Los Poldens: León, Nicaragua

Making dinner by candle light, dining by candle light - doesn't that sound romantic? Well, that's what life has been like this week.... well, one night anyhow. A storm came through on Saturday afternoon and knocked out the power. No problem, we'll just wait a little while and the power will be back on and then we can cook dinner..... well, over 2 hours later it was dark and the power wasn't back on. Dinner had to be prepared by candle light and since we only have two of them the light was pretty dim - but we managed quite well and didn't burn the tostones!

We've had an exciting week in service. We had our usual study with Jose Luis in La Paz Centro. This week in addition to his secretary Heidi sitting in on the study there was also a couple of his friends who listened in. One of the fellows lives here in León and has asked Pat to call on him. We also started a study close to the bus terminal here in León. I had met him back in March when we did a census of his block. It took me a while to call back on him because I couldn't find his shop. When I finally found the store he was reading the magazine I left him and said "I thought you had forgotten about me!" This fellow sure knows his bible and is able to quote scriptures that he has memorized. In spite of knowing many scriptures he says that he has trouble understanding what the bible teaches and he is thrilled that we can study with him. It is a bit of a challenge studying with him because he owns a very successful shop that sells saddles, ropes and well everything associated with horses. We are interrupted many times during the study by customers coming into the store but we just keep going when he has finished serving his customers. Many people in the community recognize us as Jehovah's Witnesses and we are frequently asked for Spanish magazines. We've started to bring some Spanish tracts in service with us so that we can at least leave something with them.

Tadpoles in La Paz Centro

The rain has been a bit of a challenge this week. Umbrellas are part of our gear now when we leave the house because you never know how quickly those dark clouds are going to start dumping their load. On Tuesday night we were only about 3 minutes away from the Kingdom Hall when it started lightly raining. However, by the time we were only 1/2 block away the skies opened up and by the time we reached the doors of the Kingdom Hall we were soaked. Umbrellas don't help too much because with the force the rain comes down it bounces off the ground and soaks you from the bottom up... Taxis also have a hard time because the roads quickly become small rivers and they have trouble negotiating around the city. Take a look at the picture below. You will see some tadpoles. You would think that these are growing in a pond wouldn't you? Nope, they are growing in a puddle..... I've never seen that happen back home.

So... can you believe that we have been here almost six months? We have a hard time believing it but our passports don't lie and we need to go into Managua tomorrow to extend our Tourist Visa. This will be the first time that we have gone to MetroCentro Mall on our own, so we are looking forward to it. The process is quite simple because the Interlocal bus goes to the UCA Bus Terminal which is right near the mall. We can ask to be let off at the mall or just walk about the distance of a block to the mall - so it's really easy. Time sure is flying by... we'll be in San Salvador for the convention in just a few weeks. Can't wait to see the new releases!

Here are a few other pictures from this week: