Elder Jordan Chatman: Week 9-Leaving to Taiwan- June 26, 2012

This week was the last week before Jordan left. He did not have time on his pday to write a letter because of packing and all the things they needed to do to get ready to go. But I, mom, will fill in a few things he said over his short emails and his phone conversation from the airport. The big event for him was the Sunday before he left. He was very thrilled to be at church with the prophet and many of the apostles of our church. He got to prepare the sacrament for the congregation and then bless the bread. He was thrilled to have been sitting very near where the prophet was. The prophet spoke for an hour and a half to the new mission presidents getting ready to go on into the field. Mission Presidents are a married couple who are over a mission and they run the whole mission. They supervise the missionaries and all the many assignments that go with that. They serve for 3 years. Jordan got to meet his new mission president, Pres. Daye and his wife at the MTC right before he was leaving. They are from Tennessee and he liked them a lot! They will be heading out at the beginning of July. So he will have Pres. Daye for nearly his whole mission.

He left to Taiwan on Tuesday, June 26. In the airport, he ran across some students who were speaking Chinese. So he stuck his head in their conversation and spoke Chinese to them. One of the kids was from Taiwan. He was very curious about Jordan and why he was here. He told him he was going to serve in his country for 2 years for his church. The guy was intrigued. They conversed in mostly english for a few minutesand a little bit of Chinese. The students were here studying English. It was interesting how our quiet Jordan is now starting conversations with others. He was so thrilled to be going to Taiwan. He called on Wednesday night from Taiwan. He had 60 seconds to tell us that he made it there and that he was fine. We were very happy that he made it there safely.

This is a picture of Jordan and Carter Lindquist. He is a young man who is in our Stake back in Vancouver, WA. He got in the MTC a couple of weeks before Jordan left. Carter is going on a mission to Mexico. They were excited to see each other.