Amazon: Tuesday

3/8

This morning Andrea and I got up at 5:30 for the sunrise lovers breakfast top deck. It was too cloudy to actually see a good sunrise, but it was still beautiful and very relaxing.

Andrea and I were the only people there.
Then, we went piranha fishing! First of all, just boating around was so enormously beautiful. The water of the Rio Negro is so interesting - its waters are very dark because of all the sediment it collects and the slow speed of the water. This creates an amazing mirror effect - everything (trees, plants, the sky) is reflected very clearly with color intact when the water is still.

The fishing was really fun - we used bamboo sticks with string and raw beef as bait.

My family has a lot of luck - they caught seven piranhas total (the red and yellow bellied breeds). I was the only one who didn't catch anything :( It was still very cool to see piranhas and their teeth up close.

It was so hot in the sun. The sweat was pouring off my back. While we were out, we saw a panema (a huge bird with an orange back), kingfishers, white herons, piranhas (obviously), a sloth, and Mom saw a river dolphin! We saw the sloth eating way high in a tree - I know they're supposed to be slow, but actually watching one move - they're like in slow motion, it's funny.
I learned some interesting things: the acidity of the Rio Negro is very high - it has a pH level of 4.6, apparently around the same as lemons. The acidity is so high that mosquitoes can't breed on it (which is fantastic since I forgot my yellow fever vaccine). Also, the Amazonia area of Brazil alone is larger than Europe.
There was a big thunderstorm on the river today. Since we rarely hear thunder in Salvador, it was doubly exciting. Despite the heavy rains, our excursion to a beach wasn't canceled. We took a tender to land in a hit spot for cruise stops. Andrea, Amanda, and I actually went swimming in the river (though Manda barely stayed - just got in and out). It was frightening considering a guide told us about tiny fish that swim into your body through your ears or nose and kill you (presumably by eating your brain?). Andrea and I swam across the channel and back.

We were anchored back near the port of Manaus (so much for heart of darkness). We are having a little Carnaval party tonight and they are using performers from the city who have to get back tonight....
and we just had a Carnaval party on the top deck. The party was much more fun than I expected. They had a live band and a bunch of fully costumed samba dancers. They were incredibly impressive. They were wearing barely any clothing with huge headdresses and very high heels. Yet they still danced crazy good and didn't jiggle at all. Andrea and I danced a ton and Dad danced with us a lot. They played mostly Brazilian samba, but at the end they also played some swing and old school rock and roll. When the party was over, an old man came up to Andrea and I and said we had style and our dancing was refreshing.

Amazon: Monday

Just got back from our vacation to the Amazon. We did it luxury style, on an Iberostar cruise ship down the Rio Negro. Near Manaus, Brazil, 2 rivers - the Solimoes and the Negro eventually combine to form the Amazon River. Our cruise was down the Negro, 3 degrees south of the Equator. Each day we went on excursions that actually took us into the jungle, but at night we could still sleep in air conditioned comfort. I wrote about the trip while I was there, and have transcribed it in the Amazon posts.

3/7
I'M IN THE AMAZON! I am currently floating on the Rio Negro into the jungle. It is night, and there are almost no lights. It looks like we're sailing straight into the heart of darkness.

Cooking Adventure

I cooked up a storm today. I made some homemade basil pesto, cauliflower fritters, pasta, but most excitingly...

Mom found blackberries and blueberries at the ciaza (!) so I made my first cobbler! Throughout the process, I worried it would be a huge failure, but it turned out delicious:

Excitement Coming Up

It's getting exciting around here!

Carnaval starts on Friday. The city will shut down. Preparations have been going on for some time, but they're in full swing now. Going into the city is already a traffic nightmare - I can't even imagine what it's going to be like this weekend when thousands of tourists fly in. My family and I are only going for one night - this Saturday. It will certainly be an experience :)

I'm actually more looking forward to a trip we're soon taking. On Monday, we're flying to Manaus for an AMAZON CRUISE. I'm so so so excited! It should be all sorts of awesome. Mostly because I get to go piranha fishing.

The only possible problem is that I'm getting a cold right now. Tanya's been making her nasty garlic tea for colds, which has been helping, but I hope it just completely goes away before all the fun starts. Stay tuned for pictures!

Lua Cheia

**Note** I was going to call this “Full Moon” even before the twins came home and I heard about more craziness. Then we looked it up, and I found out that it actually was a full moon!

Today has been crazy.

This morning at the convent, most of the kids were little monsters. Anyone prone to violence was exhibiting it today. Caio was hitting and biting like a madman anytime he was remotely upset. Carla was throwing toy trucks and fighting over toys. But most heartbreaking for me was Micael. This was his first week back since the break. He’s one of the younger boys, and he is (was?) my baby. I helped teach him how to walk. He always smiled for me, laughed all the time, and often fell asleep in my arms. But since he’s been back, he’s a different boy. I don’t know what happened. He’s become incredibly violent, and he’s getting stronger everyday. Today – completely unprovoked – he attacked our newest/youngest/smallest boy, Everto. He had a grip on his head. Nails dug into Everto’s eyes, Micael was biting the top of his head and pulling at his mouth. When I separated them, Everto had scratch marks on his face and his eye looked puffy. What has gotten into my sweet baby? He didn’t stop getting into fights today, and as a last result, Georgina and I had to tie him to a chair with a rag.

Which brings me to my next bit of sad news. I found out that today was Georgina’s LAST DAY. I don’t know what I’m going to do. She is the Brazilian woman who takes care of the children every day. She has the ultimate authority with them. She has a heart of gold under a steel will. Sister Isaacs told me they select their volunteers the same way they do the kids – they approach people in the favela with the worst situation and allow them to help for a number of years. They can’t really pay them, but they provide them with a safe place and all meals. Georgina has been working at the convent longer than any other volunteer. She is much better off than when she started, and all her children have now grown and moved out. So they decided it was time to give someone new a chance. This will be a wonderful opportunity for someone, no doubt, but it presents everyone else with a remarkable challenge. This new helper will be starting from scratch with these kids and it will take some time before she can establish any real authority. It’s going to be quite the trick to get the kids to behave. We’re probably going to need two of the nuns to be with us for a while.

I thought this was all the craziness today would bring me. Then my sisters came home from school.

They have had to deal with some stupid, immature crap from classmates in the past, but today almost takes the cake. I think it’s more idiotic than most high school sitcoms could come up with. So the girls have had troubles with the boys in their class for the past 2 years. This week, they were invited to a large party, and all the guys were up in arms over that fact. During school, in the girls’ hearing, people made comments like: “We should give them a wrong address that leads them into a favela,” and “At the party, we should lock them both in a closet.” Classy.

However, for the first time ever, some of the girls in the class came to Manda and Andrea’s defense. In an asinine attempt to appease those girls while still putting my sisters in their place, some boys delivered the following note to the twins:

Look, Kenners, we do not have a problem with your going to the party whatsoever. However from what has happened in the past of you guys making up shit to just try to get us in trouble…so here’s what we propose: If you guys really want to come, then you abide by the following rule: what happens there, stays there. That means you do not tell ANYBODY. No matter how good of a friend or family or whatever. If you are not willing to abide by these rules, then you are not welcome there. Really we do not have anything against you guys! So please, give this back with your answer and your signatures.

Manda’s “answer”: Are you like 2 years old?

The past instances of getting them in to trouble can factually be linked to only 2 things – once, 1.5 years ago Manda told some parents when the boys were playing the choking game and trying to rope younger boys into it. The girls also reported when they had been sexually harassed by these boys in the past. How dare they. The guys made up all sorts of other things today that the girls have supposedly done, none of which are remotely true.

This is only the latest of a long list of stupid, immature things these boys have done to my sisters. I vacillate between rage, pity, and amusement because of how unbelievably catty and juvenile it all is.

Vitoria and Brutus

There is a giant, terrifying stray dog that often hangs around the entrance of the convent where I'm volunteering. I have named him Brutus (I'll try to take a picture of him sometime). Today, as Ricardo and I drove up, I saw that Brutus had blood all over his front paws - it didn't look like his. Blood was dripping out of his mouth, and then he sneezed blood all over. Only the relatively small amount of blood allows me to rule out his eating a small child. Undoubtedly, some poor creature met its end this morning.

Also, today was Vitoria's first day back since the break. I was worried she wasn't coming back since it has been 2 weeks since the restart. I missed her so much. The first day I visited to see if it would be a good place to volunteer, Vitoria stared at me with these sad eyes that really seared my soul, and I've always felt a special connection with her. She often seems sad and older than she is - but she also has quite the wicked streak and can be amazingly sassy. I was so glad to see her, but it was also heartbreaking. She has always been one of the thinnest girls, and she's even thinner now. I can see her ribs. She has sores all over her hands and legs that look like they are probably roach bites. She sat with me for a long time - quietly, sadly. I almost cried. I was glad I knew how to say I love you and I missed you in Portuguese. However, by the end of the day, I saw a bit of her sass returning, and I even got her laughing at lunch.

Resuming

I promise I'll start writing here again. Basically, I'll think about whatever Lizzie liked hearing, and I'll write about that :)

But today, I would simply like to question why it is sometimes so hard to get starving kids to eat. They struggle with me so much! This week, a new boy, Silas, has been having a lot of trouble adjusting, and he's developed a very strong attachment to me. Georgina asked me to hold him down while she tried to basically force feed him some milk. He fought me tooth and nail - literally. And he now holds the dubious distinction of being the first to administer a bite that broke my skin.

He's not the only one, though. Sometimes these kids just won't eat. I can't understand it, because I know they don't eat well at home. When I'm helping them eat, and they're eating well, it's one of the most rewarding times for me. When they won't eat, I get so frustrated and sad for them.