Pictures of Sipacate

Welcome to SIPACATE!

November 20, 2012

Alright here we go!!! My first area is in the zone Santa lucia and my first area is called Sipacate. It's about as close to the coast as you can get. It's so freaking hot and I'm literally dying out here. It's really hard and frustrating this first week. It's really hard to understand anything besides the gospel. I am happy to be out in the field but it's so hard and discouraging sometimes. I'm trying to stay really really positive out here.

One of the things that is really hard is that there is nowhere in my area to send letters or packages and i'm hardly going to ever get any mail. I'm going to be with my first companion for 14 weeks. Luckily he is a freaking STUD!! Elder Diaz from Honduras and doesn't speak a lick of english. I know i'm supposed to be with him because i already love him to death.

One thing that i have to let you all know is that it is a mission rule that i can't email anyone but family. So you're going to need to get the address of Natalie and forward her these all the her. Unedited please haha. That's been hard for me to take but i know i will be blessed by being obedient. Please write me and i will respond when i can. I will try and send pictures from time to time.

Our area is about a 10 minute car ride from the coast and is took us 4 hours in bus to get there the first day. There literally is nothing in this place but it's all good. We teach about 5 or 6 lessons a day. But don't have a lot of success with progressing investigators. I had my first baptism this sunday and that was an awesome expierence. It was a lady named Maribel Carrera. She is going to be a great member no doubt. We have only a tiny branch in this area of maybe 30 members. But i promise it will grow!!!

Our house isn't the greatest thing in the world but it is better than the mud huts that we normally teach in. It's so DANG HOT HERE. Now i really know hat melt your face off hot means. Haha but when i get to work and am working hard, i don't really notice. Yesterday i challenged my first investigator in the field to baptism! What an amazing feeling!!

I am trying to be exactly obedient and always follow the rules. There are some that i don't agree with but i know that i will be blessed for living them. Exact obedience brings forth miracles!!!!

I tried to send the package for Christmas when we were in the city but the lady saw that i was white and told me is costed 435 quets per poud hahahaha no way lady!! So that will come when i can get it sent out. Maybe next week when we get to go to the Capital.

It's hard but I'm hanging in there. I'm really learning the real way to pray. I love you guys so much and i just want you to know that. Let the kids know that i'm praying for them always and tell them to be good and obedient. Thank you so much for all the support and all the prayers for me. I LOVE YOU GUYS!!!!!

Love, Elder Cooper Tyler Hanson

I don't have any time down here to email and the keyboards are all

screwy so the keys are all over the place so i'll worry about making
my letters look good when i get out into the field and get a normal
gomputer that works. i don't know where i'm going yet we'll find that
out on tuesday when we get to the mission home so stoked!! the quake
was pretty crazy and it shook us for like a minute and a half. It
wasn't a big deal but it was cool to feel. i just thought someone was
shaking my chair haha. My spanish when i talk to the latinos is pretty
good actually. They understand everything thyat i say and i can
understand about 80 percent of what they say. i can get my point
across but the hardest part still is understanding what some people
are saying. My testimony is really growing. It's hard for it not to
grow when we're sitting and studying every day all day. I love reading
the Booke of Mormon and reading Jesus the Christ. it's so awesome to
hear about all the amazing things that Jesus did while he was here. i
think i'm good on things that i need from you guys but i will let you
know for sure. Mom here are the answers to your questions in the dear
elder i got this week. i did have a parasite but i got on some
antibiotics from the President's wife so i'm totally fine now. Don't
worry!! down here we eat a lot of veggies and we actually have a lot
of really really good meat. the food is good here. I guess the food we
get here is comparable to a really expensive restaurant down here in
Guate. The one thing that i don't like is the celantro on every single
ting haha but i'm getting used to it. a lot of awesome fruit too.
That's really good. I never thought that papaya would taste like
straight throw up. it's so dang NASTY!!! A day in the life of a
missionary in the MTC consists of this: we wake up and go to play
soccer for like an hour of so then we go to shower and breakfast.
after that we have personal study for an hour and the we have grammar
with our teacher. then after that it's lunch. after lunch we have
lessons with our teacher and the we teach our investigator (the
teacher). then it's dinner. we switch teachers after dinner and then
we teach our other investigator (the other teacher). then we just have
lessons with the teachers or we practice teaching with the latinos.
that's pretty much it! every day!!! Mom i got the package that you
sent as a test run this week on tuesday i believe. It actually took a
while to get here which was weird because i got the one with the ipod
and stuff in it last week. This week we went tracting out in the
streets of Zona 5 and that was really fun. We got to go with our own
companions and find people and get contacts. the first two people that
we ran into were totally crazy. like they would just groan in our
faces and grab our hands and that was really weird. But that day ended
up being really good and we met and talked to some amazing people. It
was a really good week and i feel like just as i'm g etting the hang
of being here i'm having to leave. i am nervous to be in the field but
i'm really really stoked! it's going to be amazing to help realy
people. I can't wait to see this place and meet amazing people.
AHHHHH!!! here we go! My time of being a 'real' missionary starts now
and i'm going to work my butt off to try and help every single person
i can! I LOVE YOU. I love you all so so so much. have a great wek and
i will email you on my next p day! Love, Elder Cooper Tyler Hanson! <3