Cold night in San Carlos

Last week I couldn't believe how cold it got one night.  It was so cold that the Kris, the sister I live with, had to cover up Marty the dog with a towel because he was cold.  It was a chilly 70 degrees.  Yup you read that right it was like 70 degrees.  I think most nights it is 75 degrees or warmer so for it to be 70 people were really cold.  It seems so weird to be saying that people were cold in 70 degree weather.  That night I was really happy that I had light fleece blanket that my niece Essence made for me. 

Marty all covered up in his towel.

My wonderful blanket from my niece. :) lightweight but warm perfect for here.

Venga tu Reino District Convention

Weekend before last we had our District Convention here in Spanish.  It was a great convention and extra special for our congregations because we had 3 from out hall get baptized and all 3 of our elders had talks at the convention and one of them even gave the public discourse on Sunday.  They all did a wonderful job.  They are 3 very hard working brothers.  Here are some pictures from the convention.

Group from El Nance where I live waiting on the bus to pick us up on Friday morning.

On the bus on the way to the convention. It takes about 40 mins to get to the Assembly Hall from where I live.

One of our Elders giving a talk on Friday.

The 3 from our Hall that were getting Baptized.  The 2 on the left are married.

Alexandar got a little emotion about finally getting baptized.  She grew up in the truth but never made it her own and left the truth and got married and had a kid.  Finally she has changed her life around and is ready to be baptized.  She is from Columbia so she was a little sad to not be able to share this day with her family because the majority of them are all witnesses.

Does this speaker look out of place to you? Here in Panama there is a huge chinese population.  During our convention there was also a small chinese convention being held at the same time in a back kingdom hall behind the stage.  I think there top attendance was 88.  So if you speak chinese there is a huge need here in Panama for chineses.

This brother gave a interview about how he use to be in the US military and like women and money and how he changed his life and now is a special pioneer here with his wife.  His interview was very interesting.  He has give a talk at our hall he is very nice and I never would have guessed what his pasted was like.  It is wonderful to see how the bible really does change peoples lives.

This a picture from the Saturday afternoon drama where the young witness girl is interested in a worldly boy.  The brother playing the worldly boy here was excellent he could be a real actor.  He was in the english drama to.

2 sisters from my hall with there bible studies.  These 3 little girls are so sweet.  I had a hard time learning there names and so they helped me practice and were so happy for me when I finally got it down.

This is the mom of sister in the picture above on the right.  She is studying and has been for years and comes to meeting but gambling is holding her back from making more progress.  Gambling is really big here.  She is always super stylish I call her my beautiful so we too a picture together.  She looked wonderful all 3 days of the assembly but the best on Sunday.  And she holding up her hand so that you don't miss her beautiful nails.  The ways she is always put together so beautiful makes me think of my mom always has nails hair and dressed super cute.

Our coordinator and his wife and daugther.  Wonderful family.  He gave the public discourse on Sunday and did a excellent job.

On the right is the couple I live with Elvis and Kris and on the left is Kris mom and sister.  They are both very sweet and come to visit often.  Elvis gave a great talk on Sunday, the last part of the symposium on Jesus qualities he brought it home.

From serious elder Elvis in the above picture to relaxed down to earth Elvis.  On Sunday after the convention when we were on the way home Elvis thought it would be a great idea to do interviews with his umbrella of everyone on the bus to see what part at the convention they liked best and affected them most.  It was fun and very interesting to here everyone responses and very entertaining.

Elvis interviewing one of the other elders.

Elvis interviewing Kelly a sister from Columbia.  He tried to end the interview 3 times but Kelly is a talker so we were all dieing of laughter as she kept on talking.

So those are a few highlights from the convention.  Hope you enjoyed all of pictures.

Preaching By the Beach

One of the things that I love about this area is that we have all different kinds of territories.  One day last week we worked one of the territories by the beach called El Palmar.  I used to live at house on this beach.  It was sprinkling all morning long as we were preaching.  But don't be deceived by service partner that has long a long sleeved shirt on it was still hot and humid since the cloud trap in all of the heat and because it was barely raining it didn't make it refreshing at all.  It was great to see the beach though.  One of the plus to serving where the need is great in Panama, the Beach.

My service partner for the morning Yaris. She is a newer publisher and will be getting baptized very soon.

Black sand beach.  When it is nice out the sand is super hot but so pretty.

Rewarding Morning.

On Saturday I was out preaching in the morning and it was so hot.  For a few minutes I was like man I just feel like going home it is to hot and there was not breeze.  A few minutes after I was thinking that the wind started to blow and it cooled down.  I think that Jehovah knew that I couldn't handle it any more and because he is so Good he sent me a breeze or at least that is what I told me self.  I agreed to go a return visit with another sister but my car was really far away and one of our elders had his car and offered to drive us back but we decide not it is OK we will walk back and finish the last part of the territory up.  Next thing we know the elder is pulling up beside us with 2 cold bottles of water and insist on taking us to my car so we don't have to walk so far.  The water was great just what I needed because I had forgot mine at home.  Hit the spot perfect I almost drank the whole bottle in four gulps.  We finished the morning at the Grecio family house.  They knew I would be hot, because I always am and it was hot day even to Panamanian brothers and sister, so they gave me and the sister I was with some homemade lemonade and put the fan on me for a little while, while the brother told us some stories.  I wish I would have gotten a picture of it.  Sitting in the chair at there house with the lemonade in my hand and the fan on was just what I need and wanted.  Then on top of that the Brother thanked me for my bible highlights comment on Thursday regarding one of covenants.  That made me so happy because after I had comment on Thursday I had not felt good about my comment. I had written it out but I changed it as I was saying it because I had made it way to long but because I found the subject so interesting I got to excited about it and I was worried that my point had gotten lost.  So it was very satisfying to know that someone had appreciated it and understood it.  Then it was nice because we all continued talking about it for a while.  Spiritual conversation is so up building.  I felt like Jehovah was rewarding me for my hard work during the morning in more then one way.  Our God is oh so Good.

That afternoon the couple I live with asked me to come with them on there studies because there was a young girl of one of there studies that they wanted me to met so that I could start studying with her, so I went happily.  The young girl is 13 years old and her mother has been studying for like a year now on and off because they have a farm out of town so she can be hard to pin down but her mom understands things really quickly and she says that she wants to come to our District Convention this weekend at least for one day.  I hope they are able to come.  The young girl is kind of shy but was excited to study and she had her own What the Bible Really Teaches book from sitting in on her mom's study.  We started in chapter one and it went very well.  When I had her by herself she was a little less shy and now she understands clearly that Jehovah is interested in what happens in our lives and that he is only permit bad things to happen but not the cause.  She is excited for our next study.  We went to a couple of other studies and return visits.  The last study of the day was in an area called La Uva which means the grape.  I have no idea why it is called that.  To get to the study you have to go on a dirt road for a while.  The dirt in this area is like clay so the road get really bad in the rain and in the afternoon it rained up there.  Getting there we skated around some in the mud but it wasn't to bad.  Good thing we were in 4 wheel drive car.  Here is what the car looked like as we got to the studies house.

The whole car had mud on it and driving back home was even harder with all of this mud already on the tires but we made it home safe and sound.

Elvis and Kris Correa.  They area great couple and amazing in the ministry.

We made it there safe and sound and the study was great.  It was with a younger couple their baby and there mom.  They are slow to understand but love learning and have come to a couple of meeting and want to come to the assembly.  They were very friendly and gracious.  The wife disappeared for a while and then called her husband away and they came back with food and tea for us.  The tea was wonderful.  See as they learned that Satan is the ruler of this world was cool to see the light come on.  Elvis and Kris are great teachers so being with them is a nice because the student learns and I learn to.  It was a great Saturday, a blessing from Jehovah.

One thing I miss from Washington

I don't really miss alot of things from the states but I miss my shower head from my parents house in Washtington.  The shower head in the bathroom that I use is super strong you feel like you might get washed away sometimes.  You have to be careful not to stay in the shower to long because you can easily use up almost all of the hot water in the water heater if you take a super long shower.  I wish I could have that shower head here.  Here is a photo of my current shower head and its drizzle.

As you can see not much comes out at once which is the total opposite of my shower in Washington.  This is also what is called a suicide shower head because the electricity is hooked up directly to heat the water.  I have used this kind of shower head before in when I lived in Costa Rica and it was nice because you never ran out of hot water and as long as you don't touch it you won't get shocked.  For some reason this one give me problems I can only seem to get hot water 25% of the time which is normally fine because it is hot here but some mornning when it is cool it makes for unpleasant showers.  I am hoping when i move to the other place that since the shower head is new that I will have more then a drizzle but we will see.  So all of you enjoy your powerful shower heads.

Cute Little Guy In Search of Water

In service we were walking and I looked down in this bunch of grass and guess what I saw.  Yup this little baby turtle.  I don't know where he came from because there wasn't any water around and we didn't see any other turtles.  We looked for water to put him in but we couldn't find any water that wasn't going to dry up so the sister took her home with him.  She is the mom of the little girl that was over last week.  The little girl was happy to take the little turtle home.  I hope that they give him a cute name I will keep you all posted when I find out his name or if you have a good name recommendation let me know.