Hola from Esteli! July 28, 2014

HOLAAAA family and friends,

Another week down and a super tired Elder Moser. I want to apologize right off...I discovered I wasn't keeping a very good count of the foods that I have eaten. The accurate count as of last week was Elder Moser-4 Nicaragua-1. I am happy to report that I have had yet another experience that will change the score. This was probably my easiest competitor yet. It was my first authentic gallo-pinto. It's really nothing too fancy, just a precise mixture of rice and beans with specific Nicaraguan measurements. Like I said, easiest competition yet! But that puts the score at Elder Moser-5 Nicaragua-1. Also I hope you appreciated the spelling out of the punctuations last week. I didn't have much of a better option.

The start of this week was really an interesting one. Like last week, we had to go to Managua on Tuesday, but fortunately this time, I was included in the meeting. It was a meeting for all of the companionship's that are training and trainees. Basically just like you would imagine a meeting for missionaries: talking about how to be good missionaries and stuff like that. (Funny story to come later).

After the meeting we were supposed to go out and work with the AP´s in their area. But we had to wait for a little while because after the new missionaries meeting, they had to have another meeting with the president. Elder Alfaro and I didn't want to wait outside where it was super hot, so we waited in the back of the chapel where there is air conditioning. We spent some time talking about what we should focus on in the week, and then Elder Alfaro decided he wanted to kind of listen in on the meeting, so we just sat back there quietly. At one point, Elder Alfaro said to me that he wished he was part of the meeting, because he had an idea that he could share to help improve the problem that they were currently discussing. Then, literally not 10 seconds later, president said ``Elder Alfaro, Elder Moser, why don't you guys come join us for this, to see if you have any ideas to help us out.´´ It was inspired! haha and Elder Alfaro got to share his input and we were in this meeting as if we were Assistants to the President too. That was pretty sweet!

We got to work with the AP´s after, but because of the meeting we only had one hour to work with them. That was enough for them I guess and we were permitted to leave the next morning. I guess we were doing everything right ;) haha

After that, we got a good start on our week. The goal for this week was to focus on the people we brought to church last week and find a lot of new investigators. This is where the kind of sad part comes in. We had only 2 investigators at church yesterday. Yes, 2 is better than 0, but that isn't really what we were expecting. Let me explain. Cesar and Belsabet had pretty much been avoiding us all week with excuses, and we finally met with them on Saturday and they just weren't really interested anymore. That was really kind of sad. Most of the others that we had last week just weren't available this Sunday, so none of them could come. Most of our finding efforts turned out to be a bust this week, seeing as how none came to church.

The two that actually came was a girl named Dahomi and a little boy named Kenneth. Dahomi has been an investigator for a little while now and has just been busy each Sunday until yesterday. She is one of the few people in Nicaragua that actually read some of the Book of Mormon the first time we gave it to her. She is currently in chapter 21 of 1 Nephi. The other, Kenneth, is an 8 year old boy that is part of a less active family. His mom came up with an excuse not to come to church in the morning, so we told Kenneth that he was like the Nephi of the family, setting a good example to all of the others. Basically things just kind of dropped off here and we don't really know why.  We will have to find out why this week.

As far as Elder Alfaro goes, he has been trying a lot harder lately to be better about his sleeping habits and stuff, which has been really nice. He was telling me not to get down too much when families all of the sudden decide they don't want to investigate anymore or things like that. He told me that things would work out if we kept working hard. In my head, I was thinking that I don't get down as much when families stop investigating, but when he is sleeping in the morning during study time. Yeah it is sad when families stop investigating, but it makes me miss home and stuff  for some reason when he doesn't use the morning time effectively. Luckily he did a lot better this week! So that wasn't really a problem!

                                                                 A little pre baptism selfie :)

To quickly answer your questions about church: We are in a branch, and the typical sacrament meeting attendance is about 85, with a large standard deviation (the attendance wavers very much). There is not a piano in our building, so all of the hymns are just sung acapella (that is a hard word  to spell...). The people here in Nicaragua have beautiful singing abilities (that was my best attempt at ''e-mail sarcasm''). I hope that answers any questions. I will try to remember to take pics of it next week.

On a good note, Enrique and Lupe did indeed get baptized this week! I got to baptize Enrique and Elder Alfaro baptized Lupe. They were so ready and anxious, that Enrique tried to immerse himself in the water before I began saying the prayer! haha. They are such a nice family, and after church on Sunday, they invited us over for some celebratory soup! I was soooooo hungry, so the soup tasted soooooo good! haha

    At the baptism of Enrique and Lupe. You can just tell that they are so exited to be baptized by the                         HUGE smiles on their faces ;) I don't know why they all ``smile´´ like that here....

The baptism was great and of course, but the true highlight of the week is that... wait for it...... I GOT A WATCH!!! Today my only goal for this pday was to buy a watch, and I found myself a watch for $5!! That makes me kind of glad that I waited until here to get it! haha but I am finally informed of time whenever I want to be!

                                       And the moment you've all been waiting for... My new watch!!!

Funny Story: (This is very possibly a ``you had to be there´´ kind of story, but it´s the best I´ve got this week). So, in this new missionaries meeting in Managua, President had us do a little ``exercise´´. He had every companionship write down on a piece of paper the percentage of their investigators that were keeping their commitments. After discussing a bit, Elder Alfaro and I decided that we were at about 75% of our investigators. President then had people start showing their numbers one by one. 25%, 35%, 23%, 38%,40% and so on like this. We were one of the last to show, and we put up our 75%. After everyone showed, President asked Elder Alfaro to stand up, and then asked him how many he baptized two months ago. He answered 7 people, one family. Then he asked one month ago, and Alfaro answered 3 people one family. And then for the next weekend, answering 2 people, 1 family. President continued having Elder Alfaro say some of his numbers that were pretty impressive, and then he said for me to bring our number 75% up to the front. He asked everyone that was in the meeting why was it that our number was so much higher than the rest, and someone answered timidly that we were not spending time with the people that weren't completing their commitments. President ended this conversation with saying ``its because they aren't stupid!´´ That was quite the confidence booster to have the president of the mission tell Elder Alfaro and I publicly that we aren't stupid ;) haha Anyway, that's the extent of the story, so if it was indeed a ``you had to be there´´ story, I apologize. haha 

Spiritual Thought: This week Elder Alfaro and I talked a lot about feeling like we wanted to rest because we were working so hard. But then I was reminded of my thought from last week, to remember the Savior and his difficulties, and how he didn't get to rest. Also I thought more on this. I remember back in my swimming days, one of the big concepts in practicing for swimming is this: when you feel tired and think that you have given all that you have, that is the critical moment when you decide that you are either going to improve by trying harder and giving a stronger effort, or maintain your current abilities by taking it easy and giving yourself a rest. This same idea applies when we feel like we have worked so hard in a church calling, or in service to others, or anything in our lives for that matter, and think that we deserve a rest, that is the critical moment. We can decide to serve more, to try harder, and become better people, more Christlike people, or we can take a rest and just remain as good as we already were. Our goal on this earth is to become the best people we can be. To become as perfect as we can possibly be. To do this, we need to always be trying harder, always giving a stronger effort. This is not easy....at all! But this life wasn't meant to be easy. We are here to prove ourselves worthy to live with God in His kingdom. We do that by trying harder and harder every day to be more like His Son, Jesus Christ. This thought is what helped  me to have the motivation this week to keep working hard, even when we weren't necessarily having the success we were hoping for.

Love you all and hope your week is filled with blessings!

Love
Elder Moser

Hola from Esteli! July 21, 2014

HOLA HOLA HOLA,

First note of this email, various symbols on this keyboard are not functioning, one being the exclamation point, so if it seems like I am lacking emotion in this email, that could potentially be the reason.

Wow this week was a busy one. As I think I mentioned last time, we set some pretty high goals, so we had to work hard. Our most difficult goal was to have 40 lessons with a member present this week. That basically meant that we would have to teach the majority of the lessons with a member present. We also had another stumbling block in the road, we had to go to Managua on Tuesday because Elder Alfaro had a leadership meeting ``PARENTHESIS``he is the district leader``END PARENTHESIS`` so that meant we would lose almost an entire day of the week. But even with this obstacle, we arrived back home at about 6pm and decided we could get a good amount of lessons in with our investigators. So we taught 4. That left us with needing to teach 9 per day to achieve the goal. We did get 9 on day one which was excellent, but then Elder Alfaro started to lose steam. The next day we got 7, and the next 6, and the last, a whopping 4. On Sunday, we didn't really know who we should visit, and no members were really available so we only got one. All in all, we ended with 31, which is an excellent number, but we weren't quite able to achieve the goal.

BUT, that being said, our work really paid off. Sacrament meeting yesterday was one to be remembered. To begin, we got a call on Saturday night from the ZL informing us that President Collado and his family, along with Elder Maravilla would be present in our Sacrament meeting this week. So basically it was do or die with bringing investigators to church. And as I said, our work paid off, we had 9 investigators at church.``PARENTHESIS´´exclamation point``END PARENTHESIS´´

                Our Fridge. We are well stocked with ``Tropical´´ juice, because it has special meaning.                          The Mango flavor is bautizar, baptize, and the Mixed Fruits is for establecer, establish.             That is part of the reason we are having success, because we are drinking our ``bautizar y establecer´´.

Walter and Lidia, as you asked, were at church, as usual. Sadly they, like I mentioned, need to get married, and Lidia is all for it, but Walter is not really, so we are going to have to hold that one off for just a little bit. He knows he wants to get married and baptized, but he is just a little hesitant to make the commitment.

Enrique and Lupe were the family that we found 2 Saturdays ago and have already been to church 2 times, the minimum to be baptized. For that reason, they have committed to be baptized this Saturday at 4. Woohoo. They are truly a miracle, because they came to church the day after we found them, they came to a noche de hogar, or family home evening, on Monday night, and they came to the Thursday night activities that we have every week, all in less than a week. They are truly the golden investigators that are rumored to be true.

Cesar and Belsabet were also at church with their little 2 year old son. This was their first Sunday. They are a young couple that we found through a reference, and they are super nice and love us. They complain when we can't stay and talk with them for more than 20 minutes or so. I think that the talks were super good for them to hear They didn't stay all 3 hours but I have a good feeling about them.

                            This is a quilt picture thing that was in the house ofCesar y Belsabet.                                                                    We really liked it, so we took a picture with it haha. 

Carlos is the soon to be husband of one of the recent converts in the area. This was his first time coming to church, and hopefully something will come of it. We haven't really taught him much though. The other was Freddy, a man who has been investigating the church forever, but just won't do the things necessary to be baptized.

Anyway, President and Sister Collado both spoke and also Elder Maravilla. Although I couldn't necessarily understand everything, their talks were super good.

The other investigators that didn't attend church this week, well, we will have to determine if it is worth it to continue visiting them or not. If they are not going to progress, than sadly we have to move on.

As I mentioned earlier, we spent all of Tuesday in Managua. It was really just an unfortunate situation that I had to go. First of all, it costs 150 cordobas for the bus trip there and back. The bus ride was a total of 5 hours there and back. We had to pay a taxi to get to the location of the meeting which was 50 cordobas. And all for a meeting that I couldn't even attend. I had to sit in another room in the church building that it was in with another missionary, and we just studied for the 4 hours that the meeting lasted. SO pretty much the biggest waste of my time and money

...but on the bright side they did bring pizza from Pizza Hut for the people in the meeting, and we took some.

As I've spent more time here, of course I have gotten closer and closer to the people. This is great and all, except when there is a 9 year old girl who I'm pretty sure has a crush on me, and all she ever wants to do is give me a hug or hold my hand. I constantly tell her that she can't do that because it is against the rules. She really doesn't like that, so then she always ``gets mad´´ and doesn't talk to me. Elder Alfaro finally told me that there was an elder here before that wasn't necessarily the best example of the rules, because he would let her hold his hand all the time. ANYWAY, the point of all of this: One night they wanted to come home with us, but we told them they couldn't. They didn't care, so they followed us home, yes two 9 year olds. Luckily there is a locking gate outside of our apartment complex, so we were able to keep them locked outside. But they decided they had nothing better to do so they waited around screaming ``ELDERES´´ for the next 30 minutes until finally Elder Alfaro threatened to call their dads. They finally left.

                    The two kids that decided to chase us home and try to come into our apartment. They are just funny little kids, and wanted to wear our backpacks.

For the next two stories, you can decide which is the ``Funny Story´´. Whatever appeals to you more is the funny story of the week and the other is just a story. To preface, Elder Alfaro has glasses, that sometimes he decides he doesn't want to wear.

1. On the way to our lunch appointment every day there is this part of the road and sidewalk that has a huge irrigation cement ditch. It is probably about a yard or so deep. We walk past this area at least once a day, and lately we have been working more around that area, so sometimes we pass it as many as 4 or 5 times a day. On Thursday night, we were heading to an appointment at 8 PM and to get there we had to pass through this area. Mind you it was dark outside. Almost no light. I was walking and all of a sudden I realize that Elder Alfaro is not at my side anymore. I turn around to find him fallen into this cement ditch , because he wasn't wearing his glasses and it was super dark outside. The only part I don't understand is the fact that he has walked through that area every day for the last 4 months, so how could he have forgotten about this ditch``question mark´´

2. Last night, Sunday, we were visiting some recent converts and a few investigators. We were at Gabriels house first, and we were hanging out talking for a little, and then they offer me a mango... for those of you that don't know, I really really don't like mangoes... but of course, as a missionary I could not turn it down. So I struggled for the next 20 minutes putting this mango down. Finally it was over, or was it``question mark´´ We then moved on to Enrique and Lupes house, and after about 2 minutes of being there, he offers us mangoes, but these ones were different. They were green mangoes that literally tasted like bark. But being a good missionary, I accepted the offered food and put yet another one down the hatch. As we were leaving their house, they told us to wait, and oh so thoughtfully gifted us with a bag of 3 mangoes each... luckily Elder Alfaro likes them. haha But its not over. Those mangoes did something to my digestive system that pino-lio couldn't do, something that nacatamales couldn't do, something that Fritanga could not even do. Yes you already know, I will spare you the details. Luckily it was a very quick phase of ``issues´´. Only lasted one trip to the bathroom... 

But to update the count: Elder Moser-2, Nicaragua-1

Spiritual Thought:

So this week I was reading in Mosiah 29, and it reminded me in verse 12 of a very important topic. The scripture says, more or less, that God is a better judge than man, because God is a perfect judge and man is not. Often we get caught up in doing things to conform to the people of the world, so that when man is our judge we will be viewed as a good person. But God is our Judge in the end. He is the perfect judge with a perfect balance of justice and mercy. We will be judged according to his commandments, and according to his will. We need not care when we are criticized for keeping the commandments we know are true. When the thoughts of the world are contrary to the thoughts of God and his commandments, we should not hesitate to stand firm in our beliefs and stand up for our cause. We will all be judged according to our works in the end, and not by man, but by God. I don't know about you, but I don't want to be found on the wrong ``team´´. So all in all, don't let the influence of the world and the judgements of others affect you, your beliefs and your actions. 

Have a Great Week``Exclamation Point´´

Love,

Elder Moser

Pics for the week...

                               This is a horse. There is no significance to this picture other than                                                             that there is a horse on the side of the road, and I wanted a picture with it.

                               Random one of Elder Alfaro and I on P-day. If you look carefully,                                                                    the baptismal font in our church building is behind us.

                                 A pic with Gabriel, father of Gabriel, the professional welder.                                                                     He's awesome, and the whole family are such strong converts.

Me learning how to weld. He is making a metal door thing that you have as your ``second door´´ so that you can leave your real door open. I don't really know what they're called. haha He says he can make about one every day, and he installs them in the houses as well. They sell for about 3000 cordobas each. Sounds like a pretty good job to me. haha

                           No, your eyes are not deceiving you. This is the Crustaceo Cascarudo,                                                        or in English, the Krusty Krab. It is real, and it's actually pretty good                                                                                 for Nicaraguan hamburgers. haha

Hola from Esteli! July 14, 2014

Hola!

Well this week has turned out to be a super great one! Since basically none of our investigators came to church last week, we decided that this week would be dedicated to completely new investigators, because we were not going to get any farther with the other ones. So this week was dedicated to what we call ´´filling the tank´´.

We were surprisingly very successful! We found a family on accident, and they are very interested. It is really weird because a lot of random people live in this house, so we are always teaching new people every day. The Mothers name is Maritza, and then there are a ton of other people. She is the only one that has been at every one of our lessons, but her daughter and her daughter in law have been at a few lessons and they seem really interested as well! Oddly enough, I still have not met the husband of the family.

I said we found that family on accident, and that is because we were trying to find a referral, and they actually live right next door. The people we were looking for were Cesar and Belsabet. They are a younger couple and they have a little 2 year old son. Just like the Maritza family, Cesar y Belsabet have been showing lots of interest and they seem very positive. Sadly, like the majority of Nicaragua, they are not legally married, they just live together. It is really interesting how that is just the culture here. We have encountered people that have said that they have been living together for like 40 years now, but they are not legally married!! So that is a pretty common problem that we have to address, the law of Chastity.

Then on another day, we contacted another member referral, and they are a family of 6, with 5 of them being old enough for baptism. They are also seeming very positive and stuff, but like most, they will have to get married before they are baptized. Like the other family though, I have yet to meet the husband, but it looks like things are pretty promising with them. The wife's name is Victoria and she has three girls and a boy.

We talked to a girl that I found with Elder Jacobsen when we were on divisions last week. I couldn't remember if I had given her a Book of Mormon or not last week, so we were about to give her one in our lesson, and she surprised us with some unbelievable news. She said, oh I already have one, and I read in 1 Nefi up to chapter 14! We were so shocked! People here in Nicaragua never do that. It is hard enough to get them to read when we just assign one verse!! so after that lesson Elder Alfaro was super happy cause it was me that found her and she is one of our best investigators. Hopefully this will prove to be true.

One more set of investigators was found on Saturday. We had divisions on Saturday with the zone leaders and I went to their area. We are actually in the same branch as them, but there are 2 areas for the missionaries in the branch, so I went to their area and one of the zone leaders worked with Alfaro in our area. When I got to church Sunday morning, I found out that we had two new investigators, a couple that is actually already married!!! And they were the two new investigators that actually came to church yesterday! They are progressing very quickly!

Our last investigators at this point are Walter and Lidia. I don't remember if I have already talked about them, but they are basically ready for baptism, and they want to be baptized. They have been to church several times and really love it. The only thing standing in their way: marriage..... of course. So we have been pushing very persistently with the whole idea of getting married and finally it made it through. Hopefully they will be getting married and baptized on the 26 of July.

So as I hinted, we only had four of our investigators at church; Walter and Lidia and the new ones that I really haven't talked to much yet. That does not mean that we have lost hope in our other investigators. Some had legitimate excuses for why they couldn't come yesterday, and the others just need some extra help getting there, so we have modified our plan. All in all, we have 16 progressing investigators, which is apparently really good! I mean I think that its good, but elder Alfaro said that missionaries in the mission get impressed when someone has like 10 progressing investigators! So I guess we're doing pretty good! haha Hopefully that means that we have 16 baptisms coming up :D

Apparently all of our success this week really motivated Elder Alfaro, because when we were setting goals this week, he had some really high expectations, I mean REALLY high. It is going to be a super busy week if we are going to achieve them, but I'm glad that he is getting more motivated, because it really helps me stay motivated!

This week I had my first fritanga. I don't really know how to describe it, and sadly I didn't take a picture, but basically it is just a fried thing filled with some meat and then they put some lettuce on it and some sort of sauce. The ´´fried thing´´ can be different, depending on what you want. For my first one, it was a fried potato ball, and it had some meat inside of it. Other types are like a fried taco shell with rice and meat inside and other things like that. Speaking of new food, I forgot to mention a while back that I had pino-lio. Pino-lio is a drink that is basically the flavor of watery hot chocolate with a hint of cinnamon. But there's a little surprise, the chocolate powder that they use doesn't really dissolve...at all. So basically there is a bunch of powder in this drink and unless you are constantly swirling it, you end up with a ton of powder in the last gulp, and it is basically really gross. I have started to like it a little more lately, so that is a good thing I guess! haha Last on the food note, I had another nacatamale this week, and here are the stats: Wins(Elder Moser=2; Nacatamale=0). Needless to say, I really am Latino.

Speaking of that, when we were visiting the family of Victoria and all of their kids, they asked where I was from, and instead of answering right away, I asked what they thought. After some time of thinking, they finally guessed Argentina... not even kidding. I then told them that I was actually from the US. Moral of the story, I look like a South American, and my intestines are strong enough to withstand the Nicaraguan food! Coincidence?! I think NOT! (What movie is that from?)

On Thursday this week, I got to spend the entire day in the apartment. Elder Jacobsen was feeling pretty sick, and his companion didn't want to lose an entire day in their area, so Elder Alfaro said that we would lose a day in ours and he would go work in their area with the other )Elder Sotay) while I watched after Elder Jacobsen in our house! Basically I decided that I really don't want a day off, because reading and studying is fun and all, but when you are doing it all day, it is pretty boring! haha

Funny Story:

Throwback to two weeks ago: We were teaching an investigator that we know has problems with drinking and other things concerning the word of wisdom. He was clearly drunk, and told us that he was not feeling well. Elder Alfaro offered to give a blessing and he accepted. Just as we were about to start, he began to bob his head very exaggeratedly to the side, going further and further each bob. It was literally like he was having a seizure, and then he stopped bobbing and was just unconscious for like 10 seconds. (all of this was happening while we are literally just about to give him a blessing). Then he wakes up, and as if nothing had happened, he looks at us and smiles, waiting for us to begin. After we left, Elder Alfaro said to me, ´´I really thought that he was dying´´ and I, being in accordance, couldn't help but just laugh. Had he actually died, I don't know what I would have done, but since it didn't happen, I was very happy. Let this be a small testament of why we keep the word of wisdom. :)

Spiritual Thought:

All of us in our lives have difficulties. Regardless of all the good things that happened to me this week, of course there were super hard times. Also a lot you guys just had trek, something pretty difficult physically and mentally to go through. Every day on the mission, there are always discouraging things that happen. Maybe I get yelled at by a native, or someone doesn't accept us, or something with my companion makes me a little discouraged. Everyone has hard times, and I think that the easiest thing to think or wonder when these things happen to us is why isn't life just easier. But when we are going through hard times like these, and many other possibilities, lets just take a minute and think about our Savior. His life was basically the opposite of easy in all aspects. People made fun of Him, laughed at Him, spit on Him, beat Him, mocked Him, made Him suffer through excruciating physical pain and embarrassment, and killed Him. He suffered for all of our sins, pains, sicknesses, and struggles. His suffering in the Garden of Gethsemane was more than any mortal person could bear. So here is a question for you to think about: If it wast easy for Him, someone who was perfect, always serving, with a perfect love, why should it be easy for us?

I love you all and hope that you are always looking for opportunities to share the Gospel! Or accept it ;)

Love
Elder Moser

Hola from Esteli! July 7, 2014

Mother!!!

Wow what a week!!! haha Well since you asked about my companion I guess I will start there... Elder Alfaro is from Costa Rica, and he his from a family of I believe his parents and two other brothers. One of his brothers finished serving here about 1 year ago or so. Yes he has a brother who served in the same exact mission as him before he got here! Anyway, he is only 18 years old... but he looks like he is like 28 or something! He is pretty new in the mission, he has only been out for just over three months. Yeah, that means that he had just finished being trained and then he immediately started training me! He is a very good missionary and knows how to teach the people here in Nicaragua, with more basic stuff and easy to understand examples. His only problem is that he has a hard time waking up and staying awake in the mornings and during study time, but I have learned to get used to that and not let it affect me too much! We have been getting along super well so far, and as more time passes, we have been getting more and more comfortable talking to each other and just joking around and stuff. He learned English from playing video games and watching tv with English subtitles. Although I feel as though there is more to it, cause his English is very good.

My spanish is a different story! I feel like I am super proficient at speaking, but the listening and understanding is still quite the struggle. Obviously I will continue to get better and better with time, but I really want to be able to understand easily. I just need to work on more vocabulary to keep getting better.

The food, as I briefly mentioned last week is all from one lady. Well, she makes us lunch every day, and it is pretty consistent: rice and beans and some sort of something with chicken. haha but it is really good, and as aunt Lori suggested, I think that she is good at cooking to help the white missionaries to not get sick! So that is really comforting. When I want to eat dinner or breakfast, it is basically just snacks or something from a "pulperìa" which is a small shop with a random assortment of food and snacks and bread. Ill take a picture of one sometime to help you visualize.

I got some physical mail this week! so that was super fun. I think that it was here before I got here, but I didn't know how to check for mail or anything, so I just got it from the zone leaders after they traveled to Managua for something.

I had my first experience with exchanges this week, and that was quite the experience, because I did it twice! The first time was with one of the Zone leaders who is new in the area as well. His name is Elder Fanger. We are both white, and our Spanish is about the same level (although he has been out for almost 8 months) so it made for an interesting day. He came to my area, so it was a real test of how well I remembered my area, because I no longer had Elder Alfaro there to guide me around. Surprisingly, we didn't even get lost all day. Our lessons went really well, and we even found some new investigators! Missionary work isn't as hard as it seems..... sort of :) All went well with Elder Fanger, and then on Friday, we had another day of exchanges and I was with Elder Jacobsen for the day. He is a freshie out in the mission with me. We were in the MTC together, but he was in another district. With his Spanish being close to mine as well, it made for some interesting lessons, but we made it through the day rather well, and I think that we're better for it! haha

Sadly none of the investigators that we have went to church on Sunday, but that is ok, we will just have to work harder this week to do better!

Highlight of the week: I HAD MY FIRST BAPTISM IN THE MISSION!!

It was super cool! Gabriel Jr. is 15 years old and he is in a family of recent converts. It was really easy to teach him, because they all love us and so we would visit their house all the time, and they are all super good faithful converts. So he was super willing to follow in their footsteps! He is the oldest child in the family, and when it came time to see who would baptize him, he asked me to do it! I guess his dad didn't really feel ready to perform a baptism, although he has the priesthood. So I gladly accepted this invitation to baptize him!

It was such a cool experience, but I was super nervous, because it was my first baptism, and it was in Spanish... but I did fine of course!

  First Baptism!!! super exciting! This is Gabriel Jr. 

                           Gabriel Jr. and all of his family and cousins and stuff that live in the area.

Funny story: I had my first ``nacatamale`` this week. Basically, it looks a lot like a tamale. I was really enjoying this food, and then they decide to inform me that this meal is not the bomb, but it is ``a bomb``, meaning that this food would for sure give me diarrhea, unless I was from Central America. I reluctantly continued to eat this meal while they sat there and laughed about the troubles that I was going to have. Little did they know that there are rumors that I have been adopted, and I think this was the ultimate test to discover that these are not rumors. Without going into too much detail, lets just say I have been feeling pretty solid since I got here in Nicaragua, and that nacatamale didn't change that ;) PS I think I really am adopted...

                             This was my experience with the nacatamale. All is well, and the unfortunate                                occurance in Jeremiah 4:19 did not come to pass in the life of Elder Moser ;)

Spiritual thought:

This week, we were talking to a concerned member. she was really feeling kind of bad because she felt like people were judging her family and her because she has a tattoo and she doesn't have a father to her kids around. We assured her that there is no such thing as the perfect family, and that as long as she is doing the things that she can to grow closer to God, it doesn't matter what other people think. I want to share the same message with everyone else. There is no such thing as the perfect family. All of us have our trials and they are all different. We are not here to judge other people or be judged by other people. The only judge that matters in the end is God, and he is going to know what things we have repented of. The opinions of others will not affect God`s view of us, so don't judge others and don't let other`s judgements of you affect you.

Love you all and hope you have a good week!

Elder Moser

A couple more pics...

                            This is more commonly what a normal street in my area looks like. Basically                                 the houses are completely different from one another and they are all vary small.

                             Found this gem under a bridge in a little stream in our area. If you can't tell                                                                     what it is, that would be what a dog skeleton looks like...