WORSHIP Schedule
November 25, 2007
Entry #3
9-23-07 to 11-25-07
Most recently, I celebrated the Thanksgiving holiday in the company of Brazilian seminary students and a handful of American missionaries. The graduating students held a special Thanksgiving service and a traditional meal followed. There was turkey and stuffing, mashed potatoes and gravy, rice and beans—baked beans, and delicious pumpkin pie for dessert. The reality is that it’s just not a meal in Brazil without rice and beans. A nice woman named Frances accompanied me that day. She had come to Brazil 45 years ago with her husband when they were fresh out of seminary school. I believe she and her family built the Baptist Seminary from the ground up and they’ve raised their family in Brazil ever since. Now her son is the director of the school and his wife, along with other American missionaries, all teach there. I had the chance to say hello to some of the Americans, and enjoyed hearing of her experiences and how much the city has changed and developed. Of course, I’m still an American of a different sort—most of these missionaries were born and raised in Brazil and speak Portuguese as well as they speak English, if not better. It’s a life that I can’t wrap my mind around. I couldn’t imagine growing up anywhere outside of the United States.
Halloween, like Thanksgiving, isn’t celebrated in Brazil either. I should clarify that Thanksgiving is not celebrated by Brazilians. Just Americans living in Brazil! The city has been gearing up for Natal (Christmas) and Papai Noel has been in the mall for a few weeks already. With the weather being as hot as it is it just doesn’t feel like the Christmas season. It has really been warming up since October, and nighttime brings little relief. This weekend, the triple-digit heat broke with some incredible rain. The sky really opened up and made for a comfortable night’s sleep and some great (dare I say “cold”?) weather today… I’m not sure of the exact conversion from Celsius but probably somewhere around 84 degrees. I teach about the American holidays and traditions in my English classes, and will be organizing a Christmas party for the school.
Back in mid-October I traveled with the family to the capital city of Céara. We drove 6 hours north to Fortaleza and stayed in a condo on the beach in the neighboring city of Icarai. Fortaleza is a larger and much more modern city that attracts many visitors and tourists from abroad. We had a great time on the beach, around the sand dunes, and showering outdoors with street water from a hose. The condo was without running water for some undisclosed reason, and as it goes in some parts of Brazil, not even vacationers without running water for 4 days necessitates an emergency. The spirit of, “No problem. We’ll make do,” is applied here as usual. It was also very cool to see the more deserted areas of the state during the drive. It’s amazing the things you see on a long road trip—too many to name.
On the first of November, pilgrims from all over the Northeast of Brazil flocked into Juazeiro to honor Padre Cicero. I went up to the statue to see everyone pay homage (some climb the mountain path on their knees), and it had to have been the hottest, driest day of the year. I rode on a bus up the mountain and came down on foot. I really didn’t know what I was in for. The path was with terribly uneven cobblestones, very steep, and maybe 6 or 7 miles long. And to top it off, I ingested bacteria somewhere along the way (contaminated ice or water). The area around the statue very, very poor, and especially with the extreme influx of pilgrims, sanitation is out the window in a flash. I was feeling just fine on the afternoon of November 2nd while the bacteria were multiplying in my intestine, and had a great phone chat with my Mom for her birthday! Then I was very sick for the next couple of days. My host family took great care of me. It was funny describing my symptoms and to explain I was sick. We used a lot of “sign language” but now I have expanded my vocabulary to include… well, you know. We all had some good laughs.
Early in November my tourist visa was to expire, so it was necessary I had it extended another 30 days. I had to take a motorcycle taxi to the Federal Police building, and being a first-time rider, I came off of the motorcycle on the same side as the tailpipe and burned my leg. Lucky me, aloe plants are pretty abundant here. I’ve taken pretty good care of it, but it should leave me with a permanent reminder of Brazil.
Just a week ago, I returned from a trip to Salvador, Bahia. This was a 16-hour drive south from Juazeio. We were part of an organized tour group of about 40 people and took a bus down. So a good deal of our trip was spent on the bus, but we had one full day of tourism around the historic party of the city, and another full day visiting the islands off the coast. Salvador is Brazil’s greatest Afro-Brazilian city where the descendants of African slaves have stayed and preserved the culture (i.e. food, music, dance, and religious customs). I finally had the chance to watch a capoeira performance (combination of martial arts and dance, started by the slaves) and saw some fantastic 17th century architecture. The old churches were especially fascinating. The interior of the church and convent of Saint Francis is almost entirely coated in gold. Pictures weren’t allowed, but I shot a short film with my digital camera before the guide forbade that too!
So I’m down to a few weeks left. I can’t say my Portuguese ability is quite what I hoped it would be by this time, and I’m thinking of ending the lessons with my tutor. The pronunciation is just impossible! If you’ve never heard Portuguese spoken, it would probably strike you as odd the first time. I am more inclined to say words with a French accent and as a native English-speaker, well, my Portuguese sounds strange. My students laugh at me when I speak it. I can listen to conversations among Brazilians and understand what they’re saying. I have an expansive Portuguese vocabulary. So that’s progress, making coherent sentences with the words is the hard part—especially past and future tenses. I understand much, much more than I speak. I even learned some LSB, which is Brazilian Sign Language, after I visited a School for the Deaf in Juazeiro. But as anyone here will tell you, these days you are never far from someone who knows how to speak English.
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