Back in the Saddle

Our love affair with Brazil continues, and here we are, in Recife for six days already.  Who would have thought it would be over a year until we came back.  I don't know where to start regarding how we came to this point, or even how we are doing since we got here, so I will try to keep it somewhat basic.

In January we decided we'd try again with our visa process, as Shaun is still interested in the opportunity here for a coco peat business.  I won't go into all the details regarding that process, however it took long enough that we arrived here once again on tourist visas, which last for three months and can be extended for an additional three.  We are optimistic that in that time, Lord willing, we will be able to apply for a different type of visa than we expected.... an infant visa.  We are expecting a baby and pray if all goes well to welcome the newest member of our family to the great wide world in October.  In Brazil, as guardians of a Brazilian citizen (which our baby will be), you can apply to receive a visa here to care for your child.   Although none of that was part of our plan when we began this process, it seems to be to our advantage in more ways than having a new baby to enjoy! Also in newer developments, Shaun will be helping out part-time with organizations that support different mission projects in Brazil, so that will also be helpful to our family.

So that is the background in a nutshell.

We are staying in Recife currently, at a home of friends who are currently in Canada for a couple of months.  This works out well in terms of housing and being close to a hospital and being close to the projects Shaun needs to look at.  Then the plan is to move down the coast two hours, to the little town we were in before, which is more where the opportunity for the coco peat business exists.

We arrived last week Wednesday, after only 20 hours in transit.  Our friend Ken picked us up and we had too many bags for the minivan, so we ran to the nearest hardware store and picked up some ropes and bungy cords.  Yes... those are our Canadian hockey bags on the roof!

I can't believe we somehow packed everyone in.  For Brazil you are allowed to have 2 bags of 70 lbs each per person, plus a carry-on and a personal item per person.  And your carry-on can be 50 lbs!  Yes we were those annoying people on the plane trying to shove luggage everywhere, and dragging on as much as we could carry.  Already in Vancouver they let us check two more carry-on bags all the way to Recife, so that was great to not have to worry about at the 2 airports where we had stopovers.  In fact, except for a one hour delay out of Miami, our whole trip was as little amount of pain as it could be.

Ken's wife Tamara so kindly met us at our new "home" with a stocked fridge, and their kids to welcome our kids.  By this time it was noonish, so we all cleaned up and rested and fed and then even were invited to go to their house for dinner.  What a relief to have someone take care of us after that flight.  It felt like we finally took a breath.  Thanks for your hospitality, Ken and Tamara!

The next two days were unpacking and sorting.  The kids have been in general so good, although we all have had our moments.  We attended the local reformed church here on Sunday and it re-affirmed my need to start studying Portuguese again... but we'll get there, right?  It has been really cool here, usually mid to high twenties, although the humidity is sapping my energy.  It is the end of rainy season and going into spring, the most beautiful time of the year.  I am thankful to be pregnant now and not through the summer.

So we are in a different city, however Brazil has a familiar feel to it, at least here in the northeast.  We are excited to be here and continue on this crazy adventure.  We can't wait to see more of our old friends and make some new ones in the next few months.  And maybe learn a little more Portuguese while we're at it...

All our love to family and friends near and far!

There is a Possibility....

...that we may have a bank account by the time we leave!

Yesterday we left for Maceio at around 10 in the morning.  Seth and Hazel were at school and Thacianne graciously agreed to watch them when they came home from school.  She actually came home from school with them on the bus as she teaches some mornings, so that was perfect.  We brought Lyla along, and she is usually a good traveller.  We thought we'd be back mid afternoon.  It is supposed to be a two hour drive each way, and we were going to sign some papers at HSBC and then, I assumed, go out for lunch, and then return by 3 or maybe 4.

We got to the bank in good time, and were extremely happy with HSBC's helpfulness and apparent knowledge of what needed to be done.  The bank customer service rep pulled out the papers within seconds, we signed them, and they told us by today our paperwork would be in the HSBC in Salvador. That is where our lawyers "know" people and they have had no problems getting bank accounts in the past.  So excited about that potential.

We then also went shopping and then had lunch at a churrascaria, or rodizio, which is a steakhouse where waiters walk around with large skewers of meat and they slice the meat off and you grab it with some prongs you are given.  Yummy! if you're a carnivore like me :)  There's also a salad bar to help you feel healthier.

By the time we got back it was 7 at night.  We had actually a really nice little trip, and the only glitch was Lyla.  She has recently been potty-trained, however, we usually still have to take her to remind her to pee, as she does sometimes wait too long and end up having accidents.  So for the trip I put her in her diaper.  Well, would you know she refused to pee or poop in her diaper.  On the way there she screamed for ten minutes, and I mean Screamed, because she needed to go poop and pee.  We finally found a bathroom and after the bathroom break she was so angry about being forced back into her carseat she screamed for at least another 15 minutes before she calmed down enough to fall asleep.  And the exact same thing happened on the way home, except there was no bathroom and somehow I had to get this just-over-two just-potty-trained girl to understand that she could squat and pee at the side of the road.  I was actually pretty impressed that she did it.

Other than that, it was a good trip, and we are praying that this is the step we need to get things going here.

Have a great night everyone!
Brenda

(Semi)-Settled In

Hello Everyone,

Somehow it seems like a lifetime ago we were in Canada, yet it was only 5 days ago!?  Wait a second, did I count that right?  Wow.  I guess my limited Portuguese is a good reminder of how long we've actually been here.

The trip went so great, despite somehow having to collect 11 pieces of luggage approximately 70 lbs each, go through customs and recheck them, all the while dragging along our overwhelming amount of carry-on bags.  Oh, and trying not to lose any children along the way! all within an hour and a half in Sao Paulo.  However, that is said and done, and the two oldest enjoyed the 10 hour overnight flight with their personal tvs and selection of movies and games.  Lyla had a spaz in her sleep here and there (nothing abnormal for her) but she did sleep the majority of the flight.  Her restlessness kept Shaun up the most.  Thanks to everyone for the thoughts and prayers, they were definitely felt!

We stayed overnight the first night at one of the missionary family's homes in Recife.  It was wonderful to catch up with them.  Then the next day it was off to our new home!  A two hour drive down to the coast.  We were worried about traffic for Carnival, but it ended up being good.

We are very excited with our new home.  It is on a lot with 4 homes, the one in front of us lived in by our friends Hermes and Thacianne, and they have two children as well, so it is so nice to have them there.  The house is smallish, mainly meant for weekend rentals, but it does have 3 bedrooms and some furniture, which we are very happy about.  Two of the rooms have double beds, and the third has a set of bunk beds.  It is unbelievable how much stuff we were able to bring with us.  So much that it is lying around with no place to put it.  As it is a vacation rental, it is not designed for storage.  The kitchen has an old small stove, and the fridge is quite large by Brazil standards, with a small icebox up top.  There is an open plywood shelf under the sink that I don’t think will ever look clean, and a couple cupboards with drawers that are super difficult to open which complete the kitchen.  The counter space is pretty decent, I must say.  I was told there had been a housecleaner in before we got here, so I was quite disappointed to find toothpaste in the sink, the shelves had obvious dirt on it, etc.  It made me feel like I had to redo everything, because I couldn’t tell if anything had been done.  I started by cleaning the kitchen cupboards, and found mould on the backs of the drawers.  I couldn’t decide if this was something to expect so I just shoved my utensils in the top drawer (no mould should be able to fall in it, right?), and cleaned as best I could.   We are slowly assessing what we need, and so far my conclusion is some type of wardrobe or dresser.  One of the bedrooms has 3 large shelves, the other bedroom has one shelf out of the wall, and in another bedroom there’s a small cabinet.  Also maybe some plastic shelves for the bathrooms (as there is no place for towels), and a bookcase.  And odds and ends like a toolbox if I don’t want the random assortment of Shaun’s tools lying on our limited counter space.  It is a bit frustrating looking at all the little items strewn about our home with no place to put them, but hopefully we’ll get up to Recife again next week to do some shopping.  Right now we're making due with our rubbermaid containers and suitcases, and the shelves.  I was so excited to find that the mirrors in the bathrooms had medicine cabinets!  Especially as I took along pretty much every medication in my house, as well as first aid supplies.  

That reminds me, it even has two bathrooms, one off the master bedroom!  Unfortunately neither has warm water (yet), and actually we arrived to fairly cool temperatures, so a cold shower is not so appealing yet.  If you don't know how the showers work here, there is no hot water tank, but at the shower head there is an electrical current that heats up the water when you turn it on.  Another side note is that you don't flush toilet paper here in Maragogi (or Recife), you put it in the garbage can.  I'm not sure if that is a Brazil-wide thing.  And I can't tell you why, whether it's the sewage system, or the toilets.  Most bathrooms have a little sprayer to clean yourself off before you wipe.  Ours don't though, and our bathrooms sorely lack ventilation, so it's not too pleasant in there.  Well, especially ours, because we have kept the bedroom doors closed in an attempt to keep out mosquitoes.  

That's the other exciting news, the rooms have air conditioning!  So great!  The only problem is we can't hear the kids at all in the night.  Lyla was screaming last night and Shaun somehow heard her, and she was wet through.  The night before Hazel woke us up to tell us Lyla was calling us.  We currently have Seth and Hazel on the bunks and Lyla in her pack 'n play in a different room.  The two rooms are actually connected by a little square hole in the wall (just big enough for a kid to crawl through) and a fan at the top, as the air conditioning unit is in one of the rooms and it fans it to the other.  We are toying with the idea of putting all three kids together (like we had at home) and taking Lyla's room.  This is so we can hear them, and also so we only need to run one air conditioning unit at night.  We'll see what happens over the next few days.

One more crazy thing.  On Friday afternoon, it started to rain.  And rain.  And rain.  Torrential downpour tropical rainstorm.  Just like the last time we got here.  I wonder if it stopped raining in BC when we left, and just followed us here.  Then our roof started dripping.  The kids' rooms were fine, but wow, our bedroom was not.  Fortunately it was beside our bed, so we set up a few containers here and there.  It was so rainy our roof in our kitchen leaked and all over the dining and living room area.  Everything was damp.  Anyways, our friends in front of us are actually managing the property, and on Saturday it was quickly fixed after we let him know.  

We aren't sure how long we're going to stay in this house, but for sure we are renting it until June.  Anyways, I know this is a super long entry, but I thought I'd just catch everyone up on everything if they want to read it all!   We are all still on BC time, but that should change over the next few days, as we had to get up early for church this morning.  We took time out from unpacking to head to the beach Friday, and actually that's where Seth and Shaun are right now.  The beach (that we can see from our house) is a 2 minute walk down our street.  It is gorgeous and clean.  A little busier now with Carnival this weekend, and actually quite dirty with the excessive rain, but next week should be much better.

I'm going to leave you with a couple comments from Seth: 

I caught a Lizard.   I also caught a Frog.  I have 17 MOSQETO bites.  I have a sunburn. We almost caught a crab.

Seth

Talk to you all soon,

Brenda