Hurling and La Policima

Not a ton of stuff happened last week. My interview with the President didn't happen. Not sure why..., so maybe it will be this week. I did get sick again, however. Not sure if it was something I ate or what, but I was hurling my guts out Saturday night and my stomach has been super upset ever since. Some serious upset stomach issues, so it makes it hard to do anything. Makes P-Day not very fun either. It sucks being sick.

Me and Elder Sanchez at the Christmas Devotional Broadcast
with the Hermanas behind us photo bombing our picture.

We went to the church last night for the broadcast of the First Presidency's Christmas Devotional. Even though it was in Spanish I could understand it all and it was really good, except for being sick....ugggh.

The Nativity Scene my parents sent me this week.

I did get a package from my family this past week. Yo-yos for me and my companion, with instructions how to perform some tricks. I've already been practicing with Sanchez! It also had a nativity scene for some Christmas decorations that we set up on our table and 5 CDs full of Christmas music. Oh my gosh, I love all of it. We've been listening to Christmas music non-stop.

OK, so something exciting yesterday and today is the Nicaraguan Catholic Holiday called "La Policima." It basically means everyone goes out and parties and sings in the streets and lights off firecrackers and super loud fireworks -- ALL NIGHT LONG. So hard to sleep last night during the celebrations. I guess it's a little bit like Halloween where the families go to houses to get candy, but when they go, they worship the Virgin Mary and sing and chant things to Mary. It's a crazy holiday here. Also, because of the holiday, a lot of the stores are closing early, so we spent almost 2 hours this afternoon trying to find a cyber-cafe to write emails home (there was a mass of 8 missionaries together running around searching, ha ha). We almost couldn't find an open cyber-cafe and were about to go home and then I wouldn't have been able to write this week, which would have also really sucked. But we found this little cyber-cafe that we had never been to before, and it is really slow in here, so we were able to write, but we are almost out of time now.

Me, Diego (a member here who is awesome and waiting
for his mission call), and Elder Sanchez at the
Christmas Devotional Broadcast.

We were able to work in our own area this whole week, and we have been setting lots of baptismal dates, but they're not for 4 to 5 weeks from now. It makes me a little sad to be with the Zone Leaders because their areas aren't as productive because they have all sorts of other responsibilities to take care of besides just teaching. Oh well, only one more month and I'll be finished with my training and then I can be in a normal area as a normal missionary and we'll have the opportunity to have more baptisms!!!

As for Christmas, I haven't heard too many details on that yet. I have no idea how we're supposed to Skype. We get to have a multi-zone devotional on either the 24th or 26th, but other than that, we are supposed to work on Christmas and treat it like a normal day out in the field. It would be nice if we could do some service or something, but apparently even before our current Mission President was here the missionaries weren't allowed to do much service. All I do know is we get a dinner, probably like our Thanksgiving dinner, on the 25th.

Anyways, that's about all that's been going on here. I did hit my 3-month mark this last week! In the next week, nothing super big should be happening, but hopefully I get over this sickness soon! So, working hard and enjoying it more and more (when I'm not sick.....ha ha)!