First Week In Guatemala City

Hey everyone!

Man! It has been quite a week! So my flight to Los Angelos was pretty easy. Nobody sat next to me and I didn´t feel too nervous or anything. I got to Los Angelos and waited for about an hour until I found Elder Somerville. He is a nice guy and we got something to eat at a pretty mediocre burger place at the airport because we couldn´t find any chain restuarnts. It was just him and I in  the airport for about an hour until we saw a huge group of other missionaries! It was pretty cool that there was so many of us there. So we hung out in the airport as a group and a member lady came up to us and told us we could use her phone to text our families that we got to the airport safe. She also took a picture of us all which I heard went facebook famous haha. Then we got on the plane and man that was a tough plane ride. I hardly slept the entire time and was feeling a little bit homesick. Anyways we got to Guatemala and went through customs and a bus picked us up to take us to the MTC. It was pretty interesting to see all the different things about Guatemala. Lots of motorcyles and people jay walking. There was also a strong military presence which was cool and scary to see. We got to the MTC (which is fenced off and guarded by guys with shotguns) and we did a bunch of check in stuff. They cut my hair again . They told us we could sleep but actually didn´t have time so we just unpacked our bags. The rest of the day I was super tired and was dozing off in most of my classes. But after that day it wasn´t that bad. We woke up early and got to work. We had orentations and stuff and met our teachers. My teachers are both super cool. Hermana Laluz and Hermono Calindo are very nice and are about Brandts age. The food is mostly good I just have a hard time eating when I am feeling a little homesick. 

This is how my day usually goes.

We wake up at 6:30 and get ready then go eat breakfast.

After breakfast we do Personal Study then Companion Study.

Then we do lots of language work like memorizing the Missionary purpose.

We also do some grammar but not a whole lot yet. They say it is mostly just memorizing for now.

After that we eat lunch and our afternoon teacher Hermano Calindo teaches us the Lessons

Then we prepare and give a lesson in spanish to our fake investigator Bryan

Then we eat dinner have some kind of devotional or workshop.

Then we get go play sports. They only have basketball and volleyball so I play basketball

Then we get ready for bed do some planning and praying.

Then we are asleep by 10:30

I am starting to get into a routine and things are starting to feel normal.

The MTC is a pretty cool place and they work hard to make us comfortable. We don´t drink out of the tap just to get us used to not drinking tap water. The water in the MTC is safe but they still have little office water coolers eveywhere for us to drink from. The showers are warm and the food is good. It is mostly Mexican food with a slight twist. I think I have had every kind of juice known to man because they have a different juice for every meal. Watermelon juice, guava mango, some kinda flower juice and a bunch of stuff I can´t remember.

My companero is Elder Darling he is from Washington and is really cool. We get along well and we are interested in a lot of the same things. My district is really cool, we have a lot of good laughs together. It is cool to meet all the Latino Elders and make friends with them.

My Spanish is coming a long well thanks to my three years of class in high school. Muchas gracias Senora Almas! haha. Anyways thats pretty much it for this week. I miss and love you all.

Love,

Elder Gessell

 Missionaries in the LAX airport on to Guatemala January 17, 2017

Elder Somerville and Elder Gessell meet up at the airport in LAX.