What's Been Goin On

Last week we finished up Zone Conferences. This is the lunch line. They seemed pretty happy when we finally got done with interviews and brought out the food. I made 2 cookies for each missionary and even though they weren't the greatest cookies, they were a hit.

This Elder painted the back of his badge to read "I am hungry." He turns it that way when they go to lunch at some of the members’ homes. He thinks it is hilarious. Don't ask about the tie. I might have to see if I can make that disappear sometime. Though ugly, the extremely patterned ties do hide food spots better and might not be that bad of an idea for some of them.

Some of our sweet Sisters.

The next two pictures and the captions are out of order. I have already spent too much time on this post, so you will just have to figure it out. Sorry.

At the last minute Alan brought the office Elders to the going away dinner too. That explains the short tablecloth. The dinner was well, interesting. I tried to make sweet and sour chicken and besides the chicken ending up a little tough, the sauce sort of congealed (I think that is the word) while we were waiting about an extra hour for them to get to the house. It turned out looking a little like globs of jello stuck to chicken. It tasted okay though and they ate it. We had brownies and ice cream for dessert (Thanks for the idea, Mary.) and that seemed to make up for it.

We had 5 missionaries leave this week. We had a dinner for them the night before they left. The previous president's wife always had their names on a paper taped to the door when they came so I did that too. It gave the missionaries the perfect opportunity for one last immature moment together before they become dignified "returned missionaries." Our tallest Elder and our shortest Sister were among this group. Side by side, the difference is very noticeable.

We had an uninvited guest show up. Yes, that is a gecko climbing up one of the Elders pants. It was really tiny and not very scary, but still just a little creepy. We captured him in a jar and I dumped it outside the apartment building in one of the plants. I noticed his tail had fallen off though. I hope they are like lizards and can grow a new one because that curly tail was pretty cute.

The next morning we said goodbye to them at the airport. They all looked so great. Elder Hamilton, next to Pres. Batt, is from Blackfoot. We didn't get to know him very well, but wish we could have.
Right after we said goodbye to the ones returning home we greeted 18 new ones. They look excited to be here and they seem like a great group.

We even got two new sisters which is great. We need to keep a little bit of the feminine touch in the mission. So, here we go again!

Why is there a blender in my trunk?

Just when I think things might be going a little smoother, that there actually might be hope for this Brazil thing to work out, I have a day like this:

Friday we had zone conferences. They were at a church pretty close to home and I know how to drive there so Alan went ahead of me in one car. I was going to finish cutting up some fruit for the lunch, pick up a few things we needed at the grocery store and come a little later in the other car. Irene was here helping me with the fruit. She doesn't speak English and I, well.... you know. When we finished cutting up the pineapple, she put all the little scrap pieces in the blender, added some water and gave it a whirl. She doesn't waste anything and I guess she was blending it to strain and drink later. I don't know why I felt it was necessary to say something, especially when I can't , but in very broken Portuguese I tried to tell her that I thought that was a good idea to use up those scraps. She smiles, says something in Portuguese that I don't have a clue about, but I smile and nod my head in agreement. The next thing I know she is washing and drying the blender and putting it in a bag. I just watch, trying to figure out what is going on, but in too big of a hurry to go look up words in my dictionary to use to actually ask her why she put it in a bag. We start to take the fruit out to the car and I notice she has also picked up the bag with the blender in it. It gets put in the trunk with the fruit and other stuff. We say "tchau" to each other and I drive off with a blender in my trunk.

I head to the store, successfully get the parking ticket out of the machine at the parking lot entrance and go straight to the deli counter. I order the sliced cheese we need, tell the man I'll be back in a minute to pick it up, head for the bakery counter and ask for 80 buns. I had double checked how to say eighty before I left home so I didn't expect any trouble. He started loading the right kind of buns. Things seemed to be on track. Then I notice he is already going for the scale and the little machine that spits out the sticker with the amount you owe. I say, "Mais, Mais," which means, "More, more." He looks slightly puzzled and so I say "oitenta" again, this time drawing the numerals, 8 and 0 in the air as I say it. I think to myself, "That for sure ought to work," but it didn't. Another store employee comes along, says something to him, and I think I'm saved. He starts loading more buns, but hands them to me way before there are 80. I start looking around for anyone that I think might speak English. There is a lady in the line that has started to form behind me that steps forward, and asks me how many I need. I tell her 80. She then says "oitenta", just like I did, and now his light goes on. I load them up in my cart, trying not to make eye contact with anyone in the line that formed during this misunderstanding and is now having to wait while he counts out 80 buns. I head for the checkout. I remember to get my parking ticket validated. I drive safely to the church. Everything is good . I start unloading the car and suddenly remember I forgot that stupid cheese. I just don't have it in me to go back and get it then. I figure the Elders can pick it up when they get the pop later. I try to slip into the meeting next to Alan quietly. He can tell by the look on my face that I must have had a bad morning. He whispers, "What's wrong?" I say,"Nothing really, but there is a blender in the trunk and I have no idea why."

Fare Thee Well, Hebecca

The party is over, but we had such a good time with Rebecca, or Hebecca, as she was known here in Brazil. This is a picture of her arrival at the airport. She seemed a little giddy to have escaped Paraguay and all her critter friends.





We had her room fixed for her and welcomed her with a smile.

She went shopping with us and was shocked at some of the sticker prices. You can see why I no longer make anything that calls for cream of mushroom soup.

Grocery shopping is still an adventure and Rebecca liked going with us. We are still trying to figure out what things are and what to do with them once we know what they are.

We fixed a breakfast for some Elders that were leaving the mission. I thought we had to have it ready by 10:00, but the morning of the breakfast, I found out it was supposed to happen at 8:00. Yikes! I wouldn't have been able to pull it off if Rebecca hadn't been here to help. She had all of this arranged at the mission office by the time I got there with the cinnamon rolls. She had made banana bread the night before and we had quite the nice breakfast buffet. The Elders seemed to be happy with it at least.

This is the driver of the van that took the missionaries to the airport. He is a bishop here in one of the Fortaleza wards and we use his van/taxi service as often as possible. When he came for the Elders we invited him to join the party. I included this picture for a reason though. Notice the gold watch on his right arm. He no longer has that thanks to being held up right outside our apartment building just after dropping Alan off early one morning.

Double yikes!

Rebecca took this picture one of the evenings that we went walking down by the city beach. We usually go in the evening and it is often just this pretty. We were glad she got to enjoy that beautiful evening with us.

We got to celebrate Becca's BiRtHdAy with her. We went out for a nice buffet dinner and tried a lot of foods we hadn't tried before. Some we'll have again I hope. Some I hope we won't.

Anyway, we had a great time and hope she did too.

A Day in the Life

Last Sunday was a pretty long, but nice day. Alan, Rebecca, an Elder, and I left Fortaleza about 7:00 a.m. and headed for a couple of the outlying branches. Sometimes I have to settle Alan down as he is driving. It's his most traumatic time. Sunday mornings aren't all that bad though. We had pretty nice road most of the way and enjoyed the scenery which I didn't take any pictures of. Sorry.

Alan had to interview a sister that was going to the temple for the first time later in the week. She could not get to the neighboring city where he was doing other interviews, so we drove to her branch in Russas. Here he is talking with the Branch President, his counselor and Elder Olivera. You can see how young some of the church leaders are here. They all look like missionaries.

They had fixed a house into a church for the branch. I thought it was so pretty. It had a fresh coat of paint, new tile, and just really looked nice.

Rebecca and I had time to check out the neighborhood a little and I got this cute picture of her in front of one of the prettiest little places I have seen in Brazil. It is just across the street from the church. The fence was low enough that you could see into the beautiful yard and we thought it was a great photo op.

We then drove for another hour or two to Aracati. They have two branches in this town, maybe wards. I can't remember for sure. This is the church parking lot. Ours was the only car there. These good people walk, ride a bike or maybe a motorcycle to church.

I had packed stuff for sandwiches and we had a trunk picnic. Too bad I forgot the knife to cut our buns or spread the mayo and mustard. We were hungry enough to deal with it though.

We had to hurry back to speak at a fireside which we found out started at 6:00, not 7:00 like we were originally told. We made it by the skin of our teeth, but everyone was in their seats waiting for us. How embarrassing. This is a picture of the bishopric and some of the missionaries that serve in that ward.

By the end of the day, I had to kick back a little. I found just the right spot to do it too.

A Day at the Beach

We had to go to the beach, praia, while Rebecca was here. There are lots of great beaches in the area. We drove to Beach Park, which is sort of like Seven Peaks, but on a beautiful beach. They have way less slides, but it looked like a pretty fun place.

This is some of the scenery on the way there. It really is just outside of town and only took about 15 minutes to get to.

We found out when we got there that Beach Park was closed for maintenance. So we had the beach pretty much to ourselves. Yeah!! We hadn't planned to do the slides and stuff anyway.

This fun girl from the ward here went with us. We love her for a lot of reasons....like I said, she is fun, she speaks English, and her name is......Kimberly!

The sky was beautiful, the breeze and the temperature perfect for a relaxing day at the beach.

This was the only picture Rebecca got of me at the beach that I will post. Believe me, it's for your sake as well as mine.

Sleepless in Fortaleza

It is the first night here that I really haven't been able to get to sleep. It was bound to happen. It happened every so often at home. I would usually just get up and catch up on the ironing or something useful, but kind of quiet. There are some useful things I could do here tonight like write a talk I have to give Sunday, but I just can't force myself to do it. So I thought I would blog.

Is blog a even a verb? I never used to think about verbs, past tense, or conjugations. In fact, I don't think I'd ever heard about conjugations until trying to learn this language. I pretty much stink at it so far. When I talk to the North American missionaries I usually ask, "Would you like to speak in English or would you like me to torture you with my Portuguese?" I know there are more difficult languages to learn, but let me just try to explain to you why I sometimes get a little overwhelmed and confused. Let's say that blog is a verb. In Portuguese it would probably be "blogar" which would mean "to blog". The conjugation chart would look something like this:
Eu blogo = I blog
Voce bloga = You blog, he blogs, she blogs
Nos blogamos = We blog
Eles blogao = they blog
Really, why do you need all the different ways to say blog? or run? or eat? or anything?? But since at least 50% of the missionaries here are Brazilian and because I really would like to learn this language, I have to keep working on it.
Here are the top 5 reasons I need to learn Portuguese:
5. So I don't have to have the duuuuhhhh expression on my face for 3 years.
4. So I don't have 4 cars waiting behind me while I am trying to figure out how to get a validation ticket out of a parking lot entrance meter. By the way, why would you need to have a validation for a parking lot at a grocery store and why wouldn't it just come out automatically?
3. So 3 hours at church doesn't seem so very long.
2. So when I'm at a hotel and all the little tubes of toiletries look the same, I don't use lotion for conditioner.
1. So when I ask to see a menu at a restaurant they don't show me where the bathroom is.
Really though, the number 1 reason I need to learn Portuguese is so I can get to know these great Brazilian members and missionaries.
Tchau! for now..

Okay, I know this is going to sound whiny, but I am really missing milk. We've tried milk from boxes that don't require refrigeration, milk in a plastic pouches, soy milk, even powdered milk stirred up and refrigerated, Nothing quite cuts it. I thought after a month or so I would forget what a really great cold glass of milk tastes like and become accustomed to the milk here. I guess it might take a little longer than a month.