It Took Me Long Enough

Feb 14 – Feb 22

Week 1 in Mexico MTC

I’m finally writing an email and I have so much to say! It’s taken me a bit but it’s finally here!

First off I’ll start by saying that I started my mission a whole week earlier than I was supposed to which was a huge surprise! I got a call from my mom one day and she told me the stake president had called her and said the church had messed up my starting date and instead of leaving in 10 days I was leaving in 3! I definitely was filled with so many emotions. Tears were shed both happy and sad haha but I was so excited to be starting my mission that I have been waiting for my whole life! I got to spend my birthday and last three days with my family and with the ones I love most! It was just perfect!

The first two weeks of home MTC were bittersweet. I loved it but I also had a really hard time. I loved my classes and my district but it was hard being at home and trying to stay focused and motivated. Home MTC was completely different than I had expected. I woke up at 6:30 every morning, did my studying, got ready and started my first class at 8:30. My first class was my gospel class and that went until 12:30. I had about a 3 hour break until my next class and that was our time to do personal, companion and language study. My last class of the day was my spanish class and little did I know from day one that it was gonna be all spanish. Absolutely no english. It was terrifying! I did not understand a single word they said. Let’s just say the reason I survived the first two weeks was because of Google translate. That was my first blessing.

My family was absolutely amazing and helped me so much with my millions of emotions. I was having a really hard time with the language and wasn’t grasping it the way I wanted to. All my siblings were in my same spot at one point learning a new language and they gave me the most perfect advice and just told me to have fun and not be too hard on myself. To practice as much as I can and not be afraid to mess up!! That was my second blessing.

MY COMPANION!! I LOVE HER!! Seriously I have so so much love for her. She has been so helpful and so patient with me and my spanish. She is absolutely hilarious and there is not a single time we are not laughing. Our personalities fit so well together and we just have fun!! That is something that I need! I realized that if I had started my mission a week later, I wouldn’t have been her companion and I just know that we were supposed to be companions! God really does have a plan for me and all of us and I just need to put my trust in Him and know that things happen for a reason! That was my third blessing!

My time at home MTC went by so so fast! I couldn’t even believe it! I gave my farewell talk on Charity-The pure love of Christ and it was the most perfect topic. I was filled with so much love and was so happy to share my testimony on the love of Christ and for the love I have for everyone, especially for the people I will get to teach! I was so lucky to have all of the people I love most share such a special day with me. It just reminded me of how much love I have in my life and I am just so so grateful for everyone who shaped me into who I am! Again such a huge blessing in my life!

It finally came down to my last day at home before I left to the Mexico MTC and of course knowing me, I waited till the very last minute to even start packing. I pulled a nice little all nighter and just packed and cleaned and did everything that I had two weeks to do haha in one night. By 5am I got it done and got in a quick little 30 minute power nap before I had to wake up to leave to the airport! Somehow I managed to do it all and I was in shock that it was time for me to leave my home and my family! I have never really left my family and I didn’t know how to even feel! All I can say is that I have felt so many emotions these last couple weeks and it’s hard! We started driving to the airport and I had realized I forgot to say goodbye to my dog and that was the first thing that made me start to break haha. My parents walked me to security and when I had to say goodbye I was trying so hard not to cry but just seeing them waiting there as I went through security, it made me so emotional! My sweet, proud parents just videoing me and blowing kisses and saying goodbye and saying that they loved me, I was so sad and right as I finished with security I broke out in tears. I got to my gate and got to meet some Hermanas in my district! I was filled with so much love and I knew that everything was going to be OK!

I am so grateful for a family that loves me and supports me so much and the decisions that I make! Just another one of the many blessings that I have recognized.

The two weeks I was at home MTC I recognized so many blessings in my life. I knew that my mission wasn’t going to be easy and I learned that quick but every single day I recognized more and more blessings because of it. I realized that I was supposed to start my mission when I did and that because of it I received so many blessings. I know that everything is in God’s timing. He placed certain people in my life at certain times because He knew it would strengthen me and I would grow as a missionary and as a person. I am so grateful for my Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ and their infinite love for me. I know that this gospel is true and I can’t wait to share it with the people of Minnesota!

I love you all more than you know!!

(I’m gonna write another email talking about my experience here at the Mexico MTC!)

I promise things will be more organized by next week haha!

Hermana Olsen ❤

I am in love with the Mexico CCM! Absolutely in love! I never want to leave!!

I had a direct flight from Utah to Mexico and it just didn’t even seem real that it was all happening!! We had about 15 missionaries on the flight and it was just so fun to see everyone and see all the missionaries dispersed throughout the plane. I got to talk with the missionaries around me and got a little nap in before we landed in Mexico!!

When we landed, me and the other Hermanas walked together off the plane and just walking into the airport was crazy. The line for customs was insanely long but luckily we got pulled into a different line that only took 5 minutes. After we got all our luggage I found the Elders in my district! It was so fun to finally meet and see them all! We waited in the airport for about another hour and a half before all the missionaries were finished and we all got on the bus to go to the CCM! It was about an hour drive to the CCM and I just looked out the window at the city the whole ride. I love how Mexico is filled with so many colors!! There is artwork absolutely everywhere and I just loved watching and seeing their culture. Oh my goodness it was so cool to see it all. The driving was insane tho! Like seriously so crazy. I don’t understand how people don’t get on crashes every 5 seconds. All in all it was fun to watch haha.

We finally arrived at the CCM and you pull up to this whole gated community with a sign that looks like a missionary name tag saying La Iglesia de Jesucristo de los Santos de los ultimas dias! Ahhh my heart was beating so fast I was so excited!! We pulled in and I was just in awe. It was absolutely beautiful! There are cute white buldings everywhere. The landscaping is gorgeous. This place is just so well kept. There is not a single second people arent working outside to keep it looking nice. It just feels so homy and safe. Our own little bubble. I love it. We got introduced to the CCM Presidents, the Hymas’s and then we got all our books and got all settled into our cute little apartments!

My companion got to the CCM around 8pm and I was so excited to finally meet her! Like I said before she is the funniest person ever and I am so grateful for her. For as much as she is funny, she is even more of an example to me. Oh my goodness she is always helping me with my spanish and sharing her sweet spirit. Me and her have a lot of fun together. Seriously when I tell you we are constantly laughing, we are literally constantly laughing. Our district is the best haha! Everyone just has such different personalities that we just all fit. Everyone is so random in the very best way and we all just get along so well. I got so so lucky with the people here!

Our first day was crazy! Everything is very set to a schedule. We got to finally meet our teachers in person and they are AMAZING!!!! Again I got lucky with the people because our teachers are the absolute best! They make class and learning so fun and I seriously have felt the spirit so so strong. Our gospel teacher brought up the idea that our district should choose a day to all match. So Thursdays we all wear the same color. We’re so cute! In our spanish class we do this game called “Who is the latino”. We choose a person and they have to only speak Spanish. Since it’s our spanish class we all only have to speak in spanish anyways but we still have times we use english, so if we are the latin@ we can’t speak any and at the end of class our teacher has to guess who it is. He’s never been able to guess so I guess you can say our spanish is too good.

My companion and I have been trying to speak to more natives and at first I was nervous but I have never once regretted doing it. We have made so many friends and they are all AMAZING! We sat with some Latinos at dinner and they helped us practice our spanish. Of course the Elders were teaching us all the slang. One elder taught us Bueeeeno haha which is why I titled my email that. It’s what you say when a conversation ends and it’s awkward and you want to leave haha so now whenever we see eachother my companion and I always say bueeeeeno. It’s so fun to see them around CCM and talk with them!

Since I love LOVE all things pink it’s a little on-going joke with some Elders that they try and mimic me and figure out what I would say about something that’s pink and they are always commenting how I am always wearing pink. You can say I’m the Elle Woods of CCM. I love to stand out and I choose to by wearing pink!

My first meeting with my mission president and his wife.

I love classes. We have long long days of sitting and studying and learning. It’s exhausting. By the end of the day everyone is just so tired that we just have fun. It’s that tired fun you know? Our very last hour of class is from 8-9ish pm and that’s mentoring where our teachers pull some missionaries out and chat and see how they’re doing. While they do that all the other missionaries study the language and all that stuff. On our language app there’s an option to play heads so we all decided to play. It was seriously the funnest thing that we have done hahaha. We had to describe the words on the phone only using spanish words and everyone was just screaming and acting stuff out and it was just hilarious. We were all dying of laughter. Every single person! It was so intense that one of the Hermanas fell out of her chair. Anytime someone guessed the word right everyone just screamed ¡Sí! It was the hardest we had all laughed and it seriously strengthened our relationship with our district so much. At first our district was more reserved but I’m sure it’s all our nerves of being in a new place with a new and different schedule but this past week we have all opened up so much and just gotten so much closer!

Sundays I thought would be a nice day to go to church and then rest but no. Sundays are busy! We have church at 9 and we are all told to be prepared with a 5 minute talk in spanish. Every week our branch president will pick 4-5 speakers without any notice so thats why we have to always be prepared! Since the week was so much busier than we had thought my companion and I didn’t prepare one. When we got to Sacrament 4 speakers got called and it wasn’t me or my companion. There was a beautiful musical number and then our branch president went up and asked my companion to speak. She thought she was totally in the clear since we already had 4 speakers and she hafnt prepared a thing. She went up there and did absolutely amazing. Oh my goodness. I felt the spirit so so strong when she spoke. If you asked her how it went she would tell you it was terrible but oh my goodness no. I was filled with the spirit so so strong because her words came from her heart! She didn’t have it prepared or written down. She spoke from her heart and you could just see and feel the spirit through her. It was amazing. She is such an amazing example to me. The rest of our Sunday we had meetings with the branch president, classes and district lessons and we ended the night with a devotional in the auditorium with all the other missionaries.

For the devotional we watched Elder Holland speak and oh. my. goodness. His words are so so powerful. He spoke on how important it is for us missionaries to study and use our time, which isn’t our time, but the Lord’s time to put in the work to learn what we need to learn to be successful missionaries. When I say he talked about I actually mean he like kind of talked stern. But it was so powerful. You could see the passion he had about missionary work and how we aren’t here to just be here. We are here to study and learn and teach not nonchalantly but with a purpose. I was hit by his message and it really made me realize I wasn’t doing enough and that I needed to do more. It was definity perfect motivation for me. The musical numbers we all sing at the devotionals are so powerful. We all sing in spanish and just hearing everyone and realizing why we are all here, it is just so beautiful. It makes me emotional and am just filled with so much love and joy when we all sing. It’s so powerful.

Today, Wednesday, our pday we were able to go to the Mexico city temple! It’s so so beautiful!!! I am so happy we are able to go while in the CCM. We were able to do sealings and an endowment session. It was so cool to experience it all in spanish and to perform the ordinances in spanish. It was such a special moment and I’m so excited to go next week! We are able to go every pday! We got to walk through the visitor center afterwards and it again was beautiful. Everything here is just beautiful!!! The bus ride back again I just looked out at the city and the people and it will never get old. They have these gondola things that they use to travel around Mexico city. They just are traveling through the air and it’s the craziest thing. When we got back I got to call my family and loved ones and it was just perfect. I got a nice burn while I was outside talking with them and I just can’t wait for my missionary tan lines haha.

My experience here has been the absolute best and I’m SO happy that I still have 3 more weeks here! Time really does fly and I’m making sure to take it all in and not take any moment for granted. I just love being a missionary and even though it’s hard at times it really is so worth it.

I love you all more than you know!!

Hermana Olsen<3

1. My district!