Dust So You Know

Hi there!

Sorry for the delay. If any of you were wondering where I was, I was buried under enough dust to fill up an Olympic swimming pool. Not really exaggerating either! Okay, well obviously I'm exaggerating a little, but for real, yesterday brought the biggest dust storm anyone in Chinandega and León had seen in years, which just figures since I only decided like three days ago to get on this new kick of, "I'm gonna start sweeping my porch every day!" and then this happens:

This picture is from a news report about the storm: http://www.laprensa.com.ni/2015/03/07/departamentales/1794816-tolvaneras-leon

Seriously? Can I just win for once?! León got hit a lot worse than here in Chinandega, but it was still pretty bad, guys. Everything in our house is about five shades darker than it was before. The keyboard that I'm typing this post on STILL has dust on it!!!

Behold: the fish. It's there. Look closer.

And that's pretty much the most eventful thing that's happened here these days. No, there's been plenty of good stuff going on. Last Sunday, I went to Jiquilillo (he-kee-lee-yo), a congregation on the coast of Chinandega, to give the public talk. That involved a two-hour insanely full bus ride where my friends and I had to stand about 80% of the time. Seriously bros, that was easily one of the top three worst bus rides I've ever taken here, if not the worst. I'm not gonna lie - all I could think was, "I haven't had a day where I really wished I was home in a very long time, probably over a year, but this is one of those days." But then I realized that if it had been that long since I'd had a day like that, then that shows how great things have been going this past year, since I used to have them all the time! And people say I'm not positive.

Once we got to Jiquilillo, I knew what I was gonna have to face: fish. The congregation there always feeds the speaker a big fish meal. It's really, really, really nice of them BUT I'm not a fish fan, and I'm sorry, but hey, God did give us taste buds and I like to use mine! I knew that a lot of work had gone into it, so although it took about a full half-hour, I ate it, and I'm glad that I did. Not saying that I'll do it again!

Now, let's take a moment to tip our hats off to the brothers in Jiquilillo. They have their meeting at 1:00 in the afternoon outdoors with no fans and are even doing that during this time of year when the temperature is officially over 100 degrees (F) from now until at least May. We Mainers may have to contend with the snow, but at least we have Kingdom Halls with heating systems! To this day, it still astounds me how tough these brothers are. I may have rushed through my talk a little bit because I was about to pass out if I didn't sit down. Thankfully, a sister from Chinandega who lives out there on the weekends gave a bunch of us a ride back to town in her air-conditioned truck. It was worlds better than taking another bus.

Me most likely telling Marlon to stop
asking why I use that color highlighter and
just read the paragraph.

I know I'm sound like a broken record by this point, but service has been going awesome has been going awesome has been going awesome. I say that because it's true! Ben and Bree have been having some really good experiences and studies, but I'll let them post about that on their blog: www.benandbreeinnica.blogspot.com

Amy with Bastie, her bestie.

Edwin and his kids have been coming to all the weekend meetings. The kids, especially Bruno, love commenting and getting involved during the Watchtower. They're coming to their first mid-week meeting tomorrow! Very exciting times.

I did my study with Erling on Friday and was so excited to see that he had underlined the whole lesson ahead of time! He's a really nice guy and has been getting better with each passing week. I'm really hoping he'll come to the Memorial. It should be easy since the location where we're having ours is a block away from his house. Actually, three of my studies live a block away from the Memorial location, so it's my goal that all of them attend!

Caleb time.

I'm still studying with Marlon, the ten-year-old in the park. He loves the book and asks a lot of questions. Like, a lot of questions. He may have the attention span of a chicken, but he's a good kid, as well as his sister, Bastie. Man, has she got spunk! A couple of weeks ago, my friends Amy and Ashley, both from England, accompanied me on the study. They've both visited Chinandega before and are staying here for a few months now, attending our congregation. They are both hilarious and a lot of fun. What was I talking about? Oh yes, they came with me on the study and were gracious enough to watch Caleb videos with Bastie while I studied with Marlon. While Amy was showing her a video, one of their friends in the park came up and started watching, too. It ended with all of us watching one of the videos together. Dealing with kids may not be my strong suit, but it has been fun studying with them.

Also, a group of us spent the night at the Kingdom Hall on Friday working security and printing off our Memorial invitations until 3:30 in the morning. It may have thrown off my sleeping patterns for a couple weeks since I had to work at 5:30 that same morning, but it was still a lot of fun.

Got everything we need to print invitations, including toilet paper.

Trying to think if there's anything else...there probably is but I've gotta bounce since I have friends coming over any minute. Thanks for reading, talk to you all next Monday!

Take care,


Sam