Xss and I arrived at New Destiny Farm (in Ibitaritu, near Belo Horizonte, somewhere in Brazil) on Tuesday night. Waiting up for us was Angus (5) who was very excited to meet us, but despite the effort of waiting up, was then over come with shyness. However, luckily for all, he managed to fight this and speak with us in a mix of Portuguese and English, show us his favourite car and spiderman toys and then proceed to make numerous phone calls to people on his collection (?) of disconnected landline phones. Since i didnt know him that well i didn´t explain that this was rude, nor that mobiles are the way to go. We didnt know anyone he was calling, but since it was in Portuguese i like to think he was letting people know that Xss and I had arrived safely.
The bus journey was ok, i felt intensely sick for 40 mins and wore my Special-Needs-Antisickness-bands for 10 hours 20. I guess they work, and if they are a placebo- who cares. We were met in Belo by a couple who live on the farm who happen to know our vicar at home Charlie. Sometimes being part of Christian networks can be really funny, as you can be in the middle of nowhere and all of a sudden a small link like this appears.
So now here we are at the farm for 3 months. We have a room in´The Big House´with ensuite, and so does another English girl called Claire. It is basically like a hostel which the kids who come on camps stay in, so there are numerous other bathrooms and rooms full of bunkbeds. Everyone eats a communal lunch at midday in this kitchen/dinning room and in the evenings it is all ours. Also on the farm are 3 other houses, One with Angus, his telephones and his family in (his mum is the leader), One with the other leader of the project and his family, and then a final house with Angus´s grandparents in. We are mostly British on site but then several Brazilian workers come in during the day and we are going to have to re-learn our portuguese fast as some speak NO English.
Our other fan is a worker called Jeff, who very sweetly made our bed up for us along with pink roses over it and in vases at the side and cleaned the room, blue tacked up some pictures etc. He then arrived the next day wearing his ´I heart London´hoodie. :) He can speak English, and has proven this by doing so non-stop since we arrived. It is sometimes hard to get away, but he seems sweet enough. He has been to Dover once, and loved it.
Not much else to report. A group of kids from the favela´s will be coming this weekend to stay and enjoy a ´camp´, Either Xss or I will cook and the other film the event on a camera and make a DVD for them of the fun they had. We have a lake, swimming pool, numerous rope courses in the forest, and 5 dogs.
I guess if it all goes wrong and we lose our two fans at least we can stroke the dogs and instantly gain some more.
P.S Due to being in Brazil spell check works in Portuguese, hence the bad typing. That and the keyboards which all need a hard thump to get each key to work!
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