Material World

I remember seeing a photography exhibit called “Material World” by Peter Menzel that showed families from several different countries with all of their possessions in their front yard. It was meant to be a snapshot of the different living standards throughout the world. The families were selected because they represented an average family from their nation. I remember being shocked by how in most of the pictures the families had so little belongings. I remember thinking “I wouldn’t want to volunteer for that, what a pain to take all your stuff and put it in your front yard!” Obviously, for most people, this was not the primary hurdle (imagine explaining to your neighbors what you were doing).
Here are a few of those pictures:

Mali------------------------Samoa

Thailand ---------------------------------- The U.S.

A few days ago Bud and I helped a Brazilian couple move. They were a young couple with one baby. The family is going to be our new neighbors and they go to our church, so naturally, they asked us to help them move. I was shocked by how little they had. Everything could have easily fit in a pickup truck bed. Everything! Furniture, appliances, beds, clothes.

Today, I overheard Ella explaining to Ava what it was to be poor. Naturally the conversation turned to what it means to be rich. Ava asked, “Are we rich, Dad?”. What a difficult question to answer. In the past year we have given up good incomes and a comfortable home. I have to admit, there are times when I feel poor, and that I have limited my options for the future. And yet I look around everyday and see people living with so much less. I’m still not sure how to answer Ava’s question, I guess for now I’ll just have to tell her “It doesn’t really matter”.

-JTP

Another Brazilian Birthday

On Thursday, Ella celebrated her 9th birthday, the last of our family to do so in Brazil. Ava must have picked up on this because this morning she asked how long until Christmas. Ella and Brin made a Hedge Hog Cake. Other than that, the planning was pretty minimal and it was nice to be able to relax and celebrate Ella's birth, rather than running around planning and supervising a party with 25 crazy 8 year olds (no offense to any crazy 8 year olds who may be reading this).

We went swimming as a family at our favorite spot, a 3 level pier that provides different swimming conditions depending on the level of the water.

For more birthday pictures click here.

Adaptation

We've learned a couple things about adapting to another culture. The first is, it takes time. You can't rush the process. There are no Cliff's Notes version of cultural learning. So it can be a discouraging proposition, especially to us task-oriented, results-expecting type of people.

But that leads me to the next thing we've learned about adapting to culture. It's a difficult thing to measure, so you don't always know how well you are blending (conversely, there always seems to be a very distinct awareness when you are sticking out like a sore thumb). From time to time, however, we catch glimpses of ourselves doing things very "Brazilian".

Where we are from, a bicycle is a very inefficient mode of transportation owing mainly to it's carrying capacity: 1 person + 1 water bottle. Here, the bicycle can carry entire families as well as many household items. Ella was excited the other day when she and Mia (it takes talent from both participants) had mastered the art of the "front bar position" (there are several other positions for carrying a passenger which we will not go into detail here).

Our new furniture is delivered by the local delivery man. I realize this is not much of an accomplishment by us, and probably the fact that we stopped and took a picture of the event disqualifies us for any blending that was taking place. but cut us a little slack.

-JTP

yuck

Ava thankfully appears to be infection free. Here is what her ear looked like on the boat trip. It started as a middle ear infection, which she has chronically, and then she also acquired swimmers ear along the way. This is the ear she has a tube in. Heather (a short-termer) told me one morning I needed to wash her hair because she was smelly. I had to point out that it wasn't her hair that smelled. We think she was growing psuedomonas in her ear, for those of you that know what that is, you know the lovely odor I am speaking of. Only those who really loved her snuggled her because between the smell and the puddle of pus she would deposit on your shoulder she was a hard kid to love on. We are thankful she is doing better and would appreciate prayer that she will outgrow her chronic ear problems.

Birthday on the Boat

Last week, during our boat trip, Ava had her 5^th Birthday. She had been looking forward to this day since March, when her sister had a birthday. This was the 4^th Birthday our family has celebrated here in Brazil. Each one was unique, but Ava’s was by far the most distinctive.

The last couple of days, since we’ve been home, we’ve been setting up Ava’s new home school desk. She has been looking forward to going to school (a privilege she received when she turned 5) almost as much as her birthday party.

It appears Ava will present a new challenge for Brin. She is much more of an active learner, and seems to be behind in some areas as a result of her speech delay. Ava has struggled with ear infections that have affected her speech. While it has been somewhat of a concern, it has also provided some entertainment as well. Today, as I was going over flash cards with Ava, we came to a card with spaghetti on it. She knew we were practicing the “S” sound, but she thought the word was noodles. So she created a new word (as she often does) and said “snoodles”.

A Short Video

Click here for a short video we shot while on the boat, during our last trip.

Sights from Laranjal

We learned 70, 000 people inhabit the town of Laranjal. The working poor live in this city. Many people come to this city in hopes of acquiring a job at one of the two industries in town. There are more people than jobs. It appeared very needy.

Pretty much the entire town was built on stilts over swampy areas. We were told it is pretty much that way year round.

This is a view of the Laranjal riverfront. Directly across the river is another town where the more wealthy people live.

Another survey trip

Every night we slept on the boat with hammocks. The gentle swaying was comforting; eerie sounds of howler monkeys in the distance were not. One night Josh took his hammock and slept in the bamboo with the Brazilian pastors. The winds blows past the bamboo leaves and makes a crackling sounds and the flexible bamboo stalks slightly bend and creating gentle snapping noises as the hammock swings back and

forth. They risked a possible torrential rainfall at 2am and hungry bugs but none of that paned out so it made for a comfortable rest.

As many interesting things as there were to see, there were equal interesting things to hear. One night, we went to bed to the roar of frogs on the shore. So loud it was hard to believe they were only frogs. Another sound, one particularly distressing night, was the buzzing of ambitious mosquitoes. At midnight everyone awoke to put up mosquito nets. I did not have one and went half-loony until Pastor Clenildo gave me his hammock and then got up and started fishing early. The next morning I found about 20 bites on my rear. The mosquito had gotten through my hammock, pj’s and underwear. See what I mean about ambitious?!

Once in Laranjal we stayed the night tied up to another boat that had the misfortune of being parked right next to the “water taxi” launch. So all night long we heard the motor of the boats as they backed up to take their passengers to the other side of the river. For only 25 centavos. About 11 cents in American currency.

The next night we slept within close view of utterly majestic waterfalls. Surrounding us. Stunning us. It was such a treat. If God calls us to Laranjal, I’m there. So what did we think of Laranjal? The reason we traveled there, along with other missionaries and Brazilian pastors, was to scope out unreached areas and the potentiality of planting another base there. We discovered the area around Laranjal did not have very many people living in the interior (in the jungle, outside of a city), which is where Xingu Mission wants to make an impact. There were church’s in Laranjal, however there was not a lot of outreach happening outside the city simply because there were not many people out there. I did get to visit two hospitals and a health outpost where Tim (the mission MD) evaluated the health needs of the area.

View from the top of the boat as we traveled on the canal

It took around 3 days of river travel until we finally reached our destination. Throughout the way we took in the sights (and sounds). A particularly interesting part was a “shortcut” canal. It was narrow and shallow and put us up close to the jungle. We caught glimpses of parrots, toucans, and monkeys. Most interesting were the small family groups that lived along the river, children lined up at the window to watch our boat float by.

See more pictures of our trip here

Back from the River

Wondering where we were? We were out on the river with the two other missionary families and some Brazilian pastors scouting out unreached areas. The city we traveled to took us 3 days to get there in our boat, stopping at a leadership retreat in Porto de Moz, another city that sits at the Xingu river and Amazon river junction.

We’re tired. So we will write more tomorrow.

Party for Rabbit

The other day Ava woke up and decided that today was her stuffed rabbit’s birthday. Cleide (always willing to make a cake) and Ella made the cake and at lunch we celebrated the unnamed rabbit’s birthday.
I’m not just sure what Ava was thinking when she declared it her rabbits birthday. Maybe she decided that today was a good day for a party, if so, no one really argued with her (We did, however, have to lay down some party ground rules after the next morning when Mia declared it was her teddy bear’s birthday).I suppose a pointless party is good now and then. It gives us perspective on our little inconveniences and struggles throughout the day. -JTP

there and back

We all had a little break and are ready to hit the day. Josh and I got back from exploring Belem while the girls stayed with the Bergen family where there was no shortage of giggles and hugs. Belem provided new sights in the market where there was tons more fruit and vegetables than I had ever seen before. There were new smells, towels fresh from the dryer and new tastes; I accidentally ordered prune ice cream. It was named sensacao, which sounds like sensation so I thought it had to be good, and the prunes looked like fudge swirls. It was very mean of it to deceive me. And Belem provided a new friend. We met an Aussie named Henry who traveled back with us to Altamira and will spend some time checking out what we do here before continuing on his journey.

Now we are back and will be readying ourselves for the next boat trip in 5 days. I will be hitting homeschooling desperately hard, poor Ella.

A Milestone Reached

Today is our 6-month anniversary of our arrival in Brazil. Our family went to the river and built a fire and roasted hotdogs. We commemorated the event by talking about what we all liked and disliked about being in Brazil. Ava ironically said what she didn’t like about being here was “the weird people that talk funny”. If the irony was lost to you, Ava has been described, quite accurately, as both weird and talking funny.

A Garage Church

Tonight our family visited a new church here in Altamira. We usually go to the Central church, the largest of the 4 churches in Altamira. Ialton, the pastor of the Muturao church, has been asking me to come and visit his church and I'm glad we finally did. The church meets in Ailton's garage. It's a young church (the congregation looked more like a youth group, with a few parents mixed in). They have purchased a lot down the street and have begun construction on a building. The small meeting room was overflowing, at one point in the service it started to rain. I was part of the crowd that couldn't quit fit under the roof, so we got wet. At one point I saw a dog run down the aisle until he was shooed away by someone. The worshipers didn't seem bothered by the conditions. They seemed truly full of joy to be with each other, and in the presence of God. It seems garages are a good place to start churches her in Altamira. Our two largest churches started out meeting in garages, they now both have large buildings able to hold several hundred.

Little Irritants

We have a little mystery microbe invading the house. Started with Mia traveled through the Simon household and circled back around and caught Ella. Here she is on our bed watching a DVD sent to her by her cousin Emma. Ava and Mia, along with Cleide, joined her. Cleide started to sing along and Mia preferred she not.

prepare for arrival

Early on the girls were enthralled with the geckos that would get into the house and climb on our walls . They found them quite entertaining. I myself, did not appreciate them or the little lizards poops they left for me to clean up. Now almost 6 months later, the girls are not nearly as impressed as they once were. We are taking in the land and culture. Slowly and at times painfully. A few days ago I was in conversation with a Canadian visiting on a short-term team. I apparently used some Brazilian body language (the finger twitch to saying "no") during the conversation and she noticed. She congratulated me and told me I had "arrived."

That's Ava with the gecko. She is struggling right now with continued fluid and infections in her ear. She is also having some behavior issues that we are not always certain what to do with. She is homesick just like we all are so we are not sure when to show grace and when her behavior requires discipline. She is also very timid to speak Portuguese, probably because she knows we can barely understand her English sometimes. Can you see why ear infections with this girl might be a problem? In some ways parenting is much easier here because we have so much more family time. However, on the flip side, there are so many other factors that we have to take in to account. It can get tiring.

Josh went to his first Brazilian soccer game with Betu and Alisao. Like a real one where good players play other good players. He wasn't sure what to expect but is always up for a night out.

Knife wounds and such

Sometimes I catch myself wondering why I'm here in Brazil. I invariable go back to the time when God made Himself and His desires for us to come to Brazil vividly clear, sometimes even in miraculous ways. The last few days we have been participating in (observing) a pastors conference. Nearly all of the pastors and church workers from all of our churches where in attendance. One of the sessions was a history of our mission on the Xingu River. We heard about how the work here began with a few Brazilian families moving here from Santerem, and then shortly after a few missionary families. Many stories were told about God providing in miraculous ways, especially in the early years. A couple stories stood out to me...
1) When the families first came to the area in1992 they settled in Porto de Moz, a town that was ripe for church work. Within two weeks of arriving and beginning the work, there were already a handful of believers. It so happened that one of the grandkids of one of those first converts, now a worker in one of the churches, was in attendance at the conference. As they pointed this out during the presentation, this seemingly trivial fact - struck me. We've all read in Acts how when some people came to Christ there "whole household" would believe as well. It impressed me how one life turning to Christ 16 years ago would effect generations to come.
2) On a recent boat trip I got to know Naldo, one of our pastors. What I didn't hear then was a story about his first encounter with the church. I guess one night, a drunk man who had just been in a knife fight, with the wound to prove it, stopped by the church and asked to sleep there that night. That drunk man was Naldo. As the story was being retold, Naldo (with a big grin) stood up and lifted his shirt to show everyone his scar. He now is the pastor of that same church, and is working in several other villages to help plant other churches.

I'm sure guys like Naldo wonder about if they are where the Lord wants them to be. I'd also like to think that every time he sees that scar he knows that God has called him out of a life of sin and wants to use him where ever he is. -JTP

Pastor Naldo

Learning Church

Ella taking a break at a local house.

Josh and Ella taking an excursion

Ella and I (Josh) just got back from a trip where we visited some of the work on the river. We went with Bud, Keith (another missionary here) and Clenildo (a Brazilian pastor from Altamira) on a river trip. On the way to the community we were visiting we stopped at a few houses and invited people (at one point one of the guys with us was yelling to people on the shore, inviting them as we cruised by).

We pulled up to a group of houses as the sun was just dropping below the horizon. The other boats out front indicated people had already begun to arrive. Normally they meet in a house, but a larger crowd had gathered, so we met outside. This group of believers usually meets about 2 times a month. A pastor or church worker from another church usually visits at least once or twice a month. The only leaders they have otherwise is a man and his wife who have been believers for less than 2 years. They are hoping to build a church building, and can do so for as little as $1000.

The "Church" service

The church service began with some worship songs lead by a young man who had just learned to play guitar. It appeared as though the congregation, as well, had just learned to worship, when someone began clapping along with the music everyone clapped along in their own rhythm. Ella asked me “are they trying to clap like that or do they not know how to clap?” It made me think how bad they are at doing “church” as we know it. No worship band, no pastor, no building. And yet I had to think that God was pleased looking down on this group of young believers. I saw in them a genuine desire to learn about God. And yet for them to learn, it was almost completely dependant on other people, they have no means to learn themselves. It was a good glimpse of why we are here in Brazil. Bringing the Gospel to “the least of these”, who have very little means and yet possess a great desire to learn about their Creator.

Easter at Belo Monte

This past weekend I was asked to go on an evangelistic trip to a town a couple of hours away. I took Ava and she was really excited about going on a trip with daddy. I knew we were in for an adventure when we arrived and I was told there were no bathrooms at the place we were staying. Belo Monte, the small town we visited, is the home of a small church that without a fulltime pastor has struggled to grow and produce fruit. The twenty-some team members, mostly college age students from Altamira, were eager to give up there own Easter weekend to help a struggling church. I was impressed by the attitudes of the young people on our team, it seems our churches do a really good job of preparing them for service and passing on the value of evangelism.

In the morning, small groups went out and canvassed the town. After lunch, a few of us went to a local radio station (it looked more like a pawn shop from the collection of old amps, mixers and even a record player). A pastor and my friend Beto gave an on-air plug to attend the meetings later that day. I was asked to say something, and even Ava got in on the fun. It had that college radio station feel (yeah this is radio, but is anyone really listening?).

In the afternoon, the team put on a VBS program and later that night, a church program where four people accepted Christ. Before leaving the next day we prayed for the couple who leads the church. This was the first time I saw our mission’s goal of “making disciples who reproduce themselves” so vividly lived out. It was definitely one of the most unique Easters that I have had, but I think also one of the most memorable.

Kids watch as the Brazilian team performs a puppet show

Ava participates in a tug-of-war contest.


Mothers wait for clothing that our group handed out.

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Piranhas

Last week Brin made mention of me and her dad going fishing. I wanted to give a fishing report: we didn’t catch a lot (it’s not a good time for fishing right now with the water up so high), but what we did catch wasn’t your run-of-the-mill fish either. Pictured is a Black Piranha that I caught. I’m holding it with pliers because I like my fingers where they are.

Another Piranha story happened a few days later. We went on a short boat trip with the girls and grandpa. I took Ella out to fish one morning and one of the Brazilians with us handed her a fishing line that had already been baited and thrown overboard. She doesn’t have a lot of experience with fishing, but what little fishing she has done has been with a rod and reel. The Brazilian practice of just using a line was foreign to her, and the look on her face showed it. A few minutes latter, one of the guys noticed her line moving so he started to pull it in and plopped a Piranha in the boat. I yelled, “Get your feet up!” There we were, feet raised in the air with a mad Piranha flopping around at our feet. I’m not sure if Ella will go with me next time…

Feliz Pascoa

Ellie Kubacki assisting Mia with her egg hunting.

Happy Easter to everyone back home!

We went to Easter Breakfast at the Mirante Church this morning. We walked there since Josh had the car so the girls and I wore our hats for a functional purpose this Easter. Later the girls had an egg hunt among the mango trees in Rick and DeAnna's yard.

Papa went home

My dad went home and so now the house is quiet. Not that he is a noisy guy it’s just now we don’t have a reason to have fun. Ella caught on quick that her Spring Break is over. She will have to return to school with a mother not nearly as motivated to teach as she was 3 months ago. “When is our next visitor coming?” she asked with desperation in her eyes.

We were able to go to a waterfall a few days ago with my dad. See Bud’s blog if you want to hear details. http://www.budsimon.blogs.com It was gorgeous. My dad brought a tent down when he came and so Josh and I intend to camp there soon.

Right now Josh is out on the river doing Easter evangelism. Hopefully many people will be able to hear about God’s love for mankind. I think this outreach trip is sort of a training trip for the Brazilians who go to church in Altamira. I really don’t know anything about it so Josh will tell you about it when he returns home.

The pictures are of a recent river trip. The second picture is the girls exploring a school on the river. Completely flooded. Normally the Brazilians take a canoe to get to it, but right now there is no teacher, and therefore no class.