HAPPY EASTER!!! (OR PASCUA)

Hey!!!

Just some quick facts about Easter in Mexico:  Here Easter is called the Pascua.  And they have nothing like a bunny that leaves candy hidden in eggs for little kids to find.  The week before the Pascua they have the Semana Santa (the Holy Week).  During this week, the kids don't go to school, and banks are closed and everything.  In Iztapalapa, they do a ceremony of the last week of Christ's life in which one "lucky" man is chosen to haul a big timber on his shoulders through town, dressed in clothes like ancient Jerusalem, and he has to haul it up a hill where they then put him on the cross.  In Iztapalapa, he doesn't actually die, but apparently this celebration is done throughout various places of Central America and South America and in some places, the person really is crucified.  It's different, no?

This week has been crazy busy!!!

First off,  I have spent a ton of time in the offices this week, because today is the End of the Month, so all of the missions money has to be "zeroed out"  (AKA all reported for and all the excess funds deposited back into the bank).  I didn't know what I was supposed to be doing to prepare for it, so when the old Financial Secretary came by on Monday, he told me that it looked like a mess.  Yesterday he told me that this was the worst End of Month he had ever seen.  And it was horrible.  Yesterday I had to spend all day here in the Offices working and today I had to work from this morning until about 3:30 to finish it.  But it's done!  Whew!  The thing is that with every single little thing that the mission buys (with credit card or cash), I have to allocate it to an account of the church, go to the company and receive an invoice, then I have to upload the receipt and the invoice and then put an explanation of the purchase and send the invoices to the bank and to the church.  It might not sound like much, but when you have to do it for tons of purchases, it all builds up on you.  At the end is a picture of how many facturas I had on my desktop at the end of the week.   

I also had to go to the airport on Tuesday and again on Wednesday to drop off two missionaries.  One was a temporary missionary of our mission that just got his Visa so he's now going to his mission in Reno, Nevada.  The other was really sick, so he had to go home.  We always have to leave our house like at 3 in the morning to go to the airport, so it makes us really tired afterwards.  

This Tuesday, Sister Mecham came out of President´s office and said "Elder Jarrett, we need your help right now".  I entered the office and President told me that he just received an email that President L. Whitney Clayton (the President of the Quorum of the 70) is going to come to our mission on April 16, 2016 and we had to fill out an agenda of the program on the spot.  So President planned it right there and told me about it and I typed it all up.    But that is going to be Sweet!!!!

Well, sorry, a little boring, but that's it for this week!  We are SO Blessed!!!   I Love You All!!! Take care!  

Elder Jarrett