Sausage Toe and Gopher Guts

This week for me was kind of like ordering a hamburger only to have it show up without the patty, which was exactly how it all kicked off for us down here last Saturday night.  We finally figured out Uber Eats and were happily tracking our motorcycle delivery man as he raced through town to Bob’s Burgers and back on his way to deliver hamburgers, french fries, and milkshakes, the first real craving from home that the girls had requested in a month.  As has been the pattern this week, I was the most upset when both girls hamburgers arrived without patties in them.  Hannah and Lila, clearly the adults in the room, again, decided that it was ok because we had ordered bacon on the burgers and now they had a nice BLT.  As the person in the room working at the five year old level, I was in full pouting mode because I had already forgotten to order the fries, and so was kicking myself that now two thirds of the first meal the girls had really wanted amounted to a poorly decorated bun and a milkshake.  Thank goodness the milkshake was decent.  And double thank goodness both girls have more of their mom than me in them.

It was a tough week for me.  I don’t do well when I don’t get sleep, exercise or snuggles, and this week was a big three strikes and you’re out in all those categories.  Sleep has been elusive because of a combination of things that are slowly improving, but mainly because we don’t have screens on our windows yet, so nights are hot right now, and our bed literally is so hard you wake up feeling bruised.  The mattress topper arrived Thursday and is a godsend.  Screens are coming soon, and then we will have a soft bed and cool night air to sleep in, and that is going to be great.  On the exercise front, meetings every night but Friday this week at school and a more than slightly inflamed second toe on my right foot has made doing anything beyond hobbling around challenging.  I think the infection is improving, and if I can figure out a way to teach kindergarten without walking, then it should clear up.  I have antibiotics coming if things don’t get better, but I hate to put that intestinal beating on my system just as I feel like my body is adjusting to new kid and new country germs.  Hopefully my Jimmy Dean Sausage Toe continues to deflate and exercise returns to my life, and Sarah’s.   She has been dealing with the nastiest cough of her life for the last week and a half.  We are talking “great, green globs of greasy, grimy, gopher guts” sort of cough, hence the lack of snuggles.  It’s hard to ask for a smooch when you wear a hospital mask to bed.  Don’t judge, I can’t handle having sausage toe and gopher guts cough at the same time.  I’m dainty.

If it’s not clear yet, the girls are amazing.  I can’t count the number of times already I’ve heard one or both of them say, “it’s ok Dad” and mean it.  Hannah didn’t even lose it when her phone got dropped into a pool on Thursday.  I would have cried, again.  She put it in a container of rice immediately and two days later everything but the power button works.  Fingers crossed it stays that way.  Thankfully, we haven’t had the moment yet when we are all having a bad day at the same time.  It will happen, but so far we have been taking turns, and somehow the family members who aren’t falling apart are lifting those that are back up to our feet.  This week I took more than my share of turns getting lifted up.  So I’ve got some lifting, and loving, to do in return this week.

No pictures this week, and more stories to tell soon.  Electric scooter rides, commuting to malls by closed highways, birthday parties for ten year olds that cost more than our wedding, my first haircut in Portuguese, the politics and dynamics of kindergarten soccer in Brazil, and interesting soaking remedies for sausage toe that may have stained my whole foot pink.  I don’t know if this is how blogs are supposed to go, but it’s our messy world down here right now and so I’m writing about what feels like needs to be written.   There are still far more good moments than not in our lives here, and I promise to share a few more of those next time, especially the birthday party!

With love from Sausage Toe, Gopher Guts, and the two most amazing daughters any dad could have.

Coming up for air.

Kicking it off with some photos from Chapada Imperial, a guided waterfall tour just an hour from our house.  Lots of swimming, hiking, monkeys, giant spiders (not my favorite and no picture because I was headed at mach speed in the other direction),  and of course, a giant lunch afterwards.

Hmmm, wonder who was the first kid to jump off the rope swing? 

I had to go back and read my own blog entry to try to get a feel for what all has happened in the eternity since I last wrote.  Apparently, that eternity is just about a week and a half, so my word choice might be a bit dramatic.  So what has happened in that time?  Good question.  Ten days of school, two trips to the farmers market, at least three more to the grocery store, five basketball and two volleyball practices for Hannah, one trip to a waterfall, two classroom parent open house coffees, one school BBQ open house on a Saturday, a failed trip to find a mattress topper, two successful trips to buy Hannah and I new bikes, a few full on meltdowns with crying and screaming (and not just Sara and I), exhaustion, elation, chocolate dessert crepes, lots and lots of watermelon, three Portuguese lessons, living the reality that teaching is hard everywhere, countless miles walked to and from school and around town, and just not enough sleep for anyone right now.

So how are things going?   Lila could probably be a little happier, but barely.  That girl is all in and having a ball. She is making friends, playing hard, loving her teacher, and probably doing the best of all of us right now.  We had another surreal moment when Lila got invited to go swimming at her new friend’s house, which most people around town just call the Swedish Embassy.  It sounds way more exotic than it is.  This great Swedish family lives with a few other families on the embassy property and you visit them like anyone else.  But it was still kind of cool.  Exhaustion hits her like all of us, but food or sleep is the magic that sets her right every time.

Surprisingly, I give Hannah a close second.  She actually said out loud that this hasn’t been as hard as she thought it would be.  Thank goodness for team sports!  She is playing both basketball and volleyball right now, and loves her new teammates and coaches.  Every time I see her around school she is smiling and talking with someone.  She has been advocating for herself with the school counselors, who are amazing, to get the class schedule she wants and has already moved up a level in Portuguese and is going to be playing with the high school band.  Her classes are small, and her teachers are amazing, so we couldn’t ask for more for her right now.  She misses her old friends, and is excited about her new ones.  And of course somehow one of her new friends just happens to be the tallest 8th grade girl in the school.  Her name is Payton, but she reminds me of Penelope, Kendall, and Chloe put together.  Love to you girls from Hannah!

I am getting my teacher butt kicked, but in the way I expected, and in the way I wanted, most days.  I have been doing a lot of self mentoring, and folks who worked with me would be cracking up at the things I am saying to myself.  “Relationships are the most important thing.”  “You will be teaching routines and expectations every day all year.” “It will get better.”  “It doesn’t have to be perfect.” “Taking time right now to do what your kids need is ok.”  If I missed anything folks think of when they start their year, let me know.  And like I hoped, I already love my kiddos and am so happy to have them every day, if for no other reason than to have a do over from yesterday.  I am also lucky enough to have two teachers on my team that I am excited to learn from.  They are so good!  I’m learning through every conversation with them and it’s amazing.  Every day I am feeling a little more like the teacher I want to be, and I really am happy to be back in the classroom.  It’s no picnic.  I’ve been flat out told “no” more times this year than several years combined stateside, and I have a handful of kids who are still four years old, so cranky is the norm after lunch.  As a group, we are already making progress, and they do really get excited about learning to read and write. The daily roller coaster is my reality, but it does at least seem to be trending upwards.  Next step is working on the overall balance of our lives here, getting more sleep and exercise, not eating every single piece of the amazing food that is everywhere, and fine tuning the comfort of our apartment so we feel even more like we are at home.

I’ll let Sara speak for herself in her next post, which might also be labeled as her first post, so I wouldn’t hold your breath out there.  Kidding, kind of.  She is riding the ups and downs like all of us, and even busier than I am with school stuff.  Giant shocker for those that know her.  She has an amazing teaching partner, and figures out more every day.  She is overcommitted already to extra trainings and is living the nightly laptop work at home dream.  She too is working to find that balance we all are, but has a neat class and an incredible teaching assistant, so it is headed in the right direction.

It is still strange to see flocks of green parakeets instead of swallows, and to see marmosets instead of squirrels.  Now I know why people stop and take pictures of squirrels when they first see them.   They are wierd little animals when you stop to think about it.  The little things keep us going, like the incredible smiles and kindness of 99% of the people you meet, and we have yet to meet that 1% person who is rumored to out there and grumpy.  And being able to stop by the fruit stand on the way home and pick up half a giant watermelon for less than $3.00 will probably never get old.

Yesterday was rough, today is better, and who knows what tomorrow will bring.  We are slowly learning to live like a Brazilian, which currently means to pack a water bottle, a sense of humor, some patience, and a smile.

Lots of love from all of us down here to all of you up there.  

Tchau, tchau,

Adam

First Day of School

It is kind of hard to wrap my head around my the fact that we just finished our first day of school, in Brazil, on August 5th.  Two weeks ago we had just spent our first night in our apartment and now we just completed our first day of two years full of school days.  It turns out that this isn’t some sort of extended vacation, it’s kind of for real.  

And like any teacher anywhere, Sara and I started today with about a million more things we wish we had been able to prepare, and really no clue about what the day would ultimately hold.  And like any school, there was missing curriculum, last minute construction, and lots of meetings to make the lead up all the more fun.  But unlike any school either of us have ever been in, there is help.  And not like a little help.  I mean that Sara and I both have a full time teaching assistant, each.  My room in particular was in the building that was ready late, and my TA worked non stop for two days to get us ready.  I would have to go to meetings, and I would come back to major progress every time.  And the TAs know everything about the school and the kids, and they are native Portuguese speakers who are also fluent in English.  My TA even came in over the weekend to work with the other kinder TAs because we were so far behind.  So yeah, they are kind of amazing.

And I’ve even managed to hide my crazy from my TA so far, so she hasn’t asked for a transfer yet.  We’ll see if that continues when I start talking to my puppet Mikey the Marmot on Wednesday.  I’ll try to limit talking with Mikey to when I’m actually sitting in front of the kids for now, which can be hard because he’s actually an excellent listener as rodents go.

As far as school today, despite my extensive planning, I stuck to my “lesson plan” for a grand total of about 16 minutes before completely punting on about 50% of my day and basically winging it.  Thank goodness kindergarten here has a staggered start and I only had half of my class until noon.  And just to show off my mad teaching skills, and my miserable Portuguese skills,  I ended up with the wrong student in my room for most of the morning.   Nothing like your teaching partner poking her head in and saying, “I think you have the wrong So and So.”  Long story, fine ending, but yep, that’s why they hired me. 

The girls more than survived their first day.  They might even lean towards calling it a pretty good day.  Hannah found all her classes, Lila is starting to get to know her classmates, and no tears so far.  Hannah heads to day one of basketball practice tomorrow, so hopefully the transition continues its slow upward trajectory.   And they even like their uniforms, which is good because they will be wearing them every day.

I should be planning, but my brain is drained, and so I’m trying to remain coherent and share a bit about day one as teachers and students in Brazil.

Love to everyone!

Adam