New Apartment!

We can hardly believe we're now living in our very own apartment!  It's on the 4th (top) floor of a small building with only 7 other apartments.  It's within walking distance to the church, 3 other families on our team, the office, grocery stores, and a bakery.  We spent the night for the first time last Friday and the boxes we shipped from the U.S. arrived the following day (much earlier than we expected)!  I would compare opening the boxes to Christmas morning.

We went to an apartment meeting last week - entirely in Portuguese.  Our neighbors spent close to 45 minutes explaining that recyclable items go in a special bin in the garage.  We have some interesting, not-so-brazilian names in our building too.  One of our neighbors is Gladstone and another Jackie.  Ironically Gladstone is the person and Jackie is the dog.  When I commented that "Jackie" is an American name, his owner said "Oh yes, Jackie Bauer... from 24!"  Mark and I loved to watch 24 before we moved here.  We feel much safer knowing that Jack Bauer lives next door.  

These are the "before" pictures of our apartment.  We've cleaned and organized for the past 4 days.  It looks so much better now.  We plan to have "after" pictures and/or video footage to share soon!

1. Mark humored me by carrying me over the threshold

2. View from the front door of the living room and office

3. Kitchen

4. Putting together our TV stand

5. Hanging laundry to dry 

Easter Weekend

We went to a beautiful retreat center, Dom Bosco, in a small town outside the city for Easter weekend.  Frank and Barbara Barker, Pastor Emeritus at Briarwood, visited this past weekend to teach during the retreat.  Our church has 50 members but 90 came!  The Barkers told story after story of God's faithfulness to their family and church over the past 45 years.  Mark and I were able to spend a good amount of time with them during meals.  It was an encouraging time for everyone.

Claudia translating

The retreat center, Dom Bosco

Quaint room!  The musty and scratchy blankets were a slight inconvenience for Mark's allergies and my stomach.  Mark woke up with bad allergies and I with little bug bites on my stomach.

Dr. Barker and our Pastor, Raul

Yum. Rice and beans

I made a popular Brazilian dessert (really easy and only 3 ingredients) a couple days before Easter weekend - Passion Fruit Mousse (Musse do Maracujá).  I learned about the passion fruit flower from our Portuguese teacher, Claudia.  I had no idea the flower was named after the passion of Jesus.  In the 1500s, Spanish missionaries used the flower to teach indiginous people in Latin America about the passion and crucifixion.  There is a lot of symbolism!  If you get a chance, look into it.  It's fascinating.

This is the passion fruit I used.  It's so good!  They even have passion fruit milkshakes at the mall.

Passion Fruit Flower

Click here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passion_flower

Day by Day

We've made progress getting settled this past week.  We received our Brazilian CPF number (their version of a social security card) and we made an offer on an apartment!  I turned in our documentation (a novel's worth) to the apartment rental agency today while Mark went to campus at UFMG (large public university) to meet students.  We should hear something by early next week - whether or not we've been approved.  The thought of having our first real home is very exciting to say the least.  If all goes as it should, we could potentially get the keys by the end of next week!

City-life...

Another view from our temporary apartment

The sky was so beautiful, I couldn't resist.

The hill we climb each morning on our way to Portuguese class

You can't tell from the picture, but it is very steep and LONG!  Even though walking in this city isn't without challenges, we love it.  One day last week, we walked for well over 4 hours downtown!

"Oi" phone booth, "E" parking sign, "Pare" stop sign, "Ipatinga" street sign, and "lata de lixo" trash can

This is a typical street corner.  Random observation: most people use plastic grocery bags as trash bags (I think so their trash actually fits in the tiny basket)!

I had a little incident with the pressure cooker a couple nights ago.

Don't worry, the bean juice came off of the ceiling easier than expected.  I tried to make Brazilian rice and beans for the first time with a pressure cooker and didn't secure an important valve that releases steam/pressure.  No one was injured.  I'll let you know what happens the next go-round... hopefully, success.

Padaria...

I've been having weekly breakfasts with the girls at a bakery close-by, Pão e Companhia. It's becoming a Monday morning tradition. I think it's the Belo Horizonte version of Panera... I thought I'd use these pictures as an opportunity to introduce you to some of the girls on our team.  There are 7 couples (including us) and 5 singles on staff in Brazil.

Vivi, Fabiana, Marcela, Diana, Grace, and Monicke

Vivi is Raul's wife (our pastor) - they have a toddler named Daniel. Fabiana is on campus staff at PUC. Marcela and her husband, Sam, work with the church; they've done anything and everything to help us establish our lives here. Diana organizes and overseas the ministries at church. Grace Bailey is Kent's daughter (the International Director for Campus Outreach). And Monicke is a nurse and goes to our church.

Claudia and Michelle 

Claudia is our Portuguese teacher.  She teaches English full-time, and Portuguese to Mark, Sam, and myself Mon.-Thurs. each week.  She and her husband are heavily involved with the ministry and church.  Michelle and her husband, Anselmo, are on campus at PUC - pronounced "pu-kie" - a private university in BH.  Michelle is from GA and is a twin too!  She's been in Brazil for over 10 years.

Jo and Margaret

Jo is Kent's wife and Margaret is their other daughter.  The Baileys will move back to Birmingham at the end of April.  They've been in Brazil since the very beginning (1998, I think).  It will be hard to see them leave.  It's been great for us to get to know them.

"Marknmichelle"

Since we've arrived, Sam and Marcela have helped us tremendously. We currently live two blocks from each other-- it's very convenient. Marcela was our Portuguese teacher when we took classes in Birmingham; they moved here at the end of October of last year. They have a 2 1/2 year-old little girl named Rebekah, pronounced "Hebekah." Well... before Sam and Marcela picked us up from the airport (when we arrived), Sam taught Rebekah to chant "Mark and Michelle." It's really cute. She gets excited to chant it and jumps up and down... Funny how certain things stick, especially in this case because for the past two weeks Rebekah continues to think my name is "Marknmichelle" and that Mark's is "Marknmichelle" too. Today was a turning point, she said only "Michelle" for the first time. We'll see if anything changes!  

Today Sam helped Mark and I ride the bus downtown to get more documentation. At the post office, we picked a number... waited a couple minutes for them to call us... had our passports and papers ready... excited about checking another item off our list of things to do... We get to the counter and find out we must pay for this particular document with cash, and realize none of us have what would total 110 reais (pronounced "hey-ice"). So, we walk a couple blocks, end up going to two different banks, pay a pretty hefty international ATM fee to withdraw cash, and I get stuck in the metal detector inside a revolving door at one of the banks. The security guard tried to give me instructions, and I just stood there, clearly confused (it was an embarrassing moment for me to say the least). As we return to the post office and try to pay the teller 110 reais, we find out it only costs R$5.50 per person, R$11 total! I'm sure she must have thought it was ridiculous when we left her the first time to withdraw R$11 from the bank!

"Hebekah" (my new bilingual friend) feeding the "passarinho" (little bird)

Michelle Repolles, her son, Dawson, and me at their apartment.   Mark and I looked at an apt. above theirs...the search for our own place continues!

 

Typical evening routine, Mark studying Portuguese and doing his "para casa" (homework)

The first meal I cooked in Brasil!  Pasta, chicken, a brasilian version of spaghetti sauce, and "batata" (potato) sticks on top. I kind of tried to add a little brasilian flair to the dish with the potato sticks - Mark liked it! 

What Difference Does it Make?

It's been fun (right now) for me to learn a few of the differences between Brasilian and American culture.  So I thought I would offer some free rookie advice!

• Don't flush toilet paper (There are trash cans next to the toilet for a reason.  I know, it's gross).
• Don't touch or adjust the shower head, you'll shock yourself.  (I learned this from personal experience.  The shower heads heat the water.  For me, I kind of like it because I think it's easier to operate than american showers.  Strong pressure = cold water and little pressure = warmer water).
• The thumbs up hand motion apparently means a number of good things like "Go ahead" or "I'm good" or "Don't worry" or "It's a deal."  I'm sure there are other meanings, but this is what I've seen so far.
• Slamming car doors is a no-no.  Since the cars here are smaller, foreigners (mainly Americans) annoy Brasilians when they slam car doors.  Who knew?
• On elevators, 'P' is the ground level (not parking lot) and 'G' is the garage (not ground level).
• Complementary coffee is offered at most restaurants, which is nice.  The only problem is they serve it in little, plastic medicine cups.  Basically, it's like half a sip of strong coffee.  When I've talked to Brasilians about this they think it's funny I desire more since it's so strong.  I don't think they understand the coffee culture I'm used to!
• You should pay "car watchers" when you park.  Men assign themselves to a street and appoint themselves Car Watcher expecting payment in exchange for their services.  If you don't pay them, I guess they won't "watch" or protect your car against thieves, and if you do pay them, there's no guarantee they will do anything in the event of a break-in.
• You should greet as many people as you can with a kiss and hug when you arrive at a party or restaurant and say "Tudo bem?" (two-dew bayn) the response, "Tudo bom" (two-dew bomb).  This means something like "All well?" and then "All good."  When you leave, you should also acknowledge, with a hug or head nod, as many people as you can.  One word, overwhelming!

I could go on and on!  We're trying to soak it all in and enjoy this new experience.  The team here has been very helpful.  We feel like we're adjusting, slowly.  :)

This particular box of cereal cost 9 dollars!  What are we to do?

View from our temporary apartment

Travel Mercies

Although flying out of Birmingham didn't happen the day we expected (due to wintery weather cancelations), we are happy to announce we actually arrived in our new city Thursday afternoon!


Mark introduced me to listening to Podcasts by a pastor in Seattle, Washington named Mark Driscoll a couple years ago.  My Mark really likes him, and so do I.  Well, we were walking around the Atlanta airport, trying to pass the time, and I see a guy with his wife that look very familiar.  Sure enough, it was Mark Driscoll!  We ended up introducing ourselves and I pulled the I'll-never-see-this-person-again card and took a picture of both Marks.


So, you can probably imagine how chaotic life has been for us as we've been packing and getting ready to move.  I had a typical Michelle moment on the flight from Atlanta to Sao Paulo.  As we carefully read our Customs and Immigration forms, I saw a phrase that triggered a panic attack - "narcotics prohibited."  I realized, at that moment, I hadn't sorted through my medicine bag before we packed.  I had two bottles of Lortab and Percocet inside my checked luggage!  I don't know the Brasilian way, so I'm thinking "What if they kick me out of the country, or fine me, or arrest me!"  All that to say, I found myself in the Sao Paulo airport bathroom secretively flushing pills down the toilet.  Who does that?  Thankfully we made it through customs and, after all that trouble, they never checked our luggage!


Our initiation to Brasil was complete when we drove past the president of Brasil, President Lula, on our way from the airport into the city!  Lula was in Belo Horizonte today celebrating the completion of a huge government building close to the airport.

Mark & Mark in ATL

Click here to see more from Mark Driscoll

Outskirts of Belo