rooted journeys

I just read this in an article in the NY Times that says “Agência Click calculates that 2.6 million Brazilians update their blogs daily, which ranks the country as among the world’s most active in terms of blog activity.”
I think I need to absorb some of this Brazilian blog spirit – it’s a little lame that I’m barely posting monthly these days. In our defense, we have not had internet at home so it is difficult to stay on top of all internet-related personal things these days. Fingers crossed though, we’re hoping to be moved into a new (2 bedroom) apartment at the end of the month, so we should be able to get ourselves settled in with internet, among other things, soon.

The best thing to report from our recent journeys was our lovely weekend at Fazenda Alfheim with Rance and Lone. Our Saturday there was exactly how a Saturday should be . . . we woke up to coffee and homemade bread (thanks Lone!); took a hike into the rainforest to admire their waterfall and relaxed in the sunlight along the river; put a (local) leg of lamb in the oven with a truly delicious marinade that Rance assembled of fresh organic herbs and vegetables; and enjoyed dinner, tea, chocolate and always inspiring conversation with wonderful friends. Delicioso.

Sunday, Jeff suited up to help Rance and a few workers harvest honey. Unfortunately, we only were there for half of the process since we had to get back to work on monday morning, but it was still wonderful to be part of it. Jeff helped them to remove the honey from the hives and carry the wax filled frames from the hillside into a room near the house. After all the frames were transferred, the boxes were left covered until the evening for the honey extraction process. You leave the boxes covered for the day so the bees don’t eat it all and at night they subside and head back to their hives. We hear from Rance and Lone that this “spring” honey is quite delicious, so i think Jeff’s efforts will have paid off!

All is well for us in São Paulo – I’ll report back in more detail soon. In the meantime, enjoy our pictures from our weekend at the farm and check back again soon.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

This week marks one month of officially (and legally) living in São Paulo. It has been a good month. Our expat group is constantly expanding and we are both thoroughly enjoying work. In general, we’re happy to be working again, but we’re also enjoying what we’re doing – learning and contributing at the same time. Our portuguese is progressing slowly, but more and more we’ll be called upon to communicate in portuguese speaking meetings, so this will force the issue.

Last weekend was a gloomy one full of rainy days. Here’s a little peak at what life might be like in the heart of the rainy season, which is quickly approaching. This picture below was taken from the window of our cab as we were trying to get to the next neighborhood over. Also check out this video we took from inside the cab – yes, that is what I would call a sidewalk and road washing away.

So as you can imagine, we opted to spend a lot of time cooped up indoors, which made for some tasty meals, juice and relaxing.

This weekend we plan to explore a little bit more, so I hope to have some fun stories to share. And next week will be a busy one full of  design workshops as the architects for our big project will be in town from London. This will really drive home the fact that we’re on the other side of the table (as in the developer side), so we’ll certainly let you know how that feels!