4/14/08 4:45 pm

I am returning now to the house. It’s hot. I won’t turn on the air conditioner just to try to deal with the heat. I think, though, that Mirza is doing best by running around with her daughter, Stela, and the dog, Nana… So I went and joined them. I ate acerola off her tree and another fruit – a small not very sweet type of orange, unwashed with dangerous water.

I then met Adriano, Mirza’s son. He speaks english, but fitfully, probably better than I speak portuguese, though maybe not as I seen willing to try a lot of words on this trip.

I definitely was most able to communicate at the Rotary lunch meeting. Mary’s prepared portuguese speech sits in her lost luggage, so she had to speak in english with translation. She was understanding far better by later in the afternoon, so I’m sure she’ll get that portuguese down with or without the prepared version.

She, Steve, Mike and I got more of that understanding after the meeting with a trip to the Unimed Hospital, a private hospital with a specialty in pediatrics. For Steve, who works with health care financing, this was good as he could ask questions related to the size, capacity, financing, and equipment – things he knows. For me, who struggles to be around people in pain – I feel pain or sick just thinking about what they’re going through – I had to divert my mind to the construction techniques used and to the water recycling tank in the middle of the building.

Mike got himself an interview on malaria in his quest to be a journalist. The doctor, Jucilena Viana (I think), told us how it is many contracted at the river or forest between 4 and 6 in the afternoon. In the cities, we should be ok. But our (semi) scheduled trip to the river was cancelled as we saw that it was 3:30.

So we got our rides home. I called my wife and hopefully didn’t break the bank with a 5 minute cell phone call. It was good to hear her voice. I hear her words frequently down here, including “vai tomar banho” and “escovao dentes,” but her voice is special. I talk to her via the cheaper home phone soon.