Abby and Zoë

Abby and Zoë have done pretty well today behavior wise and really, really wanted tapioca's.  We saw the guy setting up earlier than normal, on our way back from the park, but I really didn't want to go.  Chris and I kept willing each other to go, but made egg sandwiches for dinner and then sat with the girls to watch a movie.  After the movie was over, Chris finally talked me in to going down.  There was only one person waiting for their tapioca when Chris checked out the balcony before I left, so he figured I'd be back before the girls were in bed. ;)  When I got down there, there was a guy who was just about to get his tapioca, a girl waiting for hers, and a car parked right there also waiting for their order.  It didn't take too long for my turn this time around though, so I asked the guy which were sweet and chose two.  I chose one with coconut and cheese, and one with goioba jelly and cheese (romeo and juliet)... always with the cheese around here.  I think I was only gone half an hour this time and everyone had done well so we all got to share some tapioca for snack.

The girls and I ventured down to the park again today, but we waited until the afternoon so that the sun wasn't so strong and there were more shady spots in the park.  This morning we had went up to the roof, not to swim but to play in their game room area just doing some hopping and general running off of energy... Abby and Zoë's, not mine - taking the elevator up ran off all the energy I have these days :) . 

We got down to the park and the girls asked me to make a hop scotch for them, so I tried in the dirt with my foot, but it wasn't coming out so well.  As we were looking for a stick, a couple of boys ran over and started jabbering to us.  One was younger, three we found out later, and the other was probably six.  I tried telling the older of the two that we didn't understand and didn't speak Portuguese, but he didn't seem to get that.  Meanwhile the younger boy was going on and on about a game he had in his hand.  I found the stick and began drawing the hop scotch, saying the numbers out in Portuguese, and then had the girls try and show the boys how the game worked.  The mother or caretaker, whomever she was, of the boys came over and sat on the bench next to me while the kids ran around drawing pictures in the dirt with sticks, and tried to spark a conversation with me.  I got a couple of the questions, but then someone else came along and she chatted with her instead, oh well.  After a while the boys began playing with the two other kids that had arrived, while Abby and Zoë wanted to play games in the grass.  Pretty soon another lady with a toddler came to the park and then another woman with a baby in a stroller. 

These women had both meandered to the edge of the (cement) futbol court, which Abby and Zoë were using for their starting off point for a race.  The woman with the baby had asked the girls their names, but they hadn't understood and took off racing. The woman then asked in English if the girls spoke Portuguese and I said they didn't.  We walked over to introduce ourselves and it turned out that the woman spoke very good English and was eager to practice... fine by me!  Her name is Simone, and her baby, Pedro Felipe, is three months old today.  She has another son, who is five and was at school.  Apparently she lived in California for a year some time ago, and had also been to New York for a visit a long time ago.  She said that if the weather was nice on Saturday she was planning to come to the park again, this time also with her other son and a ball so that he and the girls could all play together.

It's been a little while since we've had tapioca's and with the little market right down on the stree, there's also a guy doing tapioca's for R$1.00 to R$3.00 depending on what you choose.  I've been putting off having to go down and converse to order a tapioca, and also we've had some behavior and listening issues with the girls so they've been losing this treat.  Tonight I finally went ahead and went down to pick something at random and bring it back up to try.  It took forever!  Seriously I think I was gone an hour and it was literally right outside the apartment building, Chris could see me from the balcony.  There were a couple of people in front of me and they each had fairly large orders, like five plus tapioca's a piece... the guy had three little burners going.  Just before it was going to be my turn to order, a girl went around the back of the little stand and put in her order of five tapioca's.  I guess her mother, who was waiting in the car, was in a hurry.  I finally got a turn and ordered my one little tapioca. (I wasn't waiting longer for more at this point)  I had picked charque, no idea what that is but whatever it was, he was out of the filling.  I chose mista instead and headed on back up to the apartment. 

By the time I got back, the girls had done such a poor job of waiting and listening to Daddy that they'd lost their treat.  Chris and I were pleasantly surprised to find that I'd chosen one with meat, albeit one rectangle slice, but it ended up being a tasty little ham and cheese sandwhich of sorts, especially when Chris added some mustard.

Today Irene stopped by on her way to Hiper and picked us up to tag along.  We weren't in dire need of a shopping trip, but we thought we'd better take the opportunity to be able to stock up on some things without having to carry the heavy stuff back ourselves.  Also, I thought it would be a good time to look at baby stuff with Irene, since last time I looked there were things that I didn't quite understand.

Chris and I both paid attention to what Irene put in her cart and asked questions about everything, from how to prepare things, to what stuff was in the first place.  We put off buying diapers and nursing pads again, but did get wipes.  It was definitely helpful to go with Irene, and especially nice to be able to not only have a lift to and from, but a lift for the groceries as well!

Wal-mart owns Hiper BomPreço (Hyper Good Price), but I don't think their slogans are the same.  I don't see any prices being rolled back here in Brazil.  It is actually quite the opposite.  Wal-mart isn't known for quality goods in the US, nor is it here.  The goods seem to all be sourced from the same place, mostly China.  Unfortunately here, almost every single item is more expensive than the Wal-mart in the US.  Why is this?  Doesn't Wal-mart globally have the purchasing power to effectively standardize their prices across all stores, regardless of country?  It seems that they can charge more, for the same or less quality goods here than they can in the US.  It seems contradictory, as they earn less here, are taxed 17% on purchases, and the prices are higher for the same goods.  It can't all be explained as importation and logistics of goods in shipping containers from China.  I am shocked to see that 250g of Oatmeal costs R$2.08 = US$1.27.  The name brand product in the US would cost US$0.97, a difference of US$0.30 (33% more expensive).  We spend US$2.12 for a huge container of oats, lasts at least 1 month.  You also don't save money here buy purchasing the larger amount.  The larger 500g box of oats was R$4.38.  This holds true for all other items I noticed, cookies, rice, beans, everything.  If you buy two of the smaller packages, you are saving money by consuming more packaging.  I think it is because most Brazilians can not purchase so much at once, but 250g of oatmeal only almost 4 breakfasts for the girls, and if I am having any, just barely 3 breakfasts.  Butter without salt costs R$3.53 = US$2.16, with salt costs R$2.53 = US$1.55 for 200g (0.44 pounds).  At Shaws or Walmart, we get a pound of unsalted butter for around US$2.27.  Salted butter here costs US$3.51 per pound, unsalted butter US$4.90 per pound, 54% and 115% more expensive respectively than in the US.  Surely there are cows and dairy here, and we aren't getting the most expensive product here for the comparison, but the least expensive as I am too frugal.  Cheese here, I won't even detail, even the local soft cheese are more expensive pound for pound than our cheeses, and the imported cheeses like Cheddar, Gouda, Gorgonzola, Blue, Feta, Bree, etc...  are so expensive, that it would be cheaper to eat gold shavings.  There is a benefit to these prices, we are curtailing and limiting our dairy products.  We only use a small amount of butter for our pan when cooking eggs, and the girls are only have some liquid yogurt with fruit.  I have been buying rolls, which I toast up in the pan, and then place some Guava jelly or banana jelly and fry it again until the jelly is hot and runny. It is a tasty treat, and every time I make it for the girls, I think of their great grandfather Elio, and how he enjoyed jelly bread.  Eggs here are less expensive than at home, R$7.49 = US$4.57 for 30 eggs (US$0.15 per egg US$1.83 per dozen) versus the all natural omega 3 eggs at US$2.79 per dozen (US$0.23 per egg).  Comparable eggs without the omega 3's are about 40% less expensive than in the US.  Health and beauty items, like shampoo, skin care, and sunblock are outrageously expensive.  The middle range bottles of shampoo were US$20 and up, for a medium sized bottle, smaller than the US packaging.  Where we spent US$8.18 for 473 ml (16 oz US$0.0173 / ml) of No Ad sun block SPF 60, here 120ml of the cheapest stuff SPF 30, cost R$21.40 = US$13.06 (US$0.1088 / ml).  The same size product that we bought at home would have cost us more than US$50.  We buy 5 pounds of flour at home for US$1.88, here we bought 1 kg of flour for R$2.75 = US$1.69.  It is almost twice as expensive as in the US. 

Let me know if you want me to keep my eyes open for anything specific to compare.

Richard, Irene, Talita and Anabelle asked us to join them at the beach today.  They were taking a trip down the coast to some nice beaches out of town.  We had heard about Tabatinga beach [map] and the beautiful cliffs that are off the beach, and also that sometimes you could swim with friendly dolphins there, so we took them up on the offer.  The beach was absolutely deserted and beautiful.  We heard that It is ranked in the top 10 of Brazil's beaches.  No matter where we go in Brazil, it seems to be empty and beautiful.  There were some beautiful homes along the beach with incredible views.  We timed it just right, to be there at low tide, unfortunately there weren't any dolphins to swim with us this time.  The girls got to play in the sand, run around, and swim in the ocean.  Both Abby and Zoë took turns going out to bob in the waves and swim in.  They loved it, and playing with the girls was a special treat.

On the way back, we stopped off at the Cabo Branco lighthouse (Farol do Cabo Branco) [map] just before sunset at 5:30 PM.  This is billed as the eastern most point of Brazil and of all the americas.  The view is incredible from here, and there are paths down to the beach to the south, which is actually the most eastern point, instead of the overlook, it was getting dark, so we decided to head back into town.  Richard dropped us off and shared his camera photos with us.  I hope you enjoy the views.

It's surprisingly been a little while since we've been to the beach, since it's so close and all.  This afternoon we all walked down to enjoy some low tide fun.  Zoë was a bit dissapointed, as she'd wanted to go to the pool instead.  She still has some phobia at the beach here for some reason.  When we got there Abby couldn't get herself to the water quickly enough.  Zoë was trying to talk me into just going however far she wanted to go into the water.  Zoë also kept telling us that Abby was going out too far, when she'd go out and let the waves wash up to her belly.  At first I stood in the shallow water with Zoë, but even here she was grabbing on to Chris and I.  I went up and sat by our things while Chris stayed down with the girls in the water.  Zoë kept running back to me and complaining that Daddy wasn't standing shallow enough, and once told me that she was worried.  I explained to her that she didn't need to be worried, since Daddy and I wouldn't let her do anything dangerous.  Finally she saw how much fun Abby was having and began venturing out and playing in the waves.  After a while both girls were sitting down in the shallow water and laughing away when a wave would come.  I'm glad they both ended up having a great time.  Meanwhile I enjoyed sitting in the nice sand.  I commented to Chris that the sand was just like the really nice sandbox sand that you have to pay a lot of money to get.

We've mentioned before about the poor quality of toilet paper here, and the lack of 'flushable wipes' (not that it would matter since we're not to flush anything anyway).  Chris has also mentioned his solution of just getting a quick rinse off in the shower.  However, I've noticed a few places while out and about that beside the toilet is what looks exactly like the sprayer nozzle and hose that we're used to having at the kitchen sink.  Since I'm fairly certain that we're not meant to do the dishes at the toilet, I can only conclude that this is supposed to be used for the bottom. (Although it would improve our dish washing process at the crazily set up kitchen sink dramatically if we had one of these there too)  We have what seems to be a hook up beside the toilets here in the apartment, but unfortunately no sprayer.  If only I had known, I could've brought our nice new sink sprayer from home... we would've had the fanciest butt cleaner in Brazil.

We had a few issues with the apartment, mainly the phone and the shower in the master bathroom. 

I wrote an email to the owner, who is the daughter of the Divanda, whom we call the land lady.  The owner is in Germany, she works for the Brazilian consulate in Frankfort, and is married to a German.  He wrote me back on her behalf, stating that the land lady, would come by today and bring a new phone (the 4th one) and also bring a specialist to fix the shower.  The land lady showed up around 10:30 - 11 AM.  We tried the new phone with the same results.  The line is always busy, even when trying to call out.  And when someone can call in, the phone makes a very short single meep.  That meep is so soft, we wouldn't hear it in a completely quiet house, which this isn't.  So the phone will wait another week until a specialist can come to take a look, Wednesday. 

We were then waiting for the electrician from an engineering company to come and fix the shower.  I know, an electrician for the shower, keep reading.  Apparently the showers in Brazil are all heated on demand, with electricity.  Actually, they are heated in the shower head by massive amounts of electricity.  I know, water and electricity don't mix, but they have a ground wire in the water stream to make sure you don't get any of the 20 Amps at 220 Volts while getting squeeky clean.  The shower worked moderately well after we learned to only allow a slight amount of water to trickle, enough to activate the trigger, and put electricity through a coil that heats up the water flowing around it.  I tried the shower after Laura was in there on Wednesday or so, and it was completely luke warm, tap temperature.  We checked the circuit breaker, the switches, everything, no hot water in that bathroom.  It turns out, the coil was on it's way out, and finally snapped with her shower.  So he installed a new coil, super quick operation.  The engineer couldn't get the lid back on, for the shower to have enough pressure for the trigger, so he wrapped about a half mile of teflon tape around it, and said it was good to go.  I was going to leave well enough alone, not wanting to mess with the electrical aspect of this job, but while showering, it threw the breaker and I had cold water again.  So I took it apart, fixed the gap and applied the lid correctly.  The shower is now so hot, even on the lower setting we can finally get some higher water pressure.  It is a joy to shower now, but unfortunately, once you look behind the curtain, you can't pretend showering isn't a super dangerous event, not because of slipping in the shower, but because 20 AMPs will kill you, and between life and death is a small green ground wire in a water stream.  Thank god we can predict where the water flows. ;)  Now I know why nonno Ernie only wanted to shower in the maids quarters, no hot water and no risk of death.

Oh yeah, Lunch with the land lady.  So we are waiting and waiting for the phone company to open back up after noon.  So around 1 PM, we offered the land lady some rice with chili over it I made the night before.  She said it was good and ate it all up.  Maybe she was just being polite, I do not know.  But she got to see me clean the apartment once the girls went to nap, and commented to Laura how Brazilian men wouldn't be caught doing any domestic housework.  Laura just smilied at how lucky she has it, then ordered me back into the kitchen to do the dishes.  Anyhow, around 2 PM, she got ahold of the phone technician, that told her the earliest they would be here, is in 7 days, next Wednesday.  She tried to argue with them, was cut off, and then called back and said, sounds good, see you next Wednesday.  I hope one day soon, we will be able to call out with our phone, and hear the ringer when someone tries to call us.

This morning I took Abby and Zoë down to the park to run off some energy.  It was maybe half an hour after breakfast, which the girls devoured.  They each had an egg sandwich, some yogurt, and half a banana as well as some juice.  When we first got down there, I played 'mother may I' with them as requested and then they just wanted to run around a bit.  After that they wanted to do some different kinds of running and races and things and to pretend that they were racing in the olympics.  They always asked which of them won the gold medal.  They ran track, hurdles, long jump, did swimming and other odd things.  Every now and then Zoë would come over to me and say she needed to take a breather, so she'd sit with me for a moment before continuing.  After maybe half an hour, maybe, Zoë plopped her head down next to me and asked me to give her some shade, as the sun had come out from a cloud and was beginning to be strong.  She was whining and said she was ready to go back to the apartment so I gave Abby one more chance to do a run and then we walked back.

At the building, Zoë was really slow to walk up the steps to the entrance and once in the hallway she said she didn't feel well.  I took a look at her and asked if she was going to be sick and she said that she was just tired so I told her we'd get her some water and she could lie down.  Once in the elevator she just leaned against me and held my hand, then proceeded to throw up.  Her face grew instantly white, including her lips, which had absolutely no color.  Chris keeps telling me, "Well that's what happens when you throw up" but this was fairly extreme and she was lethargic all of the sudden.  It really made me nervous so I scooped her up in my arms and as soon as the elevator opened I instructed Abby to get to the door for Daddy to open up.  He helped me to get Zoë in a cool shower, where she sat on the floor for a bit and I got her some water to sip.  I was trying to figure out how to call down to the front desk to tell them that my daughter had been sick in the elevator, then just went to clean it myself but someone had already wiped up the mess.  Chris got a towel for Zoë and her and I lay in the bed together.  Abby came in and asked Zoë if she'd like a foot rub or a hand rub and said that she was giving Zoë 'the treatment'.

Pretty soon Zoë perked up and slowly got some food back in her and we hydrated her and took it easy the rest of the day, much to the dismay of both girls.  They wanted to go to the pool later on, they wanted to walk to ice cream, this that and the other.  Zoë is completely back to normal now, I think she just had some heat exhaustion coupled with a full tummy.

Abby and Zoë have been asking about Mrs. Yoga every time we do yoga.  Today the girls got a big surprise preparing for yoga up on the roof of the apartment building.  We had went up and found a spot mostly in the shade and I pointed out three squares of tile for each of the girls to have as their mats.  After they got situated I went around the corner and who should come out to do yoga with them but Mrs. Yoga!  Both Zoë and Abby couldn't share quickly enough about everything they've been doing for the past couple of weeks.  Then Zoë said to Mrs. Yoga, "Your belly is getting big.  It's bigger than the last time we saw you."  :)  After yoga the girls got to go have a swim in the pool with Mommy to cool off.

We met with an expat friend and his family today.  This is the same man that came by to help Chris file the police report.  After Abby and Zoë (and Daddy) were done napping, we gave them a call and Richard came to pick us up, as he didn't want us to have to take the bus.  Their house is pretty close by, and when we got there we heard his daughters running to hide.  We told him not to worry about it, that it was the same thing our girls would have done.  His wife, Irene greeted us and then we all went to see if we could get their two girls, Anabelle, who just turned 5, and Talita, who is 7, to come out of their shell.  Abby and Zoë had no problems going in to play with all the girly toys without Talita and Anabelle and after a while all of the girls began playing together.

We had a nice time chatting with Richard and Irene while all of the girls played, and pretty soon Talita had them out in the living room to watch Barbie and the 12 dancing princesses, so our girls were quite pleased about the visit.  When it was time to go, Zoë was the first to go right up and give both girls a hug good-bye.  Abby hid her face in my pants at first, but then went and gave hugs too.  They also invited them all to come play at our apartment sometime.