Ordinary Day - Friday, June 18, 2010

Wow! This week has flown by! Even the elders commented on it. I guess it was because every day was filled with anticipation and lots to do.

Our American friend, Bill Kennard, who is a missionary/teacher for the Christian School called Biaca and lives in our apartment building was flying back to the states tonight (we think). The school term is over and he isn't going to remain here and continue teaching anymore. He has been here two years and now his father is in ill health and his mother needs his help. We don't have a picture of him and we wanted to tell him goodbye, so on Rich's excercise trek walking up all the flights of stairs this morning, he slipped a note under his door telling him that we would stop by his apartment at 5:00 when we returned from the office. That we did, but he was not home. We needed to go grocery shopping tonight and left around 6:00. We rang his buzzer again on our way out of the building, but still no answer. I guess we have missed him -- perhaps he had already left for the airport before we got home from work.

We hope we don't miss our neighbor, Tim Elmore, who lives across the hall. He is also a missionary/teacher at the same school and right now is in China working on his masters degree. He is suppose to return this weekend and pack up the rest of their belongings (his wife is in Canada visiting family) to move to Perú. He and his wife will teach there starting in the middle of July. We want his picture too.

The elders were already at the office when we arrived. Elder Peterson was doing last minute organizing of materials to take eight elders to Immigrations to complete steps in obtaining their residency. They went by train and after they were done, he took an elder with him in a taxi to get the other mission car that was being serviced.

While the elders are gone to Immigrations, their companions stay in San Fernando and go out street contacting. These three elders, Tapia (Argentina), Palma (Chile), and Cruz (Mexico) teamed up in a trio to go out working together. Luckily Elder Tapia is familiar with San Fernando as he was in a trio with the Assistants, Elders Fernandez and Lazo, until this last transfer when he was moved to another area.

Elder Hales and Elder Kroff worked at what they do best, apartments and finances, while I put the eleven baptisms in the computer and then was happy as a lark to start on my new missionary binders. We have eleven new missionaries coming on the July 13 transfer. I need to be careful that the welcome letter from the President that goes in each binder has the correct mission president's name on it. That would not be good to make that mistake.

When Elder Peterson finally returned to the office about 3:30, he was hungry and discouraged because they were unsuccessful in getting done what they went there to do. Some rule had been changed which caused an expiration date on some of their documents. Some paperwork had to be done over to update it. He spoke to anyone and everyone on up the line until he got to the big boss and pled his case that it had never been that way before and he was not informed. If fell on deaf ears, so he and the others have to return at a later date. It is so frustrating because it cuts into a large part of the day to take time out to travel, wait, wait, and more waiting and then return back to their areas. Now they have to come back and do it all over again.

Since the food from Hermana Bolentini came late to the elders, they will have a hard time eating it all up in a timely manner, so they invited us to eat with them today. She makes them tons of food and she is a good cook. We didn't wait for Elder Peterson, but the three of us had a delightful lunch and hardly dented the chicken, potato casserole, and pasta dish that was part of what she sent. Yum! Elder Peterson headed straight for the kitchen when he walked in the door.

Now we have two cars parked at the office, so Rich and I decided to take one of them shopping tonight to the big Carrefour that is too far away to walk. Besides, we had more to buy than would fit in our shopping cart. It is a treat to go grocery shopping with transportation. We can buy anything!

In scanning the produce section, these huge heads of cabbage caught my eye. They were monsters, and none were cut in half as sometimes is the case. There were some smaller ones in a different area, so I picked one about half the size of this one. I wanted some corned beef, but we couldn't find any. One would think it might be by the canned meats, tuna and all, but no such luck. I may have to check Disco. I think I bought my last one there.

In the supermarkets here, we take our bagged up produce to a place where the worker weighs it and attaches a label with the price on it. It is not done when checking out -- always before. Sometimes there is a lineup here, but it goes fast.

Carrefour has a McDonalds, but we didn't eat our usual tonight. We cleaned up the last of our empanadas when we got back home. And that's about as exciting as our Friday night got tonight.