Mission Completed!

Nelson -soon-to-be graduate.  

"Mission completed."  That was the message I received this afternoon, and that brings the story to an end.  

The beginning came with a message sent in Facebook Messenger: "Can you get my documents for grade 7 and grade 8, please?"  Since it came in Spanish, I thought my translation was poor.  When I confirmed I had it right, I responded that I wasn't in Roatan but would be in a month.  "But," I asked, "how can you need your grade 7 and 8 documents, Nelson? You graduated from grade 9 and had those documents then."

To understand - documents make the world go round in Honduras. Stamp, stamp, stamp. Official papers require signatures from a select few government appointees.  Graduating students require the official documents proving they are not cheating the system by applying to graduate without the prerequisite studies. Nelson will be graduating from grade 12 this year.  His grade 7 and 8 years were completed at schools in Roatan. Then he moved with his family to a new school district on the Mainland. Before moving, we ensured that his parents had the official papers, with the stamps of the schools, and because he was changing district, he needed stamp stamp from the Roatan departmental.  With grade 7 and 8 papers in hand, he went to his new school on the Mainland and after completing the year, graduated from grade 9. 

Nelson has now completed grade 10, 11, and is 3 months from a grade 12 graduation. This is an amazing accomplishment as many students leave school at the end of grade 9, or 11. We are very proud of Nelson's perseverence. But - while gathering the data needed for Nelson's graduation, his school could not locate the grade 7 and 8 documents needed to verify that truly Nelson had studied the grade 7 and 8 content. The school was quite casual about this, requesting Nelson get duplicate documents - or - forfeit graduating. Needless to say, Nelson and his family did not feel equally casual. At this time, the family is without sufficient funds to travel to Roatan and spend the time and money required to get the documents. And that brings us to the middle of the story.  

Over the years I've had several opportunities to visit The Departamental.

Locating the documents required 5 stops and a week of waiting on an official who wasn't available for one set of documents until this week. I paid almost the equivalent of two days' work for a regular labourer here in Honduras. This would have been difficult for Nelson to navigate on his own. The documents included 3 pages for each grade. But, with the time and money, and lots of assistance from some really kind people - the documents were ready.

Stamp stamp stamp!

Stop 6 was at the package warehouse for the ferry to the Mainland. With all the documents collected, all that was needed was to give the envelope to the lady in the wicket - and whisper a prayer that the ferry didn't lose that special package!

Packages move to and from the Island on the Galaxy Wave (the ferry)

Twenty-four hours later brought this story to an end. "Mission completed!"  Nelson had travelled an hour and a half from his town by bus to the ferry terminal. He has his documents!  Yippee! Success.  Of course, the perfect epilogue will be Nelson's message (and smiling face picture!) telling us that he has his grade 12 diploma. To be continued.....

And - here he is - Nelson and his mom at his grade 12 graduation. Congratulations, Nelson.