An update from Elder Jewell...(May 2, 2008)

Well, they are working this old workhorse to death over here in Bulgaria. If this is a walk in the park, I don't want to go hiking in the mountains!

We are busy, busy, busy over here. If we aren't hobnobbing with the Mission President and his wife, we are hobnobbing with the Elders and Sisters.

In between, we work from about 9 AM until 6 or 7 PM in the mission home. We are supposed to get Saturdays off for "Preparation" day, but unless we run away, there is always a meeting they want us to sit in on, or have out of town Seniors stay at our apartment, so our Saturdays are not even ours. We clean our apartment when we can find an hour or two that someone isn't asking us to do something.

Yesterday, we just took the Mission Van and ran away . Well, we went "by ourselves" to the BIG grocery store (like a Super Walmart) called Metro. We shopped for two hours. Our larder was empty at the apartment. It was our first outing (just the two of us) in weeks.

I run the business end of things here in the mission. All money and most of the "money decisions" are made by me. However, along with that comes the responsibility for a lot of cash, a safe, and accounting for all the money going in and out of the Mission.

Bulgaria is a cash society and almost all transactions are in cash. I do pay all apartment rents and mission home utilities via bank transactions.

The Missionary Operating System that works in the USA - only works here for Missionary Support Funds. It is all US Dollars and we aren't allowed to use US Dollars here. Besides, the Bulgarians don't know what a greenback is. We use the Leva as bills and Stotinki as coins. I had to learn a whole new accounting system when I got here.

We have seen most of the Country now and it is pleasant and the people are friendly unless they are drinking.

For the most part the women run the country by running the home. They work, they wash, they clean, they pay the bills, have the children and take care of them. The men mostly just smoke and drink vodka! When they get tired of the husband, they throw him out.

We have been here now for 3 months and we are leaning some of the language, but our knowledge is really perfunctory . Nay Me Puka (in our alphabet) means "I don't care!" Literally No I care.

Георги недков иванов -- This is how George Nedkov Ivanov looks when I pay a rent on line.
As usual when you run a business, there are problems that arise, but nothing that is insurmountable. My philosophy is "If they don't want me here, they can just fire me". They won't, they need Senior Missionaries way too bad to even get rid of someone as crusty as I am.