And now the end is near…

Very soon we will be leaving our idyllic vacation home and beginning the trip back home. Right now we are working on packing and cleaning, so that we can head out tomorrow and begin our trek home. We will stop along the way, so who knows what day we will arrive, but we wanted to get through the city of São Paulo on a weekend not a weekday. The traffic jams in São Paulo often extend into 100’s of miles, if you can believe that.

This past week we have devoted most of our time to visiting people and not places. Sunday we visited a couple of churches, ran into old friends and ended up eating out with them (photo on right). We spent one day with João’s pastor friend. The next day we spent the evening with a seminary colleague (musician), the next we went out for sweetheart’s day banquet with  João’s cousin’s church (photo on left). We had a great time, although we didn’t get home until 1:30AM! The next night we actually stayed home. We spent the day (a holiday here) just enjoying our little piece of paradise – feeding the fish and chickens and just walking around and enjoying nature. It was cloudy, but since it was in the 50’s, we were not freezing for a change.  I wish you could have seen the fish (tilapia) jumping in the water to grab the food. Even the rooster seem to lose his fear of us as he and the chickens drew closer and closer and I finally got a great photo of him.

Friday night we spent the whole day out doing a little shopping and then meeting another old friend of João’s for supper. Turns out her neighbour (who was also there) was an acquaintance of mine. Of course the Baptist world does tend to be a small one. Today, Saturday we are going to a cookout with our neighbors and then… well tomorrow we are leaving.  It’s been grand. And we still have 6 days left to travel, visit with Marilene, get home and reorganize our lives and enjoy Elly’s university graduation.