Wednesday, June 23, 2010

Monday, June 21st

Hello Family!


I am doing very GOOD! Except, there is a virus that is passing here in Nicaragua and just about everyone has it right now....I got it and have had a fever and bad cough this past week.

Hey dad....HAPPY FATHERS DAY!! I LOVE YOU!! They don’t really celebrate father’s day here...

I have looked at the Picasa account recently that is really cool! That looks like you had a fun camping trip LUCKIES!! I want to go camping so badly. Has Carly picked the school that she wants to go to?? and what grade is she in this year??

Answers to questions:
A: The new mission president takes over in the beginning of the month of July.
A: I have been the senior companion for a while now.
A: I have not had any other responsibilities :( I would like more so hopefully I will be recognized by my new mission president :)
A: My personal studies for the moment are okay...we hardly get time to study and I have been sick all week so I have been in bed half the time. BUT I have been reading and learning a ton about the Book of Mormon ...it is AWESOME!
A: Am I doing what im suppose to do.... ?
• As far as waking up on time....Usually I get up 15 min earlier then im supposed to.
• I have almost always started working when im suppose too, if im not able to it’s usually because my companion doesn't want to get out and work.
• As far as getting along with my companions I do everything that I can so that we can work hard and effectively and with out any problems. But yes of course there are a few occasional arguments.

Well as far as this week....I have been changed/transferred....I am no longer in Managua!!! I will miss Reparto Shick we did a lot of good there. Now I am in.......LEON! With my companion Elder Alvarez he is from Guatemala! He is a really cool guy! We both arrived in Nicaragua on the same day.

This area is really cool I still haven't got to know my area to well yet because I have been sick almost all week. But it is AWESOME the people here are really friendly and the buildings here are really cool....don't worry I will take a lot of pictures. I'm not afraid of getting robbed here. My zone is really cool and there is an Elder named Elder Stratton from Snow Flake and I got a feeling we are going to be good friends, we get along well, he is a really cool kid. Tomorrow we are going back to Managua to say goodbye to president and sister Fraatz...it is supposedly their last day.

Well not to much has happened...I did get the package! THANK YOU VERY MUCH!!! Interesting selection of ties but the people here love them and are always asking me what the writing says. Dang Customs took a box of that drink mix and opened the bag of mints and ate some of them...its so weird lol people here love mints. I guy in my ward the other day was offering me candy and when I put it in my mouth I spit it back out and was like "WHAT THE HECK THAT'S A COUGH DROP?!" ha ha They eat cough drops like candy....gross.

What else... here in Leon, to travel around, we take little trucks. I can hardly fit in these but its pretty much a pick up truck with a tarp covering the top and you just chill in the back of the bed with 15 other people ha-ha.

Well that’s about all the time I got for now...
I love you all
Elder Buck

Tuesday, June 15, 2010

Two Missed Letters with Pictures

Click here:  New Pictures of Volcano and Baptisms


Monday, May 7th

Hey thanks for not writing me!? Ha-ha what happened??

Today was an awesome day! We got to go see a volcano...I have sent lots of pics.

On Thursday I can say I served two missions!! I WENT TO HONDURAS!!  It was pretty cool, just a little (like 5 kil) passed the border because my companion had to go back to be able to renew his residence or identity for Nicaragua because there was come kind of error. My companion was a little trunky when we got to Hondura's ha-ha.   While I was there we met and talked to 3 awesome people that almost right away wanted to get baptized.  The sad thing is where they live there are no missionaries. Other then that, it was a lot of fun it was like over all 10 hours of travel time. 

Click above to go to my album to see the pictures of the volcano and the recent baptisms.

We also had a baptism of a girl a couple of Saturday’s ago but she did not come to church to be confirmed the next day because she got a lung infection and ended up going into the hospital. When she got out of the hospital she went to her mothers to stay so we were told to go find her and get her to a church so we could get her confirmed. We took a member of the bishopric with us and got directions from her boyfriend to where she was staying at her mother’s house. Well the directions were not correct and we ended up out of our teaching area. After a phone call we found were she really was and were told by leaders to go find her so she could be confirmed. After a bus ride and a lot of walking we finally found her and got her to a church to be confirmed. It was a crazy day.


Monday, May 14th

Hello Family!

I am doing well! Health is doing pretty good...I'm sorry your letter from email did not come through last week.

I still haven’t got my package yet....I won’t get it until probably this Wednesday we we have changes in our area. Last week was interesting and even though my mission says we don't baptize for numbers... we really do.  We have our leaders and they have theirs and we just have to obey the higher ranked guy pretty much ha-ha.

Another thing that is crazy but normal here is for people to get married even though they are 20 years apart in age. I have seen some really crazy stuff.  I saw on the T.V news a 6 year old boy that was smoking a cigarette here.  Sad.....you should look some stuff up on the news links on the internet. Nicaragua has a couple news internet sites so you can see all the crazy stuff that happens here and how many deaths/murders there are.

I have been a little discouraged this change because im not being/acting like a missionary of Preach my Gospel. I really am losing my respect for other churches especially a religion called Evangelicals....We have been trying so long to prepare a family for baptism and someone from this other church talked to them and with the help of Satan are bringing there souls down to hell.

We went to the investigators house the other day. It’s was around 7 pm and I can hardly see because it was dusk.  There were two ladies outside so I asked for the woman investigator. One of the women responded, "May God bless you, how are you?" I was like "uh....I'm good, is so-and-so here?" This same lady replies "No she is not, no one is home, let God protect you".  I'm like okay and was about to say good bye but I take a better look at the other lady standing silent and realized it was the investigator so I said, "Hi! "Why didn’t you say you where here?" The other lady responds for her, "Oh she is busy she can't talk right now, may God bless you".  I asked,  "Well we will come back some other day" and the same lady replies "No that’s fine you don’t need to come back she is going to be going to my church".  I can't help it...it makes me sad but still a little mad.

A good thing we did have a baptism this week. His name is Christian he is a really awesome kid. He used to be a bum kid like into drugs and girls and all that. But one of the members in our ward invited him to seminary and he LOVES IT!! So that was really cool. The only set back is he has schooling and study on Sundays so we are not able to get him to church on Sunday but our bishop wants him to be baptized and so did Christian himself.  We taught him all the discussions had him take out his piercings and got him baptized. He is an awesome kid! He says he’s going to drop one of his school classes to be able to go to church.

My new Nicaragua North mission president comes on the 1st of July. I don’t think the mission address will change so far it’s still the same.  I don’t know yet but I will let you know if it changes.  The new mission president is President Rotanda (I think...).  I have said a couple negative things arobout my current mission president that I take back now,  Prez. Fraatz he’s a good guy but difficult to understand his decisions.

I'm glad you got to go camping and fishing on the Rim.  I love the pics that you sent!

Felicidades!! CARLY IS DONE WITH SCHOOL!! Will you be a junior or senior??

Cool....glad to hear Chad Mayberry is serving a mission in Mexico!

Well I think that is it for now if I forget something I will write it next time!

I love you ALL!!

ELDER BUCK