Welcome, NANAY!

My daughter-in-law's sweet Nanay arrived yesterday, a couple of years after her first try for a visa was scrubbed. This time it involved a very long bus ride (14 hours) to Manila, a round-trip (2 hours each way) on the back of a motorcycle to the emigration offices, a three day wait for the physical, another long bus ride back to her hometown to pack up her stuff and say her farewells to family and friends, the 14-hour ride back to Manila, the long jet ride over the dark Pacific Ocean to Los Angeles, waiting for several more hours in customs, and another short sprint on JetBlue to Slick City, Utah! It involved months and months and months of official paperwork, lots and lots of pesos, but finally, she is here! We are so happy, we love her so much. She is an elegant and beautiful lady who, I'm sure, will find our American desert much different from her green homeland, but we are oh so glad
to have her with us for as long as she wants to stay! Welcome, Nanay!

Such endurance and perseverance, and patience, at a time when so many others think an illegal crossing of borders assures them a "right" to what she waited so long and worked so hard for, legally.