Still Loving the CCM

Hey everyone!

Things are going great here at the CCM. Week three is almost done (they count your first wed.-sun. as week one) and things are looking up. Our schedule is finally becoming the same each day, so there might not be too much news, but exciting things are still happening. When I got here I thought I would never be able to carry on a conversation in Spanish, but the Lord works miracles for His missionaries! My Spanish has improved enough to where I don't need the guide at all and  I can have semi-normal conversations with my teachers and other missionaries. It is so amazing! Miracles do happen here at the CCM. 

Madison with her new best friend

Scriptures in two languages

This past week has been pretty fun. It has finally started to rain- and often thunderstorm- almost every day and on Saturday we had probably three different huge rainstorms. The grass and drains were flooding when we left our language lessons in the computer labs, so we naturally thought that we could just run really fast back to our classroom and not get wet. That was not so. We got soaked and it took about three days for my shoes to completely dry out. Moral of the story: we are not invincible and rain does not avoid missionaries, even if we have power from the Lord. I have come to the conclusion that Mexico City could probably beat New York for the title of the City that Never Sleeps. On the weekends it is one non-stop fiesta from Friday afternoon to Sunday morning. Music was constantly playing and festive pipe bomb booms were heard every few minutes. It was so much fun to listen to! They also finished the new bigger Comedor (dining area) and so we moved into the new one from our old one in the old gym. Its a good thing that we moved there, because we just got a HUGE new batch of missionaries (145! my generation only had 57) in yesterday. 

Our oldest district left on Monday (so sad ;( I miss them so much!), so we got a new district to replace them today. There are 12 new missionaries, 10 elders and 2 sisters. With their 12 new people, our zone doubles. It is pretty great. And since the zone leaders and sister training leaders left with the old district, we needed new ones. The new zone leaders are Elders Buchanan and O'Driscoll from the district above us and my comp and I were called to be the new sister training leaders. So fun! We get to take care of all the sisters in our zone (all 6 of us...), so I am excited. 

Hermana Jorgensen and Hermana White at the Temple visitor's center

Mexico City Temple

Hermana Jorgensen loved her day on the temple grounds

I'm a missionary and I love it

Sundays are a blast here. For sacrament meeting, EVERYONE in the zone needs to write a talk on the topic they give us because the branch presidency chooses 4-6 random people to give a talk (in Spanish!) after the sacrament has been passed. I haven't been called on yet, but it is bound to happen soon. Three of the six people in my district have been called on, so it will happen sooner or later :) We also listen to a recorded devotional by one of the general authorities or one given live by an area seventy or one of the mission presidents after sacrament meeting. The best part about Sunday though, is that we get a movie night before planning time! The movies are all ones made by the church and are full-length ones, so it is awesome! This past week we were super lucky because we got TWO movies! We watched the pioneer movie "Legacy" for our devotional and then "Joseph Smith: the Prophet of the Restoration" (aka my MOST FAVORITE CHURCH MOVIE EVER!) for our movie night. It was pretty clutch. 

Obligatory Companion Tag picture with Mexico City Temple

Finally, today for P-Day we got to go to the Mexico City Temple. That was a pretty cool experience. They took us, the other older district from our zone, and like 3 more districts to the temple visitor's center for a few hours this morning. The temple is so beautiful! I was so sad we couldn't go inside it though, because we didn't have time and because it is being renovated right now. But I got tons of pictures of it and the visitor's center. It was one of the most beautiful temples I had ever seen. 

Chokis -- Everyone's favorite cookie 

Jumex Granada -- Nectar of the Gods

That Is pretty much all I have to say today, so I am going to say goodbye. I am having so much fun down here at the CCM and I cannot wait to get out into the mission field!

Con amor,

Hermana Jorgensen

Week One at the CCM

Hermana Jorgensen and Hermana White outside their classroom building

Hey family,

I only have an hour here on the computer to read and write emails on P-Day, so I will try to get to all of your questions.

First week here at the CCM has been CRAZY! I started out by getting in to the airport around 6:30 and then driving through the absolutely insane streets of Mexico City for about half an hour to get to the CCM. There is no rhyme or reason to Mexican traffic. No lines on the streets, its just however many cars you can fit. Almost every single car had scrapes all over the side. And the intersections! No lights, just cars weaving in between each other. I almost had a heart attack about 20 times. I met up with two other missionaries in Gilbert (an elder and a sister) and then two more elders at the Mexico airport. When we got to the CCM we had a quick dinner and orientation, then they told us to go to our casas to unpack and meet our companions. My companion is Hermana White from Salt Lake City. She is going to the Washington, D.C. north mission and has a twin brother who is out on his mission in Quito, Ecuador. She seems like a really fun girl and I can't wait to get to know her. Our first full day started out so early. Thankfully I haven't had any trouble at all waking up to my alarm, but it is HARD to get up when all you want to do is sleep more. But knowing you are here to become a representative of the Church really helps to motivate. 

Oops...Her name tag was misspelled, so she will get a new one this week

After waking up and getting ready (half an hour is so short!), we went to class study before breakfast. Hermana White and I tried to study the spanish scriptures they gave us and we got through about 7 verses in an hour. We were able to meet our district (the group of other missionaries from the group that came into the CCM with us that we would be studying with for the next 6 weeks- 2 companionships of elders) and get to know each other. We all went to breakfast together.

Hermana Jorgensen and her districto

After breakfast is when the miracles began happening. I was so scared before coming here that I wouldn't understand anything and that I would be totally lost for days until I picked up a few words in Spanish, so I was praying my heart out to Heavenly Father that he would help me understand at least the most important things that our teachers were saying. He answered my prayers and more. Our teacher, Hermano Salvador, took my district on a tour of the CCM and was speaking solely in Spanish, but I understood almost every word he said. I was even able to translate a bit for the other missionaries in my district. The Gift of Tongues is REAL, and so is the mercy of God. Without it, I would be drowning.

The first few days were mostly orientations and reminders about what it means to be a missionary. Most of them were ok, but it definitely made the first 'week´ go by pretty slow. We had a few classes about teaching the gospel interspersed in the orientations. Oh, and we taught our first investigator [yes, a REAL (ok- it was a teacher pretending to be an investigator, but same difference) INVESTIGATOR] a lesson IN SPANISH on our second day. I was terrified. But again, the Gist of Tongues is real and God takes care of His missionaries. Hermana White and I were able to push through the lesson and it actually went really well. We taught him every day this past week and just had our last lesson yesterday. The spirit was so present and it was such an amazing experience. And our classes have been so amazing. I have learned more in the past week than I did In 4 years at high school.

The CCM is quite the interesting place. It used to be a boarding school high school here in the center of Mexico City. Fun fact- one of our branch presidents was a teacher here for 30 years and another one of our presidents was one of his students! The area all around here is quite the party town! There is fiesta music playing quite often. Also, people down here love to celebrate by setting off homemade pipe bombs and shooting guns at all hours of the day and night. We are completely safe here, but it is really interesting to hear a series of booms and then sirens rushing off to somewhere. Memories are definitely being made here. The CCM is so beautiful. There are flowers and palm trees and lush green grass everywhere. The CCM's nickname is the Celestial Kingdom of Mexico City and it is rightly named. I love it here. It hasn't been super rainy, but most days it doesn't get above the mid-70's. The food here is also pretty amazing, but I am still getting used to it. They serve a good variety of food, but most of it is stuff that is pretty common to the area. However, every Tuesday is Costco pizza night and it is everyone's favorite dinner.

Going along with the topic of food, I have discovered some jewels of Mexican snack foods, with the help of some elders in the older groups of our branch (we have 3 districts in our branch, including ours, of varying 'ages'- meaning they have been here for different amounts of time). They are Chokis and Granada Jumex. Chokis are like a much better version of Chips-Ahoy cookies (like everyone is addicted to Chokis) and Granada Jumex is the most delicious tasting pomegranite juice in the world. There are more delicacies to discover at the tienda here at the CCM, which I am sure I will find before my 6 (now 5) weeks are up ;)

I am sure I forgot some things, but I will try to include them in the next email. I am so glad to be here at the CCM learning to be a missionary and I cannot wait to get out to share the gospel with the people of Federal Way, Washington. I love you all, and I miss you so much. The work is hard, but it is good!
Con mucho amor!
Hermana Jorgensen

This is a safety circle, and the missionaries are told if there is any kind of natural disaster to go to one of these circles and wait for further instruction.  They are all over the CCM.

Hermana Jorgensen calls these the Quiddich rings.  She has no idea what they really are.  I wonder if they are an early warning detector for off shore earthquakes?  Of course that might just be because I am spooked by the article in the Atlantic this week warning that the entire western half of Washington is overdue to be obliterated by a mammoth earthquake followed by a devastating tsunami...Why did I read that article??????

On My Way.....

Welcome to the blog.  This will be a mixture of letters and pictures from Sister Jorgensen's mission, compiled in one place for her to have a record, and for her to share the amazing experiences she is having while out serving the Lord.  I (her mom) will post here as often as she sends letters.  I hope you enjoy reading about Hermana Jorgensen's mission.

So first off, I wanted to get down some remembrances of the weeks leading up to her send off.

Maddie wanted to go through the temple as soon as she could after her call arrived.  We finally got to the temple on May 7th.  Her YW president, Sister Carly Zamora, and her husband came with us.  It was a great evening.  After, we went to Cheesecake Factory for some late dinner. Going this early allowed Maddie to return many times before she headed out into the mission field. It was a great blessing for her, and she loved being in the temple.

She spoke in church on Father's day, which also happened to be her dad's birthday.  She spoke on fatherhood, and gave an amazing talk about what fatherhood means to her.  I will post a copy of her talk if I can find it.  I have only seen Scott cry several times in the 20 years we have been married, but her talk made him tear up a bit.  We were lucky enough to have Maddie's aunt and uncle and paternal grandparents here for the day, so they got to see her speak.

The next week was a whirlwind of shopping and packing.  Then we left for a week in Utah before arriving home July 5th.  July 7th, Madison was set apart by President Jay Andersen, our stake president.  It was an amazing blessing, full of counsel just for Madison.  It was a testimony to me that Heavenly Father knows Maddie -- her strengths and weaknesses, and wanted to encourage her to use her strengths and warn her to not allow her weaknesses to keep her from reaching her full potential.  We are thankful for President Andersen's inspired blessing.  From the moment she was set apart, you could see something different about her.  She really did have the mantle of missionary.  That night she  finished packing and preparing for her departure.

Hermana Jorgensen with President and Sister Andersen

The Family on the night of her setting apart.  L-R: Sophie, Scott, Noah, Maddie, Megan, Amy, and Sam

Wednesday July 8th we had to get an early start to the airport.  She was scheduled to leave on a 7:20 am flight to Houston, and from there to Mexico City.  When we arrived, we were confused to see the United terminal packed with people just standing in line and news crews milling about.  We quickly found out that the entire United ticketing and check in system had crashed nation wide, and that they were grounded from flying until their system came up.

Waiting patiently (while panicking inside hoping Dad makes it back with my call) for the United Airlines computer system to come back online

After standing in line for a few minutes, Hermana Jorgensen nervously re-checked her flight paperwork.  To her dismay, she read that she needed her original official mission call in order to enter Mexico on the visitor visa that the church had secured for her.  Her call was sitting at home in her closet.  She panicked.  We sent Scott home with the kids (so he could travel in the carpool lane) to grab the call, while we waited for the system to come back up (halfway hoping it wouldn't so Scott could get back with the call).  In the meantime, Hermana Jorgensen called the missionary travel office in Salt Lake City to let them know of her flight's delay.  The travel office encouraged her to stay and try to make her original flight, unless it looked like she would miss her connection in Houston.  Meanwhile, they booked her on a backup flight leaving on Delta at 2 in the afternoon, flying through LAX.  I think I mentally prepared myself that she would go out later that afternoon, so I didn't really "say my goodbyes".  As Scott pulled into the parking garage with the mission call, the computer system rebooted, and suddenly all of the United representatives were scrambling to get all the passengers on Hermana Jorgensen's flight checked in and up to the gate so they could leave as soon as possible.  Within about 10 minutes, she got checked in, grabbed her call, and took off like a shot for the TSA security gate.  We were running behind her saying, "Wait!  Wait!  We need goodbye hugs!"  When we finally got her slowed down for a second, we all said a very quick goodbye, and just like that, she was gone.

The only photo we managed to get of her as she sped off through security to make her flight

We got an email late that night from her.  It was short and sweet.  This is what it said:

Hey Mom and Dad,

I made it! I am safe and sound at the MTC here in Mexico City. The trip was long, but I made a few new friends along the way. I miss you guys tons and I love you bunches. The next time I will be able to email you is on my P-day, next Thursday. I am sure I will have tons of new stories to tell you once next Thursday rolls around. I love you all so much. Give the littles tons of hugs and kisses from me. 

Adios!

Hermana Jorgensen 

We are looking forward to hearing from her on Thursdays. We know this first week is a tough one, but we also know she will be fine.  She's pretty awesome like that.