In any case, things are pretty good here. The pollution has definitely gotten worse the past week to 10 days. So weird....when we got here, it hadn't rained for about 30 days. According to the locals, that was the cause of very bad pollution - much worse than normal, they said. But I didn't notice ANY pollution those first few weeks. You'd think it would have been unmistakable to a newbie coming from clean-aired Culpeper, Virginia, but not so. I've noticed it increasingly the past couple of weeks, and all the while, the locals haven't. Whatever. We're getting air purifiers for the bedrooms this week anyway. That should stave-off the need to wear surgical masks and carry around oxygen for a while.
We just fired our third faxeneira (maid). Our first one, Luzinete, came two times and then quit for a full-time job. She was only coming once-a-week for us, so that was understandable. The second one, Nazare, came once last week and did a nice job, but was a bit more expensive, so we were thinking we'd let her go. In the meantime, we had a new one come for a testdrive. So Rosana came today. That was a mistake. She did a great job, but she works.....sooo....slowly. It took her EIGHT hours to iron our clothes. I think I've mentioned before that we don't have a dryer...quite a luxury item here. So it's necessary to iron clothes. But the previous two faxeneiras ironed all of our clothes for the week in about half that. Four hours. Then the had time to do all kinds of other cleaning. So this woman came today and did a great job cleaning and ironing, but she was here until 7 o'clock. Unacceptable slowness. I came home at 4:30 and was forced to endure her presence here for far too long. So she's fired. We're going back to Nazare. I think she's worth the extra 10 reals per day. Another factor (not to be overlooked) is that the kids' Baba, Katty, prefers Nazare. She told me privately after I got home that "Nazare esta muinta boa"....much better. So that sealed the deal.
Speaking of...well....speaking in Portuguese, the language is getting a bit easier for me. My academic background in Spanish has definitely helped, particularly in knowing the verbs and sentence construction. I get the two confused from time-to-time, and the pronunciation is quite different. But overall, I'm better off with the Spanish background. So I'm generally able to communicate what I need. Understanding others, particularly those who speak fast, has been difficult. But it's getting better. In fact, last Friday I ordered Chinese food over the phone. Some English-speakers here consider telephone conversations in Portuguese the sign that you've "arrived" as a Portuguese speaker, but I don't feel like I've arrived anywhere yet. I'll update you on that again in a couple of more months.
Ok, so here's the latest installment of photos that Abby has uploaded from the camera. It's kind of a chronicle of last weekend....swimming in the indoor pool... after all, it was only 82 this last weekend, and the unheated outdoor pool was a bit chilly yet ;-) .... also a bit of patio life at the clube. Hope all is well with each of you!
Noah showing off his swimming skills under my watchful goggle-eyes.....
....he loves the water.
In the meantime....
...Sophie loves to dress up like this....
....and like this (what is that? Flashdance or something?)
Sophie at the Clube.
Noah at the Clube - just below.
....hence the need for ironing every week.
No comments:
Post a Comment