Recently, Tim and I have been spending a lot of time trying to figure out how to get all of our stuff to Brazil. Now, being the kind of people we are, we’d like to take a few books along with us. Okay, not a few books. A lot of books. Maybe…about 60 pounds worth of books. (This sounds like a lot of books, but it’s not. Between the two of us, Tim and I probably own about a ton of books.)

Now this would not have been that big a deal last year. The US Postal Service, in its kindly, navy-blue-sweater-wearing wisdom, had a postage rate called the “M-bag.” In this glorious container, a person could ship up to 60 pounds of printed matter for the fairly minimal cost of $1.11 per pound. It would take the slow boat to wherever it was going, and would arrive 6-8 weeks later.

Cue the ominous music.

The surface rate for M-bags has been discontinued, as of a few months ago. There are no more slow boats bound for Brazil. Now, all M-bags travel in style, on airplanes. For $43.45 for the first 11 pounds and $3.95 per pound thereafter.

This, my friends, is an increase of soul-crushing proportions. We shall not be sending any M-bags.

Enter, the baggage regulations of United Airlines.

Passengers to Brazil on United are allowed the munificent sum of two bags apiece, each weighing 70 pounds. This is 20 pounds more per bag than any other country allows, so we are grateful. That means, we just have to check another bag full of books, and pay the extra bag fee. No sweat.

Except that the extra bag fee is $100. One hundred dollars.

So as we were absorbing this blow, I decided to check the size restrictions on pieces of baggage. 62 linear inches per piece. “Hmmm…I wonder what my guitar measures, let’s see…length+width+height…SIXTY-EIGHT INCHES!!!!!!”

The ominous music swells.

I call the nice United Airlines lady. “Hi, can you tell me what the charge is for a piece of luggage that measures 68 linear inches?”

“Ah’ll just check that for you, dear.” She is a nice lady, with a nice Southern accent. Who is about to nicely punch me in the gut.

“That will be one hundred dollars.” She says it nicely. I think her name was Pam.

“Um, thank you. Bye.”

“Thanks for calling United.”

At this point, I am thinking some very un-missionary-ish thoughts. You see, my family got together to get me my guitar and its hard-sided case for Christmas this year, so that I would be able to learn to play it and take it down to Brazil. Because leading worship is pretty much my area of service in churches, and so it’s nice to have a guitar along to help out with that. I could mail the guitar to Brazil for about $60, but then would have to pay hefty import duties to the Brazilian government. I am stuck. I am stymied.

Anybody have any ideas? Or a hundred dollars to check my guitar? The books, we can figure out, but the guitar is essential.

We want to be sure to thank two churches for the support they’ve given us in our quest for transportation funds. This past weekend, my parents’ church, Haller Lake Baptist in north Seattle, gave NICS a $400 missions scholarship in addition to a love offering from the congregation. Meanwhile, Lorraine’s parents’ church, Calvary Baptist in Tacoma, has been collecting an offering for us for the past month or so. We’ve been attending both of these churches alternately for the past couple months, and have really appreciated all the support, financial and otherwise, that they have provided.

We’re not just sitting around twiddling our thumbs while we wait and pray for our visas. Check it out. Hopefully we’ll do some of these from Brazil, too.

The visa application appears to have been submitted to the consulate today. Hopefully it will very quickly move from San Francisco to Brazil and we’ll be on our way to Brazil on July 30 as planned. The consulate apparently wasn’t particularly optimistic about that. Please be in prayer that the applications will wing their way through the bureaucracy quickly.

I mailed off our visa application two days ago. It should have arrived at the visa services place at noon yesterday. Hopefully things are in process, but the service’s online system says they haven’t gotten it yet. I certainly hope it’s incorrect, but if it’s not I get my 21 bucks back from the United States Postal Service.

So it’s win-win, right?* I’ll have to check on the actual status later today.

*(No–it’s not)

UPDATE: It looks like the USPS did it’s job just fine. they were delivered yesterday at 11:39 AM, and signed for by someone named “MB”. The visa service, though, says it’s still “waiting for the documents to arrive,” at least online.