WOW WOW WOW

OH MY HEAVENS. MOTHER OF PEARL. One of my fav. quotes of the week "We can look at the Dome of the Rock while eating dinner. What up!!!!" -Jefferson

My heart is so full of gratitude. It is spilling over. I am so happy. I still can't believe I am here. I am pretty sure my mind and body are in shock mode. My body from the flight and time change, and my mind because of the spiritual uplifting and culture shock. I cannot WAIT to show you guys(family) Jerusalem! Okay, enough of the feelings and craziness that probably don't make sense.

So I traveled in a group of five to Denver and then to D.C. From D.C. we joined a big group of kids on the flight to Vienna and then to Tel Aviv. My group of five has had quite the adventure and experience. Both of our connecting flights were pretty tight. We had to sprint to catch the plane to Vienna! A girl named Ashley sat next to a person who threw up on her brand new scriptures, Erica had a huge bird poop on her arm and they lost our luggage. We still haven't gotten it back yet, but hopefully by tonight it will be here. Hopefully.... Underwear can only be turned inside-out once. Everyone is joking about how good our blogs are going to be.

It has been utterly amazing. My heart is filled with tears everytime I look out of the JC (Jerusalem Center) and see our view of Old Jerusalem with the Dome of the Rock. We hear the Muslim call to prayer five times a day- including 4 in the morning. Our Brance President said we will eventually be able to sleep through it. I woke up this morning to it and just smiled and reminded myself I was in Israel. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Everyone is so nice and trying to get to know each other. There are some real characters. I already have a deep love for everyone! Yesterday we took a tour of the JC and had a bunch of orientations. Everyone is split into two groups with the religion professors. We will switch teachers when we move to New Testament. My Professor is Muhlstein. He is awesome and I love his family. Between the two religion teachers we have 11 children in the JC. He split our group into Hogwarts houses with group leaders- I am in Slytherin. I was happy about that for some reason.

Today we had breakfast at 6:30 and OH THE OASIS IS THE BEST PLACE EVER!!!! THe food is amazing and healthy. I LOVE it!!! And we eat outside with the view. Freaking incredible. We had more orientation and then we split into groups with seven people and we each group had a teacher/advisor/person take us on an orientation walk of Old Jerusalem. OH MY GOSH. I LOVE IT SO MUCH!!! Total cultural center. I am in love. All forms of religion and peoples and old alleyways and markets and diff. food and dress and language and did I mention that I love it?! You can tell that most of the streets and walls and arches have been there forever- probably when Jesus Christ was here. When Jesus Christ was here. HERE. WOWZA!!! This is so incredible. This is sooooo INCREDIBLE!!!! This is just amazing. I still can't get over it. I absolutely love it here. There is just something about it. It is already a part of me. There is just something special here. Oh yeah and the garden of Gethsemane is about a hill away. WHAT?!?! I tried a falafal today- AMAZING and Israel ice cream- YUM!!! There are soldiers everywhere with guns. creepy but cool. Oh and it was so great and funny- there would be these security guys from the JC popping out of nowhere in the city. "Wait I've seen you before... oh your with us!" It was so crazy to just see them all of the sudden and then lose sight of them! It helped me feel safe. They showed us this place where we can go on the top of the roof and have a great view of the city! Family- I'll have to show you! LOVE YOU GUYS SO MUCH!!!! I am having the best time ever and I am just so grateful for this opportunity and I can't wait to have more adventures!!! I am so happy to live here. It feels like home.

HURRAH FOR ISRAEL!!!!