First week in Nicaragua

¡Adio familia¡

Soo that's how people say hi in Nicaragua. Man do I have a ton of stuff to write you guys about and I don't even know where to start. I guess I'll kind of just go from when I got here.

Monday was just a long day of traveling. It was so nice to talk to you guys and sorry that I didn't get to talk to you Connor, Collin, and Aubrey. I'll be calling you again pretty soon here on Christmas day! But, it was way neat. I sat by this nice woman on the plane who was going to visit her friend from Miami whose wife just passed away. It was neat because she said she didn't really know what to tell him so we talked a lot about the plan of salvation and I gave her a Book of Mormon and my copy of the conference edition Ensign with a note for her friend on the back. So, I guess you could say that she was my first investigator.

When we arrived in Nicaragua, the Monestels (Mission President and wife) and the APs came and picked us up along with a super beat up, barely operating truck for all of our bags and whatnot. We all had to run and push it down the street for it to get started. I knew from that moment on that Nicaragua would be an adventure. That night we had McDonalds, which by the way, is like a 5 star restaurant here. We had transfers the next day which everyone just goes nuts about. Its pretty cool. I got to see Elder Pace (a friend from our Stake) which was pretty neat. Anyways, I ended up being called to an area called Masaya.

New arrivals 11/29/10 with President and Sister Monestel

Masaya, and Nicaragua in general, is truly an amazing place. I really can't even describe it in an e-mail, but it's beautiful. The people here are so nice and so humble. It was pretty neat when we were in the house of a member earlier this week and she offered us food and took one of the few ornaments off of her tiny Christmas tree and she started talking about it. I couldn't understand super well, but she was talking about how reindeer work hard all the time or something and gave the ornament to me. I politely tried to tell her that she could keep it, but she insisted that I keep it to remember to work hard. The thing is, that's how everyone is here. It's amazing! They are all so giving and all love to talk and it seems like everyone wants to be friends.

My companion is Elder Rosa and he is from Honduras. He is an awesome guy and he has been in Masaya for about 6 months (on his mission for that long too). It's kind of tough having a Latin companion because of the language barrier, but he´s teaching me a lot. I'll talk more about that in a sec.

So living conditions...well first of all Nicaragua is not what I expected really. I expected like pure jungle but Masaya actually has lots of paved roads, buses, taxis, dogs roaming the streets, you name it. Our little house is actually pretty decent sized we have a room where we both sleep and a pretty big living room, I guess you could say, where we study and stuff. Yep, I get to take cold bucket showers every morning, which in reality isn't that bad. Luckily it's not that hot in Masaya too. The food is actually pretty good too. As expected, I eat rice and beans every day and usually some kind of meat. They also like bananas a lot too. We have a lady from the ward that cooks and washes our clothes for us, so that is nice. I haven't had diarrhea yet so woo hoo!

Spanish...so they speak a different language in Nicaragua. They have a lot of their own words like 'tuanis' which means like sweet, awesome, beautiful, cool, whatever you want really. They also use 'salvaje' a lot which means savage but they use it for everything. Here's the catch though, they don't use 's's when they talk. Like ever! Usually just the ending "s" of words like for example we are misionero de la iglesia de lo santo de lo ultimo dia. There should be an "s" at the end of just about every word. Anyways, I'm being patient with the language. Everyone tells me that I know a lot for just getting here, and I feel like I can speak ok. But at the same time, it's tough to understand because they speak so fast and I don't know all the words yet. Interestingly enough, we taught two people that speak English this week and I've met maybe 3 others that speak English. President really wants the Latins to learn English too, so we speak English in the apartment every now and then.

So, all in all...Missions are TOUGH. When I got here I just wanted to get to work and baptize all of Nicaragua. It's not really that easy though. Honestly, the food, cold bucket showers, bugs, heat, or any of that really don't bug me. The Spanish is tough because it's so hard to teach people when you don't know their language that well. It's been amazing though because I've been praying really hard and I've felt many times this week that the Spirit has told me what to say even if I don't understand the investigators situation that well. Also, I underestimated that it could be tough to love your companion. Elder Rosa and I are completely different in every way, which is fine, but he has been here for six months in one area and I think that he is losing his 'animo' or excitement or desire to serve. It's tough because sometimes he will just want to go to an investigator's house and talk to them for a super long time without really teaching a lesson. But I continue to do my best to love him and I'm learning lots of patience. I know that he is my companion for a reason and I'm trying to focus on the good things about him. Please pray for both of us that we can get a long and both be excited about the work and to work as hard as we can.

Gosh this e-mail is long and I have so much more to say. Unfortunately, I don't have any e-mail addresses of friends with me now so I think I'll just be writing you guys this week. Sorry to anyone else that reads this! But right now we are teaching quite a few different people. I don't have time to talk about all of them but its amazing to see how the gospel can bless every one's lives. I know I already said it, but the people are amazing here. The members travel 18 hours to go to the temple. An old man named Alfonzo, who is a recent convert and only has one leg, walked about two miles all the way to the church building this week. ahhh There's so many stories! But about the members, they are amazing. Church was pretty neat this week and I got up the nerve to bear my testimony. Yesterday, I also had the opportunity to participate in two blessings, one to one of our investigators named Gilma who was sick and one to a brand new infant that was sick. It was intimidating doing it in Spanish but it was miraculous. The spirit guided me to give a simple prayer and it was definitely a spiritual experience.

Anything more...I don't know. Well one more story. A man that I obviously have never met came up and shook my hand and we kinda were just joking around a little, but then he said, "wait, I want to say something serious". He went on to say with tears in his eyes that he was a drunk and that his family is struggling and that they need help but that the missionaries always just pass by him. I looked him straight in the eyes, thinking of what the Savior felt for this man, and I just felt love for him. I gave him a hug, and even though he reeked of alcohol and was dirty, I didn't care one bit. I just felt pure love for him. I told him that Jesus Christ suffered for him and knows exactly what he's going through and that if he would listen to our message He could change his life.

Sorry this e-mail is so jumbled, I just have so many thoughts right now. All in all, I love the mission. It is tough and I'm sure the couple first weeks will be as a get accustomed, but I know that the Lord will help me. Thank you for all your encouragement too. I love you guys so much and it was good to hear from you. Oh, and to my sweet sweet sister Ava, I love you and happy birthday!!!!! 5 years old!!!

By the way, lots of people have seen our family pictures, and they all say that we have a beautiful family. That always makes me happy and I think about you guys every day. :)

Love much,

Elder Trevor Ward