Community Garden Underway!

Yayyy! The garden is coming along quite nicely! My big project I choose for this internship was creating a community garden. It is located behind the church on land that is not currently being used. The idea is to involve both church members and the community, giving half of the garden plots to people in our church and the rest to people in the surrounding community. I am hoping to use the garden as a way to connect to others outside the church. I am sooo pumped!

A friend of ours, Region, is helping me construct it, lots of work. Today we leveled out the area we had staked out. I have not worked that hard since last summer. Region can't speak English and I can't speak Portuguese. haha fun times. Anyway so he was worried and I told him not to worry since last summer at my internship with Brickman, landscaping company, I was doing the same work and with a bunch of guys who could only speak spanish. I'm a pro by now. It has been very cool working with him so far. Also he picks me up and we go everywhere on his motorcycle. Love it!!

We are starting off with ten plots and then will expand later if it goes well. I am funding the project which means you are funding it too!! People are excited about it and very willing to help out however. We had a guy level out big piles of dirt for us and then donate the frame for the plots. Oh so that is neat. The frames for the plots are made out of the adobe tiles! I am working with a great team. Region who is incredibly crafty, and Denise is a agronomy major and as owned a plant shop in the past. She has lots of experience with plants of the area and organic gardening. She said I will have lettuce by the time I leave, we shall see!

Regional Retreat

The retreat the youth are planning are for youth in the surrounding area. So proud of them! All of them have been working so hard at planning it all out. They have decided it will be a weekend deal in Itu. Host families will keep the kids at their houses and get them to the daily activities. The theme is relationships with others and God. Besides lessons and break out discussion groups there will be a afternoon of community service. Also they have a huge scavenger hunt planned as well. A few of the guys have volunteered to help teach the lessons and preach on Sunday morning, BIG STUFF!! Debora, my beloved Lar friend is in charge of the schedule and contacting people. Each one of them has really taken it upon themselves to make this event great, so many meetings they have had to discuss everything. I can't wait to see how it all turns out!

Staying in igloos by the beach, what?!

Our youth group has been blowing me away with all that they have been doing! Our hopes for the group were that they would get to the point of pouring into others instead of just being on the receiving end. They have definitely taken on the challenge and are loving it! Here are some events that have been happening...

Mission Trip to Praia Grande: Goal to reach out to new youth group there and encourage them. Mark, Ali, Carol and I planned the trip but got suggestions from our youth. Youth group did multiple fundraisers to help pay for the trip and the activities that would take place there. Some of these fundraisers were... Japanese dinner at church, selling pizzas in the community and making/selling necklaces at the local hippie fair. It was neat watching them design and make the necklaces, each had their own special touch.

We loaded up the cars and a kombi (vw van) and took off. It was near Sao Paulo and a beach town! Once we got there we found out the kids were a lot younger than ours. We all adjusted our lessons and gave our kids some pep talks reminding them that they were once at this stage. Our youth responded wonderfully and bonded with the other youth group. A few bumps throughout the trip but great first step. I really liked watching our kids speak up during discussion groups and sharing all that they had learned so far.

Beach was beautiful and our kids grew even closer to each other! We all had a lot of fun in the waves and just hanging out on the beach. Good bonding time! Two new kids in our youth group found their spot in the group, so happy to see the group coming together and forming deeper relationships. At the end our kids left with the confidence to plan a retreat all on their own!

Part II

Then immediately head to the meeting, which had already started. Realized I forgot toothpaste, ewww dirty teeth. Reached the church and meet everyone, so warm and friendly! The meetings all day were sooo great, Jerry and Gail are kind of like the mentors for these three missionary couples, all from Sao Paulo. A lot of the meetings are about teamwork and leadership qualities, everything I learned in college. You can imagine how excited I was, finally working with something I know. They told me to jump in if I wanted to, and Gail translated for me. One meeting was about the conflict they were having with each other and the 2 couples that were in charge of leadership of the church. (5 couples in all). It was neat hearing about struggles and really being able to see peoples true feelings and personalities.

The rest of the trip went fantastic! Junior and Patricia the couple letting my stay at their house were wonderful. They treated me like a little princess. One point I wasn’t sure what juice I wanted to Junior ordered me FOUR. By the end of the trip I was calling them Mom and Dad! They showed me the sites, I post most of my pictures on facebook but will try to get a few on here. This blog is a pain when it comes to uploading pictures! Brasilia is known for its architecture and it being a planned city. The city is in the shape of an airplane and is divided up into sections. All the government buildings in one area, all the apartments in another and so on. Also the apartments (just have apartments in the city) can not have balconies and all are off the ground. Cool huh? Each couple made lunch for my at their house, all amazing cooks. Those couples were such an encouragement and so uplifting to be around. I was able to hear their stories and about their life now and wow they are on fire for the Lord! They have been in training for 2 years and are so excited to get things going!

Birthday Bash

Bus trip to Brasilia

I am so glad I was able to come here, it has been really uplifting so far, feeling a bit recharged. The bus ride here was quite an adventure, good and bad. So Phyllis wasn’t able to take me and I had to take the bus from itu to campinas. Ali dropped me off and right before leaving Thomas insisted on going as well. When we got to the bus station he helped me get all my luggage and such to the bus…side note on the way back to Maktub from the Circus Bruno and Thomas insisted on walking us the short way to our apartment. So sweet! Anyway so he takes me to the bus platform and then hands me a little velvet red bag. I opened it up and it was a thin gold bracelet! It was my birthday present! I thought my heart would burst! I couldn’t believe he got me a birthday present awwww. After that great moment my bus doesn’t show until 20 minutes past the original time. haha and then we switched buses twice. The whole time I am so confused but am paying attention to people that seem to be in my group, ended up working okay but I was quite nervous, I admit.

So take the bus to Campinas get off at their big bus station, take the escalator to the shopping/ eating area and walked around, with my rolly bag, the thing 3 times trying to find the bathroom haha. Find it and then stare at the sign for at least 5 minutes seeing how much I have to pay to use it andddd I have to bust out the Portuguese phrase book! embarrassing but little did I know it wouldn’t compare to getting dinner. After handling that I decided to get something to eat and I only have an hour. I look around and the lines are crazy long! I pick an Italian place that has the shortest line. Get in line and after 10- 15 minutes a lady comes up with a menu and asked me what I would like. I tell her I want lasagna. Well it happens to be a place where you pick out every ingredient! Ahhh. We try to communicate, unsuccessfully, and then she just tells me when I get up there to point at things. Oh and by this time everyone in line is aware I only speak English and am holding up the line so I am getting a few dirty looks along with “oh that poor girl” look as well. I get up there and somehow find out they don’t have lasagna! Then the cook lady starts losing her patience and starts speaking very harshly to me. I want to just run away and go somewhere else but by this time I only have 20 min and am to the point of extreme frustration. I am not about to let this lady be rude to me and run me off, I have stood in her line for over 30 min and I am going to get food! haha The woman behind me and the lady who takes the orders in line both help me and somehow I get through the line. It was a horrible experience! Then I get my food and it doesn’t even taste good but I eat most of it knowing I won’t have another chance to eat for 13 hours. haha at this point I just want to cry and hurry and get on the bus. The lady was incredibly mean!

Then I go to get on my bus and you have to go through a little security thing and the guy realizes or guesses I am American so he tries talking to me and makes sure I know where to go. This guy doesn’t even speak English well and I don’t even ask for help and he cares enough to double check that I am okay, goes out of his way. So after that I am able to smile again and be okay. Well I get down and my platform says 14-17, something the guy had pointed out, thank goodness. I had thought I was suppose to go to the number which was actually my bus seat. haha

Wow this thing is long

I end up getting help from a very nice bus driver, he tells me to just look at the sign on the bus to know which one to take and then he winks at me. I love it when people wink at me! He was a cute older man. haha this is so much I know but it just doesn’t end. So my bus comes about 10 min late and I go to get on and a grouchy old man who takes the tickets to board points at a part of the ticket I am suppose to fill out and he won’t let me on or help me/explain. So I get out of line and see some bus drives standing out and one of them talks to the guy trying to convince him to let me on. No luck so he finds someone who speaks English and that guys fills it out for me. So nice. Then the guys taking tickets still won’t let me on and so both of them are arguing with him. One of them pushes me on the bus and the old grouchy man just rolls his eyes and lets me on. O goodness it was a mess. But I was mainly just excited I had people who were taking care of me! They were great.

So I get on the bus and a guy in his thirties sits beside me and he doesn’t smell bad so I am relieved. haha He doesn’t try to talk to me either which I am grateful for, exhausted by Portuguese at that point. The bus ride was okay besides the fact that it is FREEZING! I was in a ball in my seat trying to stay warm. I had brought a light jacket but it wasn’t enough. At the next stop I get one of the guys to get my luggage out from under the bus and I get a long sleeve shirt and another t-shirt. Try to sleep but can’t, I even have my laptop case on top of my legs to help keep me warm and then my backpack leaning up against my legs. I looked quite silly. Around 2 am we stop at a rest stop and I jump off and buy a ski jacket looking thing. Pink by the way haha. not much of a selection, the only one in my size. Good price but I wasn’t too worried b/c I was miserable. Get back on the bus and it helped a lot, still not able to be warm enough but I caught some sleep here and there. Had a conversation with the guy beside me in Portuguese. That was cool, and found out he was freezing too, awww and he bought me a water at one point. Cool guy. Get to Brasilia and Gail is waiting for me. Yay no problems there.

Brasilia Team