First Week in Ecuador!

(Quick disclaimer. The keyboard and computer are all in Spanish so everything I type in English has the red underline. So I can not tell what is actually misspelled or not. Sorry if there are a lot of typos) 

I have arrived! My first week here been crazy! I arrived in Guayaquil at 12:40 am on Tuesday! When I first got off the plane and through the customs checkpoint I meet my mission president, his wife, his assistants, and the medics. After everyone got off the plane and met up, our mission president has all 22 of us fit in a 15 passenger van and drove us to the temple! We got stayed in houses near the temple for the first night. My roommates and I got settled in and went to sleep around 3am and had to get up at 5:30am because of how busy the day was going to be. My first day in Ecuador was spent in the mission office studying the Book of Mormon in Spanish and trying to adjust to heat and the lack of Spanish.  

My second day here we got our companions! My first companion is Elder Golpe! He has been here for 9 months and does not know any English. So it has been hard at times trying to communicate because I don not really know the language that well..... But we have been doing fine! After we met each other we were assigned to the Manta Area, which is about 4 hours away from Guayaquil. As soon as we met each other we got on a bus and went to our area. We arrived in Manta around 8pm and we still had another hour before we were supposed to be at the house so we went and started contacting people! I was extremely over whelmed by how fast everyone was talking! I was just as over the next day when we had to teach lessons. I have gotten used to the speed of which people talk and have gotten a little bit better with the language.  

The people here are so nice! The houses are incredible here. As we walk down the street there are houses of every color! It is interesting that every house has a different color, metal barricades on the windows, and sheets of tin for the roof. Every house we go into has a TV playing Disney channel, 2 - 6 fans running, and all of the windows and doors open. It is so hot here! I love it! During my first week here I really have struggled so much. But through my struggling I have truly found the power of prayer. When we are struggling through anything, we have a loving Heavenly Father who is ready to give help when we need it the most.  

Thank you for all the support! I love you all!  

-Elder Pincock