Day 11 - Beach Day & Leather Demonstration

 This morning I woke up and decided that it was time to pay for my own room at the hotel. It had been super fun getting to know the other students better but I felt that my mental health was beginning to decline a little because I didn't have any personal space.  My teacher supported this idea and I was happy to move my stuff over to my new room. It was so nice having a little bit of privacy! 

Today was a very fun beach day at one of the beaches on this island.

I had the neatest experience where I noticed that this big family kept looking over to me and giggling.  Finally, I swam over to them and started speaking to them in my limited Portuguese.  They loved it and were happy to chat with me.  I found out that they had never met anyone from the US before and they rarely see tourists like us there.  The kids were so adorable and I wanted to ask them all of the questions that I could remember.  I looked over and their mom was filming our interaction and it just touched my heart.  I didn’t realize what a very unique experience this might be for her kids.  I wish I would have had a gift to give to them.  Maybe a bracelet that I’ve made or something that they could remember me by.  Someday, I hope to serve a mission for my church in Brazil and have these types of interactions on a regular basis.  I just adore all of these people who I get to meet.  What a super special opportunity this trip has given me.  Later, I played Futebol with the kids on the beach and that was also super fun!

Lunch was super yummy and I ordered the chicken.  I also thought I ordered a grape Fanta and the lady brought out a bowl of eggs and some type of rice.  She misunderstood my Portuguese and it was pretty funny.  I didn’t mind paying for that second meal as it was my mistake.  That is a good thing to remember when you are learning another language….  Pronunciation matters!!

Then it started raining and pouring so we all went inside the little bungalow restaurant on stilts.  We ended up waiting out the storm for about 2 hours.  I hadn’t seen it rain that much yet on this trip.  We got in our van and literally drove through super large puddles/lakes on the way to our next stop.  It made me think about how this is their daily life and they have to figure out how to make it work in their lives.  I’m sure it’s super hard.  

Next we went to a leather shop and demonstration.  I learned a lot about water buffalo there.  One interesting fact was that there were different types of buffalo because their ship sank that was supposed to go to Europe and they swam to Marajó.  

They can also swim for a long time.  He took us back to the shop where we learned about how they process the leather.  It was very interesting.  This is a family owned business which has been running for generations.  

Once we went back to the hotel a few of us went out on the town to find someplace for dinner.  We were all overtired and a little bit on edge.  We ate quickly and headed back to our hotels.  It was so nice having my own room, I’m sure I will say that a lot over the next week, but it’s so true!