ios – MapView not exhibiting annotations

I am working with MapKit for the primary time, making an attempt to make a easy app that exhibits all the closest thrift shops. I do not actually know easy methods to work with annotations and have simply been looking out by the apple documentation and making an attempt to implement their examples. I believed that this code would work, but it surely nonetheless is not.

import UIKit
import MapKit
import CoreLocation

class ViewController: UIViewController, CLLocationManagerDelegate, MKMapViewDelegate {

    var coordinates: [String] = [""] //latitude, longitude
    var firstTime = true
    
    override func viewDidLoad() {
        tremendous.viewDidLoad()
        print("View loaded...")
        theMap.delegate = self //this doesnt crash although so ig the iboutlet creates an occasion
        locationManager = CLLocationManager() //gotta create occasion of sophistication first. else it crashes
        locationManager.delegate = self
        locationManager.requestWhenInUseAuthorization()
        locationManager.startUpdatingLocation()
        locationManager.requestLocation()
    }

    @IBOutlet weak var theMap: MKMapView!
    var locationManager: CLLocationManager!
    
    func locationManager(_ supervisor: CLLocationManager, didUpdateLocations places: [CLLocation]) {
        if firstTime {
            firstTime = false
            theMap.isHidden = false
            let myLocation: CLLocation = places[0]
            let coordinates = CLLocationCoordinate2D(latitude: myLocation.coordinate.latitude, longitude: myLocation.coordinate.longitude)
            let area = MKCoordinateRegion(middle: coordinates, latitudinalMeters: 5000, longitudinalMeters: 5000)
            theMap.setRegion(area, animated: true)
            theMap.showsUserLocation = true
            print("Setting the middle of the map...")
            
            let searchRequest = MKLocalSearch.Request()
            searchRequest.naturalLanguageQuery = "thrift retailer"
            searchRequest.area = theMap.area
            
            let search = MKLocalSearch(request: searchRequest)
            search.begin { (response, error) in
                guard let response = response else {
                    return
                }
                
                for merchandise in response.mapItems {
                        let annotation = MKPlacemark(coordinate: merchandise.placemark.coordinate)
                        self.theMap.addAnnotation(annotation)

                        
                    
                }
                }
                
            }
            
            
        }
    }
    
    func mapView(mapView: MKMapView, viewForAnnotation annotation: MKAnnotation) -> MKAnnotationView? {
        if annotation is MKUserLocation{
            return nil;
        }else{
            let pinIdent = "Pin";
            var pinView: MKPinAnnotationView;
            if let dequeuedView = mapView.dequeueReusableAnnotationView(withIdentifier: pinIdent) as? MKPinAnnotationView {
                dequeuedView.annotation = annotation;
                pinView = dequeuedView;
            }else{
                pinView = MKPinAnnotationView(annotation: annotation, reuseIdentifier: pinIdent);

            }
            return pinView;
        }
    }
    func locationManager(_ supervisor: CLLocationManager,
             didFailWithError error: Error) {  print("Error fetching location") }
}

I’ve solely tried a number of the instance code within the Apple documentation and have not messed round with it a lot as a result of I am nonetheless very new to Swift (ab a month of expertise) and am unfamiliar with these frameworks.