The sweat dripped down my face, my back, that little space behind my knees. it was hot.
It started off with Molly. Molly is a girl in the USA who heard a missionary named Tele speak at her church. she sat in her seat and decided to do something. she began to collect pennies. from everywhere. from everyone. she collected pennies until they were too heavy and had to be changed in for larger bills. and in the end, Molly had a check for around 800$, which she gave to a missionary, Tele. She said it was for Bibles–Bibles for children who didn´t have any.
So last week i rode in a Kombe to Recife and we bought Bibles. Nice bibles. not just the New Testament, not just words, but pictures for the younger kids. I was imagining these beautiful Bibles lighting up these houses. houses with nothing. cement blocks of blah. For many, this will be the first book they have ever owned. Picture Bibles for the younger kids, pink glitter ones for the teen girls, and black zipper ones for the boys.
Thursday was hot. Patricia and Cacau spent all morning cooking. and it looked beautiful. We had recieved “Christmas for Jesus“ packages from the USA as well, to go along with our beautiful Bibles. (i stole this picture from Jeff. his were prettier. you can see all his lovely pictures at http://picasaweb.google.com/JeffroyTurner/LivingStonesBibleChristmasHandout2009?feat=embedwebsite# )
I took a bus to another place. I met Bruno at in the gym at the University of Indianapolis. he had on a shirt that said “Brasil.“ when it is spelled with an `s´ i know it is authentic. so i asked if he was Brasilian and yes he was and he was born in Recife and lived close…He ended up staying with my family while he learned English for awhile. So when i came to Brasil, he said i would have to come and visit his family as well. We went to his church and enjoyed going out for yummy food afterwards. We saw a foster home ministry for children And ate more yummy food. so much for slimming down while in Brasil.
i already wrote, and copied and pasted in a page and a half about our trip to visit the kids´ houses. you can´t do something like that and stay the same. here are pictures. Iasmine´s home. Her grandmother is on the left. Marconi hid under the bed when we came. i caught him after he thought we had left (he is my deaf boy). The room is barely big enough for bunk beds and twin bed, that holds at least 10 kids. Some of Marconi´s siblings This is Cezar´s grandfather This is the stairs leading to nowhere. i pass it every time i go to Carpina from Paudalho, and always tell myself i will take a picture of it. because….yeah. and so i did. This is Andreza´s family. her mom is in the white-sh shirt. the one who is bringing a knife. This is Karla´s family. and new baby sister. and their mud house. i didn´t get a picture of their pet pigeon. This is the dump where Karla´s dad works. trash that goes on and on and on. Those tarp covered places are houses. where families live. jumping in. Washing clothes in the creek that runs through their “land. and the duck. picturesque mud house the size of my living room in the middle of nowhere. sticks connected with barbwire to mark off their area. 8 kids.
So pictures. if i was more brainy, all those lil non-word things wouldn´t show up on my other posts. but…oh well.
Alyssa came to Living Stones this week to help us with the jewelry project. i really, really really hope you want some jewelry. or know people who do. because i have a LOT. the girls were more efficient than i thought. they just kept making and making and making… Patricia, Fabiana, Alyssa, Alice, and….errrr, i forgot her name…Rosiane, i think. i make funny faces when crocheting or stuff. one of the girls got a hold of my camera and took unsuspecting pictures. and my water bottle sits in the middle of the table. This, and 20 other pictures of the girls, is what happens when your camera disappears for a couple minutes. Gerry (my nickname for her, because i can never remember her real name), Zilma (Zizi), Joseane, Leandra, and Jyrah (also not her real name…due to Rachel remembering issues). Picture moments like these make me feel like a good photographer. they are so cute.
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Today I walked into a different world. It was about 2.5 kilometers away. Far enough to get my feet dusty and my nose rosy red. Patricia and I set out to visit some of the kids from the Living Stones program. She said it was far, but I figured if the kids could walk it every day, I could once. Some of the kids live in better kept houses than the others. None of them are really furnished, but…some families, while poor, their children do not go hungry
—probably about 20% of the kids in the program. Another 30% are the fluctuators—most of the time they have enough food, but that can change at any time. Then we have the 30% of the kids that most of the time don’t have food. Where being on their own to get food is normal. Where they work odd jobs, often skipping school. Then we have the 20% who don’t have bathrooms or running water or more than two changes of clothes. Many have already dropped out of school to take care of themselves and those younger than them in the family.
We saw Bruna’s house. Her grandmother takes care of them, and you can see it reflected in how they act and care for themselves. Two houses down is Iasmine’s house—an unfinished brick and cement call with two rooms the size of my closet for rooms. They held matrices for sleeping 5. It is Iasmine’s grandmother’s house. Iasmine’s mother abuses her mom, as well as regularly working at a prostitute and bringing home men into this small block building. Then to Marconi’s house, where he hid under the bed that sleeps at least 6 brothers and sisters.
The kids joined us, making a parade towards the city dump, where Karla’s dad works. I looked in and saw the piles of mess around crude constructions of trash that someone calls home. Many families live inside the dump, sorting through trash to find things to recycle. Karla’s house is made of dried compacted mud and sticks. Think of settler’s houses in the wild west. Inside held five girls under the age of six and their pet pigeon. There are nine kids all together. The youngest was born two weeks ago. Next door is Andreza’s house, where her mom told us that she was going to “take care” of Iasmine’s mom with her knife, because the girls were fighting. Patricia invited everyone to come to the church and talk, without knives.
We walked up one side of a hill/mountain and down the other until we are hot and dusty. The kids didn’t even take off their sandals before jumping into the lake. The water was perfect. I did take off my sandals first though. I dripped my way to their house—there, in the middle of nowhere, their dad decided to build a mud house. They put sticks around it, tied with barbwire to make their own area. The mom and two girls were washing clothes in the creek that runs through their fenced in area, which also served as their source of running water and I hoped not—their bathroom. Chickens and ducks rand around and one kid climbed the palm tree, got a coconut, and slip it open for us. I drank greedily, and then we ate the meat of the coconut. Delicious.
Imagine living a mile from anything, your own lake to swim in, but no bathtub. No electricity, except a neighbor’s radio blasting Fergy’s “Big Girls Don’t Cry.” Eight kids in a mud house the size of my living room. And my living room is small.
I walked into a different world today. And then I walked back. Over dirt trails and around lake Orar. I got home and took a shower, because I’d already been warned that everyone who swims in lago Orar gets worms. And I just finished taking worm medicine for the last time I got them. Then I cut up a fresh pineapple for dinner and watch a bad bootleg copy of New Moon. In Portuguese. It is a different world. And I seem to drift through worlds fluidly. Until I wake up in the middle of the night and wonder where I am. In less than two weeks I will be in a plane somewhere over the Atlantic. The airport is a world of it’s own. And then cold and snow and family and Christmas. That is another world. I like visiting them all. I smile with my sun burnt cheeks and belly full of coconut. It would be an adventure to live in a mud house. To learn to wash clothes in a river before I learned how to read.
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I love…
75 cents.
To catch a moto from the corner of the street to the bus stop. I like it best with wet hair. It dries in the ten minute ride. The sun is shining as it always is and if there isn’t any wind we make it ourselves. It is a small town, and I know most all the kids. I always pass someone I know. I love seeing their face light up. Because I love them, and the feeling is mutual. I love the slow and fast of riding over lombadas. The rumble of the cobblestones. The sugar cane. The old cathedral. The Portuguese style houses. The palm trees, the old railroad. The people. Each one is special. Each one has a story. A love, a hate, a fear, a sorrow. It is up one hill and down another, over the brass button bridge and through the feira. Only a popcicle in my hand could make this any better, dripping down my arm. And I catch the bus without looking to see where it is going. Because it is going, and I want to go. Someone is waiting for me on the other end.
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I think i should give it up. cut and paste is my life now. currently. since when i have internet, i don´t have time to type things up. these are random things from the past…i dunno…few weeks. many random things add up to something specific. or so i am told.
not really. i made that up. *
Recipe for a good day: or…11 steps to someplace good:
1. Find a bus. Any bus.
2. Take it without positive destinations.
3. Get off. Wherever you want to
4. Buy fresh fruit for lunch. Street venders
5. See things you have never seen before
6. Wave to the ocean. Let it wave back.
7. Buy snacks. More street venders. Walking is better while eating
8. Meet up with friends at the mall
9. Wash your dirty feet in the public restroom
10. Follow interesting people around. Follow boring people and imagine them interesting.
11. Let yourself be happy
*
I just realized I feel guilty for being happy. For not being so busy. When there isn’t something I am supposed to be doing and I have free time. And I am not push, push, push. I stop and then scramble around…looking for it. Whatever the “it” is. I must be missing something, I must not be doing what I should…productive…I must find more ways of being productive.
Screw productivity. Screw always looking for something because what I have isn’t enough.
*
I have forgotten how to be indignant. Frustrated. Angry. Madder than heck at evil and determined as hell that it will not conquer. Last week we couldn’t give the kids any lunch because they didn’t deliver the gas for the stove. This week the cook is sick, next week it will be something else…
Once upon a time, I would have been upset about this. Written e-mails and huffed and puffed. Now I listen and think, well…this is that. I have given in. complacent. My enemies of politics, government and reality have struck me down and I lay there willingly. Yes—there is a time to rest. Say thank you, enjoy it…and then get back ot work and enjoy that as well. Ebb and flow, life is always moving. Even stagnant is circulating.
*
I got hit by a car. Well, just the mirror. But still. It hurt and it scare me. In my defence, I did look before I crossed the street. I just looked the wrong way on a one way. I have to quit walking and thinking at the same time.
Cha de Alegria.
Set up on the side of the road
Under the night sky
I saw a shooting star
I hate hand washing my clothes. Especially jeans. Have you ever washed your jeans by hand? It is hard. Really. We need to fix the washing machine.
Catch the bus to the beach + Acai na tagela = Heaven
I met a street juggler named Wally. He works for the circus in Recife, but he prefers the street. More artistic. Democratic. Free for all. He dances too. I sat on the corner and watched while he performed for the cars stopped at the light. I liked watching their reactions even more than I liked watching him.
I was the music worship leader in Church the other Sunday. Sort of by accident. But it worked. I didn’t know all the words, but everyone helped me. Then it happened. In the third song, the fly flew into my mouth. Luckily, only a few people noticed. I calmly took the bugger out of my mouth and kept singing. But I did giggle during prayer, when no one was looking. Uggggg…that was so gross.
I found this…from another epoch, another time. i can´t remember which time. but it doesn´t matter. it is like i could be writing it right now. again. because the same thing happens every time. the two week line.
it is real. alive. and very http-equiv=”Content-Type” content=”text/html; charset=utf-8″> name=”ProgId” content=”Word.Document”> name=”Generator” content=”Microsoft Word 12″> name=”Originator” content=”Microsoft Word 12″>
near. i crossed the two week line. A VERY BIG REAL line in my head. where i start hiding from the lunchroom and socialization. not really possible to do around Christmas…but…it is like when i know i am leaving the country…why try to start new relationships? why get hurt? ehhhhhhh. something big always happens at the two week line. at least in my mind. i lose it. i re-evaluate my life. i wonder how much it will cost to change/cancel/modify my tickets. i ponder the point to life and realize i still don’t know what the heck i am doing about anything.
i hung out with some of my kids from the youth center. i wonder what my kids will be when they grow up?
answer: they won’t be my kids anymore
i hate life.
some kid grabbed their mom’s hand and said “mommy, can we go home now?” and i almost cried. i swalled it down with a “pathetic Rachel” thought…but…it makes me feel things deep. am i simply being sentimental and not being content with my family? should i just say they are home when…i just don’t feel it? or am i supposed to be reaching, aching, and wanting more? how much does Brasil mean to me anyway?
i think it is true of every stage of life. there comes a moment where you can look back and say “man, if only i had known that was the last time we would be together.” and then you sigh and say “those were the days” or something cliche. i guess listening to all the christmas music makes me nostalgic. or sick.
if you think something, say it. humans are not as dense as we think. if you think something long enough, you don’t have to say it…it is basically transmitted without words. there is so much communication before the mouth is opened. but saying it makes it real. not saying it makes you tied to the same place until you do. or someone dies.
What is real about the whole “God calling” thing. it seems like lately everything i have heard that “God called me to” or “God planned this” has fallen apart. yes i am being overdramatic. WHATEVER. but…does it change? was i wrong? can you simply believe something is God because it seems good and it fits? was it something true in the past but not for the future?
i know…in the middle of all the unknowns…that i was called to Brasil. i just don’t know what that means for the future. i know what i want it to mean, but what i want can change. i am so frustratingly small and…human.
God: eyes open. look for opportunities. i will show you.
(i guess i wrote this around Christmas 2007? feels like now. only switch the countries.)
cut and paste. how do i make the little nonsense words go aw http-equiv=”Content-Type” content=”text/html; charset=utf-8″> name=”ProgId” content=”Word.Document”> name=”Generator” content=”Microsoft Word 12″> name=”Originator” content=”Microsoft Word 12″>
ay?
People think turtles are slow. Because that is what they want you to think. They are speedy when they want to be. Speedy and slick. We (Junior, Aninha, and I) have three sizes: small, medium, and large. Aninha is scared of them. She has a little gasp scream that she lets out. That means I need to come and get the turtle. Because otherwise she does things. Things like flip him over with the broom and push him like a shuffle board across the floor and out the door. I was sitting out back and saw the turtle, feet wiggling in the air, slide past me. I told Aninha that was inhuman. She said then keep the turtles out of her house. But they are sneaky. We keep the back door open to let in the beautiful breeze.
I got up from a nap and groggily went into the bathroom.
I wiped the sleep out of my eyes and saw a turtle staring back.
They like sneaking through the house and into the bathroom.
They always end up in the bathroom. Perverted little buggers.
The small one disappears for long periods of time.
The medium one doesn’t have much of a personality.
The big one doesn’t like me.
When I save him from Aninha’s wrath I pick him up and put him outside. I think he has a god-complex.
He just assumes he can fly. His legs push through the air as I carry him out.
I place him down and he tucks his head in and out and makes a “phsssssss” sound, which I am sure is saying “why is this mere mortal placing me here. I ordered a martini.”
He also eats the cherry tomatoes. But he only takes one bite of each. He never finishes them.
He is trying to get revenge, because he knows I like cherry tomatoes.
He also makes escape plans.
He hides in the bushes until I open the door to take out the trash.
Then the neighbor kids come running to me “Your turtle’s loose!” and I get him and he makes his “phssssssss” sound again.
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