There are no words...

And yet sometimes there are too many.

For those of you who can't quite make it out or just feel wrong staring THERE...

"Don't hate me because I'm beautiful.  Hate me because I kissed your boyfriend."

Watch out girls!

I can TOTALLY believe it’s not butter!

I have what some (I hope most) of you will find to be distressing news:  Ben and I are living in a land of margarine.

Large grocery stores, small corner markets and every household fridge is stocked with the stuff.

Butter is available also.  It comes from an area about 20 miles from here called the “sertao”.  The sertao is too dry to offer much if any good fruits or veggies.  It’s better known for it’s meat, cheese, milk and butter production.  Although everyone seems to agree that butter from the sertao is better than the endless variety of margarine, no one purchases it.  The reason?  Simple: margarine is cheaper.

Another staple in every pantry: powdered milk.  We believe there are three reasons for this.  1) powdered milk is cheaper and has a longer shelf life 2) Powdered milk is easier as milk from a cow must be filtered, stripped of it’s fatty film and boiled after purchase 3) Cows are fed a mix of grass and de-spined cactus.  The milk tastes just like that mixture!

Well be that as it may, Franca and Edite love cow’s milk and purchase it every week from the corner bar – why yes, beer and milk should naturally be sold together!  So every week she filters the milk, then lets it sit over night so that the fatty film floats to the top.  The next day she skims off that film and puts it in a container in the freezer.  Her freezer is literally packed with containers of what is essentially heavy cream.  

Upon asking her what she does with all those containers, the following events took place:

The frozen "nata" was scooped into a large bowl and this gets filled with water.

        Once thoroughly melted, the mixture gets put into a large glass jar and shaken for 10 min or so.. 

             

It's ready for the next step when when all the nata has separated from the water and looks like cottage cheese.  The excess water is then poured out and the cottage cheese mixture put in a pan to be cooked..

The mixture boils and foams for about 10 minutes and then begins to clarify.  Some salt is added and  JUST before it starts to brown, its taken off the heat, run through some cheese cloth to strain out any impurities and vuala!  Homemade butter.  This is popped in the fridge and used for weeks as a spread, to fry onions or eggs and for baking.

We continue to appreciate the Brazilian's resourcefulness.  It seems they have a use for everything, often things we'd throw away.  There's a trick for every problem and a remedy for every ailment.  All you have to do ask and be willing to learn :)

When the Cat's away...

The mice will work?

With our only elder out of town, I wasted no time in planting a very girlish idea in the minds of our two brothers now in charge of decisions.  What else but a:  MAKEOVER!!

Esthetically, our new hall was well...drab.  See, here in Brazil, there must be a minimum of 30 publishers for the Branch to get involved with KH construction.  When this number of publishers is met, and a piece of land is purchased, the traveling construction crew comes and builds you a lovely hall.  However in the case of this congregation here in Sao Sebastiao - and many others in the area - the minimum has not been met and therefor the responsibility of arranging a KH falls to the local brother(s) taking the lead.  Here was how it looked:

The friend's opinions were not asked/voted on as far as color or decor.  They were understandably disappointed when the "color" chosen for the outside of the hall was literally called: Concrete.  Now this color, in the states, is quite lovely on homes.  But here, as all houses are made of bricks covered in concrete, the friends felt and we AGREED that it looked unfinished and sad.  A few weeks after this picture was taken, the long awaited signs arrived.  Maybe they'd spruce it up a bit?  Wrong.  Picture two plain white squares with plain black capital lettering.  We all sighed when they were hung, walked in and concentrated on the fact that we had a place to meet at all, right?

Here are some other photos.  One will show the stark white walls in detail, one the put-you-on-edge blood red stage wall with handmade year text sign, one the yellow floor and unpainted back door and one the bathroom.  I promise the picture of the bathroom was NOT staged.  Just shot on an average meeting night:

My idea was accepted and collaborated upon and after 4 hours at the paint shop in Arapiraca, we got to work.  Here was some of the process:

Stencils for a boarder on the signs were traced, cut out and finally painted with black acrylic.

The front was painted including the metal doors.  Two coats of "masa" were applied to the stage wall.  This gives it a smooth affect, like sheetrock.  Then there was of course lots of cutting in and rolling.. A coat of paint was thrown over the brick wall in the bathroom to lighten it up a bit and finally the floor was painted.

We bought a King size sheet and two throw pillows.  Edite turned the sheet into a curtain for the bathroom and two covers for the throw pillows.  A brother in Arapirca has a glass shop and donated a piece of glass for the year text.  We only had to pay for the lettering to be put on!  Oh, oops, and the gas back to Arapiraca to his shop when Ben dropped it and broke a corner.  No worries though.  A rectangle makes a beautiful octagon if need be ;)  A small detail was painted on the literature counter to tie it in and it was repositioned to be more efficient - as in, people could now walk up to it and get literature, wow concept.  Fixtures were bought for the bathroom like a toilet paper holder (imagine!), hand towel holder and hand soap that you pump.  The previous hand soap was a bar of soap set atop a sponge used to clean the sink.  Burnt out lights were replaced, repairs were made to an already leaking roof and other small details completed.   In the end here's our NEW new hall:

No announcement was made to the friends about the makeover because the brothers decided on a Sunday and it was completed by the next meeting, a Thursday.  They had to make a quick decision as the goal was to have it ready by the Memorial.  Happily, the friends walked into the meeting that Thursday and were thrilled :)

A week later, Ben had the biggest privilege of his life.  Because Manoel sells fish and this is the Catholic Holy Week (Catholics can ONLY eat fish this week), Manoel worked everyday and all Memorial preparations including the talk, fell to Ben.  He called the Circuit Overseer to ask if there was an available elder from a nearby congregation to give the talk but the CO told him to be prepared.  Sure enough, here's Ben giving the talk:

 I had the privilege of making the bread and helping pick the wine and flowers.  We have 19 publishers and there were 54 in attendance.  One of our publishers is named Messias.  Messias got the truth in his late teens, riding his bike over two hours to the nearest congregation for his studies.  In his early 20s he started developing a terribly degenerative muscle disease, not sure the type.  He's now in his 30s.  He can't talk anymore and barely has any control of his muscles, communicating only with a thumbs up, thumbs down or very limited writing.  He lives in the country with his mother and is bound to the house.  But every month one of the brothers brings him his literature and his mother helps set him on the porch to place the magazines with those passing by.  He has a friend who comes into town once a month to pass in his impressive field service report including several placements and return visits!  Touched by his example, this year, Ben & Manoel were determined to get him to the Memorial.  They made arrangements with his mother to pick him up and he was present with us!  He was beaming and the friends were so loving with him. Many of them have not seen him in years.  Here's our dear Messias:

                 

Confident you had a wonderful Memorial as well.  Love you all.

Ben & Meg

Doing Just Fine

We are happy to announce that we got our visas extended another three months and are free to stay in the country until June 28th!  We were pretty sure based off what we had researched that it wouldn't be a problem but still, we feel relieved.

After our trip into the capital for visa extension, we decided to spend the day at the beach to celebrate.

Wanted to let you all know that as it turns out, despite his added responsibilities, Benjamin is doing just fine :)

Assembly/Pioneer Day

March 9,10 and 11 were full of smiles, nice to meet yous, picture taking and spiritual food.

Friday, March 9^th.   Pioneer Day.  This was held in a pretty Kingdom Hall in the nearby larger town (like a Worcester) called Arapiraca.  We had already attended the Pioneer Day at home so it was fun to follow along and add too our english notes.  The Circuit overseer was encouraging the pioneers to make it a matter of prayer to move where there was a greater need in the circuit.  He then said, “We have a couple with us today who came here all the way from the United States to help in Sao Sabastiao!  Couldn’t WE maybe make room in our life to move to the next town over if there’s a greater need there?”  We both flushed red as everyone turned around in that moment looking for us.  But admittedly, the happiest part of the day was when we realized we had just sat with Manoel during his first pioneer meeting.

Abraao, our Circuit Overseer

Here is an incredibly bad photo taken of the four of us:

But why so bad?

Maybe because Ben asked of ALL people, this dear brother to take the photo?:

:) :)

March 10^th and 11^th. Circuit assembly.  This was held not at an official Assembly Hall but a rented open air venue in Arapiraca.  All we knew going in was that the name of the place was “Oasis” which we thought, “Yeah suuuuuuure…..”  However it was in fact a beautiful place!  Here’s somes pics:

It took weeks – literally – of convincing Edite and Franca that they could make it to this assembly.  They said they don’t normally go because Franca, being 91 and all, has to get up and walk around frequently because the chairs aren’t comfortable and well, he just can't make it the whole day.  Edite likes to stay by his side as she’s always worried about his health although it seems it’s HER health that’s more worrisome lately… Anyway we assured them that this year it’s different!  Why?  We explained that we had already been to this assembly and that all they needed to do was say the word and we’d take them back home.  They reluctantly agreed and the morning of, were ready on time!  They were a bit disorganized and nervous and complained the whole way but in the end……..

….stayed all day, both days!!  First time in years.

We enjoyed an ice cream with Franca outside during the afternoon break.  His favorite flavor is “milho verde”= green corn.  Yes, you’re reading correctly.  A corn flavored ice cream popsicle.  I must admit, it’s pretty tasty.  For Franca, it bought him energy for the rest of the day. 

We had several teenagers run up to us wanting to take a picture with us.  Also, the circuit and district overseers and their wives wanted pictures.  We both felt a little silly about all this picture taking but the friends explained how they have never even HEARD of friends coming to help from other countries – at least in this part of Brazil.  The first they’d heard of were Bruno and Amber Echavarria from North Carolina (now our good friends thanks to Skype!) who were here in Sao Sebastiao for three months right before us.

One young brother we met got our number and he and another brother came today to work in service with us.  We had such a nice morning together and after they said, “You don’t understand what an encouragement it is to have friends from the U.S. here, in our state of Alogoas.  It’s hard to explain but we feel so special like Jehovah is really showing us he’s noticing our efforts and that there’s much more potential here.  Thank you for coming!” 

More and more we’re feeling the same way Jeremiah did when he said, “You have fooled me oh Jehovah…” because every time someone says something like those brothers said today we want to cry and laugh at the same time.  We want to cry because the words are so kind and mean so much.  But we want to laugh because little do they know, its US that walk away encouraged and strengthened and feeling special because of them.

PIG. FRANCA. SOFA. RENALDO.

By Ben

These are a few of my favorite things..

The heck with raindrops and roses!  But brown paper packages tied up with string?  Definitely!

Here's what the best mother-in-law in the world just sent:

Thank you for the survival pack Barb!