Our Chapel Chameleon

 This chameleon lives at the Manga church grounds. He (?) had quite an adventure.  He walked across the sidewalk here and is spotted.

 Hit the green stuff (crabgrass?) and loses his spots.

 Further out in the area he encounters two men who are cutting the lawn and gets a little agitated, changing colors again.

 Then some Elders found him and got him a little more more on edge.

 Now he is really, really mad at the world.  His color has become very dark and he is hissing.

We thought it was a really neat thing to see, but the two men who were caring for the lawn gave the little guy (about 7"long) a very wide berth. The local people are very nervous about these creatures.  They think touching them will bring very bad things and if you get bitten you will become ill and possibly die.  You can see the patch that they left uncut.   It was fun to watch, because it was just like National Geographic!  He even has toes that curl around branches just like in the magazine pictures.

Tire Repair

 We had a flat tire.  It was caused by hitting a pothole to hard.  This shop is toward the baixa from us.  The apartment guards helped us get the spare on and directed us to this shop.  Above is a good example of the potholes we have to traverse.  This one is pretty mild-mannered.  The tires piled up around the pole is their shop sign entrance.

 Elder Dille (Larry) kept hold of the hub cover while they worked on our tire.  The tire hanging on post is the shop sign.  It says "Reparacao de Pneus" in white paint.

 You can always find a use for a bathtub.

 He cut a piece from an old tire and glued it on the inside of the slit in our tire.  No OSHA rules here! 

(P.S.  We had to replace the tire the next week.)

 The sign nailed to the tree says "Air" .  A vehicle pulls up to the side of the road under the tree and a young boy brings the compressor hose out to fill the tire for them.  

The shop seemed to be run by 4 young men.  This one is bringing tires from somewhere across the street.  I watched him rolling those 4 tires across a busy road about 1 lock away.  He really had it down pat and never lost control of any tire.

Beira Views

 This is a movie house.   The DVD's they are playing are lined up at the top by the roof. Elder Lake said it  was about 10 MT (30 cents) to get in.

 This was on our way out to Manga. Boy were we glad to be going the opposite direction. All these trucks were waiting to turn left at this intersection in Munhava area.  The line went on for at least  mile.

 This is parked at the front of the Manga 2 Elders house.  There is a big (really large) turkey living just to the left, so I get out of the truck cautiously .   The children in this neighborhood swim in the pond left by the rain storm.

 We thought this was such a wonderful picture.  These ladies are carrying long loaves of bread from the bakery to their little road side kiosk about 1/2 mile on down the road.  This is the entrance to the Palmeira chapel close to where we live.

 This is typical of the neighborhoods that our missionaries work in.  We are here to give them a ride.

 This is a good day at this neighborhood market because we have had no rain.  In the rainy season it is a totally different story.

 This is a different part of town, but a very typical street.

Inhamizua Weddings

Elder Lake asked me to make the wedding cakes for 7 weddings. One on Thursday and 6 on Friday. Isabel da Silva (District RS Pres{also cleans for me}) helped me make the cakes the way she does it.  Wow!!  What a lot of work.  I told him he owes me big-time!  What I have on is my capulana apron.

 This is the kitchen area of our Manga Chapel.  There is a real (although small) kitchen in the building, but they only bake cakes in there.  This is where the real cooking happens over coal and charcoal.

 Here I am helping them shred cabbage for coleslaw.  I was told that I had to make my pieces smaller.  It was very difficult, but they made it look so easy, especially Maria!

 Here they are frying pieces of fish.  Elder Thurston and Elder Domingo are hard at work.

 Irma Louisa is cooking "feijão" (beans) full of good stuff to go with the rice.

 This is the rice (arroz) cooking station.

 Here the sisters are cooking fries (batatas fritas) and chicken (frango).  This is a typical church dinner.

 These couples get married and then the next day they are baptized.  It has been a real problem because it costs so much to get married that couples usually just live together.  The dowry (lobolo) paid to the brides family  is usually very high, the marriage license and the party are very expensive.  Our missionaries are helping them to complete the paper work and then break with tradition and get married so they can be baptized.  Then they are married in groups and the ward has a big party for everyone.  Works very well.

 Here are the 6 cakes.  I used cooked frosting and it held up pretty well.  The day was so hot and it took so long to get started and done I was really worried that they would all melt.  But they were okay and the couples were able to take them home.

 Elder Lake is standing on the Left and President Camelizene (District Pres) standing on the far right is getting ready to start the marriages.  Each couple comes up to the small table, gets married and signs the official paperwork.  The people in the congregation usually sign after each marriage so the process takes awhile.

Here is one of the brides waiting in a hot car until time to go in.  We have about 5 dresses at the Beira chapel for them to use.  They are really getting used and some are showing it.  But these lovely sisters are so happy to be getting married!   Some of our couples are older and have grown children.

Inhamizua Primary

 This is our Primary in Inhamizua.  Jonqueiro was called to help me with the music, but likes to teach instead.  (He is one of my piano students)  Irma Maria Da Silva Fernando is the 1st counselor. 

 Sister Laura Mafungo (bent over) is the Primary President.  We drew pictures of a blessing.  The children love to draw.  They don't do much of that in their homes.  Paper and crayons are expensive.

As you can see, our Primary is always full and we have all ages.  So far, we don't split into age groups.  It is really difficult anyway, because the older children take care of the younger siblings and they won't be separated. So it would probably be two groups of  all ages.   Pascoa (2nd counselor) is standing in the back of the room.

Catching Up!

 This is the beach just across the street from us.  This was so cute.  Her husband set this up for her and the baby and then took the older children out to the water edge.

The tide is out and they are looking at sand dollars.

 No one knows what the name is for sand dollars.  They try to call them "estrelas" (star).  There were all over the beach in our area.

 This one is moving back under the sand.  It was so fascinating to watch them. 

We don't get out here often enough.  The water is quite warm here.  We are told that is why our shrimp is so good and big.

Helping Elder Lake

 This bean is from the tree in the picture above.  We were parked at the morgue at the hospital that is only a few blocks from our home.  A man in our Branch passed away on that Sunday and we took Elder Lake ( who is the Branch President)  and his companion Elder Franscisco to the home to help the family.  It is the families responsibility to get the body to the morgue and then they have the funeral there the next day.  They do not embalm here and so the funerals are right away and not at the church but at the morgue.  They have a small area for the family and friends.  Then everyone gets into the back of a truck (or two or three) and drive to the cemetary.  Sometimes there is someone playing a drum as they drive there.  The people in the front truck hold a wooden cross up.  They often sing songs as they travel to the cemetary.

This is a picture of the road to the members house.  We are leaving on our way to the morgue.