Waiting......

Well, lets start with the good news.....Micah got his visa! No problems there. He flew down to Brasilia early Monday morning and picked up his visa on Wed. morning. However, Sofia's American passport is a whole other situation. It was supposed to have arrived by now but we believe that the lady in charge forgot to mail it in until I showed up on Monday to pick it up. We have many reasons for thinking this. even though she said she mailed it in and that is in the US and will take around ten days for it to arrive. I'll give just two examples of why we think she might be lying to us. On Monday, while Micah was at the American Embassy in Brasilia he asked about Sofia's passport and they said they had no record at all of it being processed there (it has to go through Brasilia before being mailed to the US). Then on Wed. morning he asked again about her visa and they said it had just arrived on Tues. from Belem. We think the lady mailed it out right after I visited her on Monday.

There were also a few other reasons that led us to believe she forgot and then lied about it. I went back to see her on Wed. and she reassured me that the passport was in the US and would only take 10 days to arrive. She said Micah must have heard wrong both times he asked about Sofia's passport. I believe that she has put Sofia's passport as a priority so it should arrive in 10 days, give or take a few days.

This situation has been a bit of a struggle for me as I deal with my anger towards this woman that I think lied right in front of me. Although the Lord has been bringing to my mind times that I have lied to other people. It has really helped me to get off of my high horse. This woman hasn't done anything worse than what I have also done and will do in the future. While I have forgiven this woman, I also need God's help to continue to forgive as the anger seems to come back so easily. The one thing that is so disappointing about this situation is that I am now missing my sister Cynthia's visit. I haven't seen Cynthia in almost 5 years and I've never met her 1 1/2 year old daughter, Chloe. I was really looking forward to seeing them and I'm not sure when the next chance I'll have to visit them is. I'm still hoping that Sofia's passport arrives on Mon or Tues and I make it out in time to at least see them for a day or two.

On the other side of the coin, this passport problem gave Sofia and I a couple extra days with Micah's family. Goodbyes are so hard and in spite of all that was going on, I really enjoyed my extra time, especially with Micah's Mom. The only easy goodbye was with Micah's brother, Isac. Don't worry that's not as bad as it sounds! :) It looks like Isac will be studying at Evangel University in Springfield, Missouri this year, which means he'll only be 1 1/2 hours away! It's a very last minute decision and he has a lot of details to work out before he can relax but the school admin seems to be very helpful and I'm praying that everything works out smoothly for him.

Right now, we're planning on calling the Embassy on Monday and every day thereafter to check on whether Sofia's passport has arrived. We'll stay packed up and ready to go so that as soon as we find out the news we can catch a bus to Brasilia, pick up the passport, and fly to Sao Paulo and on to the US!