Our First Two Months In the USA

Much has happened in the last two months. So much, that I have had a hard time getting to the computer on a regular basis to update. This post should catch you all up a little—at least as far as the photos that are available.

Not all the photos are titled or tagged as well as I would like, but there are so many that it would be a monumental task to do all that, then you would never see them.

The first set of photos is a slideshow that Nádya took most of the pictures. It is from her first few days here in Vancouver, Washington (the Vancouver in the USA, and the older of the two Vancouvers). Click here for the slideshow.

From Dinner at Nathan and Melissa's

One of the first things we did was have dinner as a family a night or two after we landed. Kylie was, of course, the star of the show. :) See link under the picture for more pictures from that night.

From In Idaho With Karl's Parents

We then drove to Idaho with my parents to spend some time with them, and see some of my extended family. This is where we discovered that Kylie had an ear infection in each ear, and that we were done with traveling for a good long while. (Well, done in the sense that we did not want to travel any more for a while. We still had some driving to do.) [slideshow]

From Beach Trip

We then took a family trip to Pacific City on the Oregon Coast with my parents, brothers, and their wives. It was a fun time to spend together just being a family. [slideshow]

From Mother's Day

We spent Nádya's first mother's day with Ryan's wife's (Amy) family. It was nice to have a place that sort of felt like family to go (it ended up feeling very much like we were at home there by the end of the day.). [slideshow]

The next big event was Nádya's sister's wedding. We did not think we could afford to go, so had written it off. However, a very generous person in Patrick's family was kind enough to pay our airfares there and back, so we took to the sky once again.

From Silver Springs

We were able to spend the week before the wedding with Nyna and Patrick (and his family). While there we did some tourist things, and the coolest was Silver Springs. One of Patrick's brothers works there, so we got free admission, but it would have been worth the price. That was a really fun day, and we got some beautiful pictures. [slideshow]

From Patrick and Nyna's Wedding

Nyna and Patrick's wedding was beautiful, and it was great to be there. Our photos of the event even turned out pretty well. [slideshow]

Some Statistics

I am not sure how accurate some of these numbers are, but we have traveled a lot the last month or so.

• Fly from Teresina (THE) to Portland (PDX): 8200 miles. (Our route took us through Brasilia, São Paulo, Miami, and Dallas/Fort Worth.)



• Drive from Portland to Weiser, Idaho and back to visit family in Idaho: 800 miles.



• Drive to Pacific City, Oregon for a weekend of family togetherness (and back): 200 miles.



• Fly to Tampa Bay, Florida, drive to Ocala, and back to Portland for Patrick and Nyna's wedding: 5400 miles.

That adds to a grand total of 14,600 miles (23,500 Km) per person for the three of us in a period of five weeks—not including travel within the various cities.

We are doing well, and getting adjusted to life here. It isn't without some bumps and the odd bruise, but we are doing well.

In fact, I start work on Tuesday. It is a manufacturing job, and it looks like a good opportunity to get our feet on the ground financially speaking.

There are more updates and photos to come now that we have stopped traveling so much.

Rio de Janeiro Day One: Getting There

To the Airport

The alarm went off. I sprang out of bed and as my feet hit the floor I wondered why it had gone off. Then, as the fog of sleep cleared I realized that it was time to head to Rio de Janeiro. It was raining hard (even for Teresina). I wondered how wet we would get in the process of loading the car with our suitcases.

Nádya and I got around, then had breakfast while Kylie slept. While I got our bags downstairs and out to the car Nádya got Kylie. She must have realized this was very odd behavior for us, as she completely woke up, and remained awake until we were on the plane.

It is only about five minutes to the airport from our house by car. Maybe less. The rain had subsided by the time we got there, which made unpacking the bags from the car a little easier.

After checking in and waiting for a bit the screens at the airport started telling us that our flight was delayed. Not by much, but it was enough that they decided that we needed to get boarding passes for the next flight moved back to the following flight. Unfortunately they only decided this after we had passed the security checkpoint. So we had to go back to the desk, get our boarding passes, then go back through security.

To Fortaleza

While I have taken so many flights that I gave up keeping track years ago, for Nádya and Kylie this was flight number one. Nádya was a bit nervous, but after a few jitters she grew accustomed to it and even liked it. Kylie was going about the business of getting some more sleep.

We landed in Fortaleza and had to wait for a bit for our next plane. In the mean time a family visiting from Portugal came over and started visiting with us—well, to be honest, the came over to visit with Kylie. We just delude ourselves into thinking that people want to talk to us when all they want is to talk with Kylie.

Kylie had the time of her life (she loves to see other children, and actually has taken to jumping and kicking when she sees them). There are some more pictures in our album from the day.

To Rio de Janeiro

From Fortaleza we were headed to Rio de Janeiro. But somehow we had either missed the note that we were stopping in Salvador, or we were not told. Sitting on the ground in Salvador, our flights were all running late, and we were tired and bored. Ripe time for a distraction or two.

Next thing we know we saw Patrícia Werneck coming down the asile of our plane. She is an actress who recently played a rather large part in a novela (soap opera). I had watched bits and pieces of the novela, so I immediately recognized her.

I, however, had forgotten about the Kylie factor. I figured she was headed toward the back of the plane where we were seated for any host of reasons except to talk with us. I was wrong. She had heard Kylie laughing and screaming (not crying, the happy screams), and wanted to meet her.

She said that Kylie "Looks like a Johnson's baby!" Gerber is not as big in Brazil as Johnson & Johnson, so it is like someone saying that she looks like a Gerber baby.

Patrícia Werneck seemed like a delightful person, and even though Kylie was not to excited about interacting with her (it was nap time again) she obliged our request to get a photo of her.

She left, and after a few minutes we saw another person we recognized from the novelas:

Caio Blat ended up in the chair right behind us. He too was interested in Kylie, but by this time she was pretty grumpy. I overheard him telling the flight attendant that he was very tired and just wanted to sleep. That he did. The entire flight he was sacked out in the chairs behind us.

I guess the two actors had been in a presentation of the Passion of Christ in Floriano (?) where Caio Blat had played Pontius Pilate, and Patrícia Werneck had played Mary Magdalene.

Arrival in Rio de Janeiro

One of the things we did not know about our trip is where we would stay. We knew that trying to afford a hotel was out of the budget range (buying the plane tickets there was about two-month's worth of income while on sale for half-price).

We had a promise, though, from one of the leaders of the Baptist Convention that goes to our church that we would be able to find a place if we went to the same seminary where Patrick and Nyna stayed. "If not at the seminary, then someone will find you a place. I promise."

Of course, it was 11 o'clock Easter Sunday morning when we arrived at the seminary, and nobody who knew anything about our situation was around. There was a group there who were cooking lunch, though, and they helped us contact someone who would know what to do. They even fed us, and gave us water (the last real meal we had had was at home in Teresina).

Stay tuned to find out where we ended up staying.

This entry is part of "Rio de Janeiro: A Series." All the published entries are linked from that entry. Don't want to miss out on the coming entries? Try the RSS feed, or getting updates via email.

Patrick Has Arrived

Patrick got here this morning on the right plane, and even a little early. The only hitch in the journey was that his suitcases did not arrive with him. They are supposed to come later today according to the airline.

[Update (Feb. 21 7:30 PM local): Patrick and Nyna have headed off to Rio de Janeiro this morning, and I got an email from Patrick that they had arrived safely. Patrick's luggage got here after midnight last night, so it did not get here "the next day," but he was happy to have it all the same. ;) ]

Will Travel For Visa

The ink is dried. The writer's cramp is still wearing off my hand. The paper cuts are beginning to heal. The forms are all tucked safely in a nice folder with our passports and work-permits. We even have the bus tickets.

Recife here we come!



We are heading to Recife via bus this Sunday at noon so that we can do two things at the US Consulate:

1. Register Kylie as a citizen of the United States of America.
2. Apply for Nádya's immigration visa.

This is the first step in getting moved to the US. If all goes well the process will take about six months, and who knows, maybe less (okay, so that is not to likely).

It will be a seventeen or eighteen hour bus ride on two-lane roads with a two-month-old. Want to sit behind us?

Very long-time readers may remember that we have made the trip to Recife before. It did not turn out the way we hoped. The rules have changed now, and are a good deal clearer now (at least, so it seems to me). The Consulate even seems to be more ready to answer questions than before.

Other News:

Following are some posts you may have missed if you are not signed up to the email subscription to Karl and Nádya's Blog*:

• Kylie recently turned two months old there is a post about that called: Two Months With Kylie
• We had a beautiful rainbow the other day: Teresina Rainbow
• I also posted a story about burning saltwater that you should read.

*This is a different list than many of you are already on, but still managed by me—I am in the process of trying to switch you over to this list, but you have to sign up for yourselves.

[composed and posted with ecto]

Technorati Tags: passports, six months, work permits, kylie, immigration visa, bus ride, teresina, united states of america, Our Activities, Our Story, bus tickets, recife, feedburner

Adventures and Blessings

Here we are in Parauapebas. Many things are different than we expected, but we should have expected that!

We apologize for not updating you all sooner, but there have been many things that got in our way of getting to the internet. First, I will let you know that Nádya has a completely clean bill of health (the thing they removed was benign), and has nearly recovered from the surgery.

Our trip here was quite a story in and of itself. The bus left an hour late at 9 PM, then broke down at about 4 AM. We got under way again about 10 or 11 AM, and had to change buses (planned) at a city about 3 hours from Parauapebas. When we were on the bus, and around the corner (we did not have seats at this time, and were standing in the aisle!) from the bus station this bus broke down. I think this was about 10 PM, but times are all pretty fuzzy now. The driver, and mechanics were fiddling around with it for awhile, got it started, drove 20 meters, and it died again. So the went to tinkering again.

About 11:30 we pulled into the bus station again. We were told that they would give us our money back for the trouble, so we got off the bus, and I was waiting for luggage. We were unsure of what we would do for the night. Suddenly a police car pulled up, and I found out that we were getting back on the bus.

The police got on the bus after most everyone had gotten on (some had had enough, and did not wish to go further that night, so we had seats at this time). They walked the aisle fully armed–which is to say one had his hand on his sidearm, and the other had a very mean looking short rifle, which was probably semi-automatic at the least.

They looked in my bag to make sure I was not a criminal (but not many others), and took two guys off to do a full pat-down. They returned shortly, and were seated. The police, not finding anything or anyone that looked suspicious enough, decided to escort the bus just in case.

We were under way about an hour later. The bus had not broken down, it was just a stall tactic to decide what to do, I guess. A tire blew later that night, and that took an hour to change. We finally arrived at something like 3 AM.

It was a long trip.

Both of us are still waiting for jobs. Nádya had an interview early last week, and from all appearances she has a job. First she has to have medical exams, though, which will take place the first week of July. Karl has an interview with an English school the morning of the 27th (tomorrow, as I write this), as well as other opportunities. The English school would just be for 3-4 hours per week, at the most, so I am keeping my eyes open. One of my other opportunities is to work with CVRD the same company Nádya will hopefully work for. I interviewed the day after we arrived, and the man I talked with was very interested in having me work there. He was concerned that we find a good fit for me, though, so we might have to wait a while before I actually start working there (they need to find a position that will work, as well as my possibly needing to take some tests.).

We are living downtown in the second story of a building that overlooks the central square. It is quite noisy from 5 AM to about 10 or 11 PM, with a slight lull between the hours of 12 and 2 PM (the lunch hour).

On our arrival, we found that we had been blessed with a bed-frame and mattress (He felt it was the least he could do, as my in-laws were very hospitable to him and his friend while they were in Teresina for medical reasons.).

It is about 95º F during the day–in the house, anyway, it seems cooler when we go outside. But at night it is very different than Teresina. It cools off! It actually gets down to about 70º F most every night. This makes sleeping much more comfortable and effective.

We do have internet at home, but are limited to how much we can be on it, as we pay the phone company for usage by the minute. Please let us know if you want to send a large file, so we can plan for it.

I suppose I could go on for a few more paragraphs, but I will need something to write about next time, too! All for now.

Summary of Karl's trip to the States

Whirlwind. It is sort of cliché, but that is how I felt the trip went by. So many people to see, and things to do, and so little time.

I said before I left that I would update while I was there. Unfortunately, I that plan was hampered by a lack of time, as well as an unhealthfully slow internet connection. So, I am doing an update now.

Instead of detailing everything that happened in my little-over-two-week-trip, I think I will overview the major events. Some of the details may be a little messed up, so if the one I mess up is one you know about, let me know. We will go in chronological order:

Wedding:

The primary reason I went was that my brother, Nathan, got married on the 20th. I arrived the 18th in the afternoon, and we had the bachelor party that night (I guess he wanted to be well-rested for the wedding, or some-such.).

The next day, I got to rest a little, as well as having the rehearsal, and rehearsal dinner that night. I recall being very tired, and was probably not a lot of fun to be around.

The food was very good. I do remember that!

Saturday the 20th of May, we did the picture thing before the wedding, and got the ceremony started at noon. I am pretty sure a woman would tell you all about the flowers (which were beautiful), the dress (which was also very chic, as they are saying here in Brazil), the other decorations, and, of course, the bride (I can only think of one more beautiful--mine). I am not a woman, though.

My tux was smelly. The last person that wore it had forgotten to use deodorant, or something. It also became apparent that the designer shoes I was wearing--well, the “designer” forgot the inside part of the shoe... they were pretty uncomfortable.

All of that, though, did not overshadow the very special time with friends and family, and seeing my bro get married. It was a beautiful time, and... Well, how about I quit talking, and show you some pictures. There are more, but these are the highlights. My dad took the pictures, so he is not in any of them for that reason (Just in case you felt left out, dad.).

More information about the photos can be found at our Flickr account (there is a link on the top right-hand side of this page).

Packing:
After the wedding, I rested a bit, and visited with some of the family was around. It was good to see them, as well as my church family on Sunday.

The rest of the week I spent packing my belongings better. My parents are moving, and I needed to get my things in order as much as possible, as they are storing them for me.

I did see a few friends during the week, which was wonderful. I am blessed to have wonderful friends, and very supportive ones, at that.

When I had all my boxes packed, I put them in a little truck my dad owns, and my brother, Ryan, and I headed to my parent's new home in Idaho. My mother's parent's live near there, as well as other family, so we visited them as well. Another great weekend.

Of course, it was quite a drive; essentially, two days of driving, and one day to visit and rest.

I knew I had to sell some things in order to make the finances work, as well as everything fitting in the storage space. So, undaunted by the impossibility of the tasks (well, “undaunted” might be exaggerated a little lot), I looked in the first places I could think of to sell. God blessed my efforts, and everything I had to sell sold within that week. With one exception, and it looks like my '71 Jimmy is going to sell as soon as we get the title stuff worked out.

The last weekend, I saw more friends, and visited my home church once more.

What's With This Job?
I got some emails after the last entry asking what the deal was with my new job. Sorry, I have not kept you very up-to-date on that.

Nádya's brother works at a company that he really likes, and gives him great benefits. So, he was able to hook us up with jobs there. Since we are in “hurry up and wait” mode, we decided to give it a shot.

As a result, it looks like we will be here another year, at the least. We are looking forward to having our own house, as well as me having a job. It would have been nice for both of us to visit together for this reason, but that did not work out, due to the huge wait time for visas to the US at the moment.

Yeah, I will miss my family, friends, and guitars for another year, but that is better than being away from my wife for any amount of time. We (at the moment, at least) plan to visit next year sometime. There are a million and six possiblities between here and there, though, so don't start making big plans yet. :D

Nádya Update:
She is feeling quite good today. Good enough to be pulling pranks and making jokes all day. As I have said before, we get the results of the biopsy on Tuesday.

Real Life Is Now

When I was in high school, I and my friends would look forward to the day that we graduated, and began “real life.” Sure, sometimes we were nervous about it, but over-all we looked forward to it.

This past year I have found that “real life” is an interesting cocktail of good things and bad things. Sort of like those really sour gummy worms; you know, the ones that are sour on the outside, but then, after that initial shock they are really sweet.

After Nádya's surgery yesterday, we are putting off traveling to our new town of Parauapebas, Pará. It will probably be at least a week. This may mean that we cannot have the same jobs that we were lined up for (and possibly not have work at all). But we are following doctor's orders here.

Nádya is doing well, and recovering from the surgery. She is very strong. My initial understanding was that we would get the results of the biopsy today. I was wrong. We find out Tuesday, and will update you as soon as we can.

I am in the process of recovering from all the jet-lag, and getting into the swing of the schedule here. This is the first day that I have had to do some resting since returning. And, while I was there (in the US), I did not have much time for resting, either.

My parents are moving to Idaho (they already have, technically, but have a few things to wrap up at the old house), so I had to get my stuff ready to move, as opposed to just storing it. So, I spent the first week getting that done, and the second week getting my truck ready to sell.

The weekend between those two weeks was spent visiting my grandparent's house in Idaho (as well as my parents, and other family). Essentially, I hit the ground running, and have not stopped since.

It was good, though, to hear from those of you who read that you read. Sometimes I wonder if it's really worth writing all this down, when I see so few responses from it. I am not trying to fish for emails or comments, here (um... not that it would hurt you... :D). Sometimes, though, it is very difficult to gauge whether or not I am accomplishing what I set out to communicate with no responses.

There is much more to say, but I will save it for another entry. For now, I will say that it was very interesting to visit the USA with a dramatically different view of life, politics, and such.

By the way, if you are a Google Earth user (I highly recommend it), you can look at the city where we plan to live and work by typing in Parauapebas, Brazil to the “Fly To” tab.

Ready or not...

...Here I come!

Yep, the bags are packed, and I am ready to go. I really hate leaving without Nadya (again), but I am very excited to see family and friends again.

See you on the other side of my 24-25 hours in planes and airports.

Flying

The good news is that I have in my hot hands tickets for passage to the city I once called home (I still call it that, but now that I am married to a Brazilian, its a little more complex). I will be there the 18th, but probably will not have any time until the 21st or so, as the primary reason I am coming is my brother Nathan´s wedding.

Unfortunately Nádya will not be able to go with me, because there was no time to schedule an interview for her visa by the time we knew we could go. We are all sad about this, but life is lame sometimes.

I plan to be there for a couple of weeks (I leave the 5th of June), and hope to visit some family in Idaho in that time, as well.

I will get some pictures up here one way or another of all the happenings (the camera recently started veiwing the world a little differently), so check back often for all the latest.

Let me know if you want to go to coffee or something.

The things I miss the most:

Yesterday, I got an email from my pastor asking what three things I missed the most about home. It is rather strange how time and separation puts a magnifying glass on one's relationships with people, things, and culture. I had to think (for some time) about a third thing.

Nádya asks me this type of question from time to time as well. So I presume that some of the rest of you are curious too. Hence, I will come up with a list of at least 5 things in no particular order:

• My parents, and brothers.
• Friends.
• Peanut Butter!
• My guitars--I have one here, which is a blessing, but it just is not the same as my others. I frequently find my self longing to play the other ones when I play it.
• Cars, driving--basically the freedom of movement allowed by having ones own transportation.
• My desk--Sounds a bit strange, but I miss having my computer set up on my desk a certain way. Quite a bit more space.
• Variety in food. The food here is good, but seems to lack the variety to which I have become accustomed.

Well, there you have it. I am sure there are more, but these are the ones that popped out to me as I was writing. I even threw in two extra for you--just for you!

What do you think you would miss most about home if you left for over 6 months?

Technorati Tags: Brazil, Food, Life In Brazil, Music, Spouse, Travel

Strange Fruit

Just got done posting a primmer on some of the stranger fruits and vegetables I have seen here in Brazil. If you are interested (and I think you should be--:-D). God has put some pretty cool stuff here that you have probably not seen before.

[Editors note: The link may not work. It seems to be a problem with Blogger. If this is the case for you, click on the link in the sidebar that says “Karl's Blog” and look for the entry “ Things that grow in Brazil.” I will get it working as soon as I can.]

[Editors note: I think the link is working now. {12/29/2005}]

Technorati Tags: Brazil, Cooking, Food, Life In Brazil, Living Outside the US, Pictures, Travel

Our trip to the Ceasa Market

We decided to go shopping for fruits and vegetables today. Nádya wants to make a salad tomorrow, and she knew just the place to purchase most of what she needed for very good prices, the Ceasa Market.

Its kind of a farmers market, there were all kinds of fruits and vegetables (no-not the people!)--in fact, probably more variety than I have seen anywhere else. I took my camera, and got a few pictures, which are below, but you can view larger versions just by clicking on them. This will take you to a different site.


We went fairly early in the morning. I think we got there about 7 AM. The place was already bustling with people getting fruits and vegetables for their Christmas cooking. Its pretty expensive to own a car in Brazil, so this is a pretty packed parking lot.


This is a picture of part of the general market. It was pretty big, really. I was surprised by the size, as well as how many vendors were competing with each other. It was a very cool experience to look around, and see all the people in action. These are mostly tomatoes in the picture here.


There are many varieties, sizes, and shapes of bananas here. They are all better than anything I have had in the US. Generally speaking, a bit sweeter flavor, and sort of a creamy flavor as well. There are (literally) piles of them here. The man with the basket on his shoulder was shuttling them back and forth from somewhere. There were mangoes around here somewhere as well, but I think they are behind the man with the basket.


I think I finally have put to bed the question of how the chicken crossed the road with this photo. I could not help my self when I saw this--I actually almost burst out laughing, as I saw the humor right away. I am sure Brazilians would just see this as normal life, but I had my United States hat on when I took this picture.

Technorati Tags: Entertainment, Life In Brazil, Living Outside the US, Money, Observations On Life, Our Activities, Photography, Travel, Shopping

The Latest

Well... I suppose I should apologize for letting the dust collect on this site the past couple of weeks. We got our internet connection back, but I have been to interested in other things to take the time to write.
We took a bus to Recife on the 19th of September. The purpose of this trip was to get Nádya's visa process started. It was a 17 hour bus ride which left at 8 PM. Bus here is the most affordable way to travel, and most of the buses are well-equipped for long trips. We decided to spend an extra R$15 each to get the more comfortable seats on this trip, and we were glad we did. I have never seen a bus this big. It had two axles in the back, and two in the front. On this bus the better seats are in the bottom I think so that there is less side-to-side motion when the bus goes over bumps. I slept very well that night. I think Nádya did not sleep as well as I, but still slept.

About 2 hours from our destination that bus had mechanical issues (it appeared to be a U-joint, or some similar thing), so we had to wait for another bus to come get us, and take us the rest of the way. That bus was considerably less posh (for us anyway), but we were grateful for the air conditioning.

The next morning we went to the Consulate in Recife. We were told that we should come back at 1 PM to do our business. So, we waited around in a park and enjoyed the much cooler climate of a coastal city. I had (what they called) a hamburger for lunch at the delicatessen and Nádya had rice and beans (other things too, but its not a meal unless it has rice and beans).

When we returned to the Consulate, we were ushered through the security stuff, and into the office. Well, it was more of a window type thing. We spoke with a very polite Brazilian man who was an assistant to the Vice Consul, he told us that he thought we might not be able to apply that day. He then said that we could speak with the Vice Consul, as it was my right as a US Citizen. I thought it couldn't hurt, so I said yes.

The woman who came to the window had these huge eyes and she said “Do you live here, yes or no?” See, in order to apply for a spouse's visa here, one must have residency here. I have the card, and was told that once I had this it would be okay to apply here. I was so astounded by the abrupt manner in which I was treated that I barely had words (well, I had some...). I stammered around a bit, but I think the best I managed was something like “Yes, I think so.” She then repeated herself “DO YOU LIVE HERE OR NOT? YES OR NO! YOU DECIDE. I don't think you do.” And with that she turned and left. The polite guy came back a moment later and we asked him a few more questions and left.

I have written a letter to the ambassador here in Brazil, and am working on sending copies to some other government officials, regarding this issue. I have never been so frustrated as to write a letter before. I can't believe that anyone would treat anyone like that.

That same evening we caught a bus back to Teresina.

So, it looks like we won't be coming to the States much sooner than early spring. They told us to come back in December to try again. Joy. If all goes well then, we might be back in March.

In the meantime, at home, my brother Nathan has returned safely from his tour with the Marines in Iraq. He is excited to be home, and is planning a wedding for spring. They want to wait until we return. Also, my parents are planning a move to Idaho in order to be closer to my grandparents, and possibly save some money.

I also have some pictures to post of the Independence Day parade here. I don't feel like posting them today though.

Technorati Tags: Love, Observations On Life, Our Activities, Our Story