A little bored

6 September 2015

This week has not been near as fun as the last couple — it was way too normal and not near stressful enough.  ;)   Honestly I've been a little bored. It’s been interesting.

• What has your weather been like there?

It’s been rainy a little the last day or so and on my trip we had a ton of rain, but I'm still getting to the week, so ya!

• Who are these parents that cooked you roast for Sunday?

I told you about the Warners right? They are this married couple that are working as the nurses for the mission so they kinda work in the offices with us. It’s way fun to have them and she cooks us real Sunday dinner… like we had stuffing with fried chicken this last week!

• Are you going to travel to Neuquen? it is a 7 hour drive from Mendoza.

I’m not traveling, they are coming to me to do the same thing that I did in San Luis, I'm actually going back to San Luis tomorrow to start another wave of work, but this time with 36 instead of 25 so it should be crazy and with Neuquen we are going to do 43 I think, but thats not going to happen until next month.

• Who is the boss you talked to about going to Neuquen?

There is this old guy named Elder Vilche who is helping a lot of the more illegal missions get legal right now and he is awesome, but he asked me to make an entire plan for the other mission to do what I did. I made like a spreadsheet of times and prices for the things, made the budget and made the horario is the word in Spanish, but I don't know what it is in English….

• It seems so super scary that you are carrying so much money around on you—do you have a hide-y pouch on you that you keep it in??

I never really carry money with me, I carry my card, but in San Luis it’s much easier with cash so I had to use cash and then when I was here to pay fees I have to use cash, but no, I just use a scripture case and it works great, people just think it’s a Book of Mormon when in reality its 6 thousand dollars!

• When you get your people legal what do you do with the papers? File them?

So the papers I get are a paper that states they are legal for 3 months, and then their papers need to be processed in that time before we get a ID card that says we are residence here for a year, now two — but that is a really new change! So I just need to get all the papers to migracions, get some signatures and then I wait!  Yes I file them so I know who is legal and who is not! I also have computer programs that help me!

• How many Elder are in your pens? Who are they?

We have 5 elders in our pension, but we can house up to 20, but we rarley do. We have me, Elder Bingham my comp, Elder Romero, Elder Solomon, and Elder Jacobsen. We are the office workers!

• How do you keep track of what each Elder or Hermana needs to have done so that they are legal, since each nationality seems to need different things?

Everyone needs the same papers, but it’s just different from country to country what they look like, but to get stuff I go to consulates which isn't normal, most people just ask Buenos Aires to do it but I can, I don't know why they do it there, I bet its harder when they don't have the person with them, but whatever its their deal not mine! 

• So if everything closes for siesta at 1pm—what time does everything open in the morning?

Basically everything opens at 8 in the morning, so I have a solid 5 hour window to get stuff done. All banks close at that hour, all official building close then, all everything except food closes then.

• What is a distribution Elder? What are the different jobs and titles of the Elders in the offices and what do they do?

So we all have jobs… I’ll explain:

Elder Benedict, secretary to the President, also secretary of visas and travel. I take all of presidents calls, I talk to parents, I send out group emails to the mission, I take care of minor stuff around here, and I do travel and visas as well! 

Elder Bingham is the financier or the secretary of finances, he is the money of the mission. He makes sure we all have money at the start of the month, that people have the rent money to pay for the housing, he pays mission bills and a ton of other random stuff, and he just makes sure we have money to keep going. He works close to as much as I do…not quite, but he definatly works the next hardest!

Elder Romero is the pensionista or the secretary of housing, he takes care of all housing needs and he makes sure we are all taken care of. He looks at peoples housing, makes sure it works and gets us new housing when we need it! 

Elder Solomon is the historiador or the secretary of references and records. He takes all the baptism info and sends it to the area presidency, and makes sure that no one has lack of supplies, and he helps all of us…he has a really easy job.

Elder Jacobsen has kind of a made up job because he broke his foot and doesn't want to go home, so we put him in charge of like our books and the stuff we sale to missionaries, like journals and Books of Mormon in English and stuff like that. So he doesn't do much either, but he keeps busy!

WOW that was a lot of questions, to the week!

Monday I went to migracions and worked there for the day, arguing about some papers and I got 8 people legal for a full year from it, so that was cool! I felt happy about that! But it wasn't really hard!

Tuesday I had a little interview with the guy who buys all my tickets for me for the mission and we chatted and it was fun! He really was just helping me learn how to be a better secretary and how to do this San Luis stuff and it was fun! Then I didn’t do much more…honestly this week was easy.

Wednesday I went to the consulate and took care of some background checks and got someone a new ID card from Chile, but other then that nothing. Elder Bingham went on a trip to San Juan to do some stuff, so I was bored really. I did meet the most attractive Argentine that day, I’ll be honest… there isn't many beautiful women here, but this girl knocked my socks off! I’m ready to go and marry her right now! ;)

Thursday I went and did errands with Elder Bingham and then Elder Romero asked me if I wanted to make a 3 hour trip to San Rafeal that day with him, I was all over that! So at one o’clock I left with Romero to go to San Raffy and I mad a three hour drive in two and it was awesome…speed laws are not a thing here. I passed cops and they didn't even get mad at me, it was so fun! I honestly love Elder Romero so much, him and Bingham will be my friends for forever! Then I got so wet I took off the clothes and it was just fun! Then we drove home in the pouring rain and it was fun!! i just sat and chatted with Romero for six hours and it was way fun! 

It never rains and it was hailing in that picture, but I was already soaked so I thought I would get me a good picture!

Friday I honestly did nothing. I got a little bit of stuff ready for San Luis, but really it pretty much is already there! So I just was bored which sucked, yesterday was hard for me!

Today I bought some gifts for my bosses children that I'm going to meet this next week in San Luis! Wish me luck, I'm going to need it! 

I love you mom! Be safe and happy! 

Love,

Elder Jayson Benedict