Week 23 and 24 -- Managua

No letter week 23

I'm glad that your week has gone well. And it's great that (hopefully) the rest of this semester should be fairly easy from here out. And that's crazy that Melia is already back from her mission. It seems like I remember sitting at her farewell just a little bit ago. But really, it is true. Time is weird on thee mission. Time, as it's passing, seems really slow. The days are long, and the work isn't easy. But looking back on it, it seems like I was at the MTC just a litle bit ago. But then even worse, it seems like I've been on my mission for forever. It's weird. And I've seen some photos of the inside of the City Center temple, and it looks stunning. I think that it will probably be the first one that I go to when I get back home. And I did get the valentines letters, which were awesome, and I don't know if I told you, but I finally got the package of letters from Christmas, and the package from grandma and grandpa. They were all amazing, and I really enjoyed them. But I'll keep my eyes open for my birthday package. 

So, it's been kind of a crazy couple of weeks. As you know, I got emergency changed into the office. I am now Secretary of References and Retention, along with some other random jobs that I'm picking up from the Senior couple that are leaving the mission this change. The job, on a day to day basis, is not very difficult. There are a lot of little things that I do, that are easy to handle. Mondays are a little bit more hectic, because I have to call half of the zone leaders in the mission to check on retention, which is basically statistics for all of the recent converts of each zone. But then every once in a while, we have a mission wide event that requires all hands on deck, and nobody gets any free time. Last week was one of those weeks. Elder Ochoa of the area presidency for Central America came to do a training, and we had to prepare and run that. Basically, last week the secretaries didn't get a P-day. And just letting you know ahead of time, we probably won't get to write either, because it's the week of changes, and that week is insane for us. But really, I love working in the office, and the area that I work in is fantastic. It's a great ward, and there's a lot of people who want to listen to our message. But yeah. So that's a little bit of my life in the office. Lots of stress, but worth it because the secretary's house (we all live together) has hot water. It's fantastic.

Right now, we are teaching two people named Carla and Alohndra, who are the mother and the daughter of Anielka, a woman who we baptized last week. They're really positive, and it looks like we'll probably baptize them this month. The little girl, Alohndra, is actually almost exactly a year younger than Evie (her birthday was just last week), and she reminds me a lot of Evie, just in the way that she talks and interacts with people. Anielka also has another daughter who's 4 years old, and that kid is insane. As in, bouncing off the walls energy insane. It's kind of hilarious, probably because I don't have to live with her.

As for restaurants I've eaten at, it's kind of weird. Now that I live in Managua, we have a lot of the same restaurants that we had in the states. McDonald's, Subway, Burger King, and PriceSmart (which is basically Costco). So it's really interesting, because I'll walk into these places, and for a second it'll be like I'm back in the states, until I see that all of the menus are in Spanish. But yeah. Definitely strange. But yeah, that's me at the moment! I love you all, and if I can't write next week, I'll write in two weeks! Can't wait to read your letters!

Love,

Cooper

Week 23 -- Cuidad Sandio and Managua

I'm glad that everything has gone well for you guys this week. It really is cool to read a little bit about all of your lives every Monday. I wish I could have been there for some of it, but I know that it's better that I'm here. So, this letter's going to be a little bit shorter than it usually is every week. Because, as I just found out about 3 hours ago, I have something called cambios de emergencia. Basically what it means, is that even though it's not the normal time for a change to happen, I'm being moved to a different area with a different companion. I was told this a little bit earlier today, and Elder Hironaka (one of the Assistants to the President) told me that I would be picked up "tonight". So basically, I have about four more hours to pack, get ready to go, and say goodbye to all of my converts, before the AP's come and pick me up to go wherever they send me. Which is another thing. I don't actually know where I'm going. Right now, it looks pretty likely that I'll either be in the mission office, or it a district in Managua called Boer. But I really have no idea. So the last few hours have been pretty stressful for me. But we'll see how this ends up going. Last week, we found a few new people to teach, but they're not really my investigators, so.... Yeah. Next week I'll definitely have some new stuff to share.

As for last call in my package, if you could find a pitch pipe on such short notice, that would be really cool. But other than that, I'll leave anything else you want to put in the package up to you.

Well, that's going to be it in this letter. I'll definitely have some new stuff to report next week. But I love all of you, and wish you all luck this week in your various stuff. Can't wait to hear from you next week!

Love,

Cooper

Later that week:

Well, turns out I'm in  tho office. So my P days are Wednesday now. Woohoo! Two P Days in a week! I'll very likely be in the office for five and a half transfers or so. Apparently the guy that I replaced got robbed and it got pretty hairy, so they emergency transferred him out for his safety. So now I'm here in the office. I'm over References (from members, mormon.org, etc.) and Retention (making sure recent converts get all their lessons, stay active, all that stuff). I'm pretty happy with it. It shows that President Russell has a lot of trust in me, I like all the guys in the office, and I'm proselyting in a pretty blessed area. It'll be stressful, but I think I'll enjoy it.

Week 22 -- Cuidad Sandino

Honestly, the past week has been pretty boring for me as well. But I'm glad to know that at least I didn't miss much with the superbowl. But congrats to Isaac on making the State swim team! It really is cool to see that he's having so much success with swim, especially since he's just a sophmore. By the time I get back, I'm positive he'll be making and breaking state records, at the very least. 

Like I said, not much has happened this week with me. Alison came back from Tippitappa, so we were able to baptize her, and now we're working on getting the mom to church. Umm.... the only other really noteworthy thing that's happened this week is that Elder Martinez and I were attacked by some vagos (street bums) yesterday. We were walking to an investigators house, and a bunch of them were fighting near the entrance to Pedro Juaquin, one of the areas where we work. This isn't really uncommon, so we just kept walking. But then two of them came up, and one of them kicked me. It didn't do any damage, but Eldeer Martinez looked back to basically yell, "what's wrong with you?" in Spanish at them. That's when we saw that four more of them were coming at us with the big flagstones that they use to pave roads. Needless to say, we ran to our next cita. We didn't run into any problems with that for the rest of the night, we just avoided that entrance on our way out. So that was exciting. 

Right now, now that we've baptized Alison, we don't have a lot of people that we're teaching. But hopefully I'll have someone to write about next week. 

As for the beach town that we went to, it was actually a pretty cool place. It's called Playa Gigante, which literally translates into Beach that is Giant. It was pretty cool, eventhough we really didn't get to see a lot of it (as missionaries at a beach, we were pretty heavily supervised). The town itself was pretty cool, from what I saw though, there wasn't much. A few restaurants, maybe a shop. But it was kind of cool, because you're basically in a jungle, and all of the sudden, boom, you're on the beach. There was a couple of places that you could rent out rooms. And there were a couple of houses on the beach too, which were amazing. One had a loft that was open-air, and it just looked like a really cool place to stay. If we ever come out here after my mission, I think that Playa Gigante (or San Juan del Sur, which is supposedly better) is one of the places that I would take you.

All in all, that's pretty much it for this week. As always, I love all of you, and can't wait to read your letters/write to you next week!

Love,

Cooper

Week 21 -- Cuidad Sandino

It's cool to think that you recognized something that an experienced nurse didn't (talking about an experience Mom had at work). And yeah, it might be frustrating that you didn't stand up for it this time, but next time you will. Kind of just how life works. It's been the same on my mission. There's stuff that I regretted not doing or saying, but it's an experience to learn from. We have stuff like that in our lives to help us progress. And it's really nice to hear that everything is going well with the family. I miss you guys, and these emails help me reconnect a little bit. 

As for me, the week has been pretty boring. Just normal days of studying, contacting, and teaching. But we were able to baptize Henry and Brandon last weekend! We had a bit of a problem with that, because their parents had a fight and ran off to Tippytappa (North of Managua) with Alison. But we ended up being able to baptize those two Sunday, right before church, and we'll probably baptize Alison this week. Other than that, we don't really have a lot of investigators right now. But we're searching, and hopefully there will be someone to talk about next week. 

As for my favorite memory with Elder Elison.... I'm not sure if I've already talked about this, but there was one night when we were talking, and somehow the conversation turned to the names of Christ. Long story short, we ended staying up until 2AM writing down the names of Christ on a white board. We got 141, and that was only the ones from the Bible. I'll include a picture of that one. But yeah, that's probably one of my favorite memories with him. 

Well, sorry that this email is a bit short, like I said, it's been a boring week. But I love all of you, and I'll write again next week!

Love, 

Cooper

Week 20 -- Cuidad Sandino

Like I've said, time moves weird on a mission. TIme usually moves pretty fast, except on he week of changes. But it also feels like I've been out for my entire life. But I'm glad your preceptorship is going well. It sounds like you're having a great time. And Zimbabwe? That's awesome! Her and I will probably get back at the same time, so that'll be cool. And I'm glad to hear that GD is going well. 

For me, things are going pretty well right now. We had a multi-mission conference today, and I got to be in the choir. We sang a really cool arrangement of "How Firm a Foundation" in Spanish. And the conference itself was pretty cool as well. Also, I got my new companion this week! His name is Elder Martinez, from El Salvador. He's a great missionary, and was assistant to the President for about a year. He actualy goes home this change, so I'll be "killing him". The language is still a little rough for me, but it's constantly improving. Having a Latino companion will definitely help. 

This week, we'll be baptizing Henry, Alison, and Brandon. I believe I've already told you about them. They're three kids who are super excited to get baptized. But honestly, I don't have much more to report as far as people I'm teaching goes. Hopefully I'll have more this week though.

And the church we go to is pretty cool. We're in the Barrio Ciudad Sandino, part of the Managua Stake. There's about 200 people who go on average. The people, for the most part, like the missionaries. They don't wor with us a ton though, so that can be frustrating. The chapel is about 10 or 15 minutes away from our house, walking, and the best part is, it's air conditioned. Well, at least the chapel is. The Bishop's name is Obispo Roger Rodriguez. He's a good bishop, and really tries hard to make sure that the ward is functioning well, and that the missionaries know what needs to be done. All in all, it's a good ward. Also! I need more questions about what to write about, I' all out.

Housekeepin: Yes on the beef jerky. Some more of the old fashioned candy woud be nice as well. And, if it's legal to send, some Dr. Pepper would be awesome. Also, replacement razor blades, and possibly some ties. As for little toys, that would be good as well. As for anything else, I'll leave it up to your judgement. You did a fantastic job with the last package :) Thank you so much.

Well, that's it! I love you all so much, and I'll talk to you next week!

Love,

Cooper

Week 19 -- Cuidad Sandino

So things have been going pretty well here in Ciudad Sandino. Last Wednesday, we all, as a mission, went to a place called Playa Gigante, because as a mission we achieved more than 2,060 baptisms. It's basically a huge beach (implied by the name, it literally means giant beach), where we ate hambugers and hotdogs, played games, and listen to basically two things that President Russell told us as a mission. First of all, he told us that our goal for baptisms is 2,600, which is crazy, but definitely achievable. The second part I'll tell you a little later on. 

This week we've been teaching the Cornejo-Lazo family. Basically, the missionaries talked to the parents about 20 years ago, but all of the sudden stopped coming by. But now we're teaching them, and they're awesome. All of the children are grown with kids of their own, and they all love the church. Blanca, the mother (now grandmother, I suppose), hasn't been able to go yet, but really wants to. It's kind of a struggle getting them all to church, because it means wrangling four children all under the age of eight, but it's worth it.   Again, great family.

As for what I eat, we have lunch every day at Hna Virginia's house, and for breakfast and dinner we fend for ourselves. For breakfast, we'll generally make a PB&J sandwich or something from the bakery around the corner, and for dinner, sometimes members or investigators will feed us, but generally we'll eat sandwiches or eggs. And Tang. a lot of tang. They basically have any fruit flavor you can imagine of tang here. It's awesome. We shop at a place called Maxi Palí, which is basically walmart but smaller and more.... Central-American, I suppose. My favorite snack is probably caña, which is sugar cane. you just buy them at little stands, and you can get three pieces for about 5 cordobas, and you just chew on it. It's great.

Housekeeping: For my birthday package, all I can really think of at this current moment is maybe a couple of ties, and beef jerky as always. I'll try to think of more stuff this week. But make sure that if you send any kind of food that's not factory sealed/airtight, to put it in a ziplock bag. Otherwise the humidity and heat destroys it. Ooh, that's another thing. Gallon-sized ziplock bags. good quality ones are hard to find here. And now, the other thing that President said, that might not make you too happy: Because the Latinos are now staying in the MTC for three weeks instead of two, my departure date was moved back. I will now be coming home on September 7, 2017. So that happened. 

Anyways, that's it for this week! I love you all!

Love,

Cooper

Week 18 -- Cuidad Sandino

We actually had Stake conference this last sunday as well. It was actually really cool, because my old branch president in the MTC, President Shallenberger, spoke. Apparently Pres. Russell and him are good friends. I got to go up and talk to him afterwards, which was really interesting. Also, as a bit of news I found out about two hours ago, our mission president was announced! His name is Mark S. Brown, and that is literally everything about him that I was able to find. So that change will be happening in the next six months or so.

Opening a coconut with a machete

This week, we've been teaching this really cool older woman named Carmen. She currently attends an Evangelical church, but she has been to church twice with us now, and says that she likes the feeling in our church a lot more than she likes the feeling in hers. And this last sunday, she said that we didn't have to pick her up for church (we do this for all of our investigators, because if we don't, they don't go), because she was going to beat us there. And she did! Compared to some of our investigators that we've had to drag to church, it was a miracle. 

And then something cool that's happening this week is that we get to a place called San Juan del Sur (or rather, a beach called Playa Gigante that's about an hour north of it)! President, at the beginning of 2015, set a goal with the mission that if, as a mission, we got 2,060 baptisms, he'd take us all to San Juan del Sur. We ended up baptizing, I believe, 2,158 people, also making us the highest baptizing mission in Central America  in the last 30 years. So we're going! It'll be awesome.

Well, that's about it for this week. I love you all!

Love,

Cooper