9/11/2019  Week 6
Retalhuleu Mission

Today is my first day in the field! Luckily today is P-day so it is a little less stressful. Anyways my companion is named Elder Quiñones, he is super cool! He is from Durango Mexico and he has been in this area for quite a while.  He is trying to speak English with me a little bit. He has been out for almost a year, and he has learned a lot of English from the other missionaries. He has already helped me many times, and it has only been one day.

I think the Lord wanted to humble me on my first transfer, because my companion speaks mostly only Spanish, I already got sick on the first day, our apartment sink doesn´t work, and our shower is really cold. Sorry if it sounds like I´m complaining. I just wasn´t expecting all of this already haha. But seriously my companion is amazing, I don´t have any pictures yet but I will try to get some. Our area is one of the furthest away from the mission home.  We do have a microwave and a fridge and the bed is pretty good with some warm blankets so that is nice. My companion found some pills to take for my sickness and it helped a lot.

Today was P-day and we played soccer for about 3 hours, (I didn´t play much because I didn´t feel very good) Then we ate huge hamburgers, (which I didn´t eat but they looked great) There were probably about 20 missionaries with me today, and they are all super nice. In my mission they call our trainers our padres(fathers), which is kinda odd but really cool. 

The bus ride to my first area was crazy and so packed we had to stand for two hours and one of the workers had to ride on the outside of the bus.  My first area, is called San Pedro and it is up in the mountains, and it is actually really cold during the day. It is incredibly beautiful here, there are soooo many trees everywhere. We are really high up and I think the altitude played a part in my sickness. That is super cool about Adam and Amanda! They will be amazing parents! That is also so awesome to hear that Davier is cancer free. I hope he knows how much of an example he is to all of us.

Our mission president and his wife are seriously some of the coolest people ever. They are genuinely kind and super spiritual. We met at a stake center to be assigned companions.  They fed us Lasagna and we did some training with them, and I got another package which helped me a ton. It was really pretty hard to leave the missionaries at the MTC, but I know I will hear from some of them again. I think my P-days are on Wednesdays and we get to email from the stake center with a bunch of missionaries.

Anyways all is pretty good here expect for the sickness. The people are super nice and kind to me even though I am a gringo haha. 

Thank you guys so much for your prayers, support, and love.

I love you all!

Elder Hirschi