May 16,2016

The bad, the good, and finally got it.  Yesterday at the meeting in Salcoatitan, Carlos had said that Ricardo could not attend the Monday leader’s meeting and that we really did not have that much to cover and maybe we could skip this week.  We had gotten the signed papers we needed for immigration from Bro. Larin through Seily when she got back from Honduras so we decided to try to head back out for San Salvador this morning.  When I walked Wicket I went by to leave the papers with Cesar so he could fill out our parts in Spanish.  When Charlotte and I went by in the car to pick him up we realized we had the wrong application papers.  Fortunately we had some blank copies of the correct ones so he filled those out and we used Bro. Larin’s signature and the church seal to complete the papers on the way to San Salvador.  By the time we got to the lawyer’s office it was after 11 and there was a couple ahead of us.  We ended up not leaving there until about 12:40 so we went to Burger King for some lunch and then on over to immigration.  The lady took our application papers and set an appointment for us to come back again on Wednesday.  I said “Oh no, we only had two things that needed to be changed and we still have to come back again?  Can you please see if they could look at our papers today so we can finish up without having to make another trip.”  She said ok but this was always the procedure because they had several other people whose papers they had to check each day.  She was gone quite a while but when she came back she said they would do it and told us to go back to the waiting area.  We sat there for about 1 ½ hrs. and finally a man came and said, “You can go and pay now” which meant they had approved what we had turned in.  After we paid we had to wait a little longer and then each of us had to be seen by an interviewer again to get a new photo and re-verify all of our personal data.  After that we waited another 30 minutes while our cards were made.  Finally at about 4:30 we walked out with new 3 month temporary cards that we will have until they issue our new 1 year cards and we will have to go back by to pick those up.  Our temporary cards take us into August but the one year cards may be issued before then.  When Caleb and Della got their papers accepted they did not have to do anything else before getting their year cards but with ours all the in home interviews and stuff happened after we got the temporary cards so we do not know if we are really all finished or if we will have more process to go through like last year.  I told Charlotte that if we have the in home interview we should be good to go because we have lots of members and coworkers here who will be very glad to speak on our behalf, and we have our bank records and a bag full of all kinds of receipts where we have been supporting the El Salvadoran economy and can show them our church locations in Juayua and Salcoatitan.  Anyway, we are so thankful that at least we have gotten over these hurdles and are moving in the right direction.  We started the re-application process last Monday so that was only a week but it sure was a long one with three trips to San Salvador and the temporary difficulties and uncertainties of getting all the paperwork done.  We finally arrived home about 6 pm….10 hours after we had left.  We were very tired but at least it was mission accomplished.