Bororo

On Friday morning we left General Carneiro at 6:30am in order to arrive at the Bororo village. The Bororo people are indigenous but have embraced some aspects of the western world. The government build homes for them (very small, but better than huts!) and there is a catholic church in the village. Unfortunately, the Brazilian workers who built the homes allegedly left many Bororo women pregnant and that has caused a lot of friction between this village and "white people" (Brazilians) as well as between this village and other Bororo villages who now accuse them of not being pure Bororo. The leader of this village told us that the catholic church has been present in their village for over 100 years, and yet this was the first time a social assistance group of this magnitude had come to help them. We had 2 dentists, one doctor, a pharmacy, a youth ministry team, and a children's ministry team. The Bororo people still speak their own language, but they also speak Portuguese fluently. They are very suspicious and critical of outsiders. Some of the children told us that they had been instructed to not tell us any words in their language. Many children and adults did not know their ages and unfortunately there were many men and women of all ages drunk. We were not aware of this ahead of time, but about a month ago there was a terrible accident with a truck which was full of Bororo people in the truck bed. Many were killed and those who survived were badly injured. This has brought on a terrible depression among these Bororo people and their solution has been to drink.

The children's ministry team had a program for the kids in the morning and again in the afternoon. We picked out the games, stories, and art projects that we thought would work best in the outdoor setting. We also had the workshop in which I used some of the "Claves" material as well as taught the wordless book and John 3:16.

We had some time after lunch to walk around the village and visit some of the homes. I found a little girl (she says she is 10 but I doubt it) who was in a cast from her hips all the way down to the toes of her left foot. Rafaela and her aunt were in the truck accident and sadly her aunt passed away. She was sitting in a chair outside of her house and her mother was painting the faces of some of our team members. Her grandmother and another person were inside the house making terrible wailing noises and were drunk. Rafaela looked like she hadn't had a bath in a month. Her toes looked like they were badly infected and she had a large lump on her head. Her mother was a very bitter woman and when one team member didn't want to be painted she said, "So you are disgusted by us?! Is that why you don't want to be painted?" Naturally, we all quickly got in line to be painted! :) And yet what stood out in this home full of miseary was the constant smile on Rafaela's face. I had Steve go get here for the afternoon program and she was so excited to be able to leave that house for a bit and participate in the fun. Steve stayed by her side the whole time and took her home when she got tired and it started to get chilly.


Here is most of the children's ministry team...

We had some crazy guys on the team this year who were anxious to lead some of the singing and dancing! They did a great job, and of course Michael was in the middle of the bunch!


Jônatas doing his "magic"... you can see the small homes in a circle around the village.

Thanks, Steve, for the great open-mouthed picture! :) Anyway, I am teaching John 3:16 with lots of gestures and plenty of excitement... By the end of the day the 7-10 year olds were reciting the verse perfectly!

After teaching them the wordless book and John 3:16, we had snack time!

Here is Cristiane teaching the colors of the wordless book using the bracelet. She was asking him to repeat the meaning of each color and at this point he is explaining what "sin" is. (Everything that we THINK, SAY, or DO that doesn't please God).
We used the "quadro scênico" in the morning...

and an adaption of Benjamin's Box in the afternoon.

A Wedding....

This is not the wedding of the girl who had that crazy bridal shower...this is another gal that has babysat Maira and Michael a few times. Her wedding was on June 12 (Valentine's Day here in Brazil!) and she asked Maira to be the ring bearer. Maira didn't want to at first ("I'm too embarrassed!"), but I told her how sad Lana would be if she said "no" so she agreed to it. Maira did a great job and loved her dress!

Maira and Lana

The kiddos with Eliane

The kiddos with Karyne

The Bridal Shower

This Saturday I went to a bridal shower of a gal from church, Fernanda. Her father is an elder in the church and her parents were in the first Bible study that we joined when we came to Brazil. This was the best bridal shower I have ever been to! Seriously!!! The theme was "caipira", which means something like a Brazilian redneck. We all had to dress acordingly, which was a bit difficult for me without having to have clothes made, so I just did the best I could...turning out somewhat more colonial. But hey, I don't do short skirts. Oh, and before you look at the pictures...remember this is Latin America and modesty in the church is still quite different from modesty in the US church. :)
Here is the bride and the colonial redneck...rsrsrsrsrs
And no, this is not the dress she will wear for her wedding!

Fernanda's mom is seated on the right and the little girls are her flower girls. We had a time of singing first. Then they brought out the food...my was there a lot of food! All sorts of typical foods from this region.
Some ladies from church paid tribute to the bride with a song...too bad I forgot that my camera has a video feature at this point!

Here is the bonfire of all bonfires!

Two of her bridesmaids took lessons from a professional dancer (the guy in the middle!) so they could do this dance for Fernanda. Not quite country dancing...something like country meets samba!
Then the bride had to dance "forró" with the guy...boy was I glad they didn't do this to me at my bridal shower! I would have died of embarrassment! But Fernanda is a true extravert and she loved every minute...

And now the Brazilian redneck square dancing....looked like fun, but I decided to take pictures this time. I'll be ready to join in the next time such an opportunity arises! :)

More pictures of Maira's birthday party

We did the limbo and a kind of bobbing for apples. I always thought the traditional bobbing for apples was pretty disgusting...dunking your face into a bucket of water that other people have been dunking their faces with their mouths wide open and spitting the water out of their mouths...yuck. So I saw this new kind of bobbing done at a church in Brisbin, PA and decided it would be a lot of fun to do at a party. The bonus was seeing a good number of kids eating their apples afterwards!

Maira turns 6 years old!

On March 27, Maira turned 6 years old! Here are some pictures from the party on Saturday. I'll post more later on the details, but I wanted to get these on the blog as soon as possible.

One more try...

Yep, we are trying the Brazilian school again. I know...I said I would NEVER do that again. I really had no intention of putting them in a Brazilian school, but I was not finding a tutor for them in Portuguese grammer so I started looking for other options again. My friend, Michawn, encouraged me to try Couto again. I had gone to talk to them in June of last year about the kids participating in only certain subjects, but the coordenator was not there and she never got back to me. Then I got busy with the Project, Candidacy week, and furlough so it just got dropped. I figured they weren't too interested in it anyway. I know the overall director of Couto (it is an elementary, middle, and high school) from various Asas events and so I emailed her and told her what I was looking for: Portuguese grammer, art, and some kind of physical activity. She had me come in to see her and then she took me over to talk to the elementary school coordenator. We talked over the options and we picked out two days that had most of the subjects that I wanted and also put him in a class with his bestest bud from church and another girl from church that he has known since birth. Maira has been bugging me about going to school too, and since her reading in English is pretty solid, I decided we could send her on the same days that I send Michael. Of course she was absolutely THRILLED! So they are going to school on Wed. and Thurs. mornings...7:15 - 12:10. On Thursdays Michael actually stays the whole day (until 5:30!)because his grade level does art, computer, and English on Thursday afternoons. He was pretty nervous the first day (Wed.), but it turned out pretty well. He complained about being bored because they did some subjects that were not on the schedule for that day so I had not purchased those books. I figure they are still getting the kinks worked out since it is still the first few weeks of school. Thursday he was really nervous about staying the entire day, but he really liked the afternoon and I don't think next week will be as hard for him. Maira talks NON-STOP when I pick her up from school...she just gets so energized from the whole experience! She is really loving it. We continue with homeschool and I'll have some heavier days for Michael to make up for Thursdays when there will be no time for homeschool. I had a really hard time leaving them there on Wed morning, but I feel very strongly about them getting the most out of living in Brazil at this time of their lives. Part of that includes understanding Portuguese grammar. Turns out Michael will also get in on some Math, Geography, essay writing, and volleyball. Maira's class is working on cursive already! My goal is to have the best of both worlds for the kids...homeschool with some enrichment in the Brazilian Christian school.

Washington DC and Lake Anna

After the family reunion we headed to my mom and step-dad's house in Alexandria, VA. While in Alexandria we went to Washington DC to see some of the sights. Here are Michael and Maira at the Franklin D. Roosevelt monument.

One of the fountains at the Franklin D. Roosevelt Monument

We also went to the National Zoo...one of the favorite animals that we saw were the pandas! They were so beautiful!
Then we went to Lake Anna for some water fun!