a little about our life in Natal

So far I am not having any luck getting pictures posted on this blog. I will continue to try but I can't guarantee any pictures.

LIVING ARRANGEMENTS
We have a wonderful 3rd floor apartment above the church building where we are working. The girls share a room and the guys share a room and we all share a bathroom. We are very blessed to have hot water for the shower. Out our front door is a balcony that overlooks the city and the girls bedroom window overlooks the street. I enjoy looking out the window and feeling the breeze. It is rare to have a/c here so we have the windows open and fans blowing all the time. But, there are no window screens, so we have to be careful about spraying for mosqitoes often. I am a little crazy and often at home the a/c is too cold for me so I don't mind not having it most of the time. Everyone else is sweating too so you just live with it. The church here has gone to great lengths to give us great accomodations and we feel so very blessed and know that they have made great sacrifices for us.

FOOD
Since we cook most of our meals ourselves, we have not had as many opportunities as I would like to eat the local food. I know that will change and we will get to try many new things. There are suppose to be lots of great fruits here and the ones we have tried are amazing. (pineapple, banana, coconut). We get our bread every few days from a bakery down the street and it is wonderful. We buy rolls to make sandwiches and sweet bread for a treat (my favorite is a coconut bread).
Each team member is responsible for fixing lunch and supper one day a week and everyone is doing a great job! We can find most things that we need to fix what we want or at least an equivalent that will work. There is a supermarket that we can walk to that has been bought by Walmart and we buy most of our food there. There are definately some differences from Walmart at home, such as slabs of meat set out unwrapped (we buy the wrapped stuff). As in most big city, we can go to restaurants that offer a local version of food from all over the world. At the mall the food court has everything you can imagine and more. My favorite place to eat out is just a few blocks from here. It is a "hamburger" stand that is only there at night. The owners wheel out a big canopied cart that has a big grill/griddle and everything they need to make the burgers and they set out plastic tables and chairs. They only make hamburgers, nothing else. They aren't quite like the usual burger at home but they are very good. You can order it with some unusual things one them (eggs, hot dogs, green beans). We can get a sandwich and a drink for about 2 US dollars.

WEATHER
The people of Natal never watch the weather report. It is almost always the same. It is winter here but it feel like our summers at home (I don't know how they stand the heat of their summers). The sun comes up at 5 AM and goes down between 5 and 5:30 PM. It is VERY HOT directly in the sun. It does not rain very much. We are in the rainy season and it has only rained twice. Usually it will just suddenly start raining and stop after a short time. Today has been very unusual because it has rained almost all day. The locals are so cold. We are loving the relief from the heat but not looking forward to more mosqitoes.

WORSHIP
Because of the heat, the church only meets at night (Sunday and Thursday). We have a short English worship service on Sundays at 4:30 PM. This is a good time for us to invite our readers and also for us to be renewed. Bible class is at 5 PM and the Portuguese worship is at 6 PM. We are done with worship by 8 PM. The church here seems to have about 50 people, but I can't remember for sure. They love God and His church and are full of life and zeal! I don't know what the preacher was saying but I know he really meant it!

WORK DAYS
We have readers coming Sunday through Thursday. Sundays we go from 9-4. Mon., Tue. and Thur. 9-9. Wed. 9-5 because we have our social events that night. According to Brazilian culture, we have a two hour lunch break. We take one hour for dinner. We usually don't read with more than 8 people per day. Our social events are important because they are a time for us to get to know the readers and for the church members to start developing relationships with our readers.

Okay, I think that is enough for today! I will give you as much information as I can as I have time. Please continue to pray for the work we are doing here and for the people we are reading with. We already see the Lord working here and are excited to be involved.

busy, busy, busy

We began reading yesterday and it was great. We started our day at 8 a.m. with a team devo and ended at 9 p.m. According to Brazilian culture, we took a 2 hour lunch break so that really helps us get through such a long day, along with a few short breaks. I read with 8 different people I should have 15 total before long. The people here are very warm and friendly and easy to converse with. We have a lot of college students signed up, and I have a little experience relating to college students so I feel that I will be able to make some good relationships. I had some great conversations. So many of the people are very open to discuss their personal life.
We had the day off today and while the others took care of some shopping, I stayed at the apartment and did some laundry. It was nice to have a slow morning. This afternoon we went to a street market and tonight we are going to a birthday party of one of the church members. Even though we have a day off from reading, we still have lots of work to tend to taking care of our personal needs and building relationships with the church members. One of the church members is our angel! His name is Bob (not really, but that's what we call him). He was a reader several years ago and now he is a very active member of the church. He has taken us everywhere we need to go and is often available to give us direction and translation. He is amazing and so giving. LST means a lot to him.
There is so much more to tell but I will have to do that another time because I need to get ready to go.

just checking in

We arrived in Natal yesterday afternoon and every moment except a good night's sleep has been full of activity and responsibility.
It is 10 PM and I need to go to bed soon because we will start our day early tomorrow, but I wanted to take a minute to let you know that I am well and very glad to be here. We have had so many blessing that I want to share with you and I will take time tomorrow to write more. Until then, Boa Noite (good night).