Elder Seth Hamson--Nicaragua Managua North Mission: Area time is precious

This last two weeks have been extremely busy. Tons of little things added together to make these transfers extra busy, but the main thing was the fact that transfers week was the last week of the month, which is generally my busiest week anyways. We ended up getting something ridiculous like 7 hours in our area this week. It's rough now too because now Elder Galo and I are a separate companionship because the APs have a special assignment. Like 7 zone leaders finished their missions this week and there weren't a ton of missionaries that had the leadership qualities president was looking for, so he felt inspired to call two really young missionaries to be Zls for Bello Horizonte, which is the zone that includes the office. They only have a few changes in the mission, so president put them together with the APs in a foursome, so the APs are effectively running the zone while training them to be good Zone leaders. It's kinda cool because now we have 6 missionaries in our house and in our area, but the hard part is now Elder Galo and I have to find a way to accomplish what normal missionaries get done, but in less than half the time... We'll see how it goes, but starting this week with only 7 hours in our area it was a rough start. Nonetheless we are ready to take on the challenge.

In other news we baptized our first convert who lives in Los Robles, which is a super rich neighborhood in our area. We rarely work their because the people work all day long or are all closed up in their houses and are not very receptive at all. We met her from a member from the states that was visiting on business for a few weeks and he ran into in his work and brought her to church. From there we took over, but it was slow going, because she was always working and never had much time to visit, but she was coming to church every Sunday, and then a little ways back she lost her job, so these last two weeks we were able to visit her frequently and teach her everything and since she already had a testimony forming from the times she was able come to church, plus she always asked a bunch of questions during the gospel principles class, so in these last two weeks she was able to understand everything and felt ready to be baptized. It goes to show that there are people who are ready to hear our message everywhere, so if we don't work in all parts of our area we won't be able to find the people that God is preparing. It's still difficult for me to find the animo to go contacting in Los Robles, because we have so little time that I'm afraid of wasting valuable time with investigators and converts in other parts of our area. I'll have to think of an intelligent way to go about it. We'll start with getting references from her if we can.

Another unexpected blessing we received this week was that several missionaries had to come to Managua from Puerto Cabezas to get their residencies, but there weren't any return flights until today, so they stayed with us yesterday, which was the one day in the week other than Sunday that we were able to work, so we were able to take advantage and Elder Galo went with one and I worked with the other and we were able to visit all the people that we hadn't been able to visit in the week.

Two of our most positive investigators right now are Romulo and Juan Jose. Romulo is in the intelligence division of the police and his wife is actually a member of the church but she has been inactive for a long time. I love teaching him because he has a ton of good questions and also he's just a cool guy to talk too. We've only taught him a few times, but he has been receiving the lessons really well and has been reading the book of mormon and the pamphlets. His work schedule is pretty rough, and in general he works two 24 hour days and one 36 hour day in the week and then he studies at the university on Sundays. Last Sunday he decided to sacrifice some study time and came to church for the first time! This week we have only been able to visit him once because of our conflicting schedules, but he should be coming to church again and he is preparing to be baptized towards the end of November. Juan Jose and his wife Bernarda are a tiny old couple of like 70 years or so. The are the nicest people and Juan is good friend with the first counselor in the Villa Flor stake. His biggest struggle is he can't walk and doesn't have a good wheel chair. So he still hasn't been to church, but his wife went last sunday and his friend found a wheel chair to lend him, so we'll be wheeling him o church this sunday. He is also preparing to be baptized towards the end of November.

Anyways things ar good here and it felt really good to finally get a few hours of time in our area yesterday after a long week of having to do other stuff. Nothing beats some good time in the area meeting new people and teaching people about jesus and the book of mormon and see their faith and desires to follow christ. There are so many incredible people here!

Ok talk to you all next week.

Love,

Elder Hamson

Here are some pics. Me and Elder Galo in the airport saying goodbye to my dad (trainer) in the mission, Elder Castro. Crazy that he already finished his two years, seems not too long ago that he was just completing 17 months. Who knows if I'll ever be able to make my way to Panama and see that guy again. Great Missionary. The next pick is me with David Chamorro who was our ward mission leader and will make one heck of a misisonary in Guatemala. He helped us out a ton, and I am stoked to hear how his mission goes. We were in the airport on other errands, so it was cool to cross paths with him and get to see him off. The last picture is a picture of our zone in the last multizone conference we had.