Over three months in Brasil...

...you'd think I could speak more Portuguese by now.

I'm learning about palms trees. I wondered about the "arms", then one bloomed.
And the building behind is interesting. We think three guys are doing all the work. Its been slowly changing ever since the office was opened over 18 months ago. Durk and I found we had each counted the windows to see if the tilework was actually moving down any. (view from mission office)

 I tried working on haircutting vocabulary but it didn't help the final result. It's a long ride out to the cabeleireiro (try saying that one three times fast) so I might just try finding someone closer. People in the ward might know but there's not a lot of short hair around.

I have been working on vital life skills, such as getting a drink of water from the office dispenser without splashing from the cup onto the wall, not getting hit by bicycles coming from the left when we only need to worry about cars from the right on our one-way street, getting the non-cooling air-conditioner at our end of the office to recycle cooler air instead of bringing in hot air, adjusting the chuveiro properly and turning it off between uses,

I didn't want to disturb class, so this is a quick snap as English class level one was ending. We don't usually have kids but the missionaries seem to have told one sister that it was a class for kids. I think they were bored but they knew more English than some. We like meeting where there is a big table but don't often have access. Level 2 is working better, its smaller and when a different group shows up from last week, we can work with where they are, and some even study!

I had to be sung to at the restaurant we went to for lunch on my birthday and again when the neighbors came over. Parabens! I think everybody claps to hide the fact that they don't really know a tune. The best part was when Durk offered Jose juice he said he had made with the umbu fruits that Jose had brought us earlier that afternoon from a tree he passed by. Jose seemed pretty suspicious, not surprising since making it isn't easy and the fruits weren't really very ripe or sweet, and made Cicera taste it. Then Durk brought out the carton we happened to have purchased in the morning and Cicera really cracked up. Jose loves to tease and she likes to see him get teased. Umbu are about the size of grape tomatoes and mostly skin and seed. The juice reminds Durk of grapefruit, I think maybe a bit of grapefruit and a bit apricot, pretty mild flavor. You can see the "homemade" juice in the liquid measuring cup in front of Durk in the video.

And I tried the seasoning blend we bought last week at the Mercado in a pot of beans and it was very tasty. I also added a few more spices to our collection Saturday at the big mall, and found mung beans to sprout. The only name I could find with google was the same as "sprouts" but when I tried that, the clerk said no they were for cooking. But I came home and tried and they are sprouting nicely, and the Japanese name on the label translates as sprouts. Extra good Pad Thai coming this week!

Sunday afternoon/evening there was a sociedade de socorro meeting about ministering. It was very good (Sister Chambers helped translate what I couldn't get) but we were a bit surprised not to be companions. I have four elderly sisters to minister to and a companion who doesn't speak English either, as far as I know, she wasn't there. I hope we can communicate enough to set up when to go and where to meet! I tried figuring out who everyone was through lds tools but the names are so tricky, everyone goes by first names and our list had only first names --except one, because there are at least two Jacquelines. And neither has the name on my list in lds tools. There are many many times you have to be a sleuth around here.Two of the sisters (at least) don't have phones and find it very hard to get to church because the walk is tough, bad roads, etc. as told to me by one whose son is visiting and could bring her this week - he is currently living in Provo Utah. She gave me her address but the street isn't in google maps, good thing someone asked for a landmark to go by.
We were served soup and other goodies, it was like a Young Men activity if you judge by how fast the food disappeared.

I've been able to have a few conversations that make a bit of sense, one sister sews her clothes and started helping to support her family through sewing at age 13. One problem with figuring out how to say something is that the others then rattle off lots of Portuguese I totally cannot understand but they assume I got it all.