Ho-down & Beach

I can't believe how quickly the time here has flown by. We are now firmly into our second week here and so much has happened.

Saturday evening was one of my favorite times to date. The youth of the church have their own room in the church which has recently been redecorated. Saturday was the official opening of the room, so they decided to have a big party. So the entire party dressed up like... country bumpkins! (hillbillies if you rather). There were a lot of checked shirts, straw hats, patches on jeans and girls with pigtails. It was hilarious. Now we didn't come to Brazil with hillbilly costumes foremost in our minds, so most us just contented ourselves with drawing little freckles over our checks- including the boys. Throughout the evening we played a number of games such as prince, princess and knight. You have a partner, and dance around, away from each other, while the music plays, then when the leader calls out one of the three characters, you have to find your partner and perform the correct action; prince – one partner is down on one knee and the other sits on the free knee; princess – one partner sweeps the other up into their arms; knight – piggyback. Amy and Mettie-Anne were our representatives coming in second. This was a particularly impressive feat considering they were calling the words in Portuguese and the girls couldn't tell which word was prince and which was princess, so were guessing or copying everyone else! The whole room had been decorated with paper chains and streamers and at the back of the room there was a jail set up. While all the games and the dances were going on there were 'policemen' who went around arresting people and putting them in the jail! This was a fund raiser for them, because you paid R$0.50 to put someone in the jail. The person could then either wait 5 minutes, or pay R$1 to get out. It was a hilarious idea and one that we took full advantage of starting off with Cindy and working our way through the team (plus a few of our Brazilian friends). Now the dancing! The dancing was contagious! By the end we had all succumbed and joined in, running around like mad things laughing our heads off and having a wonderful time. I don't think I have ever joined in so readily at a party dance. I was exhausted by the end of the evening!

Sunday was our earliest start since arriving, we had to be up and dressed and ready by 9am! Lol. We were up to join the leadership team having breakfast, then we split into three groups and prophesied over each of them either individually or in couples. It was a privilege to be able to speak into their lives. It's been easier doing prophecy here, I think partly because we know nothing about theses people, so there are no pre-conceptions, also we don't know them so are less afraid to get it wrong and so are just giving everything that we have (in the same was that I found it easier to pray for people). From people's reactions and their feedback our boldness was well placed as the things we were getting were really applicable to them.

Sunday afternoon was a relaxing trip to the park – which has a wooded bit at the back which, when you are walking through, could really make you think you were in the jungle!

Sunday evening was not so much fun though because I wasn't very well. I'd had a bouncing temperature all day, but by the evening I was dizzy, nauseous and very cold. I felt thoroughly sorry for myself so went to bed. The evening wasn't wasted though as I held my own healing service just for me. I felt much better by the end I must say! Yay God!

I was super glad that I was feeling loads better come Monday morning because it was our day off and we were off on an adventure. Robson (pronounced Hobson) is our main contact here and his parents have a summer apartment by the beach. So we hired a minibus and drove 3 hours to the beach! It was a beautiful sunny warm day and you could see the sea shore from the apartment windows. It did not take long for people to get changed and scramble down to the sands. We had a couple of extras on the trip, Sessile – one of the guys from the church, Alana – one of our translators who is going to SoM next school, and Sam Fowler – an ex-students and small group leader (my brother's small group leader in fact!). We spent all day on the beach in the beautiful warm sunshine, with clear skies above, had all you can eat pizza for dinner, and watched 'Bella', all curled up on one rather overcrowded sofa bed. What can I say, it's a hard life being on outreach! I think my favorite bit of the day though was an opportunity I was almost to scared to take. As we were leaving the pizza place there was a homeless lady with a withered hand sat on a shop door step near the van. So stepping out, a small group of us went and prayed for her. She was so open to receiving prayer. When we left she looked much more peaceful, and much happier. Now her hand wasn't healed on the spot, but I believe that God has started working in that hand. The next day I kept looking out for her in case she was there because I want to see this healed hand of hers. Sadly I didn't see her, but it was really cool anyway.

Monday night we stayed over at the apartment, which meant that come 6:30 Tuesday morning we were still there, so the girls all got up to watch the sunrise over the sea, we watched the sky change colour, watched the sun peep over the waves and then rises behind some clouds, did a few beach aerobics and then Cindy accidentally stepped on a dead penguin, so we decided to head back to bed for a couple of hours. Once we got up for the second time we went and explored some cliffs nearby. All except Joe that is who was the latest victim to the bug going around. We watched cliff fishermen, clambered up and down the rock, got soggy from some over zealous waves while getting a group picture taken and admired the views. Sadly once we had explored the cliffs though it was time to head back, and prepare for our evening ministry.