Day 97

I've heard it said that absence makes the heart grow fonder; I'm learning more and more that goodbyes make the heart grow fond too!! All this week it has been so bittersweet to spend time with friends and enjoy it on purpose because I know I'm leaving soon and to have people telling me that they'll miss me when I go.
Catherine's English class had a goodbye party for me this morning - lots of people brought food - mostly cakes, but some other breads too, and pop, and it was so much fun! Everyone wrote me a little note to say bye or wish me good luck, and I loved reading through them! There is a mix of English and Portuguese, but they were all filled with such kind thoughts, and it made me really happy :) - By the way, yes I am wearing jeans and a sweater... it was cold and damp this morning! I think Brazil is trying to prepare me for heading back to Canada where summer hasn't quite yet arrived ;)
Catherine also broke out her guitar, and we sang Leaving on a Jet Plane and Stand By Me. One of the students, who I also helped to teach keyboard to, learned the words to Wherever You Go and she sang it to me accompanied by Catherine on guitar. We also all did an a capella version of the YMCA, and we muddled through one verse and the chorus of My Heart Will Go On. All in all a very sappy and beautiful goodbye party for sure!

I also wanted to post a picture of my fingernails because they are gorgeous!! Socorro is the cook at Free Flight, teaches hairdressing and manicure, and also cleans Joyce's house once a week, and she gave me a manicure yesterday! It was a little bit scary because she trimmed my cuticles which I've never had done before, and she accidently cut each of my pinky fingers because my skin is very delicate apparently... anyways, the second time it happened it hurt a lot! I was surprised, and tears came to my eyes, and we had just been joking about me crying the first time she cut me even though I hadn't, so I was trying not to cry, but then I was laughing and crying and it was a big silly mess and we bonded a lot over the ridiculous situation. Anyways, here you can see that it was definitely worth it! I keep looking at my nails no matter what I'm doing, and I feel all motivated to practice this summer until I can give myself a manicure :)If you can't see very well, you should click on the picture to make it bigger and see how cute my nails are! This is NOT a picture of a missionary suffering out in the bush.

The plan is to go out for dinner tonight, although Catherine is not feeling well and Frank sprained his wrist yesterday so he has a hard time eating. I need to hang up some laundry now though so it can dry before I finish packing tomorrow. bye for now!

Day 95

Day 95... and I'll be leaving on day 99! I know that it is so close, but thinking about actually going home still feels very surreal.

I gave my testimony in Joyce's English class today - they are the class that I was teaching while she was in India, so it was neat because they've had a chance to get to know me a little bit, and they are the most advanced class right now, so I spoke in English, and then Joyce asked them questions after to gauge their comprehension.

I also had my second-to-last time with Frank's English class this morning - my favourite group of students! They're all girls, from ages 14-20 and they are just all sweet and bright and wonderful :)At lunch time I knitted a cell phone holder for when I get back to Canada, and then I had my Portuguese class at 2 as usual. I am going to do a review/final exam tomorrow, and preparing for it today with Maricildes I realized HOW much Portuguese I have learned since I arrived. On my trip home I have an 8 hour layover in Sao Paulo, which would have been much more difficult three months ago - this time I am not nervous about ordering food if I need to or asking directions for anything, or even possibly making some conversation waiting for the flight. It is a flight to Toronto, so some people will likely speak English, and I'm planning to bring things to do, so hopefully the time passes pretty quickly.

And now there is something very important that I need to know about Canada: do we have white chocolate Smarties? Because I just ate a package of what amounts to white chocolate smarties, and they were too delicious for words. Usually I have to be in a certain mood to love white chocolate, but apparently I was in that mood about 20 minutes ago, and now I am just blogging, basking in the afterglow of a LOT of sugar :) If anyone has information about that, let me know :)

A Super Duper Weekend Pt.1

This weekend we went to Cocalzinho and stayed with Frank's mom for Easter - Me, Catherine, Frank and Diego. It was amaazing.

We took the bus, which I loved - we were driving through beautiful scenery for a weekend away from volunteering and assignments and everything, and I was riding a bus in South America: such a necessary experience!

Frank's mom was so welcoming and made us supper - it was dark by the time we ate, but then we walked up to Frank's sister's house, which is just up the road from his mom. We sat on their porch and Frank and Catherine played guitar and everyone sang the songs they knew and listened to the ones they didn't, and it was great, and we went to bed late since there were no classes to wake up for in the morning!

A Super Duper Weekend Pt. 2

Friday morning was Good Friday, although like I've said earlier, the whole concept of Easter was kind of surreal for me this year. It had occurred to me that I've been pretty slack spiritually, which never helps any situation, but it seemed like fasting would just be a disaster, because first of all, Frank's mom is an amazing cook, and it would be impractical if not rude to not eat as a guest and random foreigner she let sleep in her house - in her bed! So instead of not eating, I fasted from English.

Fortunately, I remembered my intentions early enough in the morning that I hadn't said anything to anyone, and I only slipped up once. I did sing some English lyrics later that night, but I don't think that was breaking the spirit of my fast. It was great - the extra effort that it took to say things made me less chatty with my friends, but it also meant that everyone was included in any conversation that I had - a good move, I think!

We spent the morning relaxing at home (Frank's mom's home, that is), watching TV and enjoying not doing anything. After lunch, Frank's brother-in-law Tiago drove us to a river where we swam around for a couple hours. By swam around, I mean that I never actually took my feet off the bottom of the river; actually I may not have even gone in further than my waist, but it was nice and cool to stand in the water and get some fresh air and just hang out! There was a lot of PDA at that river, so that was a little awkward every time I accidentally glanced at people making out (Catherine and I talked about that today - each time we saw we were both asking ourselves, "is that the same kiss as before, or did you start a new one?" and also "really? that? here? yikes.")

We had supper at Frank's mom's and went up to his sister's house again that night - she was away until Sunday because she works weekends in Pirenopolis, but we hung out with Tiago and their two daughters, as well as Frank's younger brother and sister. It was so much fun, and the couple from next door came over to play guitar/listen to music with us, and it was great!

A Super Duper Weekend Pt. 3

Saturday was an amazing day on top of Friday. This is a blurry picture from a tree in Frank's mom's yard - blurry because I didn't have time to check the picture before my batteries died. That is why there are not hundreds of pictures from this weekend.

Saturday started out similar to Friday - I didn't sleep super well because Frank's niece crawled into bed with me in the middle of the night. Catherine and I were sharing Frank's mom's bed, and Frank and Diego were sleeping in Frank's brother's and sister's beds, and everyone else slept on mattresses in the living room. Frank's two nieces slept over Friday night, and apparently one got disoriented and went to climb into her grandma's bed: there I was.

We had an easy morning though, and in the afternoon Catherine, Frank, Diego, Lucas (Frank's brother) and I walked to another river to go swimming. This time Tiago didn't drive us, and it was probably at least a half hour walk, if not 45 minutes, but this river had a waterfall! We spent the whole afternoon there, swimming (for real this time, not just wading), sitting on rocks with our feet in the waterfall, jumping into where the water poured into the river and letting the current push us close to the beach - it was idyllic really.

Saturday was the day that I got my first terrible sunburn in Brazil.

But it's not as bad as you think! Sure in hindsight lying to dry in the sun seems unwise - but I was wearing sunscreen! I reapplied like four times! This is the thing though, I didn't reapply below my bathing suit top - that would be fanaticism, right? The sun never gets past my shoulders (again, hindsight: lying on the beach means the sun burns everything).

In my defense, my face and arms just got some colour, so that validates that when I use sunscreen it totally works - I do it right! - and I covered my head with a towel like a nun for the walk to AND from the beach, so I didn't get heat stroke or anything. I've just.. slept absolutely still for the last two nights, oh and most of the day Sunday, but we'll get to that. Clothes hardly hurt me any more at all!

A Super Duper Weekend Pt. 4

This is another flower tree in Frank's mom's yard - gorgeous!

By Sunday, our routine was pretty solid: sleep as long as possible with kids playing in the living room, eat breakfast, watch TV, make lunch, eat lunch. We were all pretty beat from our two days of fresh air and sun (some of us more than others, ehem), and everyone napped Sunday afternoon except for Catherine I think. I also napped Sunday morning before lunch. It's really hard to get a good rest when moving makes your skin feel like cracking open, but that is all in the past. Suffice it to say that I wore loose-fitting clothes and abstained from taking a shower. The movie Madagascar was playing on TV, so I watched part of that and slept through the rest - one day I will see the middle of that film! Okay, chances are that I won't.

Catherine and I had been hoping to go to church, but everyone was dead tired and it just didn't happen. Frank's sister got back from Pirenopolis late in the afternoon, and she and Tiago had a party for Easter at their house, so we walked up around six o'clock. I had mixed emotions about going since I'd spent the whole day in bed, and I was feeling somewhat better, but my stretch capris and nike hoodie were less than glamorous and very un-Easter-y.

It turned out that I had the best time at that party! We didn't have supper until late - maybe 10 or 11 o'clock, but the food was so long because it was cooked over a wood-burning stove: rice with chicken mixed together in a way that this blog cannot communicate - it was creamy and spicy and filling and amazing.

A lot of neighbours came to this party - someone opened up the back of their car so their stereo could play music loud enough for everyone in the house (everyone in the neighbourhood, really), and there was dancing forever. I learned how to dance Forro ("foho" like fo sho ;), accent on the second syllable) and Pagode, which was SO fun. Apparently Pagode is similar to Samba, but I don't know anything about Samba so I really can't say. Also, I pretty much mastered the "cockroach dance" lol, which is so named because it looks like you are stepping on cockroaches - my favourite!! (not)

It was late by the time people started going home, and it was probably at least 2am by the time I took a shower and went to bed. I've been hobbling around a little bit like an old lady today because of a sore knee (apparently I busted more than new moves!), but it was Definitely worth it!

To top off the weekend, the four of us were able to catch a ride back to Aguas Lindas rather than take buses full of commuters, so our morning was not as early as it might have been - we got up at 7 instead of 5:30 :S This weekend is definitely right near the top of my list for this semester - possibly second to my day in Pirenopolis, even considering the sunburn! (It's healing, I promise.)

Day 88

Well I'm still taking things slow - I don't know what this bug I have is, but its not going easily, and Catherine may have some of the same thing. We are planning to go with Frank to visit his mom this weekend in another city because of the holiday for Easter - it doesn't really feel like Easter at all though, I'm sad to say, although we've been having tons of rain lately, which kind of reminds me of April at home? It will be neat to see another city though, and apparently there are hiking trails and places to swim near where Frank's mom lives, so it should be a fun weekend!

I had a sweet moment with Andressa and Linda-Inez yesterday - we were sitting at Free Flight scrunching up strips of party streamers for an art project that is too complicated to explain. Andressa asked me when I am leaving, and they were both sad at how soon it is! Andressa said that she will need a picture of me, and I told her I would definitely print her one, and that I would keep lots of pictures of her and Linda and always remember them :)

I am so excited to know that I'll be home with my family in two weeks, but it sucks that I'll also be so far away from such amazing people. If only Brazil was just a couple-hour drive away - then I could visit for the weekend sometimes and keep in touch so much easier!

Day 85

This is a day that I spent in bed. I was all excited because we planned a barbeque at our house yesterday, and Frank and Diego spent the day cleaning the house and getting food ready. I started not feeling well in the afternoon and lay down until after it was dark and the barbeque had already started. I kept feeling worse and worse and got sick, and it was all terrible, although I managed to sleep through most of the night. Today I felt somewhat better and got on the computer for a bit in the morning but didn't eat much and felt sick and weak, so I stayed home from Sunday School. I lay in bed and slept and kept lying in bed and read an entire book, but Catherine made chicken noodle soup (she hasn't been feeling great either), and that was so good, so I am hoping that I'm on the road to recovery!

Day 83

Well, it's the end of another week, and April has started! On Monday, Catherine, Frank and I drove into Brasilia to get my visa extended because it was only good until April 10 and my flight is on the 19th. It was weird to go the federal police station in the airport and think that I would be going there again in three weeks (closer to two now) to come back to Canada.

I made good progress on my assignments this week and have almost finished two out of thee major projects. The rest is under control, and I am going to try to finish everything in this coming week so my final week will be less stressful.

Other than that, it was a pretty normal week - English classes and keyboard classes and studying Portuguese. I shared my testimony again in Catherine's beginner English class (I spoke in Portuguese), and I managed to finish the last book that I was assigned to read this semester, which is great!

Oh, I also watched Butterfly Effect 2 this week - it is.. the worst. Absolutely terrible. It was not a waste of time only because I watched it with friends and we got to laugh together, but if anyone ever invites you to watch this movie with them, know that it would make more sense to spend that time flossing each other's teeth.

Day 78 (my testimony)

I went to the market with Catherine this morning - we bought fruit and fresh spices and went by the bakery. It was a beautiful day and just all Brazilian and wonderful. Catherine is in the market for a new bag since she lost her old purse, so we looked in some stores on the main street in our area, and it was there that I found a beautiful dress. We also found a million ridiculous shirts that neither of us would ever fit into or be able to wear outside of our own bedrooms, but it was fun to look around, and then I saw this beautiful black and white dress with sequins all over it so it sparkles! And I tried it on, and it was gorgeous. So I bought it and wore it to give my testimony at church tonight.

But first, a hilarious story that you probably had to be there for, but oh well. Catherine was trying on a dress as well, and there was a little boy whose mom was in the store, and suddenly I heard Catherine say in a very serious voice, "Sai, por favor" which means Get out. And yeah... this little boy was creeping on Catherine in the change room... not THAT funny, but it made me laugh :)

So.. my testimony. I was so nervous from the time that we arrived at church through the whole time that I was speaking, and there was a lot of singing and even an offering in between! Catherine invited two brothers from Free Flight that we're friends with to come, and it was nice to have them there, although it didn't make me any less nervous! I was having a terrible time understanding anything and kept listening for key words to know when I should go up to the front, but finally the time came, and Catherine came up with me to introduce me a little bit, which was so nice! And then I read my testimony :) It went well, and the pastor even made some references to it in his sermon, so I thought that was cool. Catherine videotaped my testimony, but I'm not going to put the whole thing up because it would never load, and it would be five minutes of just noise to most of you, but here is a clip to prove that I did it =)
(and you can get a glimpse of that dress!)

By the way, it's been pretty cool here for the last few nights - I'm wearing that jean jacket because I needed it! So for anyone who has Brazil envy... well it's still amazing. But it's not always tropically hot! We were commenting on the cold before church and one woman said "yeah, it's freezing!" and I said to Catherine... "that woman does not know our country!"

Day 76

Today was great! I have taken over teaching Joyce's English class while she is in India - it is level 3B, so these students are in their fourth year of studying English (there is the intro level A and B, 1A and B, 2A and B, 3A and B and technically a level 4 although everyone who could be in that class is teaching lower level English classes and doesn't have time!). I speak very little Portuguese with this class, and Joyce organized everything before she left - she even photocopied the worksheets we're supposed to do! - so it has been really easy to take over.

After class, Frank's class was cancelled today so I read my Bible and my last textbook to get through. I practiced my testimony with Maricildes (which I still need to practice a lot!), and then I spent the rest of my afternoon in the break dance room!

There were only three guys there today, and I've hung out with all of them before so I wasn't too embarassed and got to try lots of things :) I kind of fell on my head once, and fell from a handstand flat on my back, which knocked the wind out of me BUT I also managed to finally roll out of a handstand instead of falling to my death so overall it was worth it!! I also practiced stopping in the middle of a cartwheel, which is a way safer way for me to go into a handstand and... other stuff. The plan is to practice more tomorrow, although Saturdays are often really busy days in the breakdance room and I prefer to have lots of space so I don't fall on/kick anybody's head! =)

Catherine went to visit a friend's mom today, so I got a ride home with Frank on the motorcycle... all was normal until we got a flat tire, but we weren't very far from the borracharia (which I don't think has an equivalent in English, someone please let me know if this exists in Canada: a place that only fixes flat tires. They fix car, motorcycle and bike tires, but they don't do repairs like a mechanic does. What do we do in Canada when a flat tire happens? If someone could let me know that would be great.) so Frank pushed the bike there.

While we were waiting for the tire to get changed (we had run over a nail the length of my pinky finger, it was crazy!), we saw our friend Bruno there - he does construction work at Free Flight and knows the lyrics to SO many English songs. Bruno bought Frank and I each a coke - the cutest coke I have ever seen! They came in glass bottles and were 200ml size. Aw! It was all a very South American moment, drinking coke in glass bottles while over-full buses rumbled by and blew dust through the air and families in cars with giant speakers on the roof navigated potholes in front of the borracharia.

The woman who sold the coke was also working some meat on a barbeque next to the borracharia (contributing to the overall very Brazilian ambiance of the day!), and Frank bought a meat kebab. Wow was that the best decision he made all day - he cut me a piece of it to try, and I was kind of sketchy about Brazilian street meat BUT.. it tasted like the most gorgeous steak I've had in my life... I will probably dream about that meat kebab tonight lol.

And then Frank's tire was fixed and we came home, and here I am! It's definitely been a good day =)

Day 75

This is actually a picture from Tuesday night, but I had already blogged that day! Catherine and I made chili for supper with a spice package from Canada that her friend sent her - it was so good! We had leftovers tonight, which were also delicious!

Last night Catherine's friend Cabelo came over (cabelo is a nickname - it means 'hair.' Cabelo has long hair) and we hung out for a couple hours, it was really fun. He speaks really quickly, so it was kind of hard to understand him sometimes, but Catherine helped and he repeated himself lots and it all worked out. Cabelo is a musician and plays in a band, so he and Catherine played some songs on guitar and talked about music that they love, and we talked about our families and church and lots of things. It was fun.

And today I finished a 500-page book that has taken me forever to get through! It is like a shackle falling off me lol - now I just have one more book to finish and infinite assignments before I go =) I have been spending a lot of time on assignments this week to try to catch up on everything I haven't been doing while I was making friends and helping out at Free Flight. I don't think that it was time badly spent at all, and it has been hard to choose to read instead of spending time with kids, although I did go by the breakdance room again Tuesday. I am hoping that by really buckling down I will be able to finish all of my assignments early and have the last few days of my time here completely free from academic responsibility and I can just soak everything in until the very end.

Frank and I translated my testimony this afternoon, so I will practice it tomorrow with my tutor and probably a couple times Saturday with whoever will listen to me - I'm nervous but also looking forward to it, and I think it will be a great experience! It looks like a couple friends from Free Flight are going to come on Sunday to hear my testimony, which is really cool. Deep down, I'm definitely excited!

Day 73

Well the bugs are back to biting me with a vengeance. Just now I caught myself scratching a bite on my elbow, and when I looked at it I saw that what had been one bite is now three. The same thing happened on my side - I had one bite the other night and today I have three. I have more bites on my legs now than I can bother to count, and this round they are from mosquitos, not fleas, so they are itchy!!!

I've been making pretty good progress so far this week on assignments and reading, so even though there is still tons to do I am not feeling too stressed out about it.

This Sunday I am going to give my testimony at Catherine's church where I have also been going most Sundays. I've typed it out, and I think tomorrow in Frank's English class we are going to work on translating it. Yep, I'm going to try to do it in Portuguese, which I am totally nervous about but think will be a great experience, and so much better than doing it in English and needing it to be translated by another person. After we translate it tomorrow, I'll have a couple classes to practice it with my tutor, and then I will just do my best to speak slowly and clearly even if I feel ridiculous.

That's about it - I've been working on assignments this morning and will be heading up to Free Flight soon for lunch, Portuguese, and a keyboard class this afternoon. Wait, there is one more thing. Last night Catherine made banana bread, and it was amazing. :)
Tchau!

Day 71

Joyce left on her travels to India today - it will take her a few days to get there, but she is on her way there for a conference and will be back Easter weekend. Catherine, Frank and I will be holding down the fort, and I'm not worried about anything.

I'm definitely feeling more pressure these days to get to work on my assignments! I have been working on them and reading and doing what I can, but I now have just under four weeks before classes end in Toronto and my work will be due! Yikes. My goal is to finish my assignments before Joyce gets back (three weeks) so that my last week here can be completely without distractions or stress from school stuff - I'm sure there will be enough stress from complicated emotions about leaving here! We'll see how it all goes.

I've had a fun couple of days since my last post! Friday after my Portuguese class I was walking by the breakdance room, "sala de break" lol, and my friend Donisete ("don-knee-Zetchy" oh Brazilian names) asked if I was going to train. I've spent the last month or so telling him and his friend Junho (which is the equivalent of Junior, I think) that I would one day, and for once the room wasn't packed with sweaty guys, so I decided to take the chance. It was so fun! My muscles are still kind of sore today from the half hour or so of "training", but it was worth it, and I will definitely try to do it again. It was kind of embarassing and I felt like such a white girl in the worst way, but everyone who was there was so encouraging and didn't make fun of me. One guy said that I'm already better than his brother! lol. I learned some standing up footwork and some weird running around in a circle with my hands on the ground footwork and two freezes, both of which require more strength than I have to actually hold. BUT I have a month to build that strength! Wish me luck!

Saturday I spent an hour and a half putting tiny pieces of double sided tape on strips of paper as part of a project for the graphics shop. There are 30 000 strips of paper to tape, so the couple hundred that I did made depressingly little impact. That's how it is though with a big project like that... everyone chips away at it when they have the chance and eventually the tape runs out or our spines are permanently bent or the project gets finished.Saturday afternoon, Andressa shared with me the exciting discovery that some of the piles of gravel at Free Flight have tiny seashells in them!! She and her brother started looking for as many as they could find, and another girl named Leony joined them. I was the holder of the shells - they found almost as many shells as I could hold in one hand, so there were actually quite a lot.Andressa was so cute - she must have heard somewhere that if you put a shell up to your ear you can hear the ocean because she was doing that with these shells. I explained that the shell needs to be bigger for it to work... these shells were no bigger than the size of my fingernail. She and Leony were pretty impressed when I told them that there were seashells in the world bigger than my hand. Anyways, it was a fun afternoon looking for seashells in central Brazil =)

Day 68

This is my token sunset picture :) Catherine and I were talking about some stereotypes of missions presentations, which include greeting the audience in the "native language" and concluding the presentation with a picture of a sunset. The sunset was way more beautiful than this picture captures, but at least its a picture of a memory.
This is a knitting project that I finished Monday - I am going to give it to my Portuguese tutor to thank her for being so amazing. I decided that since I'm giving it away I should have a picture of how cool (if not very square) this washcloth/hot plate. The thing is, people here do dishes very differently, and they use sponges instead of cloths and way less water. So if this cloth came to Canada it might one day be a dishcloth, but that is not its destiny. It's a pretty complicated pattern though, and considering that I've learned how to knit since I arrived here I'm pretty proud of myself :)

This week has kind of gotten away from me blog-wise. As I settle in more and more and get more comfortable here I find that my schedule varies a lot more, so rather than come home and blog about the day I.. do lots of different things. Sometimes I help make supper or do some reading for classes (especially now that March is half over and I have all kinds of assignments left lol), or knit something or read something or just hang out... anyways, so all of a sudden it's Thursday!

I was feeling sick today so I came home at lunch and napped and then worked on assignments (surprise surprise), but it was good - I feel much better and hope that I keep feeling better tomorrow!

Tomorrow is Friday, which means English classes in the morning and possibly in the last afternoon (I haven't been helping in the last afternoon class for the last few weeks because it is very small and there aren't many ways to help that the teacher can't just do himself, plus by the last period of Wednesdays and Fridays I'm usually pretty tired from classes in the morning and my Portuguese session after lunch. I might work on some reading or hang out with some kids or watch a soccer game... time will tell :)

Disappointingly, my bug bites are increasing and intensifying... I had a really good stretch where I had hardly any! I don't know if there are more mosquitos lately because we've been having crazy rain or what... thank the Lord that I don't have fleas in my bed any more, but mosquitos are getting to me somehow... even under my clothes. Catherine's still worse off than me though, and I'm toughing them out... I would WAY rather have bug bites than wake up to cockroaches on their backs in my room, which has happened in the past but mercifully not in the last little while. Every day when I wake up I peek over the edge of my bed and scope out the floor so that no bugs catch me by surprise :) I am also very sketchy going into the bathrooms... hidden camera footage would probably look really ridiculous as I push the door open and look all around before I go in, check behind the door, look up the wall in case any cockroaches are above my line of sight, and then close the door once I know it's safe. It's quite a process, mentally, emotionally and physically!

Well that's it for me today - tchau!

Day 64

Sunday school was really great today, and church was pretty good too, although Catherine and I had to wait an hour and a half after the service for a ride home. The pastor was catching up on meetings he had missed that day since he had been in court finding out who would pay for the church's gate being wrecked by a drunk driver. Happily, it will be the drunk driver paying for it!

I realized while I was sitting in church though, that my purse is very different here than it usually is in Canada. Normally I'd have my wallet and some lip gloss, a pen and my Bible. Here I pack my Bible, my Portuguese flash cards (they have a white ring to hold them together - you can see them in the top left of my purse) AND toilet paper, in case I need to use the bathroom at church, which I did. Not as glamorous as lip gloss maybe, but definitely more important!

Day 63

Tonight after our day at Free Flight, Catherine, Diego and I went out for pizza. It took forever to be made and we were all starving by the time it arrived, but it was so delicious and worth it! The best part of the whole night though is that we only spoke Portuguese from the time we left the house until the time we got back! Having moments like that and being able to see the progress that I'm making in the language and enjoying the perks - hanging out with friends! - are high points :)

That's all, I was just proud of myself and wanted to share :P

Day 62

No pictures today. This week has been great, especially in the afterglow of Pirenopolis! We haven't had the most reliable internet, but I've been managing to work away on assignments, finish a knitting project and have a great week in all the classes I helped with! My Portuguese is still improving, so that is great too.

I had a great talk with Joyce today about how things are going so far, and we talked about the book of Amos, which she had given me an assignment for. She is going to India for a conference in just over a week, so she will be away for a few weeks and it will definitely be a change. I'm not worried about it because Catherine and Frank are here and have been here without her before, but it will be strange.

I have a lot of thoughts in my head - I've been journaling quite a bit lately and thinking about different things but I don't have anything coherent to say yet, so I think that's the end of this post :) Tchau.

Day 58 - A Day Trip! pt.1

Oh my goodness... I think this was one of the best days of my life. Catherine, Frank, Adilio, Joel and I went to Pirenopolis for the day - about an hour and a half's drive away from Aguas Lindas. It was a gorgeous drive and a fun group of friends and just generally incredible.Part way to Pirenopolis we stopped to look at a waterfall, and the green hills all around it are basically the same as the scenery that we drove through the whole way.

So the drive down the highway was great - Catherine and I talked in the front while the guys beat each other up in the back in between all of us singing songs until we arrived in Pirenopolis. It is an old city that dates back to Portuguese colonizers looking for gold, and it is now famous for its celebrations during the Festa do Divino Espirito Santo. I asked Frank what giant bull heads have to do with the Holy Spirit Festival, but apparently part of the celebration involves people dressing up with these big cow masks. I still don't see the connection lol, but the colourful statues around the city were cool, and the city is SO pretty! The streets are all cobblestone and the houses are lovely, and it is so clean! :)There is a church that you can just sort of see at the top of the street through the trees. We didn't go here, but it is the oldest church in the state and there were lots of souvenirs that had a picture of it. There is also a picture of this church on the Wikipedia site, so you know it's real!

Our first mission in Pirenopolis was to see the amazing waterfalls. There is a hiking trail where Joyce always takes groups here on short term mission trips, so we went there.

The hike started quite a ways out of the city, probably 15 or 20 minutes down a dirt road. The drive was no big deal because we are used to the roads in Aguas Lindas which are still terrible compared to this, but I took a video for the scenery and to share a little bit of the experience :)

Continue on to Part 2 for more!!

A Day Trip! pt.2

This is the tough barn at the beginning of the trail up to the waterfalls.

And this is some of the scenery from the path... amazing.

Like a bridge over troubled water (?)The first waterfall along the path

Yet another bridge that rustically bent under your weight and was totally fall-offable

Another waterfall on our way up the mountain! Interesting fact: the woman whose head you can see at the bottom was wearing a one-piece bathing suit. Catherine thinks she's probably not from Brazil because... that just doesn't happen here.
This is where the path got steep. And by steep I mean... climbing with hands and feet, holding onto tree roots and the ever-present cable wires. What you see in this picture is tame.
But the path was so worth it! Part way up the path carved into the side of the mountain was another waterfall, and I braved the current to cross over onto the rock where you see me standing :) It was cool and misty and great, and then we kept climbing up.
This is THE waterfall. And that's my head swimming in it! Joel is standing in the place where we eventually jumped off, but that didn't happen until like 45 minutes of deliberation. I am proud to say that he finally decided to jump after I said I'd do it first, and my deliberations only lasted like... 10 minutes? It was a lot harder once I was actually standing in the place looking down at the trees growing out of the cliff and imagining what would happen if the impact broke all of my bones.

But then I jumped anyways! This pose is what I like to call the "fear position" where you've just jumped off a cliff and are bracing for impact, for drowning, for a wedgie... whatever you happen to get. My first jump was amazing and I was so proud of myself! My second jump was more painful and a lot of water washed through my nose into my lungs, so that was kind of a buzz killer, but it was Totally worth it!!