lessons...

this will be a short post, friends, a reflection actually about my past few days here in são pãolo...

thursday and friday were spent with sister mercy, a 35-year-old nun from tanzania... she cracked me up with her demeanor and wild style in clothing... she was very informative, though, with information about being a maryknoll sister and about life as a missionary... she's been here in brazil for 6 years and spent the last couple of years discerning before she made her life vows... she shared about the tough decision she faced, either committing her life or not committing her life, with only the support of her parents... none of her family supported her decision to become a sister! her story was very heavy but very real to hear... made me appreciate what she went through to become a missionary... she also told me a little about the struggles foriegners have trying to make connections in communities to start their missions or help flailing ministries shift focus and come to life... good information to hear, the good and the bad.

we also talked about finances and she told me about her monthly expenses and what she normally lives on (very modest and meager means, to be sure) and i thought it would be a nice treat to take her out to a museum and then to eat at a restaurant... she was a great sport as we found the museum pretty easily but had to search for the restaurant... we saw an ad for a real, live tex-mex joint in bairro pinhieros, so we had to try it! and it was sooo good! :O)

this morning, saturday, we woke up early and mercy insisted on guiding me through the metro and back to heidi's apartment... heidi had arranged to take me to the womens prison's monthly Mass with her to talk with the inmates and see what her work is like as an advocate... i am still at a loss for words at what i saw, heard and experienced, but what i do know is that we all take way too much for granted in our fast-paced lives...

the security process for visitors in and of itself was a bit intimidating, i could totally understand someone not wanting to go through that process every week to visit their incarcerated loved one... as such, many of the women wait in vain every week for visitors who never come... it was depressing seeing the hope in their eyes for their spouses, children and other family members as they talked about getting ready for their potential visitors on sunday...

i also learned that although the country provides public attorneys, the women don't have the right to speak with the attorney until a court date has been set for their case... some of the women spend weeks and months--and in a few cases YEARS--just wondering what the status of their case is... for example, one woman was arrested for robbery back in february and has been waiting to hear when she will be in front of a judge to plead her case and she was told it should happen by march, but march was four months ago! she is still waiting to speak to a judge with no end in sight for her waiting game... it's maddening... so, heidi showed me a file full of case upon cases that she looks up every week to see if they've had any updates for court dates... the women spend so much time in angst just wanting to know what their status is. it's ridiculous...

later on we went to Mass with the inmates that showed up... there are over 5,000 inmates there and the guards literally yell through a gate that Mass will be in 5 minutes" or so, and the inmates come and are escorted to an old church-like room... there are shadows where the shape of a cross was etched into the paint by the sun, the old wooden pews creak and tremble as the people slide into them and the makeshift alter is fashioned out of a table... a group of music ministers and a few eucharistic ministers came, along with the priest, to celebrate Mass with the inmates... one of the inmates offered to read one of the readings, and you could tell that even in her prison uniform, she was trying to look her best... she had tied her hair back and put on some lipstick, and stood up in her white tshirt and orange scrub pants and flip-flops and proclaimed the Good News. it was very touching to see... after sharing the Eucharist, we sang some songs with the inmates and many of them cried, sang and swayed with the music... one lady, who i noticed participated as much as possible and listened intently to the readings and the priest's homily, was sobbing as we were hugging everyone goodbye and praying with them before we left... i hugged her and asked her why she was crying, and she said, "i cry because i wait for this day every month when we can have Mass. every day i pray and thank you wonderful people for remembering us and bringing Mass to us. and every sunday i read my bible and pray, because i know that Mass is going on outside of here and i wish i could go." i was in tears as she shared her story and wanted to sit and visit with her some more, but the guards told the inmates it was time to go, so we hugged and i promised to pray for her... couldn't help but let the tears come after that.

i just wondered how many times have i been inconvenienced with going to Mass, saying, "oh, i can't make it because i have to go to church." but really, i should want to go to church, especially knowing that there's people in prisons who would love to go to Mass every week, or even every day, but they can't. man, life smacked me right in the face today...

after Mass, we went back and visited with another group of women in another pod, and i heard more stories upon stories about the women's families, their trials and sentences, waiting and waiting for information or for their time inside to be up... instantly i was thankful for all the fortune i've had in my life that has kept me from making really bad decisions that could have cost me my freedom...

i'm still processing all the things i'm doing, seeing, witnessing, hearing, saying, thinking, feeling here in brasil... but this experience has definitely been one that i can't forget.

i would have never thought about visiting a prison in the u.s., but now, seeing what inmates here go through in person, how can i not visit them when i get back?

i had never thought about helping out our local food banks beyond donating a few cans of food every now and then, but now after visiting my kids' families in the favelas, how can i not do more when i get back?

there's so much work to be done... will you help in some way?

this week in sao paolo...

it~s been four days since i arrived in sao paolo and it~s been an interesting four days...

on monday, sister caroline took me to see the aldea of the guarani tribe in the northwest part of sp... the aldea is just like our reservations for native americans in the u.s., in that the government in brasil removed the indigenous peoples from their centuries old land and moved them to small parcels of land on the city~s outskirts... since the guarani people lived off the land and had no formal education, they had no need to apply for land claims in the 1400~s and 1500~s when europeans started ^discovering^ brasil... so, centuries later, as cities like sao paolo continue to grow by exponential amounts, metropolitan areas swallow up the areas that the indigenous have in forever, forcing them out... it~s just sad. for centuries these people hunted in the floresta atlantica, grew small crops of vegetables and picked fruits from the trees and washed themselves in the natural springs and rivers that flow all over this part of the country, collected seeds and dried berries to make native jewelery that they were able to sell in the markets... but now, without any legal claim to the land their ancestors inhabited, the guarani have been moved to the aldeas...

the aldeas, i found out, are nothing more than plots of land unsuitable for commercial development and unhospitable for plant growth... builders can~t build apartments or stores on the land and farmers can~t coax anything usable or edible out of the nutrient-deficient ground... so, naturally, it seems, it was a good place to put the indigenous people. it makes me so mad... now, these people, who no longer have the natural resources to eat, drink, bathe, make textiles or crafts for work, have to depend on the help given to them by donations... it~s very debilitating and humiliating for the guarani people...

it makes the plight of native americans more real to me, seeing it, in the 21st century...

we drove onto the aldea and i tried to keep my jaw from dropping, so i wouldn~t seem like i was gawking at the conditions these people lived in... but, the truth is, i was shocked that this kind of place exists in 2010 just outside of one of the largest cities in the world!!! it was mindblowing...

once the car stopped and we got out, i looked around and noticed that there were clusters of little communities inside the gates of the aldea... it~s hard to call them communities, they were little more than a few shacks penned in together... i later learned that each of the clusters of shacks were entire families, sleeping 5+ people per room... in their homes in the forest, they lived in community, whole family trees sharing homes, so naturally, they did the same on the aldea...

the shacks were constructed out of cardboard boxes, sheets of plastic, corrugated tin roofing, plastic crates, scrap lumber, you name it, they used it... few homes were lucky enough to have brick facades and i didn~t see the familiar criss-cross of electrical wires overhead like i thought i~d see... no, here electricity was something the guarani people did without... as was plumbing. this particular aldea housed hundreds of people and only recently had a humanitarian group come in, with the help of the guarani tribe, to build outhouses and shower stalls for each family group... once i knew what they were, i noticed the little green sheds dotting the aldea... now, at least they had somewhere to go, but without running water, what happens when the outhouse gets full is anyone~s guess... can you imagine: in 2010 an outhouse is an upgrade of their previous facilities! something~s just not right with this picture...

it was cold on monday morning, cold enough that i was wearing a pullover sweatshirt and a denim jacket on top, along with jeans and tennis shoes... as we walked around the aldea, i noticed children outside playing ^pula corda^, or jump-rope, some wearing pants and t-shirts... most of the kids only wore a shirt and no pants, or pants and no shirt, and absolutely none of them wore shoes... a little removed from the jump rope group i saw about 4 toddlers gathered, playing naked on the dirt next to a trash pile that was waiting to be burned...

sister carolyn showed me the community health center where the tribal council, with the help of the archdiocese and local humanitarians, petitioned the prefeitura (city government) to build medical facilities to attend to their needs... it is a source of pride for the guarani as they fought for a long time to get something done on their land, but it is little more than two rooms where a volunteer doctor and dentist come twice a week and inspect the children and weigh them to see if they are malnutritioned. i saw the process where the doctor took a screaming and frightened little girl and as calmly and efficiently as possible, removed her clothes, inspected her for sores, bruises, cuts, placed her on a scale to weigh her, than handed her over to the dentist for inspection... what a traumatizing thing to endure for the first 12 years of your life...

it just broke my heart.

on tuesday i went with father dan to his parish and saw their community... here in brasil, the parishes are actually made up of different communities, and st. rita~s is actually about 4 communidades... can you imagine celebrating Mass with 4 different churches every week! think about the parish councils, the catechism, formation, weddings and funerals, etc., for one church... CAN YOU IMAGINE WHAT HAVING 4 CHURCHES MUST BE LIKE!!! i really gained a whole different respect for the parish priests... wow.

later that evening i started feeling a cold coming on and by the time we got out of a parish meeting with one of the auxilary bishops from the archdiocese, i had a full on cold. i went with father dan to a pharmacy and got some OTC meds, went home, took some meds with tea, and crashed til the next day. yikes.

today has been spent with mercy, a maryknoll sister from tanzania... we~ve talked about the maryknolls in general, about vocations and about her discernment towards making her life-long vows as a nun... what an amazing story. more on mercy later this week...

one thing i do want to call to your attention is the fact that there are not enough young people looking into vocations at all... whether the priesthood, the convent or as a lay missionary, the average age in maryknoll is around 60 years old! 60!!! father dan was pacing me and telling me to keep up with him as we climbed a hill towards his parish, and he~s 77! certainly there~s got to be more of us out there who feel called to serve the Church in some way... even as single and married people, that~s a vocation, too... think about helping your church in a more real way than just showing up for Mass on sundays, would ya! just sayin... :)

okay, that~s it... going to bed. we have Mass at 7:30 a.m. tomorrow and then a full day in mercy~s parish... see you soon!

peace and love,
crystal

baking and packing, packing and baking...

so last night, aline, regiane and i made chocolate chip cookies!!! in between the cookies baking s l o w l y i was also trying to eat dinner and pack for my trip this morning to são pãolo... prolly the big reason i was a tad bit late this morning and missed my flight... but that's another story, scroll down for that story because right now is about cookies!!!!

they actually came out right, didn't burn or get fluffy! woohoo!

mixing up the dough... yummmm.

dropping them by the spoonful...

waiting FOREVER for them to bake... literally 45 mins!

we couldn't wait for them to cool to start eating them!

gloriously chocolatey walnutty cookies! yessssssss.


first day in são pãolo

as i mentioned earlier, this morning i woke up a little bit late (surprise, surprise--see the note on the cookies above!) and regiane and i were a little late leaving the house this morning to get me to the nearest airport, where i needed to take a shuttle to the bigger airport i was flying out of... well, when i finally caught the shuttle and made it to the airport, i had about 20 minutes to make it through check-in, security and board my flight.. so, i kind of knew that things were not going to go my way... well, i flagged down someone who could help me try to get booked on another flight, but the prices were double what i paid for my round-trip ticket online just for one way! man, i missed american-style customer service this morning!

i ended up spending the next hour going from airline counter to airline counter trying to find the cheapest flight from belo to sp that left today... well, i finally found one for half the price of all the other guys and decided it was going to have to do. i have plans on monday morning with one of the missionaries and it was my fault for missing my flight today... so, i sucked it up and paid for the ticket and boarded my flight about 30 minutes later... just a mere couple of hours late, i finally made it to sp by 10:30! EXPENSIVE LESSON LEARNED! hmmpf.

i met heidi, the MKLM missionary who arranged my visit, at the downtown rodoviaria (bus station) after taking an hour and a half long shuttle... i slept on the bus the whole way to downtown, so i really have no idea what the scenery was like in sp... sleep deprivation has definitely done a number on me today! anyway, heidi literally lives in the middle of EVERYTHING! the cathedral is about 2 quarterois away and i can hear the campanhas toll on the hour... very cool.

she had also taken the time to see what things were going on in the city in case i wasn't too tired from the trip... so, we went home, dropped off my bags and headed back out the door... the first place we went to was an arts & crafts fair (kinda like feira hippe) where i saw lots of cool, reasonably priced handmade items... there were tons of people, though, so i wasn't that comfortable busting out my camera to take pics just yet... once we had walked around and looked at everything we headed about 5 quarterois away to the praca da liberdade for some big japanese festival they were having...

it was so cool! it's a total mind flip to see japanese people speaking portuguese! ever since i read about the japanese population here in sp during BIP training i wanted to come and see it for my very own eyes... and i did today! ;)

we saw some traditional performers and also walked through the arts & crafts they had on display, too... we also stopped for some real, live japanese food!

heidi and i eating pot-stickers in the japanese district (near praca da liberdade)

the tastiest pot-sticker i have ever had in life! it was amazing... really.

the big stage for the festival...

big cartoon figure of one of the candidates running in the city election...

tree of luck: wishes written down on colored pieces of paper and tied to a tree...

colorful japanese decorations on the praca

very creepy street artists... i have no idea why this girl was smiling.

while on our way home from the street fair, we saw a movie being filmed...


i swear one of the ladies on the bike is the girl from the novela, passione!


well, long story short, that's been my first day... i'm pretty pooped so after dinner and Mass i think i'm crashing out to be up and ready to go for tomorrow morning... it's been great so far and i've had fun asking heidi questions about missionary work and what the process is like...

she also told me today that she knows and works with people in the Educafro organization, a franciscan education ministry that works to eliminate racism from the education system here in brazil. she's getting in touch with some people there to see if i can visit their offices and see what they're about! very, VERY EXCITED!

more to come soon... thanks for the love and prayers. you're in mine, too.

peace and love,
crystal

serra da piedade and são pãolo in the morning...

hi all!

i wanted to post some pics of the ordination Mass i went to today with my host mom and their family's church... we left the house at close to 7 a.m. and boarded charter busses that drove us the hour and a half to caete, the town right outside of serra da piedade... then, we climbed a winding road uphill for about an hour and when we finally got to the top i found out that serra da piedade is actually a beautiful stadium-like area carved into the mountain's peak... that's where the archdiocese celebrates special occasion Masses... Mass on top of a mountain--it couldn't have been more picture perfect...

the awesome thing was that when we trekked up the hill in the morning, the whole place was stuck in a cloud... it was gray everywhere, you couldn't see more than 10 feet in front of you and it was windy and cold... but we began praying before Mass, and in prayer we asked the clouds to lift so we could celebrate Mass in the light... and what do you know?! the clouds lifted, the sun shone bright and the winds slowed down... it was truly awesome!

there were 9 priests ordained today! it was a very moving service and i am so excited that i was able to go to this celebration in brasil... i wrote down some notes in my journal during Mass, and what struck me about going to Mass in brasil, is that it is different and still beautifully the same... you can go anywhere in the world--even caete, minas gerais, brasil!!!--and the Mass is still the same. <3

here's some pics from the Ordination Mass
TONS of people







i've never before seen anything like the serra da piedade, especially since i was born and grew up in lubbock... it's plains as far as the eye can see... here in brazil, everything is as mountainous as anything i've seen in books or movies... truly breathtaking.

kind of hard not to be in awe of our Creator, you know?






awesome stations of the cross overlooking the scenery...





anyway, wanted to ask for your continued prayers as i travel to são pãolo in the morning... my host sister is taking me to the airport at 4:15 a.m. to catch a shuttle to the other airport, where i'll catch my flight at 6:45 a.m... yay me! on the other hand, that leaves me all day to get to know heidi, the MKLM lay missionary who is hosting me at the MKLM community over these next 10 days. Hopefully, we'll get to go to Mass in the evening as i'm sure i'm going to want to nap when i arrive in sp.

my schedule is set and i'll be doing some things with the lay missionaries, the sisters and the priest in the MKLM community this week, and some things i'm doing on my own... yikes! super scared to not have my bip's with me to lean on as my portuguese is not fluent yet, but i am sure that it will just be more to learn from.

please pray for my safety this coming week as we will be visiting prisons and favelas in the MKLM's area... also, pray that i'm able to see past my own prejudices and circumstances and be able to see people who need to know Christ's love.

finally, pray that the Holy Spirit guides my decisions over these next few weeks, months and years... things are changing fast and i just want to do what God is leading me to do.

thank you all for your thoughts and prayers, i'll post an update from sp when i can!

peace and love,
crystal

winding down the week at ONG... são pãolo bound!!!

i realize that my last post was a bit over-the-top dramatic and i just needed some time to simmer on what happened this week... so... this is my simmering. :)

i was not happy with the way the project at ONG was worked out between my program coordinator and the ONG coordinator, the wild goose chase and wrong addresses just to get there, the expense to get to and from nova lima or the time spent on busses... but, after getting everything off of my chest to our program coordinator via email (patty, you are a saint for dealing with as much stuff as you do from all directions!), i just stepped back for a second and thought about the kids...

on tuesday i let everything get to me and it bothered me all day... but i know that it was unfair of me to be upset/angry/frustrated with the adults who coordinated the program and let that affect my mood at the camp all day, the kids had nothing to do with it... as a group, the BIP's decided we needed to talk to the coordinator of the ONG camp to try to resolve some of the issues we were having, unfortunately, most of the problems were issues that the coordinator couldn't resolve on the spot... he explained his side of the story, and said he understood if we didn't want to come back the next day, but that he would be severely short-staffed and there wouldn't be adequate supervision for all the kids... so, the next day, two of us returned to the camp out of guilt... lol.

on wednesday i went back to camp and tried to put everything behind me and move on with life for the rest of the week, and surprisingly, me and my kids had a great day! i think my good day actually started in the morning when i spotted a group of mounted police at praca sete, and i had to stop and take a pic! [diego always rolls his eyes when i get all touristy on him, lol]

BH Mounted Police


today, thursday, we had a small talent show of sorts near the end of the day where each of the groups got to sing, dance or do some acrobatics and my little kids and i sang some american songs... we did our group chant again--"we are the diamonds, mighty, mighty diamonds, everywhere we go people want to know, who we are, so we tell them..."-- and then sang "the wheels on the bus"... it was hilariously cute! my kids are the 4-6 year olds, so singing in a group is about as much as they could handle off the cuff... we tried teaching them to sway while singing the song and it was a disaster! kids falling all over each other, they went down like dominoes! haha

here's the diamonds getting ready for "lights, camera, action!"


here we are singing "the wheels on the bus"... trust me, it's more difficult than it seems!


while the other groups performed their stunts, acrobatics, sang songs and danced, my kids were mesmerized... sooo funny!

the kids watching one of the other groups perform


i decided to snap a few pics while we were waiting for the next group performance...
me with a couple of my munchkins, iago (in the cap) and lui


tomorrow (friday) is the last day of ONG camp... what started out as a disaster has actually turned out pretty good... guess i just had to get past myself and my circumstances and remember that it's for the kids... lesson learned!

this weekend i'm going to an archdiocesan ordination Mass with my host mom... she is very involved in her church here in nazaré and she invited me weeks ago to go with her... i am interested to see how different things like ordination Masses are here in brasil versus the u.s., i expect it to be both different and the same, just like normal sunday Mass... the ordination is actually going to be in a town nearby, so we will be boarding a bus at 7 a.m. on saturday to get there for the 9 a.m. Mass... the scenery and mountain-top church is supposed to have gorgeous scenery, so hopefully i'll have some time to snap some pics!

saturday night i'm supposed to bake chocolate chip cookies with my host sisters and make some cosmopolitans (they are also obsessed with SATC, as am i!!!)... should be tons of fun as most things are here... then, i'm off to são pãolo on sunday morning!

i got an email today from heidi, the maryknoll lay missionary who arranged my visit to sp... part of my visit will include going with her and the MKLM community priest to their prison ministry and celebrating Mass with the inmates... i'm nervous and excited all at the same time... i know brasilian prisons are different from u.s. prisons, but i've never visited one in the states, so i have no idea what to expect... i can imagine that any prison is isolating, depressing and lacking hope... hopefully, celebrating Mass with the inmates will remind them that they, too, are loved.

i have a feeling the week in sp will be life changing for me, compounding on this incredible summer... please pray for me as i travel to são pãolo this coming week... and i'm also changing families again, somewhere in there... hopefully bianca's family still wants me, the dates have changed and i have no idea when i'm actually supposed to move! eek!

after i return to belo on the 3rd of august, i'll spend a few days nearby hopefully traveling to ouro preto with my family to see the historical monuments there in the city before returning to belo and flying out for a week in rio de janiero... i bought my ticket on tuesday and can't wait to visit the cristo redentor monument... there's also a great metropolitan cathedral that looks just breathtaking from what i have seen so far... as i mentioned before, i'm trying to coordinate a couple of days with another lay missionary community to see what their work is like in rio...

can't believe my summer in brasil is winding down... it's just a few short weeks til i'm back in the states and starting school at university of st. thomas... wow. God is good!!!

peace and love to all!
~crystal

this week at ONG...

things have been difficult this week, i don't have but a few minutes on the computer so i wanted to show you some pics of the camp we are working at this week... words to come later. pray for me and my co-workers, that we have enough patience to make it through another day tomorrow... and also, pray that we have mercy on the soul who coordinated this project. just saying.

this was our mis-adventure on monday... great way to start off the week. we were given the wrong address and spent two and a half hours searching for the mystery circo... i think you can tell by our faces we were not having a great time. the one bright spot in the day was that i walked by chickens on the street!!!
MONDAY





i had high hopes for tuesday, but i woke up with a sore throat... made it to nova lima after nearly 3 hours on the bus this morning to find out that my ONG "partner" was not coming to the camp today. super.
TUESDAY
kids on the tremzinho, making our way from the circo to the water school

random boi we saw on the way to the ONG "water school"

nova lima wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't so hard to get to!

i spent my day wrangling 30 4- and 5-year olds since my ONG partner didn't make it to work today... yay me.

the ONG people explaining energy conservation... total presentation time: 10 minutes. why were we there for 4 hours???

the kids actually sitting down in one spot for more than 5 seconds. it was heavenly while it lasted!

diego and i didn't get to eat lunch or eat a snack since we left with our kids all day to the water school... so, when we finally made it back to belo at 9 p.m., we stuffed our faces with pasteis de queijo and carne moida... yummm.

me, stuffing my face with my double decker! take that, hunger!


okay, enough about this week in ONG... on to other news...

i am officially rio de janiero bound on sunday, august 8th... i'm working on getting a visit scheduled with another missionary community while in rio and will also taking a few days to relax and re-boot before trekking back to the states... the boys will be in rio the whole week, too, so it should be some interestingly fun adventures... i imagine laying on a beach drinking coconut water at least one day... ahhhh. hope the weather holds up for us!

gotta run, but wanted to let you know that things are still going well here... aside from my sore throat, everything else is peachy! ooh, and i'm in love with this song right now... "bem vinda" by jeito moleque... give it a listen!

NAC's festa juninha...

well, friends and family, today was a big day...

this morning we had our final day at NAC with the kids... i danced the long-awaited and much-hyped quadrilha dance, which is essentially an old-school square dance...

oh, i had a good chuckle when i remembered the olden days when they made us square dance in the gym during elementary school... it was completely akward having to choose a partner--or having one chosen for you by the coach-- and we usually squaredanced on rainy days during winter... the banjo/fiddle combination of music playing, someone calling out the "grab your part-nah, doe-see doe!" my complete lack of spelling aside, for some reason, that's what i remember about squaredancing as a kid.. i guess we had run out of all the other 'rainy day' activities when our coach thought, "i've got it! let's make them SQUAREDANCE!!!" at least that's how i think the advent of squaredancing in elementary school came about... lol

me and carozinha and sister and mom


festa juninha, on the other hand, actually is a tradition in the farming communities in brasil that coincides with the saint's feast days and harvest days... there is a patron saint of crops, harvests, of farmers, etc., and when it was time to harvest the abundance of crops, the people would have a celebration to give thanks to the patron saint for caring for the crops... so, that's how the tradition started...

nick, me & kids (bianca, brian & taynara)


nowadays, people dress like stereotypical hillbillies and do stereotypical countryfolk things... still, it's fun to go to and observe and participate... i did find out today that dancing the quadrilha is much like dancing the squaredance... you do complicated turns, dance in circles with partners, kick up your heels and everyone pretends to be a cowboy for a day... it was awesome! haha it was a bit akward, though, dancing with a little guy [read: one of the kids] because at last minute the dance coordinator thought it would be funnier if all of the americans danced with the kids instead of pairing us with other adults... and so it was.

me and my little guy dancing


my little guy was hilarious, he puffed out his chest like a peacock because we got paired up and we actually made it through the dance ok... i've got some pics, too, which i'll upload soon...

there were games that you could play to win little prizes like the fishing booth, shooting boxes off of a ledge with a slingshot, and a ball toss... there was also a place to buy traditional festa juninha food like canjica, caldo de mandioca and canjicinha... yummmmmmm.

one of the things i was not looking forward to was saying goodbye to all of the kids today... our last day at NAC came all too quickly and i will honestly miss making the long trek from wherever i'm living at the time to catch bus #4802 to boa vista, getting off at the last bus stop on rua calma and walking [mostly trudging] up that hill to the creche... i knew it would be hard saying goodbye, but i didn't know it would be that hard.

on friday, i went to downtown and bought 100 little gift bags, lots of candy and made 100 copies of the 4 of us BIP's at our first brasilian world cup game... we are all decked out in green/yellow in front of a tv with 'belo horizonte' written on it... we are smiling and happy and having a good time... that is the experience in brasil that i wanted the kids to remember of us... turns out the pictures were a hit and tons of the kids came up to us asking for our autographs... so cute. :)

we came, we ate, we played, we danced, we took TONS of photos with the kids, and we said goodbye. as the party was wrapping up, one of the kids, kairo (who has two brothers who also go to NAC), said it was so sad that we were leaving and that they would miss us so much... and i couldn't handle it, my eyes started tearing up, then one of the girls sees that i'm starting to cry, so she starts crying, then one of the other BIP's sees that we're crying, so he cries, too... it turned into a big crying hugfest for a little bit, and when we all calmed down, we hugged it out and left each other smiling.

me and some of the kiddos--a tearful goodbye!


i think i understand the term "saudades" now...

finally, before we left NAC, i was able to leave a donation collected from family and friends for the benefit of the kids i would be working with in brasil... i spoke with the directors during the first couple of weeks about their needs and what they thought might be the most beneficial way to utilize the funds and they said their first priority was to raise enough money to buy puzzle-piece wrestling mats for their dance studio upstairs... as it turns out, leo, the dance instructor, is also a judo and karate instructor and he will begin teaching classes once they have the proper equipment at the creche... i'm happy to say that with the support of my family and friends back home, NAC will be purchasing the mats they need to give these kids a chance to experience an art that they wouldn't otherwise be able to experience on their own.

from the bottom of my heart, thank you to my family and friends for supporting my mission this summer... these kids deserve to be loved and looked after and cared for... thank you for loving complete strangers enough to be willing to give out of your own pocketbooks. thank you.

me and ruilani