts 10:34, 35 says that “God is not partial, but in every nation the man that fears him and works righteousness is acceptable to him.”

The faithful and discreet slave class has often referred to this scripture when it encourages us to seek out all sorts of people in our ministry, to not deny someone the right to hear the good news based on their appearance or lifestyle. Our obedience to this was recently put to the test, and the following account has by no means told its final chapter.

It all started when Marlene was visiting an interested young woman (I wasn’t with her then.) While speaking to her, her friend “Perla” came out and joined in the conversation. It turned out that “Perla” was actually a man who, obviously a homosexual, had gotten a “gender reassignment” surgery a while back and lived his life as a woman. He dresses as a woman and behaves as one. During the course of the conversation, he asked Marlene why it was that God would destroy him for being homosexual, if God was the one that made him that way. Marlene later told me that he began to cry as he expressed his fear and confusion. She kindly assured him that, although Jehovah condemns such a lifestyle, he doesn't hate the actual person and hopes that he can change to become approved by Him. After the conversation, she told him that she would come by again to speak with him, and he readily agreed. Under pressure from his friend, he begrudgingly admitted that his real name is Cesar, and Marlene said that that was what she would call him from then on.

We spent a few days the following week looking for him. Although he has the habit of often being at his friend’s house, he seemed to disappear. We were told of two different houses where people were sure that he lived, but he had moved out of both places. Of course, we took this as yet another indication of Satan trying to cut across our path, but we kept at it and asked around for him.

Finally we heard that he was always at this particular corner selling food in the mornings, and that was where we found him. The conversation started easily enough, speaking about the wonderful hope that Jehovah gives us for eternal life on the earth. Marlene then brought out the Young People Ask Book, volume 2, which she had promised to bring him, and showed him the Table of Contents. When he saw the chapter on homosexuality, he pointed at it and said “I want to read that!” We then got into another conversation about his situation, and it was very obvious to us that he has a sincere heart and wants to be pleasing to God, but thinks that he is who he is and he doesn’t know if he can change that. He also seems to be accepted by most of the community as being a woman, and so that is an added incentive to staying the way he is.

As we spoke to him about what God feels on the matter, he agreed with us that these feelings are an effect of living so far below our perfect origins, and also living in Satan’s world. We read to him 1 Corinthians 6:9-11 which shows that some of the Christians in the 1st century had practiced homosexuality before coming into the truth, but had been able to change because of help from Jehovah. We told him how, in Jehovah’s eyes, homosexuality was no different than a man or a woman committing fornication or adultery. He agreed that, just as a person who has strong tendencies to commit immorality doesn’t have an excuse to engage in it, a person who has homosexual tendencies doesn’t have to give in to them either.

Instead of painting Jehovah as a cruel God who implants wrong desires in the heart of a man and then punishes him for acting on those desires, we told him, “This is the kind of father we have. Look at what it says here in Isaiah 41:10: ‘Do not be afraid, for I am with you. Do not gaze about, for I am your God. I will fortify you. I will really help you. I will really keep fast hold of you with my right hand of righteousness.’”

He was very moved by that scripture and broke down over it. We assured him that as long as he asks God for help and makes every effort to obey his righteous standards, he can be clean and upright in His eyes. He really seemed to appreciate what we were saying. To us, he absolutely has the 3 “H”’s required of a sheep-like one: Hungry, Honest, and Humble.

Time will tell if God opens up his heart and makes the seeds of truth grow. But we won’t give up going by and talking with him. This week we will attempt to establish a study with him using the Bible Teach book.


A BUSY TIME AHEAD

Well, that is all for now. We are looking forward to starting off the new service year at full speed towards our yearly hourly goal. Marlene and I have been invited to go again to the group at the Isletas, which you have surely read about in the recent September Watchtower!!! Hopefully we will get to be on the floating Kingdom Hall and get some pictures this time, since we will both be there.

Also, we have received the wonderful privilege of being invited to this year’s Pioneer School. That takes place the last two weeks of October, so the almost-2 months that remain will be full of anticipation.

We sincerely hope that Jehovah continues to be with you, our dear friends, and we mention many of you by name in our prayers. Please do the same for us.

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Thoughts on Death - By Motorcycle, Drowning, or Swine-Flu

I sit here before the computer, contemplating the fleeting nature of man’s fragile life, as I cough and wheeze, hoping that my life will not be cut short. I slowly shake my head, thinking what a pity it would be if I really do have that much-maligned pig flu.


I cough again.

“Put a cough drop in your mouth!” comes the call from my dear beautiful wife. It’s apparent that my coughs are irritating her sensibilities. I hack up another lung in her general direction, for good measure.

“Sorry,” I rasp in my sick-voice. Then I begin to write.


SEEING THE SIGHTS AND GETTING LEFT AT THE CURB

When I last left you, my friends, we had just gotten home from our wonderful trip to Chicago. Ah, what a fine vacation that was! We still talk about the wonderful food and friends to everyone here.

When we returned, as you will most likely remember, the power went out. This time it was nothing too major; it has gone out sporadically ever since, never more than 6 hours at a time and never after 9pm, which is good. We really would rather not go through the whole sweaty-mosquito-filled nights any more. We’re not sure what the causes are. It seems to us that in order to conserve power, the city is cutting off electricity to different sectors of the city on certain days between certain times. We hope that it doesn’t continue to be regular, but we will really never know. They don’t actually tell you. They just assume that you will figure it out sooner or later.

Anyway, the weekend after we got back we went down to a place called Nagarote near Leon for a visit. It started out as a nice day, the bus ride down was easy enough. We got hold of a taxi driver that actually pedals people around, like a rickshaw driver, and he took us out to this lake overlooking Momotombo Volcano.



It was very nice. On the way back to the main town, however, it began raining and then the rickshaw driver pulled over and told us to get out because he had damaged a rim. After we got out, he waited for a few minutes in the rain and then basically abandoned us on the side of the road. We aren’t really sure what happened there. He didn’t flat-out leave us there without a word, but he told us that a bus would be coming along very soon and he had to get back to town so he didn’t want to wait, and he couldn’t carry us in his pedal-mobile because of the busted rim.

After a few failed attempts at flagging down a bus, however, Marlene and I realized that the buses don’t stop there, and so we started walking towards town. We eventually made it back on a bus and were in Granada right on time for the Spanish meeting that evening. It really was just a very strange day. We attended the meeting in severely wrinkled clothes and were all sweaty, and we were very, very embarrassed, but the bus stop is literally a block away from the hall and it dropped us off like 10 minutes before the meeting. Besides, the friends were happy to see us anyway and didn’t ask why we looked so disheveled. But I’m sure they wondered.


(ALMOST) DYING FOR A RETURN TO THE ISLETAS

The weekend after that, I was invited to give a talk at the Isletas group, the group that meets on the little islands off of Granada. Marlene and I were excited about it, because we were hoping we’d get to be on the floating Kingdom Hall.

The Friday night before, however, I called the brother over there to confirm, and he said that there had been a slight problem. The boat that normally would pick us up at the dock in Granada was not working well, there was something wrong with the motor and would start acting up on long distance trips. So the boat could only pick me up at Dock #2, the closest one to the Kingdom Hall, so that we wouldn’t overwork the engine. The other problem was that Dock #2 was accessible only by a 30 minute motorcycle trip, and there were only 2 motorcycles available. One brother would be taking me to the dock, and another would be taking the Watchtower conductor. So there was no room for Marlene. Oh, and instead of it being on Sunday, it would have to be on Saturday afternoon at 2pm.

I had to break it to Marlene that she couldn’t go, but I know she doesn’t like riding on the back of a motorcycle anyway, and she was fine with it.

Little did I know that I was about to embark on two harrowing trips that would almost cost me my life. Well, maybe not so much, but it really was rather frightening.

I took a taxi to the place I was supposed to meet the brother the next day, at a little junction called the Three Crossings, because of a 3-pronged fork in the road. The motorcycles were already there with the brothers waiting. I could see that the three roads were all dirt roads. Well, two of them were dirt roads and the third one, the middle one, looked like someone had tried to recreate the Grand Canyon using bulldozers and bulls dragging steel implements behind them.

“So, which road are we taking?” I asked, already fearing the worst.

One of the brothers, Danny, smiled and said, “The middle one. But don’t worry. If we make it there before it starts raining, we won’t die.”

“Ah,” I said. I see.

After hopping on the back, I held on to the support bar behind the seat (I wasn’t going to hold on to the brother’s waist, obviously) and we were soon on our way. For the first 3 seconds I thought it wasn’t going to be so bad, until we hit the first of about 2,000 ruts. At least the first part was hard ground.

After bouncing around for a few minutes, I asked him, “How long is it til we get there?”

“About 30 more minutes,” he yelled back.

Wonderful.

Soon we started on a long, winding patch of road that was made up of loose gravel and dirt. We really almost went down about 5 times. And the brother was driving pretty fast, since we were going to be late for the boat. At one point I began to pray that I wouldn’t die, not like this, not in the middle of the jungle on a gravel road. At that moment the brother’s cell phone rang and he slowed down to about 40 miles per hour to answer it and stick it in his helmet, talking and laughing at whatever the person was saying. During the phone conversation we wobbled a bit and almost went off a bridge into a river, when he realized he probably shouldn’t be talking on the phone and put it away.

Finally, after what seemed to be about 45 minutes through dense jungle, we made it to a tiny little dock. My brain told me to quickly jump off the death machine, but I had been holding on so tight that my hands wouldn’t let go of the bars and I basically fell off. My butt didn’t stop buzzing for a good 5 minutes.

“Thanks for not killing us,” I said to the brother, who laughed and said that the guy who had tested him for his motorcycle license had said the same thing.

“But I’ve only fallen a few times, and only twice with someone else on it,” he said.

Anyway, we were soon on the boat and headed out to the Kingdom Hall. About halfway there, we met up with a few other boats full of brothers and they tied onto a small island and hopped on with us, since we had a motor and they had rowed there from their homes on the other islands.

We were soon at the meeting site and we did get to have the meeting on the floating Hall after all. It was a pity that Marlene couldn’t be there, but there was no way she would have made the motorcycle trip.

The meeting was well attended, about 30 people. About 25 of them were under 18 (it’s a very young group), so it was extremely appropriate that the Watchtower study was about young ones serving Jehovah.

Immediately after the meeting ended, the wind really started to pick up. I looked out over the lake and was amazed at how high and choppy the waves were.

“Are we going out in that?” I asked the boat driver.

“Yes. Either we go now or we catch the rain and it gets rougher,” he said.

So we quickly locked up the chairs and equipment and the Kingdom Hall and set off.

I don’t think I have ever been as terrified in water as I was that afternoon. Not even when I saw a giant R.O.U.S. in the shower with me a couple of months ago.

The waves were incredibly rough and we were all hanging on for dear life to the rails. At some point we were practically nosing straight up and coming down with loud, wet crashes. It seemed to go on forever.

At one point, in between the splashes of water on my face, I yelled out to the brother, “Have you guys ever flipped the boat over?”

“Yes,” was all he said. And he wasn’t smiling. I decided not to ask any more questions.

Eventually we made it to land and tied up the boat. We waited a bit for the winds to die down and for us to dry off. We had some refreshments at one of the local Witnesses’ house. Finally after our short break Danny said, “Are you ready to go, brother?” and motioned over to the waiting motorcycle.

I stared at it and said, “Perhaps after another drink,” and dragged it out a little bit more.

Finally it was no use putting it off so I hopped on the bike once more and we were off. The ride back was basically the same as the ride in, except that the brother took me straight to our house. I very slowly unclenched by hands and gingerly stepped off, checking to see if all my body parts were intact.

So, all in all, it was a very terrifying ordeal, but in retrospect it was a good experience.

In retrospect.


FRIENDS AND PESTILENCE

The same afternoon I returned from the Isletas we received a visit from some friends in our old assignment, Luis and his wife, Jesse. We knew they were coming and they planned on staying the night so they could attend the meeting with us in English the next morning. It was a very pleasant visit, and we went out to eat a couple of times, which is always my favorite thing to do. They enjoyed the meeting in English, for which we had a nice attendance of 30, and we went out to eat again afterwards. That evening, however, we found out that they had missed the bus ride back to Santa Teresa, so they stayed another night and left early the next morning.

It was a nice visit, but near the end of it I began coming down with something. I don’t know where I could have gotten it from. Luis, Jesse and Marlene weren’t sick, and I couldn’t recall anyone at the Isletas being sick, either. Perhaps it was from some lake water that had splashed into my mouth when it was gaping open at the shock and terror of that harrowing boat ride. I don’t know.

But I felt terrible pretty soon and on Tuesday I even slept through Marlene going out and coming back from service.

My beard grew out and everything. I looked like a disheveled homeless person. For a moment I thought that I might perhaps have the pig-flu thing, until Marlene suggested that we go to the Hospital and have them take samples. Yeah right. I’m sorry, but I’m still majorly paranoid about Nicaraguan hospitals.

“Maybe it’s not the pig-flu,” I told her. She agreed.

Normally I get tempted into milking my sickness a bit, because Marlene tends to feel sorry for me and gives me extra attention. But along with that loving care she is very, very strict on what I can or can’t eat. No candy, no Coke, no ice cream, no pizza. Only chicken soup, chicken broth, disgusting Vitamin C drinks, and orange juice.

And medicine after medicine. Sometimes she’ll wake me in the middle of the night and give me a small pill with a glass of water. I tend to be quite paranoid when I wake up in the middle of the night. “What is this?” I ask.

“Just take it,” she says.

“Why don’t you want to tell me what it is?”

“Just take it and go to sleep.”

“All right.”

And I swallow it, hoping she is not poisoning me. But I always wake up just fine in the morning.


A VISIT FROM A HIDEOUS MOTHER AND HER DISGUSTING CHILDREN

Don’t worry, I’m not talking negatively of anyone in our congregation. This mother was a truly hideous creature. Literally.

A few nights ago Marlene and I were reading or something when I got the urge to get a snack. On my way out of the back area of the house, I unfortunately happened upon a gecko that had recently died (I didn’t measure its body temperature, but the lack of a swarm of ants eating it indicated that it had been a recent demise).

I switched on the light to look for a plastic bag to pick it up with, when my eyes were immediately riveted to a large shadowy insect-like creature crouching near the wall trying to avoid detection. Upon a closer look, I could see it was a scorpion about 4 to 5 inches long. But in the gloomy darkness, it looked like it was lying upside down. I squinted at it, thinking that perhaps it had died, and noticed probably 30 legs on it. I frowned, trying to remember if I had ever heard of a weird centipede/scorpion creature. I decided that although I didn’t remember hearing of any such thing, one encounters many strange never-before-contemplated creatures in Nicaragua, so I yelled for Marlene to come take a look.

She arrived and promptly freaked out. Fortunately the dogs were asleep somewhere in the nice air-conditioned bedroom. I could tell that the creature knew we were talking about it, but it didn’t move. I asked Marlene to get me some sort of heavy, blunt object to kill it with, preferably a cement block or something.

“We don’t have any cement blocks,” she said. “But I can get you the machete.”

I shook my head and told her that I didn’t want to risk getting it angry but chopping off one of its pincer-claws and then making it attack us. (Some of the scorpions in Nicaragua are very aggressive, although I didn’t know if we were looking at one of those species or not.)

I finally just took the broom in my hand and raised and lowered it towards the creature, practicing my swing. I knew I would have to get it with the hard wooden edge above the bristles if I was to kill it. If I missed, it would probably scurry away from me and towards Marlene.

“One, two, three!” I exclaimed, and gave it a good shot. Unfortunately, the creature didn’t die instantly, but scurried away towards Marlene. And if that wasn’t horrible enough, I now realized that all of the multiple “legs” that I thought I saw were actually about 100 baby scorpions that had been resting on their disgusting, hideous excuse for a mother.

Upon the first glancing blow, they scurried in all directions. I stepped on as many as I could, at the same time as I repeatedly beat the mother to death. It was really rather disgusting. After I killed her, I started killing as many of her children as possible. (It sounds terrible, but it was in self defense! Their poison could easily make our dogs very sick or even kill them.)

After I was sure that I had gotten most of them, I poured bleach on the whole cement area and also in the dirt that some of the children had run into. We then thoroughly washed the whole area and went to sleep. Marlene had nightmares. I, for some reason, dreamed about being at Giordano’s pizza in Chicago.


OUR TRIP TO CHONTALES

Last Saturday we took a long anticipated trip to Santo Tomás, Chontales, to visit the Lau family. We ended up renting a car in Granada and drove a good 3 hours around the lake into the interior of the country. It is a breathtaking drive, going through rolling green hills and past picturesque lakes.



We finally arrived and ate a nice lunch that they had prepared for us, and then went to the meeting at the group. It was a very nice sized group, and it was actually the Congregation Bible Study, Theocratic Ministry School and Service Meeting (they have that on Saturday, and the other meeting on Sunday).



We got a kick out of a very young publisher doing the reading. He was very enthusiastic.



There was close to 30 present, and they all seemed to be very cheerful and zealous.

Afterwards we spent some time at the Lau’s new house up there, which is actually quite comfortable, and then we went to dinner where I had a pretty good steak.

We had thought about staying the night and going to the meeting the next day, but we didn’t want to leave the doggies by themselves so we headed back later that evening. It was night time on the way back, through a winding mountainous road with about a hundred semi trucks blowing past us at ridiculous speeds. Combine that with some gory details Silvia told us about some recent accidents on that same road, and it made for a very stressful drive back. I don’t think I want to drive in Nicaragua at night anymore. There are no lights on the roads, the stripes on the road are not reflective (they’re just painted on with regular white paint), everyone drives with their high-beams on regardless of whether you flash the “hey-man-turn-down-your-lights” signal at them, and they drive like they’re being chased by someone. It was amazing that we made it home alive.

And now, for the last subheading:

NOW WHO’S THE SICK, DISGUSTING ONE?

Well, not disgusting. Just sick. I speak of my beautiful, wonderful wife.

As of this writing, about a week after I started this post, I am no longer sick, you will be happy to know. However, Marlene is currently battling a serious cold. She sticks it out, but unfortunately the other day we were in service when she started to get sick, and a rain broke over us. She has since gotten worse, although she denies that the rain did anything.

She’s getting plenty of rest, though, and it’s not a serious thing. But now it’s my turn to cram cough drops down her throat, ha ha!

And restrict her from all sugary drinks and snacks.

Isn’t life beautiful?

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Whirlwind Visit to the Windy City

The last time we parted, dear reader, Marlene and I were anxiously anticipating our visit to Chicago. At the time, we believed that there was absolutely nothing that could dampen our enthusiasm here in Granada while we worked in service and looked forward to our vacation.

And, with a little help from some alcohol-based sleepy medicine, we were right!

About two weeks before we left, we were sitting in the living room watching tv when all of a sudden the power went out. We just shrugged in the dark and turned on some candles, which are strategically placed throughout the house for just these such “emergencies”. So we turned them on and placed them on our kitchen table and pulled out the old Scrabble board and began to play, all the while confident that the electricity would come back on in 20 or less minutes.

But for some reason, it didn’t. As the night got further and further along, we began to be somewhat perplexed and irritated. At about 10:00pm, after waiting for it to come on for a few hours, we went to bed. We positioned the fan to be directly on us so that we could be quickly cooled off whenever the power decided to come back on later that night.

As the hours dragged on, we found ourselves unable to sleep. The heat was oppressive, at least in the high 90's. The windows were open, but there was no breeze. The door needed to remain shut because of the mosquitoes who busily hunt for human blood in the night. It soon started to feel more and more like a tomb.

We sweated and shifted in the bed, trying to find cooler areas that our bodies hadn’t yet touched. Unfortunately, the dogs seemed oblivious to our predicament and snuggled their furnace-like bodies close to us as usual, but were met with firm denials.

Around 3 in the morning we finally fell asleep from utter exhaustion, dreaming of fans and air conditioning.

We woke up at around 6:30 in the morning, and the power was still out. Thankfully this did not affect the water flow, like it used to in Santa Teresa, so we were still able to shower and get ready for the meeting in generally the same way we always do, except we couldn’t use the hair dryer obviously. We went out in service, confident that it would be back on by the time we got home.

Only it wasn’t.

At this juncture, I’ve decided not to bore you with a day-by-day account of this ridiculous situation, only to say that we did not get power back for a whole week. When the second night started out much as the first, only hotter and sweatier, we decided to take a few “helpful” sleep droughts, my choice being a nightcap of NiQuil. It sort of worked, sinking me into a dreamless sleep, but the entire next day I was swimming through life, and it was just very, very irritating. But alas, it was the only way we could sleep and sort of function the next day.

The problem with the electricity, it turned out , was that the transformer down the street had burned out. From day 1 to day 5 we called the electric company several times, and they always told us, “We’ll be out there today to fix it, there is a work order already in effect.” Of course, we soon learned that it was really only a lie.

What had happened was that once the transformer blew, the electric company saw it as a wonderful chance to get a ton of money that was owed to them from the neighborhood. Most of the people on our block hadn’t paid their bills for many months, some of them owing up to 10,000 cords (around $500). Taking into consideration that the average person takes about 5 or 6 months to make that amount of money, the company wasn’t expecting them to pony that up any time soon.

So, they sent a representative to the neighborhood who almost got mobbed by a crowd of about 50, and told them that unless they paid up certain percentages of the total owed, they were going to have to do without power.

This really irritated us since we had nothing to do with it. But thankfully, at the end of the week the people had worked out payment plans and had paid off a percentage of their bills and the transformer was replaced.

When the repair people finally arrived, their truck was met by cheers and people jumping up and down. When they hopped off the truck they were literally hugged by little kids.

We really must say that having no power for a week was probably the worst it has ever gotten for us here in Nicaragua. But while all of this was going on, we drew great encouragement from reading the yearbook. I remember that during one of the worst days, we remembered the experience of a couple in Samoa who had to sleep on a flattened cardboard box in a one-room house with another family. So we figured it could be a lot worse.

During the power-outage-misery-week the Lau family returned from the States, and we were able to meet up with them for lunch in Managua. It was very nice to see them again. They got us come edible goodies which were greatly appreciated, and told us that it was going very well in Chontales. They are serving primarily in the group there, and to hear them tell it, it is very productive and enjoyable to work in. We do miss being around them and hope we can go up and visit some time within the next month or so.


CRISIS? WHAT CRISIS?

You may remember from the last post that we were majorly stressing out over the fact that our tenant in New Mexico was moving out and the ugly possibility of being unable to stay here in Nicaragua loomed on the horizon. Of course, we prayed to Jehovah about it repeatedly and hoped that he would do something about it, since we were not able to.

We also mentioned our worries to some friends in New Mexico. Strange to say, they almost unanimously expressed that “Oh, we hope it works out so you can stay down there,” but also said in different ways, “But we really hope you don’t find anyone to rent your house so you are forced to come back and be with us again!” (You selfish people know who you are!) Actually, we appreciated those sentiments because it shows that we are at least a little bit missed. It was also good for a laugh.

We were in constant contact with our property management guy in New Mexico, and we agreed to try and get someone in fast. We lowered the rent by a bit, and were pleasantly surprised to get a couple with a small dog almost immediately. They ended up moving the weekend after the previous tenant left, and we had no gap whatsoever in the income coming in from the house. Jehovah truly answered our prayer for help.

CIRCUIT ASSEMBLY

The weekend before we left for Chicago was the circuit assembly for our previous assignment in Teresa. We were no longer assigned to go, but when we heard that Santa Teresa was having 9 baptized, we felt impelled to go.



We were thrilled to see everyone again, and were happy to hear that the congregation is going strong and smooth. They made us promise to go and visit soon.


OUR TRIP TO THE WINDY CITY

Two days before we left for Chicago, we went to Managua to get our exit visas at the mall. (They have a little immigration office there.) It went by without incident, and we went to the pet store to get some treats and vitamins for the doggies to have while we were gone. Of course, as it inevitably happens whenever we go into a pet store, we wandered over to look at the puppies for sale. There was a tiny black thing that Marlene fell in love with and asked to hold.

My brain was instantly filled with traumatic flashbacks of when we got Molly. We went inside a pet store by the house in New Mexico to get some cat food and Marlene asked to hold a tiny Shih-Tzu. The little thing was beautifully colored but ran around the holding area like the Tazmanian devil on stimulants. We walked out of that store with some cat food and a puppy that was so expensive that my stomach still hurts when I think of it. And yes, Molly is still a little Taz, but we love that little rat.

Anyway, while Marlene was cooing over the little fluffy black dog, she asks, “I wonder how much it is?”

“You know we already have two dogs, right?”

“Yes, yes.”

“And you know we have to pay an arm and a leg to get them out of Nicaragua when we go back home, correct?”

“Yes, yes, I know.”

But she still buried her nose in the little thing’s neck, smelling it and running her fingers through it.

I reached out for it and said, “Here, let me hold it.”

She reluctantly handed it over. It immediately growled and bit me.

Of course, I was deeply offended and handed the monstrous thing back like it was a dirty, smelly rag. “Put it back,” I said.

After whispering soft reproof in the puppy’s ear, she slowly put it back in its cage with a pained look on her face. Then she looked at me.

“It bit me,” I reminded her. She nodded and walked away.

That was a close one, but she later realized that Molly would have terrorized the poor thing, and Savannah would have been very resentful and would probably have attempted to murder it before too long, which is really true. Savannah has no conscience whatsoever.

Finally, on a Wednesday, it was time to fly to Chicago.

We were very excited as the plane touched down at O’Hare. As my sisters, Lizette and Sandra, picked us up amid cries of intense happiness at seeing our wonderful faces once more, I was inundated with very strange emotions. I expected it all to feel very alien, to be overwhelmed at the modern world in which we now found ourselves, but strangely enough it seemed to me like we hadn’t missed a beat. Nicaragua felt like a dream from which we had just woken, filled with wonderful scenes and vague memories of nocturnal terrors in pools of sweat with mosquitoes buzzing about. It kind of amazed me at how seamless the transition to our past lives was.

Anyway, Chicago was hot upon our arrival, at least to local standards. It was like a cool spring morning compared to Nicaragua.

We soon made it to my family’s house, which was filled with family (my little nieces had made a very nice banner welcoming us back) and glorious, glorious chinese food. A banquet, really.

It was too much food and I really do think I ate 4 heaping plates of it. My stomach, not accustomed to anything except for chicken with white rice, accepted the edible happiness at first, but grumbled for a few days afterwards. I, however, repeatedly and very sternly told it to shut up and shoveled more and more unimaginably delicious meals into it.

The following day we set out for the district convention which was to be held in Bloomington, a charming town with hundred-year-old houses about 2 ½ hours away.

The district convention deserves its own subheading and a long-winded account, but I will refrain from doing so only because many of you have not yet attended it. So I won’t spill any secrets and I won’t talk about the wonderful possible new release(s) that may or may not have been presented. But I will tell you this:

Do. Not. Miss. Friday.

And the drama was so beautiful and SO timely. The faithful and discreet slave cares so much about us and hurries to help us in any way that it possibly can. And if that drama doesn’t move you and help you young ones in the congregations, I have no idea what will.

While at the convention, we ran into many of our oldest friends. They were very happy to see us and we were thrilled at the news of new congregations and the unrelenting growth of the circuit. All in all, the program was wonderful.






We also had a nice treat in that Marlene’s brother, Sal, came up from near St. Louis to visit her. She had not seen him in about 6 years, and I had never met him. She described him as an impossibly tall, intimidating person (thanks for the confidence-builder, honey), but he turned out to be impossibly tall and very, very nice. He and Peggy were very easy to get along with and we had a bunch of easy laughs. We were sorry that we couldn’t visit with them longer.



The Monday after the convention, once we returned to Chicago, was spent in a nice reunion with the girls that visited us in March. We met up with Briana, Lidia, Ashley, and Tahlia, as well as other friends. We met David, a very nice brother from near Wisconsin who was visiting, and Luis, Lidia’s husband, who turned out to be nothing like what I had imagined. I don’t know why, maybe it was from talking to him briefly on the phone while Lidia was here in Nicaragua, but I imagined him to be a stuffy-lawyer type of a person, but he turned out to be a very kind, encouraging, and easy-going guy. And we got to walk around and eat in the city, which really is just beautiful.









The rest of the week was spent lounging around with family, going out in service with a friend, dinners and more dinners with old friends and family, shopping for absolutely necessary things, and more and more eating. We were very happy to meet up with family that was also visiting from Texas, who I hadn’t seen in about 15 years. And we also got to spend time with some very good friends that we had missed.



We also got to show some friends a slide-show type thing we had put together of our adventures in Nicaragua. They laughed at the cool little animals we see here from time to time, and were impressed with the way people respond to us in service.

And the showers! The hot water was amazing. Our shower-times went from 32 seconds flat to a leisurely 10 or 15 minutes. You people have it made. You can’t hear me, but I am grumbling as I type this.

Our family was very accommodating. Actually way too accommodating. They made sure that we were very comfortable and VERY well fed. They bought us some much needed clothes and never complained about having to share us with way too many friends. Of course, we always appreciate them, but we were just so taken aback from how they treated us and we keep asking Jehovah to reward them for their kind hospitality.









While we were up in Chicago, we got to talk to the Morales family up in New Mexico by phone. It was so encouraging to talk to them, and we were very happy to hear that they are building an extra room in their house. I think that Daniel always had the plan to do it, and now that we are coming up in December for a month, they tell us it will be ready for us. They are so awesome. I just really hope they don’t hate us after being around us for a month, which is definitely a possibility. Marlene is an angel, but I have to admit that I am an acquired taste.

During this trip, I was also trying to look into buying a guitar because I now have some time to learn it and I have always wanted to. My dad, very surprisingly, still had a guitar he had bought for me when I was probably 12 years old (I was a very impatient child and quit after a short time. Marlene still thinks that I tend to be an impatient child, but we will see!). Lizette bought me a really nice guitar case for it, and so now I’ve got it down here in Nicaragua. Hopefully I will be able to learn it in the next year.

So, with sad hearts mixed with excitement, we boarded the plane and headed back to Jungle Land. The day we left Chicago we had to wake up at 2:30 in the morning to make our flight, and when we got home it was pouring down rain like a monsoon. We were so tired that we basically just lounged around and waited for it to get dark. I think we made it to 6:30 pm before we fell asleep. And as soon as we did, the inevitable happened.

The power went out.

Welcome home.

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