Planes, Trains, Taxis & TULSA

We are here! We got to the house at 3:00 this morning, then slept until 9:00, ate breakfast and met the other volunteers. It was pouring earlier, but I think it's stopped now. But here's our trip up to that point...

We left Portland on time, but everything after that had some element of delay or surprise to it. When we approached Dallas, TX the pilot first said that we were making good time and would be about twenty minutes early. A few minutes later he came back on and said there was rain and lightening in Dallas so they closed the airport for a couple hours. We were going to circle and wait it out. We circled and circled and circled for awhile, then he announced that we would need to land and refuel in Tulsa, OK. So we landed, refueled, and sat there in Tulsa to wait out the storm, then flew into Dallas. We were supposed to get to Dallas at 5:25 or 5:35pm and ended up getting there at 8:00. We were worried we would miss our flight to Sao Paulo which was scheduled for 7:45, so we basically ran to the Gate. They were still boarding a Miami flight before us so we waited, and waited... and waited. We finally left at Midnight and flew for 10 hours. When we got into Sao Paulo we had already missed our connection to Rio. They put us in a taxi to another airport in Sao Paulo, where we caught our flight to Rio. We took a taxi to our hotel.

***Check the pictures page for photos of each portion***

Now the interesting part...
As we took the taxi through Sao Paulo streets, I noticed they were crazy with cars, bicycles, motorcycles, honking, sirens, and car alarms. There's graffiti covering the entire side of tall apartment buildings. I wondered how people got up there to tag it all. But through all the craziness, it all flowed in a rhythm of purpose. It felt as though that's how it had always been and that's how it will always be, and there wasn't anything anyone could do to change it. There were murals between good old fashioned graffiti and advertisements along the highway. The visual landscape was as diverse as the people there. It reminded me of America, but with a slightly larger proportion of gorgeous women. Even the murals were diverse, depicting the soul of Sao Paulo - the culture, music and their history.

My impression of Rio was similar, but without the enchanting rhythm, just craziness. Our first night in Rio we took a brief walk along ipanema beach and watched kids flying kites in the dark. (It gets dark here at like 5:30pm because it's winter) What made the biggest impression on me in Rio was the caution with which one must breathe. There are so many smells that you never know when an awful one will hit you. The mix of smells included fresh, cologne, sewer, hamburger being grilled, plastic, etc.

I got my placement

I just found out where I will be helping at all summer. I will be teaching English and assisting teachers at:
CEIFAR was founded in 1994 as part of the initiative of a nurse, Simone Alice Debounck. It is a Non-Governmental Organization located in the neighborhood Tancredo Neves in the city of Salvador.
The main objective is to improve the quality of life by focusing on education and family health at a community level. CEIFAR takes 326 children aged from 3 to 16 years old.
The program prioritizes families in the neighborhood and works with the community in a holistic and integrated way. The group evaluates the needs of the families and plans meetings and orientation session on sexuality, education, and leisure activities. These programs help to promote a positive perspective within the community and raise the standard of living.
The group promotes the nuclear family and education for young people of the community.
In the last 10 years the organization has trained educators and community leaders with the goal of preserving family life.

You can Still Donate!

Some people have asked me so I will post this on here. I talked to the people at Cross Cultural Solutions about the donations. We had to pay off our trip already or it would get canceled. We used some of the money we were saving to buy a house. Since then, we received another donation even though our site says that we have raised 100%. CCS said that anyone can still donate until July 7th (the day we start) and the extra money that is paid will be refunded to us. That could help us pay for the plane tickets or put money back into saving for a house. Thank you so much to all of those that have made this trip possible and thanks for your continued support!

By the way, we received our visas this week so we are now ready to go! We went through an expeditor called abriggs and they were great!

Car Wash!

We had a car wash to raise money for our volunteer trips. Some of Megan's class mates are going to Nicaragua with Natural Doctors International. We had a good time and did pretty well. Then the rain came and we called it quits.

19 DAYS

We turned in our Visa applications to an expeditor recently and are awaiting those. We paid off the rest of our balance, and must thank all of you who contributed. This trip would not be possible without you! From the bottom of our hearts we thank you sooooo much! In a week we will start packing up our stuff and moving it for storage while we are gone. We also put in our notice at our apartment complex and will be having a CAR WASH this weekend (Saturday 10-3 at SE 11th & Hawthorne Burgerville) to raise money for the trip.

Less than 50 days

We're getting really excited and it's hard to just continue our daily routines when we think about Brazil. Scott got in touch with a couple of old friends in Salvador and they are anxiously awaiting our arrival. For Mother's Day we got to see Scott's grandfather who he hadn't seen in seven or eight years, and I had never met. He delivered a donation from Scott's "Uncle Cal" and Scott's parents graciously contributed. Then we went to my parent's, and we got to hang out and talk to my brother in the Phillipines when he called. My grandmother also donated some more.
We are almost to our goal, which is good because we have to finish paying it off in two weeks. Thank you again to everyone who has helped us out! It means so much to us that you are all going to be a part of this trip with us because we couldn't have done it without you!
My Portuguese is coming along, I can now generally form my own thoughts into sentences, but understanding other people is still somewhat of a challenge. If they speak slowly it's much easier. I guess the same applies to my understanding English sometimes, too. :)

Countdown

Our trip is now officially less than 90 days away. We have one month to gather the funds to pay off the rest of it. Thank you so much to those of you who have donated! Even small amounts help tremendously. We're crossing things off our To Do list like crazy. We are completely vaccinated and Megan is taking a Portuguese class through PCC to help with her language skills. Soon we will apply for a Visa and receive our official work placement information as well as a list of other volunteers that will be there with us and their contact information.