Hermana Ashlyn Jorgensen: August 2013

Madonna's Multicultural Funeral Home

August 12, 2013

OKAY HELLO!!! ALREADY HAS BEEN ANOTHER WEEK! WOW! no the time isn't getting any faster i just said that so you guys would think that i think that the time is speeding up! hahaha wow im funny! anywaysss!

CRAZY STORIES ALL AROUND!!

Alright how great is this. Tuesday night we get a call from our branch president and he is like can you sisters go to this funeral it is for a less actives mother. Of course we said yeah. So we show up to the funeral home. The name of the funeral home is "Madonnas Multi Cultural Funeral Home".... Awkward right off the bat. Like what do we have to claim that it is multi cultural? Like what does it matter?! OF COURSE IT WILL BE MULTICULTURAL NO ONE IS AMERICAN HERE!!! So we show up its raining so we are slightly damp.. As we walk in EVERYONE LOOKS AT US. Here we go. 1. It was a Spanish funeral. 2. No one spoke our language. 3. People looked at us like you girls are in the wrong place. 4. Everyone was sobbing. 5. The deceased is just sitting right in front of us. 6. I was trying so hard not to laugh because like it was the most uncomfortable/awkward thing of my life! Okay so we are sitting in the seats and no one approaches us... weird right?! Ive never even met the less active lady whose mom died, and my companion has only seen her like twice so we couldn't even find her.. (she wasn't even there yet) We sat there for 35 minutes and our branch president walked in, literally thanked my Father In Heaven. Well he gets there and he is like where are the elders? We didn't know. They were supposed to be there but they didn't show up... SO we wait 20 more minutes keep in mind everyone is just sobbing and we are the only white girls... who don't speak Spanish!! So its now 50 minutes later the president was like okay we will start the service. We have to go to the front of everyone (NONE OF THEM WERE MEMBERS OF THE LDS FAITH) so as we go to the front the elders finally walk in. Again i thanked my Heavenly Father because it was getting a little uncomfortable! President started the funeral service and says as he is up there that the missionaries will be singing " How Great Thou Art" for them... in Spanish... ACAPELLA. HAHAHAHAH WHAT?!!!!! YOU ARE LITERALLY KIDDING. We all stood up and just MURDERED IT. After One of the elders got called up to say the opening prayer and didn't even know the name of the deceased and in the prayer he was like, "I'm thankful for... (paused for like 1 minute literally) this sister... " Seriously MISSIONARY WORK IS SO AWESOME!!! never in my life would i go to a Spanish funeral for someone i didn't know and just sing a church hymn in there language... GOD BLESS SERVICE!!

Thank you for everything i felt so much love this week! A letter from the Goodfellows and Stevo... I LOVE THEM! ALSO the Morgans... I MISS OUR WARD. We have such a solid ward. Tell aunt Kimmy i love her and thank you for the letter, and Kaleb's talk was incredible! who is he?!! Not the same Kaleb i remember!!

hmmm well the work is pretty slow here i guess. We had 3 investigators.. The dad was a member but the mom is not. He has 4 kids one girl who is 16, two boys who are 13 and 9, and then a baby. We had all the kids with a date for baptism. besides the baby.. Well we saw them Monday, and had an appointment Thursday. We were going to check on their reading Wednesday and they didn't answer so we left a stick note.. We came back the next day no one was there so we left a sticky note. We came back the next day and NO ONE WAS THERE. Well we were driving by on Saturday and we saw the 13 year old Steven outside and we pulled over and talked to him, his mom and siblings were coming down the road so we waited! We said we wanted to come visit them and asked where they have been... OH WELL THEY ARE MOVING! Saturday morning they all moved. In a matter of 3 days they picked up and left... that happens all the time here. Missionaries told me that people do that here but i didn't believe them... Well NOW I DO!! So the work is hard and slow but we are trying to do our best! I LOVE THIS MISSION. IT IS HUMBLING AND IS GIVING ME A CHANCE TO CHANGE. I NEED TO. i love the support that i have out here from you all. Bubba how was your bday? Did you get our card and presents? Baby your pictures and everything just made my life! Landon went into the mtc in Mexico today how exciting. alright i love you guys!!!! seriously thank you for everything you do for me. You are always in my thoughts and prayers. xoxxx

District Bowling day.

How cute is she?

I had to speak at a baptism of the Elder's again. President Jeppsen came! NERVOUS!

Her name is Melina and she is in our ward.

I can't believe I ate the whole thing

August 5, 2013

alright HELLO FROM HERMANA JORGENSEN WHO COULDN'T BE MORE JEALOUS OF YOU BOTH!!! i

wonder what it would be like to just frolic along Europe on a nice cruise ship!!! PROBABLY NICER THAN ME SITTING HER IN NEW JERSEY WITH 19 MOSQUITO BITES ON MY LEGS WHICH CAUSE ME NOT TO SLEEP!!!

Yeah okay so this letter will probably be short and sweet. This week has been wonderful and not so wonderful the not so wonderful parts well hmmm EVERYONE CANCELLED ON US!! whoop there it is, missionary work! haha But funny stories lets just hear funny things! I know i told you sorry in advance that my letters probably wouldn't be these spiritual letters like Lexi's but i just write what i feel like, what i loved about this week, or what just keeps me going!

OKAY HAHA SO lets start off with the food of my mission. So, we go to this members house and we told them last time that we cant eat at there house cause there is a mission rule that we can only eat at someones house 2 times a month. So we planned on not eating food at there house so we had dinner, and then we went to there house. WELP NOPE. THERE IS FOOD!! i wonder where the miscommunication was at... OHHH YEAH THE LANGUAGE BARRIER THAT IS WHERE ALL THE MISCOMMUNICATION COMES IN!! HAHA oh and let me just tell you not just food.. STRAIGHT UP SHRIMP LIKE THE WHOLE THING OF THE SHRIMP!!! tentacles, crawlers, THEE EYEBALLS.... oh heck no you know i straight up just prayed and said Heavenly Father you better help me get this down, if you brought me here and knew they were going to feed me this! MIRACLE :) i got it down, about had a nice freak out but i turned to prayer and it worked :) haha

So it was raining and me and the other sisters i live with all went out and played in the rain :) oh and does it RAIN IN NEW JERSEY!!! Now a more spiritual thought. I had the opportunity to have an interview with president. Can i just say i love my president with all my heart. We got in there and he was so interested in how my family was doing and how everything was back at home. Then we continued to talk and he is just so inspired and so uplifting. He told me that he has seen incredible change in me. He said that he knows i can do this!

wow do i have the BEST family around. I sure do love you guys. I am doing great, the work is slow but it is building! Be safe and know that i love you all!!

ps- sister cheatham wrote me!! SUCH A SWEET GIRL! Also grandma jorgensen wrote me, already wrote her back :) she is just the greatest :) also Lexi and i sent pres a birthday present bubba is getting so big!!!

PPS- mom i got your letter and post card, i sure love how much you think about me! xoxxx

Now you see it truly was a MIRACLE

I think there is a curb and sidewalk under there

Rain days are the best.

Yep! They are following me

July 29,2013

okay, HOLA EVERYONE!

WELL what a week! Its been okay, a little hard but not that bad. I AM LOVED. WOW. Packages from The Hedgers, and Grandma and Grandpa Robinson! OH and the countless letters and post cards, GREATEST FAMILY EVER. This week was very odd just because Sister Morrison has still been on rest so we have to do a lot of splits.

BUT lets start out with my great old born again christian friends! YEP! THEY ARE FOLLOWING ME I SWEAR!! I saw them 4 times in one day. We were at walmart and Sister Atkinson and i were getting honey and i saw them and was about to turn around but we made eye contact. So, we couldn't awkwardly not keep walking so we continued to walk and the guy came up to us and instantly said wow you girls are the ones who think Jesus and Satan are brothers.. I'm like oh HECK NO! DO NOT START WITH US!! haha We proceeded to like kind of talk but not really we just kept looking for our honey. He was relentless. He kept hounding us, and Sister Atkinson started getting mad and just let them have it! Welp there is me.. awkwardly NERVOUS! I just kept saying ya know we got to go, and for 10 minutes in walmart they were just pretty much yelling! I was like oh you are LITERALLY KIDDING! HOW EMBARASSING! We started walking away, and he started walking and talking.. I was like oh no!! I told him to stop talking to us.. We see him wave to someone and of course my heart drops I'm like its another one of them... ITS HIS RIGHT HAND MAN! His good ol buddy! He continued to ream us! I told them goodbye and at the end they said, " We only tell you these things because we LOVE YOU GIRLS." EWWW WHAT NO!! SICKOS!!! YOU DON'T LOVE US!!! We walked away.

Later that day I went running and as we were running i saw them at the stop sign in there pedophile looking van, and they rolled down the window, said hi, and waved with a creepy smile... I felt kind of nervous. We ran about 2 more miles and THERE THEY WERE AGAIN WALKING! Thanks goodness on the other side of the street.. so i thought! NO, they straight up were yelling at us across the street!!! I felt very nervous so we ran home! Later that night me and my companion were walking to our appt. and guess who we see... yeahh don't even get me started!! ahah gross!

Anyways I finished ALMA FOR THE FIRST TIME IN MY LIFE. I LOVE THE BOOK OF MORMON. i would say that is where my testimony is at. i absolutely love it. Okay the FUN PART! I went to Ellis island! It was so fun, brought back so many memories. Man did i feel a little homesick but i met SO MANY COOL PEOPLE! People from India, Israel, Japan, China, Albania, South Korea, Peru, Mexico, France, Italy, Spain, Greece, Russia, Africa... You name it i met them! Almost none of them spoke English it was awesome! I got to use my Spanish haha The little that i know! After we came back and we went to dinner with our senior couple. They are seriously the greatest people ever. They took us out because they felt so bad sister Morrison had to be in the hospital, and they loved how willing we were to help her out! I will definitely visit them in Utah after the mission! OH ALSO I WILL BE IN THE CHURCH NEWS PAPER!!! SO LOOK FOR ME! I will be in it because of Ellis island :) Send it to me if you can?

I also got a lot of packages this week.. I am so blessed. Tell the Hedgers right now thank you! I gave all the toys away to some kids in my branch that have nothing, and they LOVED THEM!

Okay I hope you all enjoy your trip and your upcoming week :) Your letters and support mean nothing but the world to me. I LOVE YOU ALL. I'm staying strong don't worry about me!

15 months more :)

Love. Hermana Jorgensen! xoxx

ps. Can we go to Peru? MY FAVORITE PEOPLE IN THE WHOLE ENTIRE WORLD!!!