Land Lines and Life Lines

Well, our first month was about finding and securing an apartment and getting all of our documents processed so we could live here in Salvador, Brazil. This month we have been setting up our new home and learning culture and language as we go. Everything here runs at a much slower pace than in the States. There is no hurry here to deliver our furniture or our shipment of things or a telephone or a refrigerator. As of now, however, we have two sofas, two ceiling fans, and two mattresses in our apartment. Little by little, we’re getting settled in. We really love our apartment and have a great view from the 12^th floor.

Language school starts this week. We’re ready to get some help. Did I mention earlier in the list of two’s that we also have two cell phones? The second one was delivered last week. When the delivery man opened the box, we didn’t know what to say. We were expecting a land line phone for our apartment. You see, our realtor, Helena, said she would help us get a phone. So we let her call for us and set it up. Apparently there was a slight miscommunication. Our team thinks this is pretty funny. They call our new cell phone our land line. We had a good laugh about it and moved on. All of us have stories to tell now like this one and it helps to share these experiences with each other.

Our team has been very important to us since we’ve been here. In fact, they’ve been our life line. Without each other, this experience of moving to another country to live as missionaries would be much more difficult. All of us Christians are on a team. Satan makes it easy for us to feel isolated when we are going through a trying time. But it is especially during such times that we must remember, the church is our team. Remember your team goal. Take care of each other along the way. We miss you all very much! Keep us informed about the ministry there! mabery@missionsalvador.com

Citizenship?

For the past three weeks we have been working on living as citizens of Salvador. Of course we don’t have the full rights of citizens here, but we have had to make certain arrangements in order to be able to live here and do our work. Everyone moving to Brazil must go through the same procedure. At least our whole team was able to experience all of this together.

First, we were obliged to travel across the city to the Policia Federal to register with the Federal Police of Brazil. This took two trips, one to find out what paperwork we had to have with us, and the other by the whole team to stand in line to pay to have our papers processed and then to stand in line again to actually have them processed. We had three small children in our group and they were more than happy to move our process along, especially when all three decided to start screaming at the same time.

In order to rent property or buy any large items, we are required to give a CPF number, the equivalent of a social security number in Brazil. We went to the revenue office here in Salvador to apply, and ran into a bit of trouble. We had to go to the central office of the Banco do Brasil to pay a 4,50 reais (less than $2.00) fee and then call to make an appointment at the revenue office to get our number. We paid the fee but opted to just go wait in line again, which worked. The Parker family on our team received their numbers on the first try just on their charm alone without having to pay.

For the next week we hunted apartments. We have now all found our apartments, signed contracts, and should all be moved in by the end of the week. It helps to remember something that is true whether we are in Brazil or in the U.S.- our real home is in heaven. Paul writes to all the saints in Christ Jesus at Philippi (3:20) about citizenship saying, “But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ.”

Flood Waters

These were a couple of the days welcoming us to the beautiful city of Salvador. In the first week we were blessed with a lot of sunshine, and then rainy season began (they say it lasts from March to August). You can see similar pictures in the banner to the right>

Greetings from Brazil

Well, we made it safe and sound! We're here in Brazil to begin this long awaited journey and adventure! We arrived on Sunday night and our first two days have certainly been eventful. Many of you have asked about MayVa stories from Brazil like the ones I sent from Europe. So, here's the first one... We have a kitchenette in our hotel room and the Porter family and Matt and I were trying to cook our first meal in Brazil, a frozen pizza. (We wanted a meal that didn't take three hours to cook or three hours to wait on at a restaurant.) Jennifer had packed a pan and we had done well for our first trip to the supermarket on our first day in Brazil. The only problem was that we couldn't figure out the gas oven since it was different than any one we had ever seen.

Therefore, I was nominated to call for help. I called what I thought was the front desk and explained in broken Portuguese / Spanish that we needed someone to come and light the oven. The woman I was speaking to transfered me to the front desk and I explained again. The man at the front desk didn't know what I was talking about so he handed me off to someone else. Finally, someone who spoke English. When I explained he said, "Okay, I send someone up." Thirty minutes later, two maids arrived carrying pots and pans. Through sherades we communicated what we really needed and the laides radioed their supervisor. Matt and the two ladies found instructions (in portuguese) and while they rattled off things in portuguese that he couldn't understand, Matt lit the oven - just before the supervisor arrived. By the time all of our visitors left and we cooked the frozen pizza, it was still a typically long Brazilian meal.

As I think about how many miscommunications we'll have while we're here, I'm reminded of how our heavenly father understands us no matter what. He knows what we're going to ask for even before we ask it and it doesn't matter what language we ask it in. God understands us and knows us better than we know ourselves. So when you have one of those days when you feel like you can't communicate your thoughts and feelings, even in your own language, remember that God understands and is waiting for you to come to Him.

P.S. Thank you for the wonderful send-off and the gift that you gave us! It means so much to kwow that we have such a caring church behind us. We miss you all already.