aren's first visit to mommy's office

yes it was almost two years after he was born that aren got to visit mommy's office for the first time.

flashback: december 2010. institutional christmas party at the sports pavilion. (thanks for the photos, tita amy!)

the visit was meant to be a very memorable one, too. when we were about to exit the village, rands was given the wrong driver's license. he called the attention of the person in charge at the gate, and we were asked to wait on the side while they sorted out the problem. out of the many people who were going in and out of the village that day, it had to happen that rands' license was given to the wrong person, who was a taxi driver who could have been anywhere in the country at that moment! it was already getting dark, and the two kids in the car were getting restless. they were trying to figure out the best thing to do to address the situation. we the adults were on the verge of losing our patience.

as a temporary measure, they wrote a certification in their office (which took 30 minutes i think) that it was "their fault" that rands was driving without his license. they asked for my name and promised that they will give back my husband's license the following morning. we also got their names, and they knew that they have "no escape" because they and the security in our school were from the same agency.

true enough the following morning, barely 8 am, the same guy who was head of the shift during our ordeal, came to our office and handed me rands' license. he shared that they sent a couple of people to the taxi driver's house (thankfully the address in the license was recent!) and waited there until late at night for the driver to come home and exchange licenses.

lesson: please always ALWAYS check the license you are handed back. or any ID for that matter. i'm sure it was such a hassle for them to do what they did, but i was thankful, and they were apologetic anyway. i told them i perfectly understood that mistakes such as putting the licenses in the wrong pass slots can happen on days when there are a lot of cars getting in and out of the village, especially during christmas season.