This morning I ran four kilometers, but I tried to pick up the pace so I was running harder than I had on previous mornings. For breakfast I had tapioca (a tapioca wrap) stuffed with sun-dried meat and cheese, and for dessert I had a slice of papaya. I think that is one of my favorite breakfast foods so far. Perhaps because it’s like a breakfast eggroll.
After breakfast I did my devotions in Acts 9 (the story of Saul’s conversion and then I called Grandpa to talk to him and tell him about my trip so far. He wasn’t expecting it, so it was great to let him know how things were going and to hear how he was doing. When I was done, I tried to figure out what was wrong with my blog because there was an error somewhere that kept me from having the ability to update it.
For lunch we had rice, beans, beef with onions, beets, and a banana. Part of the afternoon I spent working on my blog and got it working again. The other part of the afternoon I helped Pastor Jim install some electrical outlets in the chapel.
The electricity had already been wired into the platform when it was built a couple years ago, but only one of the five outlets had been installed. So we put in the other four so that they would be ready for Musica Sacra next week.
At 4:45 I went with two others to the Cariri shopping center in Juazeiro, the same one that was built on the seminary’s former property. This shopping center was the first of its kind in this region of Brazil, and it now sits right where the seminary buildings used to stand.
The first level is a huge grocery store and the second level is the typical mall composed of several stores and a food court. Another interesting fact about the mall is that it has escalators going upstairs, but the only way to get back down is to take the stairs.
The purpose of the trip was to help another seminary student with his English class students. He had three girls and one guy who were going to arrive at 5:30, and he was going to divide them up into two groups and send them around the mall to find those of us who were helping him with the activity.
The other two people with me were Neto and Joy. Neto is Brazilian and studies at the seminary, and Joy is American and taught at the seminary this last year. Joy first came to Brazil in 2010 for only a short time. She came back again as a missionary and has now been here for two years. The two of them met, began a relationship, and they are now engaged, hoping to get his visa soon so they can go back to the US and get married.
MallJoy was assigned to just sit in one spot in the mall while Neto and I were told to walk around and just window shop. The English students received a brief description of who we were and then they had to find us in the mall and ask us several questions about ourselves, all in English. However, they didn’t know exactly what we looked like, so they were supposed look around and ask people if they spoke English until they found us.
We received word that the students were ready, so we started to walk around, looking at the various stores. I enjoyed walking past the athletic stores with windows full of soccer balls and soccer shoes. I also saw some extremely expensive clothes, several phone service providers, and a display that told about the history of Pedro Cicero (a famous Catholic priest) in Juazeiro.
We walked and talked and the English students never found us. We eventually saw two girls talking with Joy, and we later saw those two girls meet back up with a teenage guy. None of them ever came to talk to us, so we joined Joy and the three students and their teacher back in the food court.
The third girl didn’t come, so the poor guy had to go around on his own, but I have a feeling he was a little too scared to actually ask people if they spoke English. The girls reviewed the questions they had asked Joy and told us the answers she had given them. I answered the same questions for the boy and then Joy and I asked them some questions about themselves.
It was a good, creative way to have class, and those three seemed to speak a little better than the three students I spent time with last week. Neto took a picture of us all when we were finished, and we left.
None of us had eaten supper yet, so Neto and Joy took me to a store in Crato that had an eating area upstairs. They introduced me to a
For breakfast we had baked oatmeal and homemade granola. I really enjoyed the granola from last week, so it was great to have it again. Oh, and I had a slice of papaya for dessert!
As I crossed to the median in the middle of the street to get a picture of the parking job, a bus approached, but the driver kindly stopped so he wouldn’t photo bomb my picture. I finished and crossed the street again, but the bus didn’t move! I looked back, and he was smiling and holding two thumbs up, indicating that he wanted me to take his picture too! So I obliged (even though I couldn’t really see him because of the reflection off the windshield) and then he continued driving his passengers down the road.
We then walked around downtown, looking for hardware stores and bananas that weren’t already overripe. I’m starting to become acquainted with the layout of the downtown area after having been there several times. Today there was no soccer game so the place was bustling with activity.
Shortly after supper, several other missionaries arrived, and we met on the poor for a prayer meeting. It was encouraging and fun to hear them go around the group, talking about their most recent experiences and share prayer requests and praises. Missionary life is not easy, so this is a great chance for them to interact about life and encourage one another.
Well, that’s it for the day, but there’s something else I want to quick mention. When we were in our small groups to pray, I noticed lots of tiny ants scurrying across the tile on the porch. They were so small yet they zoomed across the tile, almost as fast as that teleporting frog I met last week.