Observations behind the wheel

I like imagining what things used to be like before modern times. When Izabel and I were in the States doing Partnership Development we traveled a lot and saw a lot of open country, I was always wishing I would be able to see the land from 300 years ago compared to how it looked today. If there was a large prairie did it use to be a forest? If there is a large forest, did it use to be a prairie? Was the Rocky Mountain range always so densely packed with trees? If so, how did the wagon trains cross those mountains?

Part of the mountain area going from the coastal plain to the higher altitude

Living in Brazil has made me start to consider these and other things as well, mainly how traffic laws and routines evolve. We live in the coastal plain of the state of Sao Paulo, just after our city are mountains that level off into a higher altitude for the big city of Sao Paulo. These mountains are densely covered with trees and other vegetation, were they always covered this thick with green? I imagine being an early explorer tasked with uncovering this land yet being discouraged by the hard work of having to march my way through the thick jungle, of course I also think what an adventure that would be.

I was told recently that Brazil is going to increase some traffic fines which will hopefully prevent reckless driving, it reminded me of the emphasis in the States on using a seat belt or child safety seat. All during my lifetime seat belts have been required, but over the last 10 years or so there has been an increase in the fines associated with not using them. I remember my first trip to Brazil in 2007 I was riding in a car and looked into a car next to us and all four people in that car had a can of beer in their hand. There was another time when, as a pedestrian, I was passed by two guys on a motorcycle, both of whom were holding a beer can. Thankfully, the laws have taken a strict stand against drunk driving since 2007.

It takes much more energy to drive here in Brazil than I used to expend in the States. When we first arrived here I was nervous when I first started driving into other cities, not knowing all the rules, written and unwritten, but also just trying to keep up with the differences in driving cultures. After I returned from the States earlier this year I was talking about the differences between U.S. and Brazil with my soccer friends. I joked that in the States a road is wide enough to hold 4 or 5 cars side by side but there are only two lanes of traffic. In Brazil the roads are only wide enough for 2 car widths but somehow three cars and a bus fit in that space.

Since I've been in Brazil I have learned that here it's important to be aggressive as a driver or you'll never get anywhere. I've seen how common it is for people to approach a controlled intersection where they have a stop sign but to approach the intersection so rapidly that it seems they want to force the driver with a right-of-way to stop, so the car with the stop sign can continue without stopping. Eventually most of those cars stop, but it's important to be ready in case you find one of the drivers who is going regardless.

On the one hand you have a group of drivers that seem like they expect the seas of traffic to part around them, on the other hand you have a group of drivers who are awfully generous. These people have the right-of-way yet will stop and let anything into traffic or cross the road, human or animal. One group will happily continue driving, ignoring a pregnant woman with a small child waiting in the crosswalk, while the other group will stop anywhere along the road to allow a single male to cross the street who may not even be waiting to cross. What a study in contrasts.

Pretty much like this

I was driving in the city of Santos last week and for a while trailed a team of four motorcycle cops. I watched their diamond formation while on the move but was fascinated at how they arranged themselves while stopped at a light. As they came to a stop they positioned themselves to have a view of  every direction. Immediately after each motorcycle was positioned correctly, their hand went to the gun in their holster and they scanned their area for things that seemed out of place. One officer looked into my car trying to see my soul, I probably would have confessed to anything he accused me of at that point. This was the second time I had noticed motorcycle police driving in such a formation.

The last thing I'll mention about traffic is that somehow I think a Brazilian uses a third hand while driving and I have no idea how. Both the horn and the headlights are used as communication devices. Not only do I need to learn the Portuguese language but I also have to learn 'lights and sounds' too. It's amazing how quickly the lights will be flashed or the horn beeped when necessary. The length and pattern of the lights or horns probably also have different meanings like Morse code. The only conclusion that I can make is that a Brazilian drives with one hand on the horn, another controlling the headlights and they use their third hand to use the steering wheel, not to mention shifting, maybe they have four hands.

Turnback Tuesday

Sometimes I'm reminded of things for no apparent reason, earlier this week I had such a thought. I don't think I ever shared it on this but at the time I remember thinking it would be appropriate for something like a blog.
During my first full year here in Brazil I had 5 hours per week of Portuguese classes and we completed two lesson books during that year. In these classes we had some regularly appearing exercises to practice different important activities. Sometimes I had to discuss vacations I would like to take (with an unlimited budget, of course),

My Dream- A house on stilts over the ocean

My reality- a house on stilts over a swamp

 













other times I made comparisons based on a topic for the day. On this specific day the activity was about giving directions to different destinations in the city and surrounding areas. One of the destinations was a nearby city where the person would have to get on a hard to find highway.
After finishing the class for that day I began walking home and was stopped by a couple in a fancy car asking how to get on this highway I had just given directions to in my class activity. I eagerly put into practice this lesson I had just learned and helped them get on the road to their destination, hopefully they arrived.

It's hard to believe that we left for Brazil almost two years ago. Our life experiences have been adjusted to nearly two years of living in a foreign developing country. I know there are many things I have missed out on by living in a different country (celebrating the first major championship in a long time by a sports team from my state; oh yeah and of course my family), but there are also experiences and friendships I've had living here in Brazil I wouldn't have thought possible.

I'll try hard to share my unreal experiences but for now I'll just share some pictures we have accumulated during our time here in Brazil.

The street in front of our house completely flooded during a storm

Too busy studying Portuguese to pose for a picture

 

Ok fine, we'll take a break.

 

I guess we did one nice overnight stay, an usie

Half my class hard at work, you don't want to see the other half.

It's hard to tell who they're cheering for.

We've been back in Brazil for about a month and a half, it's nice to be back at home where it is easier to relax. We had a great yet busy time in the States when we went up in June for Conferences and visitations. In all we spent over two months in the USA between 3 different states (OR, WA, and TX) and too many airplanes. We saw all of my immediate family but unfortunately didn't see nearly as many friends as we were hoping to see. For Samantha and I this was our first time back in the States after leaving in December of 2012 (a little over 1.5 years).
I felt prepared for the re-entry into the USA as I knew what other people had experienced after long absences from the USA. I deliberately avoided some of the things many talk about, for example, getting overwhelmed in a grocery store at the sheer variety of cereals, frozen foods... I protected myself by walking to my favorite cereal, getting a box, and walking away instead of trying to choose one of the many options.

I re-experienced some forms of culture shock as we came back into Brazil, though. It's crucial to stay on high alert while driving on the roads in Brazil, watching for other cars, people on bicycles, pedestrians or animals who at any time may wander into the middle of the road. We were grateful for several people who maintained our things while we were away, we found out that our house was cleaned two different times by people in the few days leading up to our arrival. Even with the extra cleaning it's still a never ending task to keep floors clean here in Cubatao. As we walked around the house after we arrived our socks and feet turned black because of the black dust that settles everywhere.
One of the things we bought while in the States was a robotic floor sweeper/mopper. We knew that with Izabel using most of her energy keeping her and the baby healthy through this pregnancy that we would need something to try to keep up with the never ending dust. Oh how happy we are to have this new toy that Samantha has named "V." Even though we have V running all day long sweeping and mopping the cloth we attach always returns black with dirt and dust.

Izabel had an ultrasound last week, during the ultrasound we learned that we are going to be having a boy and everything is healthy. In the States we were told that the Due date is February 1st but when we arrived back here we were told the 4th. I hope the baby doesn't get confused.

Celebrating Izabel's mom's birthday. The 4 daughters and two grandaughters

The three son-in-laws

Pregnancy belly!

English? Yes please.

Life became normal for me last week as my English classes started in earnest. I was happy to continue one of the longest running ministries through Evangelical Church Missions here in Brazil by going out into the rough neighborhood of Vila Esperança to give English classes. Last week Cris and I went to three classes out of the four we will regularly go to. We were called before the Wednesday morning class and told that there weren't any students in the class, last year Wednesday morning classes had the most students. In all, there were 22 students, ranging from beginner to advanced. I anticipate that throughout the next few weeks there will be more students to register and we will go out 4 times each week.

My classes also began at Life English Center. I have one VIP student on Monday evenings, 6 students in a class that meets Tuesdays & Thursdays, and 4-5 students in a Saturday morning class. I am not used to lesson planning and organization but I have put together a good template that makes things easier.

We have been looking for ways to connect our church to some of the other ministries of Evangelical Church Missions-Brazil. Last night, Monday, was the first of weekly Bible studies in the classroom where I teach English in Vila Esperança. We have encouraged the students in the classes to invite their families to the Bible study, last night 16 people attended. Tonight, Tuesday, we begin a Bible study in Life English Center, this study will be done in English and will be practice for the English students to read, listen and speak.

We appreciate your prayer and support, here are some ways you can keep us in your prayers this week.

• For good relationships to be developed with my new students.
• For Izabel's Citizenship process
• Good attendance at all 4 of the weekly Bible studies.

Happy New Year!

I started a post with this title last year but I never really got around to finishing it, I guess I'm stealing my own idea then. What I have been told before is that the new year in Brazil doesn't officially kick off until after Carnival so I'm a little bit early in spreading my New Year's wishes. Carnival is later in the year than most years so some thing are getting started before this major holiday here.

Izabel and I on the beach with our Brother-in-law for New Year fireworks

It has been quite a ride since late November as both Izabel and I, along with Aaron and Cristiana Brakefield, have been working on documents for Izabel and Cris to become U.S. Citizens. This process has included required trips to the United States for Izabel and Cris in order to maintain their Legal Permanent Resident status.

Izabel met extreme cold on her trip north...

The process is moving smoothly so far for Cristiana, but Izabel is working on her third try for submitting the application and hoping that this one is the charm. Once they are accepted we anticipate at least one more trip for Izabel up to the States and potentially two more trips. We see many benefits for Izabel becoming an American Citizen and are using those benefits to help encourage us as we continue to resubmit the application.

and had the other extreme upon her return.

We spent our second Christmas as a family here in Brazil and all that I can say is that it is completely different than our Christmas traditions up North. The weather allows, even encourages, people to stay outside as we are in the heat of summer and the air is usually quite hot and stale inside. It's common to celebrate from Christmas Eve into early Christmas morning by visiting friends and neighbors and by lighting off fireworks. I felt bad having a hard time staying energetic and finally used the excuse of needing to get Samantha to bed in order for us to go home.

I have taken a break from lesson planning in order to give an update about what is going on down here. Although it is one month before Carnival, the year has commenced for me. By the time this is published I will have completed my first class teaching at Life English School in 2014. My days will be busy planning lessons or giving them. Since Shelly moved back home to Washington (way to go Seahawks, by the way) I have taken over the classes that she had been teaching. I will be teaching three classes at Life along with going out to Vila Esperança twice a day on Tuesdays and Wednesdays.

Thank you for your continued prayer and support. Here are some specific ways you can keep us in your prayers this week:

• Pray for the Citizenship process for both Izabel and Cristiana
• Thank God for protection and safety, we should thank Him even more when he keeps us from danger we may not even know about.
• Pray for David beginning classes at Life and in Vila Esperança.

How do you say 'straw' in Portuguese?

I meant to get this out on Saturday but things always seem to get in the way. Since the last week of November it has
been extremely busy for all of us here in Brazil. That shouldn't be news to any of you since Thanksgiving, Black Friday and all the preparations for the Christmas season make everyone's end of the year busy. Here is what has been keeping us busy.

• Aaron, Cris, Izabel and myself took a trip to the U.S. consulate at the end of November to file papers and have questions answered. Even though Cris and Izabel are Permanent residents, the U.S. powers that be expect their permanent residents to reside inside the States, since Izabel and Cris do not, we went to file papers to keep their residence. While there however we were all told that the U.S. Consulate couldn't help us because they didn't qualify for those specific papers.
• Believe it or not, in Izabel's case we were advised that the easiest and ultimately cheapest way to preserve Izabel's residency was to have her make a trip up to the States. We left this morning to take Izabel to the airport for her trip to Minneapolis. While she is there she will work on some of her documents and help Barbara Kochendorfer around the house (not that Barbara needs help).         
• To tag along with the previous bullet point we have a visitor arriving tomorrow to help Shelly Fuehrer in her final week here in Brazil and her trip back. Instead of making two airport trips in two days I decided to find a hotel in São Paulo to stay at. So far Samantha and I have explored Walmart, a big shopping mall, drove through busy traffic to a zoo that didn't look like it was open...or fun, and checked into our hotel. We also explored a big outdoor shopping area close to the hotel but I got tired of holding Samantha and she got tired of the heat so we came back to the hotel. 
• I've been on my own all day long with no one to help me with the language and I've done alright. Samantha interrupted me before this bullet point saying she was hungry so I successfully called and ordered some little pizzas to be delivered. I forgot to bring a straw with us on this trip so before I went to the restaurant in the hotel I typed into google "how do you say 'straw' in Portuguese?" I also successfully asked the front desk for a crib for Samantha that has now been delievered. Many times I still feel lost with Portuguese but other times I can look back and see how far I've come.
• We had Shelly move in with us a couple weeks go and we're getting her apartment prepared to turn back over to the owners. We are still looking for someone who knows how fill an air conditioning hole in her wall. Please pray that someone can be found shortly.
• There have been many other things going on and we appreciate your prayers during this busy yet rewarding time of year.

Back from retreat

I want to thank you all for your thoughts, prayers and support, it is hard for us to be productive here in Brazil without a good support team back home. We had a major event this last week as we took a group of 13 teenagers from the English ministry that we assist from the tough neighborhood of Vila Esperança.

We attempt to have some sort of reward each semester for these students but this was much more involving than other rewards, we haven't taken these students on a multiple day retreat for several years. Us missionaries left Wednesday afternoon to prepare the rental house and then the children arrived Thursday morning and stayed until Saturday afternoon. There were fun activities, a few hours at the beach, much time spent in the pool and a lot of good food to eat. I believe that our main goals were accomplished, safety, fun and times to present the Gospel.

This was also a time that Shelly was able to use to say thank you to the students for many years of taking classes with her and an opportunity to say goodbye as she returns to the States in December. On the last day of the retreat I sat down with the main teacher of these classes and with Aaron Brakefield and we discussed the future of the classes. We agreed that I will take over as the American assistant beginning next year, continuing a partnership that has been going for over 10 years. I've never thought of myself as much of a teacher but now I get the opportunity to test myself and develop relationships with many young people in a difficult neighborhood to grow up in.

We have used these classes to help teaching English with great success, we have also had great success in teaching these students about God and the Bible. Our desire is to draw a connection between these classes and a church that will challenge them to grow in their relationship with Christ. We would love to have them come to our church but it is unrealistic to expect them to come walking or by bus from the other side of town.

Please pray for commitments made and seeds planted during these few days to remain strong and to grow. Activities were mentioned to connect our church and other ministries to these young people, pray that these ideas can come to fruition. We didn't bring a camera on this retreat. As pictures get posted from others we will share those so you can see the faces of some of these young students.

Success!

A typical Portuguese class

I've been stressed out the last few weeks because I committed to preach on the last Sunday of September and then again on the first Sunday of October while our normal preacher is in the States for meetings. I am happy to say that the church got through both of my sermons and even though I felt like I was preaching for a long time I ended both weeks on time! Those of you from Park Place know that didn't always happen when I preached there. Adding to my nervousness was that for the first time in my life I was going to lead Communion, which I felt afterwards was a great spiritual blessing.

Being told in the past that going and playing soccer with a group of Brazilians will help with learning Portuguese, I have been very loyal to play on Wednesdays. Last Wednesday as I was driving to Santos to play I was rear-ended by a car who was rear-ended. After getting out and seeing no damage at first my initial thought was to get back into the car and drive off so I wouldn't miss playing. After taking a closer look I saw that the bumper was damaged so I waited to see what the other two drivers would do. Seeing them immediately get on their cell phones I got on mine to call people who I thought would know what to do. The three of us proceeded to the police station for them to take our statements; instead of practicing my Portuguese by playing soccer I ended up practicing my Portuguese by giving an official statement, making me arrive to the soccer field at the time that everyone was leaving. Everyone I have talked to assured me that I did the right thing and the person at fault has already filed with his insurance company and his insurance has already started the process for us to get our car fixed.

We celebrated Samantha's 2nd birthday twice, once with Izabel's family before church and one with our church family after the service.

Earlier today, Tuesday, Izabel and I drove to Santos to accomplish three things, each one of them was accomplished.

• At the end of last week I received my health insurance card for our Brazilian insurance; Izabel's and Samantha's have already been sent twice, yet not received. They told us that they would send our cards again. 
• We also went to the car insurance agent so we could know where to get our car fixed, thanks to a traffic detour and Izabel's eyes we drove straight to it and have a shop close to our house to take the car to. 
• While I was at the police station making my statement they told me that my international driver's permit was expired (even though the permit says it's valid until December) and they pointed out that my temporary Brazilian Green Card was expired (my permanent one should have arrived by now). Thankfully later that evening the officer came back and said that my driver's permit is still valid and they didn't make a fuss about my temporary Green Card. Izabel and I waited over an hour at the Federal Police today to ask about my Green Card only to find out when we got to the desk that it had arrived and we walked out of the building with it.

Relaxing Sunday morning

We are in the second week with a new format at Vida em Cristo. Based on research that some have done, and observing those same results here in Brazil we have decided to strongly emphasize getting each church member to attend an activity twice each week. We know that there are few who come whenever the church doors are open, but most people work, have family, and many other busy schedules only have two time slots each week. Traditionally Vida em Cristo has had Sunday school in the morning and then Sunday service in the evening, prayer service and youth group on Wednesday and Cell group on Thursdays. Our desire is to increase the amount of Cell group offerings, and hopefully, through various days and times, provide cell group access to everyone in the church.

To replace the traditional Sunday school teaching time the church will have different classes offered at different times throughout the year. There was a lot of thought and discussion that went in to these changes and we came to the decision that what is missed by eliminating everything but service and small groups can be made up for by having consistent groups who have the confidence to confide in and grow with each other. We are approaching the beginning of the first session of classes, which will begin in the middle of September, and we really appreciate your prayers. There will be one group located in downtown Cubatão on Wednesday nights, Aaron will host one group on Thursday nights, and Izabel and I will host a group on Saturday afternoon.

We have had guests to the field down here, but they are no strangers to anyone down here, Aaron's parents are visiting for a little over a month. Also, a friend of theirs has been able to make a shorter length of trip and we have the pleasure of hosting her at our house. Samantha loves any opportunity to have somebody new to play with, so while we are happy to use our house to help others out, Samantha is extra happy.

I remember writing updates and afterwards realizing that I had forgotten to say that I've begun teaching a VIP student at Life English School. It is a good opportunity to spend more time at the school getting to know more people. I've gone regularly to the Saturday morning English exercises and been able to get to know many students, I also see many others when I show up for my Portuguese classes which are held in an unused classroom. Cris Brakefield hosts another activity that I have been able to attend since the time for this activity was moved ahead one hour.

I've been feeling more confident to talk with people in Portuguese but I know that I still have a long way to go. I still drive in to Santos every Wednesday to play soccer. This was originally meant to be a time that I would have fun, but Aaron encouraged me to make it a time to work on my Portuguese too. I quickly learned that it is not appropriate to yell all of the things that they yell at each other but it has given me a group that I can be a good example to. I have more freedom now to stay after the game and talk with them since I don't need to hurry back to Cubatão in order to make it for the prayer service.

We appreciate your prayers, Izabel has had a nasty cough for a few weeks and within the last couple days Samantha decided it looked like fun to start coughing. We don't like when anyone in our house is sick so please pray that these go away quickly.

I apologize for the lack of pictures on this, I rarely plan ahead to bring the camera to activities and it is usually when I am already somewhere that I realize it would be a good photo opportunity. I will try in the future to plan better.

A distracted review

There was a group from Life English School who were touring the United States the last couple weeks. Aaron was in charge of the groups planning and traveling. While he went north with the group the activities down here continued, church, prayer group, Bible study and Sunday school. Two weeks ago I was able to preach my first sermon in Brazil since Izabel and I visited in 2010. Last week one of the Brazilians Rodrigo did a great job preaching the sermon. Even though the group and Aaron arrived back in Brazil earlier this week I will be preaching the message tonight since Aaron had many other things to be doing other than preparing a message. Whenever I'm preparing to preach, especially when it's imminent, it is hard to focus on other things; hence the distracted update today.

At the beginning of June I was asked to take on a private English student as his classed with his previous teacher were coming to an end and I was looking to get a little bit more involved with life down here and at the school. We have had 4 classes together, he is a very inquisitive student so a lot of our class time is spent in dialogue, forcing his English which is pretty good already. The thing that makes it hard is that I am teaching principles that I know but they are things that I've grown up with so explaining why and when to use certain tenses is difficult. I am enjoying the time that I get to spend at the school getting to know some of the students, I hope to hear good stories from the ones who were able to visit the States.

I am continuing with my Portuguese classes. When we began almost 6 months ago I felt like I still needed to learn a lot but at the same time I felt like I knew quite a bit. Now I know a lot more than I did back then but I have come to the realization that I have no idea how much more there is to learn. To illustrate this,
       Imagine exploring a house that you do not know how big it is. Having explored what you feel are a lot of rooms you cannot imagine the house being larger. You come to a door and you think to yourself that it must be the exit but when you open the door you realize that you were just touring the guest area and that the house is much larger than you expected.

I knew that I had a lot to learn before I started but now I am learning that I underestimated how much it was that I actually had to learn. There is also a common illustration about peeling off layers of onions. Portuguese, just like peeling onions, the more layers I peel off the more I want to cry.

On Tuesday we will be going with a group from the English school in Vila Esperança to the zoo in São Paulo.

I almost forgot to give an update about the protests. They were receiving attention during a soccer tournament here and using that tournament as a good platform. Once the tournament ended there was one mass protest the next day and I thought that was the end of it. This last Thursday, the 11th, there was another mass protest organized and we were surprised to find that it went through our neighborhood. We were on our way to the Bible study and had to take a detour because the protesters were blocking the road we wanted to take. We are all still safe and I don't think anything will happen to us. We receive warnings from our consulate to stay away from the protests while they are happening, so we do.

Thank you for your prayers and your support, feel free to share this around.

Dave, Izabel and Samantha

Not another week

Lately nothing has seemed to go normally down here in Brazil. Just this last week there have been continued protests all over the country of Brazil; Aaron took a group from Life English School to the United States and their flights were delayed, canceled and transferred to a van to shuttle them between Chicago and Minneapolis (all this after the time they were to leave Cubatão kept getting earlier and earlier due to worries about protests), and because Aaron is in the States for two weeks I am taking over the regular pastoral duties. Preaching, leading Sunday School and leading the Thursday night Bible study are the three main things.

My first duty was the Bible study and that went better than planned. At one point we began talking about different names that Jesus is called and that caused a spontaneous breakout into song. This reminded me of a chart we have at our home that lists Scripture verses and names that Jesus is called which turned into the Sunday School lesson for the next few weeks. I will preach this Sunday evening, a Brazilian will preach next Sunday and then I will preach the following week. We all appreciate your prayers for things to run smoothly while Aaron is gone, things never seem to go as planned when the pastor is gone.

With regards to the protests, they are still going on. Today is the final game in a soccer tournament hosted by Brazil and there seems to be a large protest before each soccer match outside the stadium and in many cities there are one or two planned protests each week. To read about why these protests are happening you can read my previous blogs. I mention them again in this blog to say once again that all of us missionaries are safe. We are monitoring updates, but the protests seem to stay in the area that they are planned and we stay away from those areas and try to stay home during the protests. Most of the people protesting seem to desire peaceful protests but unfortunately there seem to be a handful of people who want to vandalize and loot.

Izabel's sister Mirian had her baby on Wednesday, the doctors decided that she should have a c-section because of low fluids. Mirian has been released but her son Miguel has stayed in the hospital because of breathing difficulties. Mirain and her husband, Miyai, are driving to the hospital daily.

We appreciate your prayers for Miguel, our safety and David and Rodrigo's preaching while Aaron is away.

Protest updates

I really need to get out another blog, mainly because of what has been happening here in Brazil with the protests. Cubatão as a city is not nearly large enough to become too involved anytime there are protests taking place. I have read in the news that the big cities are the ones hit the hardest by people protesting the last week, São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Salvador and other large cities are the most mentioned. We are in an area that is generally safe from all of that.

We had a group here visiting us for the weekend and wanted to take them out to dinner in Santos. As Shelly's car was locked in the shop after they had completed the work (that in itself is a long story) it took a long time to finally figure out how to get us all to a city roughly 10 miles away. We found a Brazilian willing to let us borrow her car, thank you Raquel, so I drove her car and Duane Erickson drove our car because Shelly's driving documents were locked inside her car locked inside the shop. Duane did an excellent job keeping up with Aaron Brakefield and I. We reached a certain point in Santos however where the traffic completely stopped. We inched forward for a while until we were finally able to see the area that we wanted to go but we were still stuck in traffic. Izabel looked out her window and said that she saw a bus stopped in the middle of an intersection. About that time two transit authorities on motorcycles passed by (motorcycles can drive on the lines when traffic is stopped) and shortly after that the traffic picked up and we were able to continue to the restaurant.

Since that evening I have heard from a few people who said that traffic jam was part of the demonstrations happening all over the rest of Brazil. I think that some protestors somehow caused the bus to stop until the transit authorities we able to stop the demonstration. Until last night that instance was the closest that I had heard of the protests coming to us, Aaron and I even drove into São Paulo to take the group up to the airport and didn't see any protests. When I went up to bed last night Izabel told me that it was all over Facebook that some protests had started in Cubatão. She said that some people downtown had seen a bus lit on fire and some looting happening along the main avenue. When I go downtown I will be able to see for myself if there is anything still happening downtown. I know it's easy for people to assume the worst but just assume that all of us missionaries are safe from these protests unless you hear otherwise.

Here is what I know about the origin of these protests. Last week the government announced that they would be raising the bus fares a little bit, causing protests against the transit system. Through coordination on social media sites people, mostly students they say, organized demonstrations against these rate hikes. From there the protests took off and lately the protests are more about expressing their displeasure about the government's handling of finances than about a small bus rate hike. From what I have heard, many Brazilians are upset with how many billions of Reais are being spent on preparing the country for the many large events coming up, when things on a much less public scale are being neglected.

When one group protests against another group it is not usually the case the one side is all in the right and the other side is all in the wrong. How is it that that people can become so reliant on a government or something else to take care of them. I have bad news for you, we as humankind have problems, we are all going to be let down at some point if we put our trust in another human whether it's a president, a boss or friends. Instead of finding help from one of those listed we have a Good Shepherd who offers to take our burdens away from us.

John 10:11-13
"I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. The hired hand is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep. So when he sees the wolf coming, he abandons the sheep and runs away. Then the wolf attacks the flock and scatters it. The man runs away because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep.

Matthew 11:28-30
"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light."

Pentecost greetings!

Greetings from Cubatao. I realize that many of you have been praying for us but lately you probably have not been sure of ways that you can pray for us. I want to send something out before you wake up and head to church. I sent this out as an email but then I had so many of them returned from undeliverable addresses I thought I would make a blog too.

• Just over a month ago Samantha had a regular check up with her Doctor down here and she was beginning to show symptoms of a cold. Two weeks later the cold had gotten much worse and we have one month after we pay for a Dr.'s appointment that we can go back for free, the only problem was the Doctor was on vacation. We decided to go to a public hospital (read 'free') and after driving around from 11-3 we finally arrived back in Cubatao in line to see the Doctor. Samantha had "a lot" of mucus in her lungs and we were given other medicine and sent home. Now, about 2-3 weeks from that public hospital trip, Samantha is much better. She's been eating more than normal in order to replace what she lost while she was sick and she's also been sleeping much better.
• We finished buying furniture for Samantha's room. We'd been talking about getting her furniture and decided when she got sick that it was time because of how often Samantha was waking up in the middle of the night. When Samantha would wake up the only thing that would calm her was to lay on Mommy, Samantha would come into our room and I would go downstairs to the couch. We wanted a bed for Samantha so that Izabel could put her back to sleep in her own room. The night that we finally had her bed installed was when Samantha started sleeping all through the night again.
• There is an important soccer match today at 4:00 our time. The team I cheer for is playing against the team that our missionary pastor cheers for in one of the local championships.
• We went up to Sao Paulo last week hoping to return with a car. We had a successful trip, we bought an almost new car that we were able to get inside out budget. It's a very basic car but it's the car that most taxi drivers use so we figured it was a safe bet. Also on that trip we were able to splurge a little bit and we ate lunch at Outback Steakhouse and then Izabel and I went on to a Starbucks.
• I've been asked and have agreed to begin teaching English for a student, Renan. His current semester is about to end and in June I will begin doing classes with him. You can pray about the classes that I will be having with Renan and also for our future ministries.
• Yesterday morning we found an abandoned kittten, with all the dogs on the street it wouldn't survive so we gave it a safe place to stay. We're hoping to find someone who wants to take in a kitten.

Thank you for your prayers and encouragements. Feel free to share these updates around.

Time really flies

We've been here 4 months already! That's hard to believe. I remember on my 6 month trip in 2007 the time seemed to go by much slower, not that I wasn't enjoying myself. To think that if Izabel and I were only going to be here for 6 months; and to know that 4 of those six months would be already passed, makes me happy that we know we have a lot longer to be here.

It is easy to see how quickly time is moving by watching Samantha. She has changed so much since the day we arrived 4 months ago. One of the most encouraging things is that Samantha has remained healthy since we have arrived.

I look forward to getting started with some ministries. What is taking up most of my time right now is reading and studying. I've been assigned some books to read by Aaron on subject of missions and Brazil history. I'm also a couple months into my Portuguese lessons with Raquel. I have had some good opportunities to get to know some of the students at Life English Center, where Raquel and I are using one of the classrooms.

Every Saturday morning, Aaron and Cristiana Brakefield lead any English students who choose to come to practice their English. I've been attending these discussion times simply to participate and introduce myself to the students. I brought my camera this morning and forgot to take pictures during the first session. I took these pictures during the second session.

 

And because no blog is complete without a picture of Samantha...

 

Samantha is showing off the traditional Easter candy. Large chocolate eggs usually with toys or other candy inside.

Here are some issues that you can be praying with us about.

• Pray for us to be sensitive to God's leading about future ministries. We are excited about some ideas but unless God is with us in this we will not be successful.
• Pray for us as we (re)adjust to life in Brazil. Both of us are experiencing some of the many differences between the countries.
• Pray for Izabel's mom who is experiencing difficulties getting a needed surgery scheduled.

Thank you for your involvement in the work here in Brazil.

Speaking in tongues

I had the huge discovery about a month ago that my understanding of Portuguese and Samantha's understanding of language were on about the same level. That's not the case anymore, so I was about 1 month late in sharing this.

It is easier to understand what someone says in another language than it would be to say that same thing correctly in that language. The reason is that when I am trying to think of a sentence to say in Portuguese I need to put so many different things together. First I have to think of the words, after I know what word to use I need to think of how to conjugate the verb(s) and then finally I need to know the correct order to put all of these words in. The goal is to be able to have all of that come naturally so everything simply rolls off the tongue without needing to think about it. It's easier to understand than speak because when I hear someone talk in Portuguese all I need to do is listen to the words, which should already be in the correct order.

Now, a month after I had realized that my daughter's and my comprehension was at the same level, I think that Samantha's comprehension is well ahead of mine. In situations where there is only one person or conversation to listen to I feel like I understand roughly 60% of what is said. I understand enough to have a good idea of what is being said but not enough to feel like I'm able to contribute to the conversation in any way. It's difficult in Sunday School and small groups where I know the direction of the discussion and it's expected that I contribute, but I have a hard time understanding everything that's being said. I could say something but I always have the fear that I misunderstood the question or what the person before me said. In instances where there are multiple conversations going on at once I am well behind the 60% understanding.

Samantha, when we have her attention (rarely happens) she'll understand what we are asking her. We ask her to go find her chair or a specific toy and she'll go searching for it until she finds it; and she's able to do that in both English and in Portuguese!

I have completed 3 weeks of Portuguese classes now and it has been a good opportunity to ask some dumb questions in a safe atmosphere. I have about 5 hours each week in the classroom studying under the guidance of Raquel. Thank you to Life English School for allowing us to use one of their classrooms. Hopefully it won't take me long until I'm able to effortlessly put sentences and paragraphs together.

What time is it?

I'm reading a book about missions assigned by Aaron Brakefield and I hit one of the chapters on culture. The book tells a story about the different understandings of 'time' in different cultures. The story is told based around a meal where the missionary feels disrespected because his invited guest arrives an hour late. On the other hand is the guest doesn't want to arrive on time because to do so would give the impression that the meal is only about business. A true friend will arrive 'a little' late to show that the meal is about friendship rather than business.

This story reminded me of some of my experiences here in Brazil in the past. A friend invited me to eat lunch with their family multiple times. The appropriate response for an American to this request would be to ask "what time?" and "is there anything I can bring?" Each lunchtime I arrived when stated and became a little frustrated that the meal wasn't ready yet. In fact it hadn't even been started. Imagine me showing up ready to eat and learning that I still had to wait for the meal to be prepared.

It took me a while to learn what the invitation was about. The invitation wasn't about eating, which I had originally thought it was. The reason to go to their house was about the time that we would be able to spend together. What I had learned though this was that I should have felt honored about this family wanting to spend time with me and getting to know each other. The time that I had to wait while the food was being prepared was time that we were able to talk and build our relationship.

What ways in your life with friends are you able to show them that what you really enjoy is the time you spend together. Take some time to smell the roses, your relationship will grow with the time spent together.

After all of the rain that happened last Friday afternoon we've had a couple more days with thunderstorms. It's sad walking the streets of Cubatao and seeing all of the furniture that people have had to throw away because of the flood. There are some parts of town that are using bulldozers to deal with all of the garbage.

Last night the weather was becoming ominous while I was getting ready to go to Portuguese class. During class the rain came down hard for a few minutes with some close lightning and loud thunder. Once, during class, the power flicked off only to come back on right away. Walking home I heard some people on our street say that "this house has it but that house doesn't," I wondered what they were talking about until I got home and realized that our house didn't have power. We finally had power again at 4:30 this morning. I guess it's the stormy season.

And the rain came down

The rain began at about 3:30 yesterday, it started trying to come into our house from about 4 until 6pm through somewhere above the window. I had to stand by the window holding a towel to soak up the water before it would flow inside. Early on Izabel asked if our car would be ok out on the street instead of in our elevated parking area and I said, "there's no way the water will get that high. About an hour later I waded out in knee high water to bring our car inside. There were cars and buses stopped outside our house because all of the roads were flooded. Aaron Brakefield said that our road is not known for flooding, it's a few blocks down that get flooded easily, so I guess we were lucky that at the crown of our road it was only about 4 inches deep. Other people (including Aaron) inside Cubatao proper had to abandon their cars in waist deep water or worse. News showed residential areas in Cubatao where water went over 6 feet high inside a house.
We are grateful that we only had to worry about a little bit of water trying to come inside our house when so many other people lost so much. Please pray for those who lost items in their houses due to the flooding and also pray for the families who lost loved ones. 
These pictures were taken early on. The water came about another foot into our garage and shortly after this the top picture would have a few cars and a bus included.

I finally figured out what this hole in the stairs is for. It has kept Samantha and I entertained for hours with me throwing a ball through it and watching it bounce down the stairs.

The rain stopped around 6:45 or 7 and the water slowly went down. Our neighbors were not home but we were able to see water a few inches up the door. By the time one lady came home the water had gone down so there was no standing water in their house but everything was wet. She lives with her elderly mother who had gone to Santos and finally returned at 2am when the buses were able to get through the traffic and mud. I shared one video of downtown Cubatao area on my Facebook but I invite you to search out other videos either through news in the Baixada Santista or on youtube.

3 weeks in

One of the things that I thought I would be prepared for as we were beginning to put our house together was that things go at a different pace than Izabel and I were used to. In my previous months living in Brazil I had seen it first hand and it's also something that I've heard from many different people. Knowing that, however doesn't make it easier to handle delays when they come.

We have had an advantage of having a car available to us on the day that we arrived. Because Shelly Fuehrer was on vacation in the States we were able to use her car to go around and run errands that we needed to do. With Shelly's car we have been able to make a couple trips to a nearby beach town, Mongagua, where Izabel's sister lives to spend time with her and her husband. We have been able to drive to Santos to visit the Federal Police so I can register myself as a permanent resident and we've been able to go to Praia Grande and do some shopping for our house. I was a little uneasy about driving down here but now that I have done it quite a bit I actually enjoy it. As Aaron Brakefield said, "you just do what needs to be done" while driving.

We've had some frustrations while getting our house ready.

Our kitchen cabinets already being put to work.

• Our Brita water pitcher was cracked in transit from the U.S. to here. We bought a water filter at the mall in Praia Grande so we could finally have drinkable water at our house. When we bought it we were told that someone would come and install it for free, we just had to call the number for the installers in Cubatao. When Izabel called, she was told that they don't have authorization to install the water filters in Cubatao. After talking to many different people and losing her patience after being given many different numbers to call we aren't sure someone will come by to install the water filter.
• Speaking of installers, we bought a kitchen table and cabinets before Christmas and they were delivered as promised on Dec. 29th. We were told that they would be installed on Jan 2nd or 3rd in what would be a two day installation. On Jan 2nd, Izabel called the store to find out what time they would be installed and was told that the earliest they will be installed is Jan 8th with no explanation. I encouraged Izabel to call back and remind them they told us the 2nd or 3rd and how much money we spent at their store and we were told that their three installers quit at the end of December and they need to hire new guys.
• We went to the Federal Police as instructed in the visa I received to register myself as having arrived in Brazil. The first time, we arrived 7 minutes after they stopped helping foreigners for the day. The second time, the lady handed us a paper that listed everything that we needed to bring with us, copies of documents, passport style pictures.... After gathering all of those things Izabel and I went the next day thinking we had everything we needed only to be told that we were supposed to have scheduled an appointment, which is now scheduled for Jan. 7th.
• To receive our Brazilian copies of Samantha's birth certificate and our marriage license we needed to go to the official records office in Cubatao (Izabel's ID card here in Brazil still has her maiden name). They required a more recently issued copy of Izabel's birth certificate in order to give us the Brazilian wedding license. The one Izabel has was issued at the end of 2011.
• The people that lived in the house before us did not take very good care of the place, making it a good home for small critters. We are currently waging a war on these critters and at this point it's hard to tell who is winning. We've spent some money buying things that will hopefully get rid of them but we keep seeing others come from other places. This means we need to keep a constant eye on Samantha while she is playing.

Despite all those we have had some success.

• Our couches and bedroom set were delivered and installed. We now have the ability to have guests over and not make them sit on the floor.
• A lot of the things we brought from the U.S. were made to go into a 110 volt outlet. All of the outlets here in Brazil run on 220 volts, meaning that unless we want to burn our our appliances we need to get converters. I couldn't figure out why my coffee maker kept shutting off while brewing coffee until I realized that it took twice as many watts to brew coffee as our voltage converter could handle. We finally found a converter that can handle 1010 watts which will be enough for my coffee maker (Finally!!!!) and will hopefully be enough for our blender.
• We had a merry Christmas (even though I've never had to wait so long into Christmas to open my presents) and we hope that you did as well. It was 107 degrees here and we went to the beach along with many other people. For the first time ever, Izabel said that I had good taste while choosing a clothing item for her.
• Thankfully Samantha has begun to gain weight. We bought a scale and 10 days after Samantha's Dr.s appointment she had gained half a pound and is still gaining. I plan on keeping everyone updated on her weight gains for her next 23 years.

I don't know why the pictures are so hard to place in the area that I want. I've not had that problem before.

Thank you all for your interest in the ministry here in Brazil. Feel free to contacts us if you have other questions.

Hey, We're here!

We've had quite few changes the last week and more and I want to keep people updated on them. We've finally made it down to Brazil, arriving Thursday Dec. 13th. The weeks before we left were scheduled busy and we knew that we would always find more to do once we completed our to-do list. Then, less than 2 weeks before we were to leave for Brazil Samantha got sick which caused a whole new to-do list. Thankfully she's acting better and now that we're in Brazil she is eating quite a bit of food.

The couple days before we left for Brazil were spent purchasing last minute things that we thought we would need, luggage tags for all of our luggage, TSA locks, misc. baby supplies, games for our Wii, you know, the important things.

Tuesday was a very busy day and if we ended up getting any free time we would have gone to Clackamas Town Center. Knowing what we found out later that day we're very happy that it was a busy day because that was the day the mall shooting occurred and we would have been there at the time it happened.

After packing everything but Samantha's pack & play which we were still using, we went to bed late Tuesday night only to wake up at 1:30 Wednesday morning (a little earlier than we planned) to tend to a crying Samantha. Thus begins the long day of travel. With all the luggage we had we discovered that we should have arrived at the airport more than 2 hours early as we barely made our flight. A big thank you to the guys who showed up at the airport to get us out of the country. I don't know if their motives were to help us or to get rid of us, either way we appreciated it.

Now that we're here we've spent a lot of time with Izabel's family (they love having Samantha with them), going through our luggage (all of the suitcases arrived, but not everything inside arrived in one piece). Friday we spent the afternoon shopping. We planned on first buying things to set up our kitchen, then our bedroom, then our living room, then our guest room. After doing some browsing we saw two couches (very comfortable for Brazil standards) and the pair of them was $500 cheaper than one of the same kind we saw at an earlier store. After negotiating with the owner we agreed on a price and he told us he had kitchen stuff at his other store down the block. Instead of getting kitchen stuff we saw a closet (there are no closets built into houses in Brazil) and we quoted a price we got earlier from another store and he dropped the price by a large margin to match our previous quote. Both our bedroom set and the sofa's will be delivered either on Wednesday or Thursday, along with our appliances which will be delivered on Thursday. When our things are delivered I'll post pictures

There is a lot more to share but I think I'll keep it for future blog posts when I have nothing better to write about. Thank you all for your interest in the ministry and for your prayers.

Happy New Year

There's a lot of times that I think it's good to have some new year's resolutions. A good resolution will be made to improve one's life and once someone walks into Costco they will see what the most common resolutions are. Work out equipment, dieting books and foods are all closest to the entrance.
I've been working on some resolutions myself, not for the new year but for the new stage in my life, which just happens to come at the turn of the calendar. My job at Costco had kept me active enough where I did not have to think much of diet and exercise when I got home.

Oh, how things will change now. I've been waiting for this for a long time where I can sleep later than 3:45 and not have an aching and exhausted body for the rest of the day. I now have the responsibility of disciplining myself to take care of my body while I have a less physically demanding job as a full-time missionary. My resolutions are:

1.  to keep my body physically fit.
2. To make more time in my day for prayer and devotions

One blessing from the ability to be home in the mornings is to spend time with Samantha

We are only able to start this part of our ministry on a full time basis because of those who are praying; and those who have chosen to partner with us in this ministry God has called us to work in. We thank you for each of your commitments.