Green thing

Lincoln and I have these two shinny new green bookie things we like to call our FM3s!!!! Whoohoo! FM3 in hand... photo, thumb print and a bunch of Spanish text we can't read. We're still a little confused cause it doesn't specify an "activity" of photography. Our lawyer says as "managers" of our company we are able to preform any duties for the company. I really have no clue and have no way to find out except wait..... We're doing our best to do everything by the book here. The trouble is there is no "book", nobody knows what it says.... and nobody follows it anyway.

It's tough to know when to celebrate these accomplishments, when you're not quite sure what has actually been accomplished. So, all I have to say is.... whoohoooo......

Also, we're onto our 6th trip for our cortinas (curtains). Seems they can only understand one issue at a time. They did fix the length of them, now we're working on the width. We'll find out next Tuesday what the verdict it. Hopefully its right cause I have reason to believe they are just as annoyed with us as we are with them.... Arg.

Again, I'm not blaming them... We're starting to realize this is just how things are done here. If you want something done now, or at least on time.... don't move to Mexico. Mexico is in reactive mode. They're not Pro-active... they're RE-active. And let me tell you.... reactions around here are ssssssslow.

I do think I impressed Linc at the material store today.... I broke out in Spanish to explain the situation. I'm not sure who I confused more tho.... Lincoln, the curtain guy, or myself. hahhahaa.....

Problems!!

Doesn't really sound like a "biggy". Once you break the language barrier you'll be OK. The question is "How much time do you/they need?" Hope the bank card situation is resolved. Are people starting to book again? Well at least the curtains will soon be hanging in your place soon. I've been busy planting and painting. Same story tomorrow. Have a gooder. Luv ya! Mom & Dad.

Yet another

Well well... yet another lesson or two learned about Mexico today.

Today was the day we found out if our cortinas were sewn correctly.... or not.... And... drum roll please.... eeeew... boooo.... they were wrong. Too confusing to get into details but I must say this is the first of many many lessons we will learn along the way here. They are still at the tela store being extended 10cm and 16 small curtains sew into 8 bigger ones. sigh.... I was so confidant we had it right. Lesson learned, 40 mins is not long enough to explain our curtains... we should have spend ANOTHER 40 minutes. I'm a little disappointed because we did all we could to get it right. We drew OBVIOUS pictures!! Math and pictionary are not language specific.... They should have been able to get it.

Anyway, I fully blame ourselves as we are the ones invading their country with our English ways. Hahaha. Really tho.... its not their fault we can't speak the dominant language here. I'm sure if we would have gone in there speaking spanish we would have come out with what we asked for.

Lesson #2. Today was also the day we pickup our bank cards for our new account. We needed this account so we could deposit international cheques from our brides. Yup yup, no problem... It takes 10 days and cost 15 bucks... but at least we'd get the job done. Got our cards then found out since last Thursday they are no longer able to deposit international cheques.... sigh.....

BUT!!! Funny story, we walked up to the counter, asked for our cards for our new accounts, gave up our passports, contract, etc.... Then after about 5 mins of communitcating... the teller askes me "do you speak spanish"??!?! Hhhahaa.... it took her that long to figure out I don't know Spanish! I guess I was doing a good job with my short list of words. I was impressed!

On a brighter note, we did manange to get an oil change today (cambiar de aceite). Lotita was well overdue for her check up.

So, broke out the Spanish book yet again when I got home. Estudio mucho a mi espanol por que no quiero un otro mal grande. Hahahah... that doesn't make complete sense but... I'm studying my spanish alot because I don't want another big mistake.

The verdict

The verdict is in.... I do no have an FM3 in my hands yet. Altho... I did see it today... and gave the Mexican government my thumb print and photo for it. I just figured out today that you really can't get your hopes up for anything.... or think that you understand what is going on in this country. Our FM3s are obviously supposed to have an activity of photography. But... that was nowhere to be found today. Also, this "basic file" that we've been waiting for has 3 mistakes on it. Not sure who's mistakes they were. Not mine... thats all I know. Also not sure how much time these mistakes will set us back.

1. Company address different on 2 different documents
2. Company name is not what I thought we got approved by the government to start with
3. Company name is also spelled wrong on the basic file.

Our company was originally set up by the clowns who were supposed to help us with our FM3's. We ditched them a long time ago because we found out they were misinforming us about some important things. Anyway... could be either of these offices or even immigration that have screwed it up. No idea how long it will take to correct.

Also, never believe a Mexican just because they sound confidant. They always tell you "yeah yeah.... yeah.... no problem.... thats correct....". I guess they don't consider all these mistakes to be problems.... or the fact that we were told today by one person that we couldn't take pictures for our company. "yeah yeah... you have to hire someone to take photos".... Not true. Just have to keep asking questions until we get the answer we want... Someone will have it... or should I say... they'll PRETEND they have it.

Money Money money

It's official! The mortgage has gone through to the builder! Now we get to make mortgage payments! Whoo hoo. Anyway, it does mean that we are finally the owners of a place we like to call... HOME! It's all ours! Just in time for the market to drop due to the swine flu. Naaa... that won't last long. Celebrate!!!

FM3 Progress

Just got word from our neighbor (the one helping us with our immigration documents) that there has been some progress on our FM3's. She says they have initial approval but are just waiting for our "basic file", which she will then present to a judge for final red tape approval. This friday we have appointments to have our photos and fingerprints taken at the immigration office. These are to be used in our FM3!!! Then... within about 2 weeks we should have our official documents... with authority to work as photographers in Mexico!! Whoohoo! So exciting... Can't wait!! Keep in mind... we're not sure how much of this message was lost in translation. This is what we understood from her... until we get our documents we just really can't be sure whats going on.

Still trying to get confirmation that our mortgage has been transferred to the builder.... I won't celebrate that win until I know they have the cash.

Oh, also.... power is supposedly pretty expensive here. Can get upto about 700 bucks per two months if you run your air alot in the summer. Turns out our first bill is 38 pesos. Aka... 3 Canadian dollars. Checked out the meter today and the dial to keep track of our usage isn't turning..... We'll be crossing our fingers that it takes a while for them to figure it out..... Feels like a little swine flu gift for us. Thanks Mexico!

Actually...

I had 3 pics to upload but they are large sized from my camera. I'm at The Hat and I didn't figure out how to resize them smaller so they aren't taking forever to put onto the blog and then for everyone to view either. We are still in The Hat til about 1pm tomorrow. We can Skype tomorrow am...Addy just went to bed. What time?
Good night.
PS I want to take a class...not so much how to use the camera but to understand what an F-stop, amp, lighting, etc does to the pictures. I can figure out how to change my settings on my own. There are automated ones on the camera. It just snaps SO MUCH FASTER than my old one.

Nice Cam

Good job Kim. I like ur pic! I can see some 'depth of field'!! Are you going to take a class to learn how to use it? You could always just do auto.... but if you want to get creative at all you should take a class. Or learn from the peeps in your neighborhood... ie ME! or Michelle???

I take if you guys are all gone from the Hat now? I told mom to Skype us so I could see Addy... Never found you guys online..... boooooooo.....

Weather looks decent there! I will remind you all that I am never cold when I jump out of the shower now.... Also, pool temp is nearing bathtub like. When you get in it actually feels warmer than the air. Come visit, I'll show you!

New Camera

Well, I got a new camera for my birthday/Mother's Day....Canon Rebel Xsi. So, I got around to taking a few pictures with it over the weekend at Gma/Gpa's house. Here are some snapshots. This is much than our point n shoot where Addy is already half a mile away before the camera takes a picture. Hopefully it will be nice outside again and we'll get some more pics of the cutie pie!

Labour rate

My mistake.... the labour on the sewing is actually about 2 Canadian dollars per sheet of material. So, one gigantor curtain of three sheets of material sewn together will cost 6 bucks labour.

Also, I should mention we counted 21 employees in the store. I'm surprised we only had 5 helping us... as the rest didn't have anything to do either.

Cortinas!

Curtains was my guess. Just have to keep combining the English with the French and add "o's". Maybe I was a Mexican in my past life. Maybe 5 mexicans are trying to justify the cost. Anyways, Kim and Bill are here. Darin is on the road. Did a little Skyping with Connie & Gavin. Maybe you guys tomorrow? I saw golf clubs come out of Bill's truck. Does that mean a round is coming up?

Riddle

How many people speaking broken spanish does it take to order "cortinas"?? Curtains. We're not sure yet.... We did spend about 40 minutes trying to explain what we needed. We had 5 mexicans listening to our "spanish" to get our order straight. Still not sure what we bought. It has cost us 50% to find out. By the way... seamstresses are CHEAP here. The material for our whole place was 280 bucks and the sewing was 14 bucks per panel. Keep in mind, a panel is so big its made up of 3 widths of material.

Now that we've gotten home and translated our invoice we're preeetty sure we're gonna get what we tried to order. We'll find out on the 25th... when we go pick them up..... Crossing our fingers.

Almost there!

Well... our website has come a long way! It's been up and running for almost a year now. Constant improvements, new slideshow, and... most recently it's hit page two of the Google search. That is HUGE for us. We started off near page 5... and as we all know... nobody every clicks to page 5. Anyway, we're the very top of page 2 and since we've added our blog, I'm sure they'll bump us onto the first page, once they re-index us. Celebrate!!!


Learned a new song at our 2 year old neighbours birthday the other day. When they hit the pinata they sing (but in spanish of course):

Hit it, hit it, hit it. Don’t loose your aim. Because if you loose it. You loose the way. You hit it once. You hit it twice. You hit it three times. And your time is up.

When the song is over, their turn to hit is over.

Also has some 'Cochinita' in a soft taco shell. It's pig. Oooops... ingested some swine... Hope I don't get the flu.

cut off!

well family, i'm cutting off our house phone. i'm calling to cancel it today. we have no reason to have a landline right now.....it never rings, and we never use it. so why pay for it. anyways, you all know my cell number, so use it. i'm also cutting off my texting on my cell....cuz i never use that either. from now on texting will be pay as you go....so be nice. :O)

you know KIM....there is always skype!!! and that is FREE!!! just the price i like to pay!!!

Mother's Day

Thanks for the Mother's Day Wishes. It's nice to see everyone thought of ME today. Wasted my whole day away. Seeing how I didn't have any children around, Dad sprung and took me out for lunch. Other than that, went for a walk, puttzed around outside (trying to figure out where I'm going to plant the annuals), went to the Open House of the Kinsmen Home Lotto (possibly our future home, haha). Also spent time checking out L & Ls wedding albums. Great Job! I just wonder where you get the fabulous ideas. They are all so unique. Noticed the water/dress scenes are becoming more popular. Is it hard to talk the bride into dunking their gown into the ocean? I especially like the one ring picture on the flower with the light coming just right and it seems to glisten in the middle of nowhere. Group pictures are great. I really like the shots of the guys coming in a group....reminds of "we're here and we mean business". Must be hard visiting these different resorts and not having a clue as to lighting....As usual extraordinary work!

Happy Mothers Day

Hope you're taking the day off and relaxing. Have a good day. Love you Mom.

Life at Akoya

Hey Fam.

Last few days we've been working hard to make some improvements to our website. Seeing as we have some free time on our hands thought we should get productive. I've re-designed our 'Galleries' and added a couple new ones. Have a look http://www.momentsthatmatterphotography.com/gallerylist.htm.

Also added a blog, just like this one. We will be updating our brides on our recent wedding shoots, and pretty much anything exciting in our business or the Mayan Riviera. You can click on 'visit our blog' or goto Our Blog.

Just got back from a bday party for the 2 year old downstairs. We took lots of pics for the family. Good times.

Went for a walk the other night. Re-diculously quiet around here. No tourists... hotels and streets are dead! Thanks to the over blown reaction of the media. Just had another cancellation for June now. Seems Nolitours has canceled flights for yet another month! That should mean a couple more cancellations to come. Sounds like US brides will still be on there way! Good for us.

Good News

Hey, the good side is....you are living in paradise and I hope your getting to enjoy some of the beach front and sun these days.

Happy Anniversary Gavcon! I hope you had a big steak dinner!
As for a "forbidden paradise"... I see the media has poisoned the brain of our Medicine Hat Clan. Attitudes like that not only hurt Mexico but make place like Playa del Carmen a ghost town which it is right now. I would have to say that this is one of the safest places on the planet as nobody is here... and is, or has been sick.
For your latest circus show updates on the swine flu... you might as well read the Enquirer. Its now coming out that the virus may have been in decline while everybody scrambled to make up the most sensational stories sending the population into panic. Shutting down flight and pointing fingers to the south.
Oops... the sky wasn't falling... I guess we just stop reporting on the real news. Where is the global wide retraction and half billion dollars in lost revenue? I'll take our 6000 is cost us.
Link-a-roo

First Year Wedding Bells

Happy An-ni-ser-sary! Hap-py An-ni-ver-saryyyy! That's like singing a song and from me it sounded pretty good. Wow, can't believe a year ago we were on the sandy beaches of Mexico. Today, because of the Swine Flu or H1N1, it's forbidden paradise, except for Lincoln and Lori of course. I'm on holidays for the next 11 days so I started today off with going to check out the greenhouses. Got a few plants. Guess I'm hopeful we will get sunshine and heat this spring. Tulips and daffodils are beginning to fade away. Need some color in the front yard. The grass is even slow.

Thanks

Good Ole' Dog! Now if I could only be skinny like it, life would be good. A little extra info for you all. It's Uncle Fernie & Auntie Pauline's 35th anniversary.

old dog

Good job old dog!

Whoo-Hoo!

The party's on. Got my marks and passed with flying colors. Anybody who's interested, here's a toast to myself...Congratulations! I've proven you can teach an old dog new tricks. One more step and I should get a nice raise. Convocation is May 9th, however, I won't be attending cause it's in Edmonton. I'm tired just thinking of the drive. I think that is a rather nice Mother's Day Gift if I do say so myself.