Happy 4th of July

It’s an interesting thing to spend the 4th of July in another country…mostly because you tend to forget it’s the 4th of July. Here, it’s just another day. No cookouts, no fireworks, no American flags on the doors of houses. In fact, I was supposed to go to a party tonight with my friends from work to celebrate Independence Day. But since I had prior obligations, I didn’t make it 🙂  However, I enjoyed a fabulous 4th of July in Brazil. First, Samuel and I met up with some Americans (who are here on a mission trip) and a few Brazilians to take a trip to the beach. We stopped at a little park first, which is on an island. The park was set up to help with the conservation of manatees. There were 6 baby manatees there. They are raising them so that they can be released back into the wild. It was a nice little park and it was right by the beach!

Next we drove to a place called “Forte Orange”. This is a fort that was built in the 1600’s when the Dutch occupied Pernambuco. The fort has been reconstructed, but there are remnants of the original fort there. We walked around in the fort and then went down to the beach where we sat under and umbrella and enjoyed the beautiful weather. It was a perfect sunny day with a cool breeze. I drank some agua de coco, which I had never tried before, and it was delicious. It’s just the milk straight from a coconut, but it was cold and refreshing. After the beach we drove back to the apartment where everyone (14 people) gathered for a wonderful lunch cooked by Samuel’s mom. (Chicken, mashed potatoes, gravy, dressing, jello, cake and ice cream…..which beats burgers and hot dogs any day!

On a different note, I’m finding that my Portuguese  is coming along nicely. It’s amazing how much I’ve learned since I was in Brazil the last time. (2 years ago) My professor would be proud 🙂

Next time I’ll write about the mission work we have been helping with.