No Nesecitamos Agua, o Ingles: 10/30/23

 ¡Hola mi amigos! It's been a wild week, that's for sure. I left the MTC, came to Mexico and have begun the real deal.

For starters, our flight got changed last minute. We ended up having a red eye flight into Atlanta and from there to Mexico City, and finally, into Tuxtla Gutierrez. It was a good time, not crazy eventful though, i was way tired after the fact tho.

In Tuxtla we met our trainers! My companions name is Elder Garcia and he's from North Central Mexico and doesn't speak english, so that's been fun. Like legit, it's been super fun trying to communicate with each other in what little bit we know of each other's languages. Let's just say Google translate is our best friend (other than Jesus of course), siri always has my back. I'll have to put in a lot of work to learn Spanish if I want to survive out here haha. Hence the title, no nesecitamos Ingles. 

My zone I got put in with my comp is La Zona de Costa, the costal zone. The city I'm in is called Arriaga, its on the north end of the coast of Chiapas. It's the hottest zone of the mission and has the toughest Spanish in it. The people here speak way faster than in other parts of the mission for some reason. So I dont understand anything of what's going on in lessons. Fortunately my companion does, seeing as he's a native and speaks perfect Spanish, so that's nice. It's way hot here tho, I'm just gonna have to get used to always being soaked with sweat.

Funny story of the week, we have no water in our apartment! But it's OK, we have buckets and nice neighbors. For some reason our water went out (apparently it's more common than not here) and we have no way to shower or do any of that other stuff, so we just knock on our neighbors door and they fill our buckets with their water so we can shower with not-swamp-water. It's a good time. No Nesecitamos Agua. 

The food here is good if anyone is wondering, we gotta load up when we do get it. Because we got whitewashed into our area, meaning neither one of us as companions have been here before, we don't have any food in the house, and we haven't had time to buy any. So we're really living at the mercy of the few members who feed us lately. It's truly embodying the commandment Jesus gives to His disciples to "go out and take no thought" of what we eat and where we use the bathroom. The drinks are probably my favorite part, they call it "agua", but it's really just watered down fruit pulp. It's good though, you just gotta get used to chewing your "water" tho... It's super nice after a long walk through the hot sun tho.

Anyways, that's the rundown! It's been a blast and it's been a great beginning, I pray that I can learn Spanish better each day, because I know that "I shall have power to do whatsoever thing [that] is expedient in (Christ)" - Moroni 7:33. And I know that this is an "expedient thing in Christ", to bring the light of Christ into His children's homes. 

Talk to y'all later! ¡Adios!

- Elder Allen

Photos (just a few, I'm bad at taking pictures):

1. Me with the Arriaga sign (they have these signs everywhere in every town in Chiapas, its kinda fun)

2. Me with a weird lady head statue thing my companion thought was cool 

3. We went to a Baptism of a little boy in the branch our first day, it was way fun

4. The excitement of Travel day