The Last Push in Anã

We had a lovely visit to beautiful Vila Franca yesterday, getting a new view of a similar community on a different part of the adjoining rivers here. It had a huge 180 degree view from the bank across the river to Alter do Chão, the quasi-resort beach area where we will re-enter urban society tomorrow.  Like everywhere, the river is huge and wide here (this particular river is the Tapajós), so you can't see very much but the topography.  The sky, though, is huge, as are the clouds, and the whole place is just calming and beautiful.

The context was not calm, though, as the reason for the gathering was a regional kicking contest (like a penalty kick competition), where pairs of people pay to compete for the regional championship.  There was also a live band playing (loudly and constantly, with no breaks) and some people were dancing.  There was food and drink available (even ice!) but most people were just sitting and waiting for their area's turn to kick.  Lots of folks from Anã were there, so we joined them.  Scott and Max signed up to compete and did not advance but did not totally embarrass the United States either. That's about the most we could hope for.

We walked a bit along the river and took in the sky and then got back on our boat right at dusk to head home for dinner. Lightning was flashing in the sky far away so a lot of us just stared off the deck of the boat hoping not to miss a big bolt or a big orange flash.  We saw plenty.

We headed for bed early because we needed to do a lot today even before the big Brazil v. USA soccer matches.  We started packing in the morning, even though we planned to do it after lunch. We discovered that some of our little cubbies had developed mold under our bags and backpacks, so we had to do some major cleanups on those. We also discovered a little marsupial animal that had nested in one of our cabinets to have its little babies.  Neither the mother nor the babies seemed to hurt anything.  There were spiders aplenty, but Scott ran around with a leather glove and took care of them one by one.

We then hit our worksites to do some last minute jobs, though the entire jobs will remain unfinished even when we leave.  The roof on the viveiro should be half done, but the fence for the living pharmacy will be complete.  A subset of us went to the fish food factory to help in producing three new sacks of fish food.  A few of us managed our leftover food and safety equipment so that we can leave those things here to benefit the community rather than carrying them home with us.

We will have a late lunch and then rest up for our soccer games around 4pm here this afternoon.  We can probably predict the outcome here now, but we'll let you know tomorrow how it all turned out.

We're not ready to leave our little paradise here, but we will get that way.  We think some tears await us over the next 20 hours or so.  We think we can hold each other together enough to get on the boat and get on our way.

We have a few errands to run in the city when we get there and then we leave for Manaus at 4am Wednesday morning.  We're going to be tired.  Our laundry is going to stink.  We are going to feel funny whenever we sleep in a bed again.  And we are going to miss this place.

More soon.

Gui and Katie walking to their final day of work at the fish food factory!

Dona Odila, Tonico, and others hard at work grinding up manioc, a potato-like vegetable that is used for a multitude of different things here in Brazil. Here, it is the main base of the fish food. 

Gui, Jaron, and Scott take a football break (American style) after lunch. 

Max warming up for our last day playing soccer. 

The large, beautiful trophy that went to the Brazilian women who beat us 3-0. It was quite a tough game, but we played hard and still had a lot of fun. The other trophy (front) is in a mango – this was the guys’ 1^st place trophy after the men of Anã decided not to show up to the game. Go Gaels!

Katie sifting food at the fish food factory. 

A beast that recently had given birth on top of Shawny’s bags when the DIRTies were packing up to leave Anã. 

 After a hard fought game, the women of DIRT lost 3-0 in the final championship, losing the recently acquired trophy.

After a hard fought warm up, the men of DIRT won the final championship when the men of Anã didn’t show up. 

After a night of dancing, our new family had to prepare to say their final goodbye.