Arrival in Panama

"We were given the general authority room". It has air conditioning and we slept very comfortably. There was a loud party somewhere, but it certainly didn't keep us awake.

This is the view from the penthouse apartment of the mission home. We arrived last night about 8:30. President and Sister Ward met us at the airport. We slipped through customs and were here.

This is President Craig Ward and his wife, Lanna. They are some of the most friendly, positive people I've ever met. He thought he was applying for a mission like ours to work with his friend with whom he opened Spain for missionary work years ago. The call was long in coming and he was called to serve here as president instead. He has 200 missionaries all over the country. He has a lot to do. It makes me glad I'll just have our little corner of the world.

Rod has been practicing speaking and is doing amazingly well. He's sad that his humor doesn't work yet, but!!! We attended General Conference today in the stake center. We decided to take the Spanish option. I could understand much of it. Rod stayed awake better than he usually does. He was working hard.

We took a walk at a park down by the ocean that is about 5 minutes from the mission home. There is tons of history right here under our noses. The president has decided that we should see a bit of it before we go to Aguadulce, so we'll play tourist for a day as well as shop a bit for our tiny home before we go out there. We also need to go to the immigration office to get more permanent papers.

Thank you to everyone who was concerned about our "London Plight". It was nice to know we have friends.