Tuesday, June 19, 2012

Culture Shock

I am experiencing culture shock upon my return home.  I truly did not expect that....but for two weeks I had no tv, news, internet, etc.  There were many things that were different in Brazil, but honestly those changes were easier than my return home.  Upon entering the Miami airport we were faced with a large tv blasting the news.  The stories were ridiculous.  When I went to the store I saw all of the magazines with all of the latest gossip on the stars.  I think we get numb to just how much junk we have in our lives and it takes a detox to make us see it.   Everywhere I look I see junk junk junk.  When we go to other countries to help them, I think we feel sort of superior to them and that we are going to rescue them.  I think maybe they have it better than us in some ways.  On the trip, we worked hard when it was time to work, but there was a very clear end to the work at noon each day and in the evening.  And when we stopped working, we relaxed and talked and played and laughed.  That is not normal for me.  I work and work and work and work.  If I have a little time left over, I might relax or do something fun.  It is not planned or purposeful.  I think I am going to plan my relaxing time and play time.   I feel like that is healthy.  Also, I was warned about the food on the trip.  Don't drink the water.....wash the fruit....cook the veggies.  Honestly, we ate very well.  It was all fresh and healthy and nutritious.  It was not thawed according to our standards here--they just layed it out on the deck until it thawed.  But, none of us got sick from the food on the boat.  We did start getting sick when we started eating processed and restaurant food again.  Again, I think we numb ourselves to the junk and don't even realize that it is making us sick.  In many ways I think I am going to bring Brazil home with me and make some healthy changes.

Monday, June 18, 2012

Changing lives, including my own....


June 2012 Amazon Boat Trip Journal
Greencastle Christian Church, Greencastle, Indiana
Chelle Thomas—journal writer

 

Tuesday, June 05, 2012 (Morning)
I believe the challenge for me on this trip will be letting go of the details.  I planned meticulously for this trip.  I thought out every detail….and….most of those plans have fallen apart.  I bought every type of bug spray I could possibly need and it was confiscated.  I packed only carry on luggage precisely meeting the regulations I found in writing and on the website before the flight because I did not want to risk my bags getting lost.   On the first plane, it was a small jet and they made us valet check all of our carry on luggage.  On the second flight—the one actually going to Brazil—they made me check all of my bags again because the rules were different than the website had stated.  I have had to make myself go with the flow and I am realizing this does not come easily for me.  I am guessing that everyone around me has known this for some time, but I am sometimes slow to learn.  I think this journey is going to make me give up some of my need to control all the details of life and it’s events.  Right now we are sitting on the runway getting ready to take off.  The plane is huge—7 seats across and it is full!
Tuesday, June 05, 2012 (Evening)
Our group got together on Sunday afternoon and spent a few hours sorting and packing all of the items we had collected for this trip.  We had 10 large suitcases filled to the brim with medicines, glasses, baby wipes, etc.  We met yesterday around 3 pm to head to the airport.  We arrived in Miami around 11:30 pm and got our hotel room.  We had to be back at the airport at 4:30 today, so none of us got a lot of sleep.  I was not able to fall asleep at all….We arrived in Manaus around 12:30 pm and then we got to go through customs.  Some of us were a little nervous about this, but the others that had been before said we had nothing to worry about.  Anyway, we waited about an hour and a half for bags to start coming off the plane.  We noticed that the federal police were there and they ended up inspecting every bag.  This is apparently not the norm.  About half of our bags came back with a special piece of tape on them…once we had all 22 of our bags off the belt an employee ushered us to a special line.  They took over half of the stuff that we brought and confiscated it.  We were really sick about it.  I guess tomorrow Earl is going back to the airport and thinks we will be able to get it back.  I sure hope we are able to get it.  That whole event took a few hours.  Once we left the airport, Earl had a giant tour bus waiting for us….We rode to the boat.  The water was super high…We unloaded and got set up in our rooms and then unpacked the items we were able to keep.  We made little baggies for our patients.  Each one has some soap, shampoo, toothpaste and toothbrush, and lotion.  We had lunch, which was grilled beef with onions and peppers, spaghetti noodles, rice, a salad and bananas.  We also had a yummy soda called Guarana (pronounced Guadana) or something like that.  The food was delicious and was way different than I expected, even after reading all of the previous journals.  Around 7, we prayed and ate again.  This time we had rolls, shredded beef, bananas, cheese and some kind of sliced meat like spam.  We took our showers.  We were surprised to find that the bathroom does not have a shower curtain.  It is just one big room with a shower head, a toilet, and a sink.  We have a 2 liter of water to brush our teeth and you cannot put any toilet paper in the toilet.  There is a little can for it.  We have not seen many bugs but we are dousing on the bug spray just in case.  I am in the room with Megan and Katie.  We are all sleeping upstairs in the Rede’s (hedgies) tonight.   Two other people are too…It is 10:15 and I am ready for bed!   Tomorrow we have breakfast at 7 and then devotions.  Then Earl will go to the airport and when he gets back our first village is about 4 hours away.  He said we will try to see two villages tomorrow and they are both completely under water.  I guess I forgot to mention that the river is the highest it has been in a very long time—maybe ever.  I think they said it is 98 feet high. 

 

Wednesday, June 06, 2012
Wow, there was a lot going on today…we got up around 6:30.  Several of us slept in the Rede’s last night.  They are super comfortable!  They rock just a little and you can really stretch out.  I was a little worried before I got here that they would be easy to flip over, but they are not. 

There were no bugs during the night that I saw.  We had breakfast around 7 am.  It consisted of mango, papaya, tapioca (which is not pudding—It is kind of a fried crumbly bread), tapioca with meat and cheese inside, rolls, apples, bananas, fried bananas, grapes, and guava juice.  Again it was fantastic.  After that, Earl and the doctor left to go see about getting our meds back.  While they were gone we packaged up children’s vitamins, ibuprofen, and Tylenol.  Earl got back around 12:30 and we were thrilled to see that they got ALL of our stuff back!  I have to note here what an amazing job Ruth Ann does organizing all of the meds.  There is what you see in the pharmacy, which is well organized….but then there is the stuff in the very bottom of the boat.  She has big cases; each labeled and sorted for all of the items they collect.  It is amazing to see!  We ate lunch next.  These ladies can really cook and there is so much food.  There has not been anything I have not liked!  For lunch we had fried chicken (kind of like chicken nuggets), rice, and a bean and sausage gravy type thing, manioc, pineapple mousse, salad, and watermelon juice.  After lunch, we took off down the river.  It was great.  This place is one of the most beautiful I have ever seen.  The river is super high and we saw home after home under water….they were covered halfway or more with water.  The crazy thing is that they are still living in them.  I was told that they just put boards down and keep raising the floor.  We saw laundry hanging outside several and boats tied up to them.  Some of them had kids playing outside in the water.  That part was pretty sad.  We also saw a passenger boat.  These boats carry people up and down the rivers from their villages to the bigger cities.  They may travel for two weeks to get to town.  When it went by we could see that it had three decks and about 40 -60 Rede’s on it.  People take anything on there they can take—washers, pigs, goats, dogs, anything really.  We traveled for about 4 hours and finally arrived at our first village.  I could not believe we got the boat into the dock.  There were plants and trees totally covering the area between us and the dock.  Earl got a machete out and cut branches out of the way and they got the boat all the way up to the doc.  We immediately had patients.  We treated four or five families.  There were a lot of little children.  I taught a little girl about 4 years old how to blow bubbles.  It was pretty cute.   There were tons of bugs once we pulled into the dock.  I ended up having a giant green bug bite me.  I knocked it off and it played dead and then when I picked it up it moved.  All of us in my room screamed.  It was pretty funny!
We had dinner around 8 pm.  We had a chicken vegetable dish, rice, leftover bean gravy, and a guava paste thing with cream over it.  After dinner we showered and then we talked with some of the crew for about an hour or so.  It was fun trying to communicate and figure out what we each were saying.  I think we did a pretty good job of figuring out what we all were trying to say.  The moon outside was full and shining over the river.  It was beautiful.  We ended up sleeping in our bedroom tonight.  There were just way too many bugs outside!  Our room feels good (AC).  I am on the top bunk and I cannot sit up because my head will hit the ceiling….It has been many years since I slept on a top bunk…I hope I don’t fall off!  Tomorrow we will see more of the village.  It is expected to be really busy.  If we have time we will see a second village as well and then tomorrow night we will leave at 1 am to travel through the night to pick up the dentist. 

Thursday, June 07, 2012
What an incredible day.  We woke up around 6:45 and had breakfast at 7.  We did not do morning devotions because the people were already waiting to be seen.  We saw patients until around 11 and then we moved a bit up the river to another village.  I just cannot believe how much water there is.  It is just beyond words.  We ate lunch and then we started seeing patients again.  There were tons of adorable kids.  There were not very many elderly people.  I think someone said we treated about 175 people after lunch.  They came in groups.  The biggest group had something like 8 kids.  So, breakfast was rolls, cheese, ham, cinnamon cake, and lots of fruit.  Lunch was beef cigar (beef stuffed with potato, cheese, and ham), rice, spaghetti, salad, and the yummiest flan I have ever tasted!  Dinner was spaghetti, sliced beef, rice, leftover cigar, and cookies.  When we finished seeing patients in the afternoon, we went to church.  We had to ride in small boats because the whole village is flooded and the church is completely surrounded by water.  Luckily it is still above water.   They just built it two years ago.  The service was amazing.  Not so much because of the message….because it was actually in Portuguese and we could not understand most of it, but because all of us believers—even unable to speak the same language—were all worshipping the same God.  The people were praising even though their lives have been turned upside down by this flooding.  They are still just going on with life and they seem truly happy.  It was just four little walls, an open door and open windows and people praising the Lord.  Today one of the ladies that came had a sore throat and a cold.  She said that she had to jump in the river under her house because two of her pigs had fallen into the river.  That would be so scary, but after being at church tonight, I can totally see how that could happen.  Tonight we are sleeping in the Rede’s again.  We will be leaving this village around midnight and traveling through the night to get the dentist.  We get to sleep in tomorrow because we will get to Manaus around 4 am and then travel about 16 hours to our next village.  Some of the guys were fishing off the dock and caught a lot of little Piranha.  Something funny in our room is that all of us have accidentally thrown toilet paper in the toilet multiple times.  Each time we have to grab q-tips and fish it out and throw it in the trash can.  It is a little frustrating!  We all know not to do it and yet we all keep doing it and then groaning immediately after!  Also, I think in the future I will bring a few toothbrushes.  Mine fell on the floor of the shower once—I am not using it again and I accidentally rinsed the second one in the sink….not using that one either!

Friday, June 08, 2012
Last night I slept so well!  We slept in the Rede’s and we were moving all night.  There was a soft breeze and the sound of water.  The moon and stars were beautiful and there were no bugs.  We all slept really well.  Around 7:30, the wind picked up and it got kind of chilly.  After we woke up, we ate breakfast individually and then we all just sat around and talked.  Some of us sat on the water tank so we could see better and feel the breeze as we coasted along the river.   We had devotions and we talked about Galatians 1.  It was interesting hearing Earl talk about Paul and Timothy.  I thought it was interesting that the main point of the lesson was making sure we are following what God taught us and not worrying about whether it is pleasing to man.  So many churches base their decisions on making people happy and somehow forget that we are to please God and that if we are doing what he tells us to do it will all work itself out.  While we were doing our devotions, the Coast Guard stopped our boat.  Earl said this was the first time that the new boat had been stopped.  It seemed to go ok because after about 15 minutes they let us go.  They asked for a list of all passengers to be dropped off when we come back through.  It is so funny….on this trip, just about every difficult thing has happened that I had imagined before the trip, but every time it has turned out ok.  It is a firm reminder to me that God is in complete control and that we can trust him fully with all things.  After lunch we kept traveling and we saw the pink dolphins we were hoping to see.  They were hard to see and if we had not heard about them before, we might not have known what they were.  They only stuck their dorsal fin out of the water, but there were several and it happened over and over.  That was amazing!  We arrived around 4 pm at Sao Sebastiao.  We docked and got off the boat and walked to the Greenhouse.  It was about 2-3 miles and it was hot.  I was surprised by all of the skinny dogs wandering around and the trash everywhere.  It does not appear that they have trash service.  A few places you could see where people were really trying to clean up their yards.  The greenhouse and the pastor’s house were beautiful!  While we were there we met Santana.  She made beautiful jewelry, baskets, key chains, and oars.  It is all super cheap and very nice.  We walked back, had dinner, and now we are getting ready to head up to bed. 

Saturday, June 09, 2012
Another great night of sleep….we slept in the dock at Sao Sebastiao.  We drove for about an hour and a half and went to Santa Maria.  The ride was beautiful and the flooding seems lower here.  The top deck on top of the water tanks is my favorite place to sit.  There is always a good breeze.  We tried to hang a Rede up because I wanted to sit in it and get out of the sun and I fell out of it three times before we got it right.  And then we pulled into our stop less than five minutes later.  We were all laughing really hard!  When we pulled in, there was no one around.  This was a little different than our other stops.  We only treated a few people.  We did have a dentist for this stop—he had a few patients.  Katie cut hair on the beach.  The crew of the boat let her cut their hair, but only after they saw how well she did someone else’s hair first.  The electronic blood pressure monitor was not working correctly, so I learned to take it manually.  We are already pulling into our next village and it has only been about 20 minutes.  The next stop we made was a request from one of the patients.  We had two families there and one young man that had just gotten off work.  I think he was really nervous.  He would not come see the doctor until he had taken a bath in the river and then changed his clothes.  He asked for a haircut after that and he seemed even more nervous about that.  He kept breathing heavy during the haircut and we are not sure he really liked it.  After we left there, we headed back toward Sao Sebastiao.  We had dinner which was very delicious and soon we are going to play cards with several of us.  We have regular cards and Uno Flash.  The sky tonight was amazing.  We saw a rainbow and then a beautiful lightening show.  It has only rained once so far and that was just for about 10 minutes. 
We played Uno tonight---me, Michelle, Katie, Megan, Flavia, and Sales (Salice).  It was really neat.  None of us speak the other language really well—(us Portuguese and them English).  We managed to figure it out though and laughed so hard!  We did learn not to use the English word “shuffle” because it means something else in Portuguese and is not a word we want to keep using!  Sales is incredibly funny and cracks us up all the time!

 Right now it is about 2 am and I woke up to use the restroom.  I was struck by how beautifully calm and beautiful the river is right now.  The moon is high in the sky, there are a million stars, and the water is as smooth as glass.  There is a lovely cool breeze blowing through the top deck.  All in all—just simply amazing.

Sunday, June 10, 2012
Today we woke up to heavy rain. Katie and I jumped up and put the sides down.  It really helps a lot to have those down.  Once we were back in our Rede’s the wind really kicked up.  I was very glad we were docked at the time.  The wind was so bad it blew over the ladder, which made a really loud noise and scared everyone below.  We just finished breakfast and are getting ready for devotions.  We will then travel about 2 hours to a village where there should be about 100 people to treat.  Someone joked about not working on Sunday and we remembered how Jesus treated people on Sunday and discussed it a little.  There is so much that happens here that is difficult to put into words.  I am so glad that I was able to come on this trip.  It has been nothing less than amazing and even though we work hard when we are at the villages, I feel really relaxed and refreshed. 
It is now Sunday evening…I think maybe I did not drink enough water today.  I have been tired and not hungry all afternoon.  Also, if you are using bug spray you should remove the label from your water bottle, because if you don’t, the color will melt all over your skin and clothes.  Yep, I am saying this because earlier I had smurf arms!  Today we were in Saint Helena.  There were so many pregnant girls there and girls who thought they were pregnant.  These were 13, 14, 15 year old girls.  There was also a couple there that had been basically living together for 8 years.  She wants to get married and he doesn’t, so I guess some things cross cultural boundaries.  After lunch we got to take a nap for about an hour and a half.  That was great.  Katie did 19 haircuts.  We have not had very many dental patients on the boat.  I feel bad for the dentist.  This whole trip has been light on patients—at least lighter than they say it usually is.  I know there has been some sort of festival that some of the people went to.  I am going to go drink some more water now and we are going to play Uno.  We will sleep in Sao Sebastiao again tonight.
Monday, June 11, 2012
It is hard to believe we have been on the boat pretty much for a whole week.  It has gone so fast, but also seems like we have been here forever.  It is hard to explain. I did not feel good again this morning, but drinking water and staying in the pharmacy did help.   I worked in the pharmacy all day today and it was fun.  Ruth Ann is fun to work with and talk too.  I think she likes being in the pharmacy better than anywhere else on the boat.   We had more pregnant girls today.  It is a huge problem.  The villages we went to were so beautiful.  One of them is normally too hard to get to, but with the flooding we were able to make it there.  It was the first time they have ever been there.   It had a half built Assemblies of God church.  I am not sure how long it has been there half done.  Katie cut 24 people’s hair today.  I felt bad for her because the clippers were so hot they were burning her fingers.  She was so hot out there.  Also, the last man who got his hair cut had a really bad fungus thing on his head.  It was not pretty.  He was also a bit intoxicated, so I am not sure he actually understood what he needed to do with the medicine we gave him, but hopefully he will figure it out!  In a few minutes four of us are going alligator hunting!  I am excited and nervous about this, but I am determined to try new things!  It should be interesting because the three of us in my room scream over seeing a big bug.  We look so funny decked out in our alligator gear.  Maybe we will post photos and maybe not!  We had signal again today so we could have some contact with home.  That is really nice because I was pretty sure it would be 10 days with no contact….
We just got back from alligator hunting!  It was so much fun!  The guys were ninjas!  Doo Doo was in the front of the boat.  He sat with his feet in the water, with an oar in one hand and a flashlight in his mouth talking on his cell phone.  He would get quiet and then just grab a gater out of the water! The bigger ones they hit on the head with an oar first and then grabbed them out of the water and tied them up.  It is the craziest thing I have ever seen.  We caught (well honestly, they caught) five gators but threw one back because it was so small.  The smallest we got was about a foot long and the biggest was maybe 3 ½ feet and about 15 pounds….I guess we will be eating gator tomorrow. 

Tuesday, June 12, 2012
Today we stayed in Sao Sebastiao.  We treated people from the church here.  I think we treated maybe 120ish people.  There were tons of pregnant young girls.  This is just a really big problem here.  I cannot imagine my daughter, who is 14, being pregnant at this age.  I know that customs and culture are different here, but I still feel sorry for these girls.  The people here are all so beautiful.   They have amazing skin and hair and they are all just adorable.  There have been a few people that have not liked the fact that we are all Americans volunteering on the boat.  That is a little tough to hear.  I do know that there are not enough people or supplies here to staff the boat and meet all of the needs here.  All of the medicine on the boat is from the USA.  When I think about how many people we have met and served on this trip, I cannot imagine what would happen to them if we did not come and bring medicine to them.  This afternoon, after we were done treating people several of us went for a swim.  The water felt great!  It was nice to splash and float a little bit.  The only bad thing was that I decided to join some of the others in jumping off the top deck of the boat.  I landed wrong and hurt my rib.  Everyone else had a lot of fun doing that though and it was fun watching them after my jump!  We got to see them skin and process the big alligator today.  They let the rest of them go.  I think Timmy is going to join us for lunch tomorrow, but I am not really sure.  Things here go at a little different pace.  I am learning to just go with the flow.  Tonight we had ice cream at a little place here in the town.  It was really yummy!  I highly recommend the Dolce de Leite and the Chocolate Blanco.  We had pizza for dinner, but it was not your average American pizza.  It is a pizza shell with some kind of tomato sauce—maybe ketchup, peas, egg, onion, olives, ham (spam-like) and cheese.  They like to eat it with mayo or ketchup.  I did not think I would like it, but I thought it was pretty good.  I did take the corn, peas, and egg off, but otherwise it was good.  There have only been a couple dishes I did not care for.  Mostly, I have loved everything.  We are going to play Uno again tonight and then bed.  There is a boat next to us loaded with cows, so it is kind of stinky upstairs.  I hope that we can still sleep up there.  The crew on this boat is amazing!   They work non-stop and it is really impressive how hard they work. 

Wednesday, June 13, 2012
Today was a really LONG day!  We started with breakfast and devotions. After that we drove maybe an hour to a village.  When we arrived, we were a little surprised.  This was one of the nicest villages we have seen.  They seemed to have more money than the other villages.  Their homes were very nice and had screens on some of the windows.  There were fences all around the property and they had about 60 steer.  This village needed lots of medicine though.  It was really remote and we gave them more than I remember giving any other village.  I was told that it was also one of the villages they have been coming to for a long time, so they know what to ask for.  We stopped around 12:30 or 1 and had lunch.  We had our alligator for lunch.  It was really good.  It tasted like a really good chicken nugget with all white meat.  We also had lasagna, but it was not quite what we Americans usually think of when we talk about lasagna.  It had noodles and cheese and some sort of tomato sauce, but the meat was the ham (spam) and there were different kinds of beans in it.  We had fresh pineapple (yummy), and salad and then they brought out a super delicious coconut cake.   I think that has been my favorite thing so far….well maybe…..the flan was pretty good too.  We had several people from one of the villages / churches on the boat all day today.  After lunch, we started treating people around 2:30.  We normally stop at 5 but today we worked until almost 7!  We saw 70 patients in 2 ½ hours!  They just kept coming!  A lot of them were very sick kids.  We gave out a lot of antibiotics—more than any other stop on this trip.  The dentist was also very busy.  After we stopped working, we all had some sweet bread that Santana (the lady who makes jewelry) made.  It was really good and we were all very tired.  Most of us went to a cookout that the local church threw for us.  It was very sweet of them and the food was good.  We ate the meat and the rice mostly.  When we got back, I straightened up my stuff a bit, chatted with my friends here on the boat and then Katie and I played Uno with several of the crew.  I am not going to try to spell their names because I will totally mess them up, but we had a lot of fun.  They LOVE to play Uno and they do a good job trying to figure out what we are saying.  I bet their English will get better with every trip if the people on the trip keep working with them and try to learn Portuguese while they are learning English.  This crew is fantastic and they work really hard.  Tomorrow we get to sleep in till 10 if we want to.  I am pretty sure I will not be able to sleep that long, but we will see.   We will travel all day tomorrow to Manaus and then on Friday we will get to shop in the market at Manaus.  After that we will go to the airport and fly to Goiana.  We will then stay with our host families until Monday and then we fly home.  I am so glad that I came on this trip.  It has been truly amazing and been a blessing to me.  It is rewarding to see how many we have helped. 

Saturday, June 16, 2012

Today is my son’s birthday.  It is really hard to be away from my kids.  They are 12 and 14 and I have never really been away from them for any length of time.  I have been busy most of the time, which has kept my mind off of it, but when I heard his voice today when I called to say happy birthday, I started crying and I miss them so much. 
I did not write Thursday or Friday because we were traveling.  On Thursday, we took off around 9 am and we sailed the boat all day.  We arrived in Manaus around 7 am on Friday.  During the day on Thursday we packed additional meds for the next trip.  We also all got packed up and cleaned things up.  I have a ton of bug bites and they are all really big.  I don’t think any of them are mosquitoes and there hasn’t been any malaria going around, so I am not worried about that but they are uncomfortable.  It stormed for part of the trip.  In the evening several of us played Uno again.  They really love to play and it is a great way to learn some new words and connect with the crew.  I just simply cannot say enough good things about them.  Someone told me that when they went on the trip two years ago they left a piece of their heart in Brazil and I think that will be true of me as well.  Val cried when we left.  I will miss them.  Several of them do have facebook though, so we can kind of stay in touch that way.  Friday, when we got to Manaus we docked by the market.  I could immediately tell that this was a different sort of place…probably more like what I imagined it would be like here before coming.  There were people laying around a place that looks like a bus station, but for boats.  There were all sorts of people carrying heavy bundles of food.  There was a boat carrying goats and pigs and they looked like they were going to tip….It was a little canoe type boat with probably 20 animals and 2 men.  There were tons of passenger boats and people were very loud.  We walked up to get Rede’s and then shopped in the market.  There is some fun stuff there, but a lot of it is for tourists (think corner stand at the state fair).  I picked up some Rede’s and some little items for my kids and friends.  We could not go to the fish market because it got flooded and they moved it.  There were no sidewalks because they were underwater but they had built wooden plank things and people walked on those.  When we left there, we went to the boat and had a sandwich and moved the boat to the location where the bus would pick us up.  We got to shop in the hotel for a bit.  One of the ladies tried to short one of the girls a pair of earrings, but we got them back.  Those shops will barter if you like to do that, which I do.  I got a few good deals.  Next,  we hugged the crew good-bye and got on the bus to the airport.  We had a really long wait there so we walked around.  I found some really cute items that were very reasonable.  I cannot wait to give everyone back home their gifts!  I hope they love them.  We got thru security and boarded our flight.  Our flight had been delayed a little, so when we landed we had to hustle through the airport pretty quickly and then got on our next flight.  It was only 25 minutes, so it literally felt like we took off and then landed.  We got our baggage and headed out to the van.  They drive a little differently here in Brazil!  They go pretty fast, don’t really yield and don’t stop at stop lights or signs.  It was a little scary….in fact that was more scary than hunting for alligators.  We were all starving so Earl had the boys take us to Subway.  Now, you would think it would be pretty easy to order Subway, but it is not!  You have to order every detail and a lot of the words don’t make sense.  They did not speak a bit of English so it was really difficult—especially after traveling all day and being tired.  I have a whole new appreciation for foreigners.  I will never say, “if they are here, they should learn the language…”  It is harder than it seems like it would be!  We went to our host families and went to bed around 1 am.  Our host family is amazing.  It is a really sweet lady and a girl from America who is here teaching English.   It is so great to have someone there who speaks English!  They made us a big breakfast….chocolate cake, pineapple, bread, cheese, meat, coffee, milk.  We overslept because we did not realize there was a time change.  Today, we met at the church and went to a street market.  They were selling veggies, fruits, all kinds of meats and cheese.  They will barter here too….we did pretty well and saved some money, but honestly most of the prices were pretty good anyway.  After that, we went to the mall and ate lunch.  I ate Japanese food and it was good.  One of the girls went to Burger King and tried to order a combo number 3, but actually ordered three combos.  They laughed pretty hard about that.  We went to the supermarket, which is like a Wal-Mart and bought items to take home.  Then some of us shopped at the mall.  It was pretty expensive there.  I guess they just made a car seat law and a car seat can be anywhere from $R500-$R1000 ($250-500)!  I could not believe it!  We had seen people coming here from America with several new car seats.  Now I understand why!  We just got changed and are getting ready to go to dinner.  Tomorrow we will go to Sunday school and then lunch and then church.  Monday we will head home.  This has been an amazing trip and I have been blessed beyond belief.  It has been difficult at times, but I plan to come again in two years.

Monday, June 18, 2012

Wow, so I really thought I would not have much to write once we got here to Goiania, but I was so wrong.   It is amazing how different it is here than Amazonas.  This city is huge, kind of like New York or Chicago.  I got to go to an apartment that had a view of the whole city and it is HUGE!  So far on this trip we have traveled by plane (both large and small), boat (both big and small), motorcycle, car, van, bus, and taxi.  One of the families that we met at the church are actually coming to Indiana in August, so we are going to try to meet them for lunch.  Saturday night we ate at an amazing restaurant.  It was a huge buffet with all kinds of food.  They have one vegetable they eat that they only suck on.  If you bite it, it is full of sharp needles that will shred your mouth.  I really don’t think that will ever go near my mouth!   Then they brought out these skewers with meat and potatoes and cheeses and breads.  They would walk around and cut off chunks of the various meats onto your plate until you could eat no more.  It was so amazing and delicious!  Sunday, we went to Sunday school in the morning.  Katie and I rode the bus with Dani.  That was an adventure, but it went well!  Then we walked to a bakery and got some goodies because we were a little early.  After church we went to another buffet.  I did not care as much for this one, but others in the group liked it better than the other restaurant.  There is something for everyone here.  After lunch, we went back to the apartment and watched a movie in English and napped.  Dani was so excited to have us there, which made us really happy.  Then we took a taxi back to church for the evening service.  It was about 3 hours long.  It was neat to hear everyone singing and worshipping to some of the same songs we sing at home.  After church we went to a street fair across from the apartment.  The family that is coming to America went with us.  Their daughter was so cute!  She was learning English and kept asking us to ask her questions in English.  I think they are so neat.  We went home and talked a little and packed to go home.  I actually slept through the night, which was great.  It was the first time in about 5 days that I have slept well.   I hurt my rib when I jumped off the boat earlier in the week (I forgot that I wasn’t 20)….The pain got really bad on Friday night / Saturday morning.  It was so bad that I thought about going to the hospital or going home early.  Earl was able to get something from the pharmacy for me and it worked really well.  It really eased the pain.  Here, you can just go into the pharmacy and tell them what you want and buy it—even without a prescription.  That was a surprise for me!  Today, I got up early and walked to the pharmacy with Dani to get more medicine for the trip home.  It wasn’t cheap, but it works!  Today we drove out to the camp CBM has.  It is beautiful!  The weather here has been perfect—this is their winter.  I cannot believe that we will be flying home today.  I am so eager to see my kids and cannot wait to hug them, but I am already missing this place and the people we have met.  This trip has stretched me further than I even dreamed it would and has blessed me as well.  I feel so privileged to have been able to do this!
Here are the stats from this trip:

DATE
VILLAGE
MEDICAL
Patients
DENTAL Patients
DENTAL
Procedures
GLASSES
HAIRCUTS
Thur-7/6
Jandira
64
0
0
0
0
Thur-7/6
Lago Preto
56
0
0
0
0
Sat-9/6
Santa Maria
26
4
6
10
6
Sat-9/6
Illra do Modruba
18
0
0
8
4
Sat-9/6
Igorapi do Ferreira
10
0
0
7
4
Sun-10/6
Santa Helena
60
2
2
8
19
Mon-11/6
Inojotuba
51
5
11
13
21
Mon-11/6
Monte Siao do Igoropeacu
31
8
18
12
17
Tues-12/6
Sao Sebastiao do Uatuma
93
12
20
9
9
Wed-13/6
Urucara
68
8
12
7
10
Wed-13/6
Taborari—Sao  Joao
42
8
18
6
7
TOTALS

519
47
87
80
100


Saturday, June 2, 2012

Good-byes...

Today I hugged my kids good-bye for two weeks.  I really did not expect tears--at least from me....but guess what.  They got in the car with their dad and I started the waterworks.  I have never been away from them for more than a few days at a time and it is gonna be tough.  I have been crying a lot lately over many things and that is just not normally me.  It seems that I have been saying a lot of good-byes lately and that is hard.  Today, it was good-bye to my kids....yesterday it was getting ready to say good-bye to a co-worker that I really enjoy working with....last week it was saying good-bye to a job opportunity that I really felt God was leading me toward.....I don't know why all of these good-byes are coming so close together...but I do know that I am not enjoying it.  I have also had my washer break, my bathtub drain break, rain so I could not mow when needed, etc.  It would be easy to have a big old pitty party--and I'm not gonna lie--I have had a few of those moments....BUT...really compared to the people I am going to help in a few days, these problems are nothing.  They are trivial and they are not permanent.  How many of the parents that I will see have had to say good-bye to their children forever--or at least for this human lifetime--because of diseases that we have medicine for here in the states.  How many people in Brazil or even here in the states don't have co-workers to say good-bye to because they cannot find a job.  I have not one job, but two....that is something to be thankful for.  The people I am going to serve in Brazil don't have washers or bathtubs or even fresh water that is really healthy to drink.  Today, I really needed to mow, but I had several things I needed to do first.  I got home, jumped out of the car and got the yard mowed.  Literally, the minute I pushed the mower back into the garage, it started raining!  And then there wasn't just one rainbow, but there were two of them.  God is good, all the time and I want to be thankful for what he does for me and has done for me and not focus on the things that do not seem to go my way.   There are blessings around us all the time and sometimes I think he breaks us down a little so we can really focus and see them all around us.