Ha ha! Silly Americans or not, Brazil you've let us in! We arrived this morning about 9am eastern time...we flew into the Sao Paolo airport about 1.5 hrs from our destination, Cubatao just south. Sao Paolo is the second largest city in the world allegedly (depends on who you ask) with just over 17 million people. It takes 1.5 hrs just to get out of the city and onto roads that will actually take you to your destination. We are on the southeast coast...pretty much the Amazon turns into an Atlantic rainforest thats been filleted apart by development so once you leave the city of Sao Paolo you are immediately entrenched in the rainforest dotted with occasional 'favelas' before you smack into Cubatao. See side photo for 'favela'. We encountered some interesting methods of transporting goods while driving and of course as with any central or south american country, it's pedestrain at your own risk.
We got to the mission house and promptly passed out. We everyone had regained somewhat of their sanity after having traveled 12 hours by plane, yes trevor I know this doesn't compare to your flight to Africa, but this is my blog ;p...Aaron, one of the missionaries took us on a tour of the soccer stadium where Pele won title after title in soccer. Afterwards, we stopped by the youth center and then headed out to dinner. Below is a picture of me and Barbara, Pastor's wife, she's 5 mos pregnant and as sweet as can be. She was surprised that I was older than her, apparently I don't look older in Brazil anymore than I do in the U.S. They were all very wonderful to us. We had swedish meatballs for lunch--ha ha! They were delicious--for those of you who are drawing blanks, swedish meatballs was the last dinner I made for the boys before I left. The desserts were passion fruit mousse and flan...woohoo! It's been 4 years since I was last enveloped in the smell of the Amazon, yes I
realize I am waxing poetic now and I don't care, at least you don't have to read my journal which is one big long stream of conciousness working it's way into some semblance of understanding--I realized how much I missed South America. Tomorrow we head out to tour the various ministries that the missionaries are putting together and seeing where the need is. Then we will head out to the favelas and meet the children. I am very excited! I've met 15 new friends in a matter of one day and they are all so passionate about what they are doing that it's intoxicating. I am happy I came.
We got to the mission house and promptly passed out. We everyone had regained somewhat of their sanity after having traveled 12 hours by plane, yes trevor I know this doesn't compare to your flight to Africa, but this is my blog ;p...Aaron, one of the missionaries took us on a tour of the soccer stadium where Pele won title after title in soccer. Afterwards, we stopped by the youth center and then headed out to dinner. Below is a picture of me and Barbara, Pastor's wife, she's 5 mos pregnant and as sweet as can be. She was surprised that I was older than her, apparently I don't look older in Brazil anymore than I do in the U.S. They were all very wonderful to us. We had swedish meatballs for lunch--ha ha! They were delicious--for those of you who are drawing blanks, swedish meatballs was the last dinner I made for the boys before I left. The desserts were passion fruit mousse and flan...woohoo! It's been 4 years since I was last enveloped in the smell of the Amazon, yes I 
realize I am waxing poetic now and I don't care, at least you don't have to read my journal which is one big long stream of conciousness working it's way into some semblance of understanding--I realized how much I missed South America. Tomorrow we head out to tour the various ministries that the missionaries are putting together and seeing where the need is. Then we will head out to the favelas and meet the children. I am very excited! I've met 15 new friends in a matter of one day and they are all so passionate about what they are doing that it's intoxicating. I am happy I came.
1 comment:
Hello,
I'm a student from Brazil and I'm working on a research project about favela tours. We're now working on the tourists's perceptions about tourism in Rocinha and were wondering if you would like to articipate as an interviewer. We could send you the questions (about 15) by email and would appreciate it if you could get back to us with any suggestions you find useful.
Thank you for your attention,
Palloma
pallomamenezes@hotmail.com
Post a Comment