Getting Ready

This always happens when a VERY IMPORTANT PERSON comes to visit. New paint jobs, facelifts, and extra shifts to clean and pretty up everywhere.

All around the MTC and Area office little paint jobs, cracks, and the grounds are going through a rigorous treatment

I guess this is a good idea as I didn't even notice that the paint was streaking or getting dingy

No idea what they are doing up here - something important

The temple renovations were scheduled a long time in advance - I wonder if the other improvements were too?

Elder Rasband will come strolling through the Area and MTC next week and I wonder if he will even notice all the little details that have been improved? I think it would be very difficult to notice anything different as there is always a big push to improve every little detail when ever anyone from Utah comes - but especially when the Apostles arrive.

I have happy thoughts and dark thoughts on the whole issue of getting ready for dignitaries. Yes, I  want the Area to look wonderful and beautiful as an honor to someone who is a representative of the Lord. The inside scoop is that men are working for 65 pesos an hour for an over-time extra shift. So a man with four children takes home a little over 600 pesos on a regular day. He signs up for an extra shift, stays overnight and goes home the next day after working three shifts. The added benefit is that he doesn't have to pay the cost of going home and coming to work which is a little less than 250 pesos a day.

My heart just about cracked when I did the math. Men here regularly make a little over $10 A DAY, spend almost $5 for transportation and feed, clothe, and take care of their families with the rest. A true emergency could be life changing. Without God's grace and assistance they will never get anywhere fast.

The perils of over-tipping fall on deaf ears to me. Sorry to the other Senior missionaries on a tight budget who may follow. There may be expectations.  Five dollars goes twice or three times as far here as it would in America.

"2 To turn aside the needy from judgment, and to take away the right from the poor of my people, that widows may be their prey, and that they may rob the fatherless!" Isaiah 10:2