Week 56 - 7/21/12

Basically every day this week has been tons of work, but I’ll go over some the highlights.

So I think it was Wednesday... not sure.  We had a ton of elders that had medical problems, so I had to be at the hospital all day.  So first at 12:00 I went to pay for an elder, then we get stuck waiting there until like 3:00 while we waited for the results.  We quickly ran to the food appointment. Then back to the hospital.  We took this same elder to a different doctor so he could read the x-rays and give him his prescription.  Then another elder had to be there for something, it don’t even remember what, maybe knee problems...  But I went to pay and the receptionist didn’t want to give me the 10% retention of the tax.  She wanted to raise the price and do something that a lot of doctors want to do but is not legal.  Normally they have to give us a 10% reduction and we then take care of the taxes.  Anyways, if it cost 800 pesos then they should take off 10 percent and charge us 720.  But she wanted to raise the price so after the retention it came out to be 800.  But she wasn’t doing it the wrong way correctly.  She wanted to charge me 880.  If she was going to do it the dumb way she should have tried to charge 888.88 duh.  Haha. Anyways so I was there in a heated battle, not so much, but trying to explain the Mexican tax law to her... I don’t want you think I’m a tax expert, I was just well... making it up as I go. I really have no idea what I’m talking about, just that that is how my boss has told me how I needed to do it.  Anyways... the receptionist said, I don’t know, let me ask the doctor.  So the doctor came out. I was so sick of this, it happens every time at the hospital. I was tired and did not want to fight a doctor again... So the doctor came out and the receptionist explained the situation.  At this point you see Elder Wigington ready to explode... then the doctor just said, I don’t care, its 80 pesos, I’m a Urologo not an accountant, just do what he says.   You could hear hallelujah singing from the heavens.  First of all I have never heard someone here say “I don’t care, its just 80 pesos” and second of all it was a miracle.  It’s like in a talk from Elder Bednar, one of the tender mercies of the lord.  Well right after this I had to go to another doctor to pay them and I was just skipping down the hospital in happiness and I got to the other doctor and they wanted to do the exact same thing.  Then I just whipped out the other receipt from the doctor I had just come from and said, HEY LISTEN (shout out to dad) haha, look at this receipt from this other doctor, this is how he did it and how you’re supposed to do it.  And they were like OHHH ok alright.  And they did it for me how they were supposed to.  Haha, Victory End of hospital story.

Ok so yesterday something awesome happened as well.  President bought us all dinner. But not just any dinner, like pizza or something, we went to a nice restaurant and he got us all chiles en nogadas.  They are soooo good.  It was so much fun to spend time with President and Sister Reeves and the assistants.  It was fun because it was just like hanging out and talking, no work and busyness. I think I might have told you about chiles en nogadas before.  They are a pepper that is stuffed with fruit and nuts.  Then breaded.  Then with white cream.  Mmmmm good eatin.

Anyways.  So this morning I signed the hospital contract! Finally haha.   Who would have thought that I would be signing contracts with hospitals in Mexico.  Gotta love it. 

So I have a little bit of an idea of what will be happening as far as me losing my job.  Yes... I will be losing my job.  But not for a little bit.  Another elder will be joining us in the office, mostly because he has a knee problem and shouldn’t walk much for the next month.  And the senior secretaries will be coming on the first.  We will train them for 2-3 weeks.  And then will finish our change as regular missionaries in our area.  So I will be in this area for at least another month and a half.  But anyways... I was just pondering about going back in the field.  I feel I finished my mission and now I have to go on another one. Haha. Cause right now we only teach a little little bit.  To be honest I’m a little nervous about going back into the field.  I feel like I’ve had a 3 month vacation.  Well we will see what happens. 

Love you all.

Curtis

Week 55 - 7/14/12

Ok, so another week.  Wow time is going so fast here in the office.  It’s a good thing I write in my journal because I can barely remember what happen yesterday.

Ok, Sunday. Well we went to church.  Then after church we had to go to the hospital to pay for some missionaries because we haven’t been able to finish the contract.  You know... we waste so much money on medical bills.  A simple observation that I have made here in the office....  There are missionaries who go to the hospital for very little things... and... I’m pretty sure there are some that have spent more on medical bills than they pay to go on the mission...  But seriously sometimes they go for the most lame things ever that come out to be nothing... then we pay like 500 bucks... I don’t think I like to see where a lot of money goes, I mean it’s supposed to be sacred money right? Haha well what can you do.  That’s life.

Monday. Well we had a normal morning.  Then we went to the food.  Wow it was sooo good. We ate some huge hamburgers. Very good. Very very good. Not even spicy.  Then we had to run back to the office for a little bit.  From there we had a family home evening with a family and a new investigator.  Her name is Araseli.  

Tuesday. Good day, we went and bought a whole bunch of stuff at Office Depot.  We helped one of our investigators with English.  His name is Dario.  He is really good guy, but he has been seeing the missionaries for like ever...since 2010, but we have had some very spiritual lesson with him and well we hope he will get baptized soon.  Then probably one of the most nerve racking things happen.  We had another lesson right after that with Araseli... but in our morning meeting with the president he asked us if we had any lessons and he wanted to come with us.  Now I mean that’s intimidating.  Not saying I’ve lost it all, but you get a little rusty on teaching after being in the office so much, I mean we only teach 2-3 lessons a week if we are lucky.  Anyways he came with us and it went really well.  I would have to say Presidente is pretty good at teaching.  I guess it would make sense... Oh also the assistants moved into our house. It’s interesting to be around the assistants a lot; they really aren’t the angels that have descended upon the mission.  You see a lot more them just being themselves.  One is going home in a week and I would have to say... he is a little dead.  Haha can’t blame him. 

Wednesday.  We got to wake up bright and early to go drop the assistants off at the mission house.  Well, a lot of running around.  Going from hospital to old office to who knows where.  Yeah, just a lot of paying bills and stuff.  Oh joy. haha. Then we had another lesson with Dario and he told us about a lot of the doubts that he has.  He has heard a lot of anti-mormon stuff, so it makes it a little hard, but we are still working towards baptism. 

Thursday.  Well lots of normal work.  Then I went to with Elder W., one of the assistants to pay for his ticket.  He got pulled over for doing an illegal u turn... it cost him like 500 peso.  Ouch. So then we got some interesting news.  We were working like at 8ish and we got a call from a stake president.  He said that a couple in his stake got their mission call to be office missionaries in this mission.  WOW.  What does that mean?  They’re coming August first. Does that mean we are losing our jobs?  The only thing... I really don’t know how well they will be able to do our job.  I mean…  Not to sound like I have it tough, I love it, but it is a lot of work and you have got to be smart. haha.  Who knows.  My thoughts on it are one of two things will happen.  We will stay in the office, just leaving sooner or only coming in on certain days to help and the senior missionaries are full time in the office, OR we just take 2 weeks to train them and then we are out of here.  But who knows.  I really do like working in the office.  It really challenges you.  Ok so the contract with the hospital had just ended because the mission split and then the president asks you to make a new contract. Ok how exactly do you go about making a contract with a hospital? I mean I don’t even know what the requirements are for a U.S. contract.  Another one, a missionary calls you and tells you that the mission doctor has said he needs a urine doctor.  Ok. That’s great, I sure know a lot of doctors... not. First of all how do you even say that in Spanish and how am I supposed to find a urine doctor.  But it falls on you, it’s your responsibly, no one else will do it, so you just got to call around and google for a urólogo in Puebla.  Haha.  It really makes you thinks.  I love it.  I wonder what they will do with the computer haha, president it always calling me in his office to fix his computer.

Friday.  Well I pretty much spent the whole day on my butt at my desk registering payments online.  That’s really all I did. 

Saturday.  Well we spent 3 hours this morning helping the brother we live with move stuff out of his garage.  I’m going to be sore tomorrow.  It wasn’t light stuff either. It was tiles and wood.  But at least he invited us to eat breakfast.  mmm tamales.

That’s about it that was my week.

Address Change!

The Mexico Puebla Mission has split into the North and South missions; Curtis is in the Mexico Puebla South Mission now.  Below is his new address to mail letters and packages.  However, "Dear Elder" is still probably still the best way to send letters.

Elder Curtis Wigington
Mision Mexico Puebla Sur

31 Poniente 109 Int 201

Colonia Chula Vista
Puebla, Puebla Mexico 72420

Week 54 - 7/7/12

Well you might be wondering what I did this week.  You might be asking you self, did Elder Wigington make a contract with a hospital, is he starting an insane workout plan, and did he throw up in a food appointment. Well these questions and more will be answered... after the break.

Well on sunday.  Regular church.  We visited a few less actives.

Monday.  Well we did a lot work in the office in the morning.  So this week was when we got our money.  And two elders lost their wallets with all their money and rent, and then call to see if I can deposit it back because they lost it.  Well I do it if the president approves it, but it just makes you wonder what these people would do in the real world if they just went and lost all their money for the month and their rent... Then we did our first day of our extreme work out plan.  It’s a DVD series called Insanity. It’s pretty tough, so I should be getting pretty ripped haha.

Tuesday. Regular office work in the morning. Then we came back to our area to do a little missionary work.  There was a guy we were going to visit, but he always tells us he has other things going on or is about to leave or who knows what else. Sooooooo, we pulled a good old “dad” trick.  We when and bought some pan, not a frying pan, bread pan, but the sweet kind.  They don’t have much of donuts here.  We showed up at the house and he saw the food, and let us in.  Haha, the secret plan worked.

Wednesday.  Well Fourth of July.  To celebrate we ate pizza.  And in our district meeting we said the pledge of allegiance, considering our whole district is American, it was pretty awesome.  We ate food. And... then office work and that is about it.

Thursday.  Well we had zone conference.  It was good it finished at around 2, and we ate there.  I got super filled up, it was great.  I was full. Then I remembered we had a food appointment with a sister in our area, so I called to cancel, but she already had the food ready.  Sooooo, we went.  I started eating. I ate the rice... then the chicken... then the cucumber... I made it, I managed to fit it all down.  Then she brought out this bowl of fruit for each of us.  I was about to cry.  Well I managed to put it all down. At this point I thought I was about to explode so I went to the bathroom [censored by Elder Wigington’s mom] Then just wash my hands and went to give the spiritual thought.  I felt really good at getting all that food out of my stomach, and so yeah!

Friday.  Ok, so we had our zone leader conf.  Then we went to the hospital to get some paper work done.  And because of the mission split we have to redo the contract we have with them.  It’s kind of confusing, but I’m in the middle of trying to figure out what I have to do with that.  So that’s fun. 

 bye, good bye, good bye now. ok good bye

Week 53 - 6/30/12

Ok well I would have to say I am so worn out right now.  Things have been pretty crazy, and I have a cold... but it’s all good.

Sunday was a normal day.  We went to church.  Then we went to the office. We have had a ton of stuff to do here.  We are technically the old mission and so we have to take all of the records with us.  And so we have a bunch of junk. I had to organize records from like 5 years ago to bring to the new offices.  Wow that stuff was a mess!!! 

Monday.  To president had popped another tire... he ran over a big chunk of metal and it popped it, so we had replace it for him again.  I guess we didn’t really have to replace it, just we had to pay for someone to replace it. We got the deposits ready for rent and the missionaries money.  Speaking of money I’m down to 2 pesos to my name,  In the offices it’s hard to save money. You are always running around don’t have time to buy groceries so you just buy food and that burns your money really fast. 

Tuesday.  Well president invited us to pizza.  It was pretty good I would have to say.  Really, all these days we have been preparing for the new president and going to the new offices. Really kind of boring stuff.  Lots of old records.  I mean we found baptism records from 2002, that’s almost from when I was baptized.  Haha.

Wednesday. Well we went to the new office for the first time.  They are pretty nice.  The computers are a lot nicer than the old ones.  And.... they were still setting things ups and you know how it is….I had to help the techs set up some computer stuff.  You know, getting a multi functional printer working over the network is can be pretty confusing, can you blame them.  Yeah these computers have 4 gb of ram and its 3.2 ghz processor.  So not bad.  They were going to give us a training on how the phone system works, so we had to wait.  Like until like 11pm....  But while we were waiting there were a bunch of people here and way too much authority. There were stake presidents, people in charge of building and stuff and it was getting pretty heated.  "No that desk can’t go there. In D&C it says the printers can’t go on the desk of the reception desk because blah blah blah.”  It was funny. The president did say as a secretary you would see the church from a different side, I don’t know if that’s what he meant. haha.

Thursday.  Just working here the office, nothing exicitn, same for friday.  I have nooooooooo money....

Curtis

Week 52 - 6/23/12

Well one year wow.

Ok so what happened this week. 

Right now it has been mostly office work.  One day we had to go to the hospital to pay for some bills.  And one of the tax laws here is that they have to give us 10 percent off of the consult. But it’s really not a discount, just a tax thing. They will end up receiving the same in the end.  Anyways they thought they were trying to rip them off.  So we were there for like an hour trying to explain to them the law.  Then we talked to their accountant and blah blah blah.  Eventually we got them to give it to us, but the doctor was not happy haha.  But what can you do.  Then there was a day that we had a bunch of work to do, so we stayed in the office until like 4 ish in the morning.  We really just went back to the house to sleep a couple hours, shower, and come back.   Yeah... that’s fun.

Friday.  We were just doing office work.  Then the president had to go do temple recommend interviews and wanted someone to go with him.  He asked me and Elder M. to go with him. We went to a place called Izucar.  It was cool he told us his life story.  He talked about how he was called to be a Stake Pres., then later patriarch then mission president.   It was cool.

Today.  P-day. Elder M. wanted to go visit some people so we went to his old area.  We saw some of his converts.  Then after we went back to Cholula.  We actually went and saw the pyramids this time. It was cool.  There are a lot of people here and everyone wants a computer... sorry it was short.   This week was really just a lot of office work

Elder Wigington

Week 51 - 6/16/12

Well crazy week we had changes so that made things really busy.

monday.  Well we woke up like normal bright and early at 6:30.  Then we went to the office and did regular office work.  Then around 4:00pm we went to the mission house to start getting things ready for the dinner for the missionaries that were leaving.   While we were cooking on the grill we ran out of gas so Elder J. and I went to get more.  It was just one of those propane tanks that grills use in the U.S. and we went to Walmart and they didn’t have any.......  no one knew where could buy it and we got lost looking for gas for like 2 hours.  Eventually we got to the mission house again and right from there we went to the airport to wait for the new elders coming in. We waited there forever......  they came in at 10:30pm.  Then we drove back with all their stuff. Then we took all the leaving Mexican’s to the bus station at 1:00am.  We got back to the mission house at 2:00am.  Then everyone was sleeping inside and we couldn’t get it so we slept like an hour in the van... Not the most comfortable thing.  Then at 3:00am we packed the American’s stuff all up.  Then  the other secretaries went and we stayed and slept for a little bit like 2 hours.  Then we woke up to make breakfast for the new missionaries.  It was funny the president asked how they slept.  And they were like good, but one had to sleep on a mat on the carpet and didn’t sleep well. If only they knew.... that carpet is more comfortable than any mattress in the mission. Well we ate breakfast, it was good.  Then we trained the new missionaries about the money stuff and visa stuff.  Then we went to the office where the changes were going to be.  We got there and then it was with the whole mission because it was the last time the mission would be together.  But.... I had to go to the hospital to pay some bills so that a sister could get her medicine.  And basically I missed the whole thing. It was over before we got back.  I got back and everyone was asking for a whole bunch of stuff.  Then when finally everyone left.... we ordered pizza and then crashed at the house.  6:30 Monday morning to 8:00pm Tuesday….. Like 2 hours of sleep in all that.  It was crazy. 

Wednesday.  We slept in soo late. Totally right through our district meeting.... but that’s ok we can say we had important things to do. Then we went to the office in the morning we did regular work. Then after 2:00 we spent the whole day driving sisters around from a doctor to the hospital to Walmart to buy medicine.

Thursday.  We woke at like 6:00 so we could get to the office early so my comp could get some visa stuff done early.  Well we went to that technology plaza again to buy ram for president.  Yeah, that place still gives me bad vibes. haha.

Friday.  We went and replaced the mirrors that were stolen off the van.  Then we went and paid some bills at the hospital.  Then... office work.  We are organizing a lot of the payments that have been made by us and the president.  Fun stuff.

Saturday. We went to a market place for p-day with President. It was fun. I bought some clothes they are awesome... I’ll send pictures.   And a new missionary came.  He needed to move to a mission with a cooler climate.  He was in ugh I forgot what it was called.  But Pres bought us all tacos.  That was really good. Now im here. emailing.

Week 50 - 6/9/12

Wow Matthew you are rocking the long hair, but my hair is so long as well. I can pull it down to my eyes.... that is not good, but it always looks the same so.... I’m around the big people every day and they haven’t said anything to me.

Ok last Saturday ended pretty crazy.  So we still had not moved the mattresses out of our house so the assistants took us home.  Then they helped us move the mattress into the minivan.  Well you see when you put mattresses in a minivan they take up all the room, so me and Elder W. had to lay on them as we transported them to the new house.  It was pretty crazy.  Also, a lot of fun.  It’s interesting to be a secretary cause you get a whole different perspective on the leaders. 

Sunday.  Well church as normal. Hey we had two investigators in church and we didn’t even teach a single lesson the whole week.  We ate at the house of the member where we used to live.  Let’s just say the food was hot, very very spicy.  I really don’t like spicy food, but I can manage to eat it now.  Sundays are the worst for us right now because we don’t do office work on Sunday, but we have nothing to do in our area, well because we never work it.  So we went to try to find some less actives and no one was home.

Monday.  The president had to go to a lot of conferences on Sunday and well on last Saturday we didn’t get the tires changed because the place closed.  Anyways one popped on him on Sunday. Sooooo that was an urgent thing to do.  SO we did that and then they messed something up and needed to redo something to make up their mistakes.  Then they were going to charge us for the extra service.  You should have seen me.  I was not going to let them charge us extra.  Actually it wasn’t that impressive, I just told them that we would not pay for their mistakes.  haha ok. yeah, but we got that done. 

Tuesday.  Sooooo the president’s computer was running really slow.  Soooooooooo..... I may or may not have stolen ram from the assistant’s computer and put it in president’s haha.  They don’t use it for anything important.  But I actually asked president before I did so I didn’t do anything bad.  Then we had to go with the assistants to take some sisters back to their area which was pretty far away.  By the time we actually got to bed it was like 11:30 ugh..... That is the one thing that kills.  Having to go bed late then still wake up early.  And we can sleep in a bit if we are out really late, but a lot times we have to be in the office early so we still have to get up at 630.... ugh.

Wednesday.  We went to our district meeting.... then we worked in the office.  We eat here in the office with the ward here and they are really rich.  So the sister called and told us that she was not going to be able to make food so she came and gave us money.  300 peso for the 4 of us.  That is a lot to buy food here.  We went to a Chinese buffet and it was really really good. Wow it was so good, I think just because it was something different. but yeah very very good.  Oh so one of the assistents, Elder W. was in Las Vegas in the beginning of his mission when he was waiting for his visa and he has David Boschi’s towel.  Haha whats the odds of that!

Thursday.  We taught a lesson for the first time in like 2 weeks. Her name is Lupita and she is really great. 

Friday.  Well we got to the office bright and early so my comp could do some visa stuff. Then we ate and it was soooooooooooooooooooo good. We started off with some watermelon.  Then some soup, idk what but it was good.  Then we had lasagna. One piece of chicken lasagna and one regular.  Then ice cream and brownies. Wow, it was soo good.  Oh also some nice green salid.  Wow some many things I haven’t had in so long.  Really good. Well the night before someone had robbed the mirrors from the presidents car.... so that means it’s our job to get new ones. So I had to drive across the city to the dealership without side mirrors. That is scary....  so also the president wanted them to do a full check so we just had to chill there for like 2 hours.  We went to Home Depot.  Would you have ever guessed that Home Depot is in the richest place of Puebla. Only the rich people buy there.  But we walked around there for a while...... then Walmart..... then we went back and their parts were busy so we couldn’t even order the mirrors.... so the president had to drive to Mexico city today without mirrors... that would be fun.

Today.  Well we didn’t really have any p-day plans so we just walked to this park and bought tacos and quesadillas at random food stands. That means we will be sick tomorrow, but it’s cool, it was really cheap.  Like 3 tacos for 10 pesos is just bad news.  That’s 70 cents for 3 tacos.... yeah, that is 3 times cheaper that taco bell. Then we are just here, with nothing to do fun fun.

That’s all.

Curtis

Week 49 - 6/2/12

Wow life has just been crazy or maybe just today.

OK well...  Sunday we gave talks.  That was fun.  We were planning on 10 minutes each, but we found out then that we were going to be the only ones to talk sooooo..... yeah, I had to pull a “dad” and just talk about random stuff for an extra 10 minutes.  But it was all good. haha.

Wednesday, we left the offices a little early so that we could go and clean the house and empty it out.  We moved everything to the new house.  It is pretty dang awesome.  Only one problem…if you open the windows a whole bunch of mosquitos come in because it’s kind of by the lake.  But everything else is good, we just need to buy some mesh to put over the windows. 

Thursday, Elder Bertha and his comp stayed at our house because there was going to be a zone leader meeting the next day and their area is really far from the city.  Elder Bertha taught me how to make an origami unicorn; it’s pretty cool. 

Friday.  Well we went to the zone leader meeting. 

Saturday.  Well about 3 days ago my phone fell out of my pocket on the bus and the person who found it said he could return it to us if we met up with him.  That doesn’t happen here.  Anyways we went and got it back. Now the assistants had to go to interviews but we had some time to kill so we thought we would get from breakfast.  Soo......  we went to a place that looked nice.  It’s called VIPS.  Yeah, that’s a bad sign. haha.  So we get there and it was super expensive.  I got breakfast for 100 pesos.  That is crazy! Then leaving we had to pay 3 pesos for parking! Good thing they don’t do tips in Mexico. I’m not eating for a week now.... Anyways.... then we went to drop the assistants.  Then we tried to find our area.  The big city by our area is called Valsequillo.... but apparently there is another.  So we had the President’s van so we got lost and there were signs that said how to get to Valsequillo.  But..... we found this random lake.  Kind of cool.  Anyways we went back to the office.  Then we found our way back to our house.  A brother gave us a stove.  Well then we went back to the office. And from there the executive secretaries went and ate while we went to find replacement tires for the van.  We spent like 4 hours running around getting lost in Puebla. yay pday.  Now I’m just super burned out.  We were not even able to get him tires...... we called after we found some and he said they were too expensive and we should go back and try to lower the price.  By the time that we got there they were closed and he has to go somewhere far on Sunday so he won’t be able to take the van then.... ugh. I hate driving here it is nuts.  I just want to sleep right now.  But I guess that’s the thing about being a secretary, when there is work to do there is work to do... even if nothing even results from driving all over Puebla. haha

well yeah that’s life

Elder Curtis Wigington