Immigration Office

Greetings from Bonaire!

Yesterday Elder VV and I were in the immigration office to renew our residency status so we can stay on Bonaire for 6 more months.

I need to preface this. First of all you don't talk to anyone face to face in this country. Everyone is behind a glass partition with a few holes in it. So you have to raise your voice to be heard and put you ear down by the little slot at the bottom of the glass to hear. This is at the bank, the government offices, the doctors offices, when you pay at the utilities offices, all the government buildings. The government workers and clerks in the stores are very rude. Usually the workers in restaurants are kind of pleasant ..not always but the government workers are the worst. So we were waiting for about 45 minutes for our turn at immigration. The waiting room was pretty full and one of the men was very anxious. The woman behind the glass called the next number, it was ours but we said it was ok for him to go before us because his number was lower than ours. He was speaking Spanish, the worker was telling him to move along, he was trying to talk and explain to her, she wouldn't listen.

We were looking for a Spanish person to tell the woman to let him go first and take our place. She wouldn't listen and she had done the same thing to us the last time we were at immigration. If you don't run up to the line immediately she says you lost your turn and to take another number! I was furious! BUT...We are the face of the church. We can't be rude or complain or honk, or shake our fist. We must always be kind and patient and smile.

When we got to the window Elder VV started explaining what we needed in Dutch. I got out my pen, looked at her badge, and started to write down her name. She looked startled, she said," why are you writing  my name down?!"  I just continued writing and smiling.  She said, " I am not the only one who works here!"  She was alarmed. All I did was write her name down I didn't say a word. 
It was a good day.