Amazon 2009: Day Eighteen (Thursday, January 22)

Today’s video was produced by the team Paz.

We awoke this morning on a riverfront beach outside the community of Urrucureá. Among other things, we immediately learned that we are quite a loud bunch of people. As it turns out, the entire community was quite aware that a boatload of U.S. Americans had arrived in the night. Our loud voices and laughter carried across the water and shattered the usual quiet that reigns supreme after dark in this area.

As we mentioned before, the communities out here have very little access to electricity. Most have a central generator that provides power for a maximum of two hours in a given day. Thus, when darkness falls, the day ends. When the sun rises, the day begins. This entire concept is pretty foreign to us as U.S. Americans based on the lives that we normally live.

No one was particularly perturbed by the fact that we made our presence known so obviously (except maybe some of us who were disturbed by the noise inside our own boat), but it was an important cultural lesson for us to notice that sound itself can be oppressive. In fact, we have only recently noticed that apart from the music and parties identified with Brazil, this culture is actually relatively quiet. We rarely hear someone call out across the room or the yard to get someone else’s attention. We almost never hear car horns honk. Even when we approach a friend’s house, the appropriate move is to clap our hands softly out front to get the occupants’ attention. Though SMC groups have been to Brazil several times before, no one ever made this important observation on any of those trips.

Before continuing on a description of our time in the community, our readers might be interested to hear about our sleep in the hammocks. Honestly, most of us struggled a bit, but everyone managed to sleep eventually. Alec, who is 6’6”, probably struggled more than anyone. The basic method that helps people actually sleep in a hammock is to position one’s body diagonally so that the body is essentially parallel to the ground and not in the “V” position usually identified with lounging in a hammock. If Alec achieved this position, though, he would take up much more than his share of the deck space. He decided right away to give up on the hammock entirely and put a cushion on the deck instead.

In Urrucureá we took a long walk through the rain forest to find our way to a huge river-fed lake called Lago Grande. The edge of the lake was a reed-filled marsh that also contained one of our new favorite things: Piranhas! We busted out the fishing poles again and baited them with red meat. Our guides taught us how to simulate a sense of distress at the top of the water then drop our bait into the middle of the ripples we created. By the end of the session, we had caught 10 piranhas! (We are not going to admit here how many of them were caught by our guides and how many were caught by us.) A few of them were small, so we only kept four. The small number didn’t disappoint us at all, as we were stoked to have caught any at all. (Marie and Joey might have been a little less enthused, as they got stuck babysitting the freshly-caught flesh-eaters inside their canoe. They survived the trauma.)
We walked back through the rain forest with our fish, stopping along the way to marvel at the huge plants (especially palms and ferns), the weird bugs, and the highlight of the hike for some of us: monkeys! A few of us heard something drop from a tree and stopped to look. We finally noticed a big monkey way up high and lured it closer to us with little noises that we might use to call a cat. Once we moved on from that monkey, another set of four started following us down the path at a safe distance so that we could see them and watch them, but they were never terribly close to us. We returned to the boat pretty hot and tired, so we decided to find a spot to swim and bathe in the river.

We took our fresh catch to a beautiful undeveloped beach and added in the two huge fish that we mentioned in our post about the food run before the boat trip. We went all along the shallows with our fishing nets, but didn’t catch any more to add to our feast. Our captain, Rionaldo, dug a pit in the sand and set up a beachfront barbecue with a bonfire on the side. He and our cook, Louro, tended to the fish for more than an hour to get it to a state of utter perfection. We ate until we were stuffed, then ate a little bit more. Some of us washed dishes and got settled into our hammocks while others sat around the bonfire telling ghost stories.

We just can’t believe how little we have around us and how happy it makes us feel to be here doing just this. Apparently, we are adjusting to the quiet that is around us. Some of us have even pulled the ever-present headphones out of our ears to embrace the quiet just a little bit more. A lot is happening for us: in our heads, our hearts, our spirits, our minds, our bodies, and even more. We look forward to finding out how much of this new perspective sticks when we return home.

Today’s newest member of the Order of the Purple Bike is Felicia Zhuang. Felicia was supposed to ride the bike a couple of days ago, but when Alec saved Shana from the dangerous hammock-flip, he took the honor. Felicia has been a trooper in Brazil in many important ways. For one, she braved some ladder work while we were painting that went on for hours and hours. Secondly, she overcame a legitimate case of arachnophobia (fear of spiders) by coming to Brazil at all. Finally, she was so excited about the whole hammock thing on the boat that it was a joy to behold. She was giddy about the hammocks, snapping pictures before everyone awoke just to capture the experience. Yay, Felicia!



After our unsuccessful piranha fishing, we feasted on the fish that our boat drivers caught.


This picture is a little deceiving because what you don’t know is that my camera is zoomed in completely. Our gator friend is actually a little baby.


Just for scale please notice that the fish are almost as large as the machete in the background.


We had a fish bbq on the beach.


Taking a bath in the river.


The fish we bought at the market was cooked on open fire for our luau-style dinner.


Just one example of the beautiful sunsets we got to see during our boat trip along the Tapajos River.


A picture of the beach we stopped at to have a luau-style dinner complete with bonfire and scary stories.


Evaldo, taking a quick break while spear diving for dinner.


A picture of our boat at one of the beaches that we stopped at along the river.

This is a view of the boat during sunset.

This is our barbeque pit where we cooked our delicious fish.

Katie collecting wood for our bonfire.

This is Evaldo, our first mate on the boat.

Amazon 2009: Day Seventeen (Wednesday, January 21)

Today’s slideshow was produced by the team Dar Um Jeito.

Our riverboat trip was slightly delayed, as last night’s rain never stopped. We got up at 5:45 anyway, ready to get on the boat no matter what. We packed our things, gathered them all for delivery to the boat, then learned that it was fruitless to leave so early when it was raining so hard. We all went back to bed. When we awoke again, our bags had been delivered to the boat for us and all we had to do was walk to the river and embark. A slight rain continued to fall, but we were undaunted.

We dropped the first stop from our trip, which was supposed to be a visit to a community east of Santarém on the Amazon. There would have been no good way to tour the area in the pouring rain, so we just skipped that step and headed west (upriver) instead. Before we had gotten anywhere, we were already exploding with excitement because the captain told us that we were about to go fishing . . . for PIRANHAS!

We headed to a small community called Santa Ana, where a long staircase led to a small town that was almost entirely dependent on the river for its survival. Groceries were being delivered by boat as we arrived, and we even docked next to the grocery boat and walked across it to get into the town. Young men were carrying huge loads up the long staircase, mostly supporting them with their heads. We were huffing and puffing just to walk up the staircase itself and we could scarcely imagine trying to conquer it with two cases of soft drinks or beer on our heads.

The community at the top of the stairs was simple and beautiful. The dirt roads were mostly used by people walking from place to place, though a few work animals also pulled wagons along them. A lovely church stood open in the center of it all, so we stepped inside to check it out. The people of the community were friendly and happy to see us and it took us a few minutes to realize that one reason they were so happy was that they, too, like so many other Brazilians we’ve met, are VERY excited about Barack Obama. Their town has a generator that produces electricity for only about an hour and a half a day. They used their hour and a half yesterday to watch our new President’s inauguration.

One man approached Marie and Shawny gushing and offering thanks, saying the word “Obama” every fifth word or so. All of us were stunned at the level of interest and enthusiasm that we encountered. We also, realized, though, that when we are out in the world, we are held accountable for the actions of our nation, no matter what our personal politics might be. None of us had really faced the relationship between our own lives and our country’s foreign policy quite so directly before. Fortunately, most people that we meet are giddy and hopeful about the U.S. at the moment, so those are the feelings that we got to bask in today.

Once we left Santa Ana, a very small number of us had our first confirmed sighting of a pink dolphin. It leapt up right in front of our boat, but only a few of us were out front when it happened. Those people screamed and called out for everyone else, but the dolphin didn’t surface again when we were looking. We’ve seen lots of other gray dolphins, but the pink ones are the ones we really want to get a glimpse of.

We also took turns going into the march in the dingy attached to our big boat so that we could scope out some ENORMOUS lily pads that are just called “The Big Leaves” here (but in Portuguese). The Big Leaves are endangered, so we counted ourselves as lucky that we got to canoe right next to them and check them out.

Pretty soon, we stopped to do our fishing for the day. We found a place that our captain knew would have piranhas and we baited our hooks with red meat and fished away. Unfortunately, we fished and fished and fished but didn’t catch ONE piranha today! Our captain said that they either bite or they don’t and that therefore patience would not pay off. We surrendered, but only for today.

We moved on to another river beach to park and sleep for the night. We stretched out our hammocks and lined up on both decks of the boat to learn whether hammocks are a viable place to sleep or not. The rain had come and gone all day, so we dropped the tarps on the boat to help us stay dry if it rained in the night. (It did.)

As mentioned already, our purple biker today was Joey Cacciatore.




First community we visited off the amazon river.


Family living on the edge of the amazon river.


River leading away from the main river to a small community off the river.


Kids shying away from us as we looked on the community.


Couple in the community who greeted us as we walked through the community.



The rainforest is home to numerous species of plants, most of which are new to us.


Instead of spending all day behind a desk, this fisherman spends his work days in the Amazon River.


Our boat has become home to many large creatures including this large grasshopper.


This small community off the Amazon River is home to less than 100 families.


Lotus flowers grow from the harshest of conditions, yet always rise to the surface.


None of us know what lay ahead of us, but if it looks like this we are happy to continue down the path to find out.


if these lily pads were not green they could easily be mistaken for bathtubs.


Franklin was seeing the white light as he came face to face with Margeaux.

Never have I ever seen a bird this blue.

Amazon 2009: Day Sixteen (Tuesday, January 20)

Today’s slideshow was produced by the team Bota Fogo. (Still to come....)

We have returned from our boat trip and we are all intact! (Well, actually, we have lots of mosquito bites and lots of band-aids for a number of reasons, but we are NOT complaining). We’ll move backwards a bit to catch our readers up on all that has happened since we last wrote. By the way, because of our inability to charge our technology on the boat, we reduced our load by producing slideshows this week instead of videos. Today’s presentation by Bota Fogo preceded the boat trip, but they had to finish things later so we had them do a slide show too.

The group called Bota Fogo (named after a soccer team in Rio) got up very early this morning to join Jesse, our boat captain (Rionaldo), and our cook both on the boat and at camp (Louro) to purchase all of the food that we needed to move around out on the river for four days straight. Because we were to visit rather primitive communities, we knew that we could not acquire any extra goods along the way (there are no Safeways there), so we had to really be on top of things. The group went to a local market to buy fish and produce and then went to a large grocery store to get everything else. Among other fascinating purchases, they bought two fish that (combined) weighed 45 pounds.

Once they finished with the purchases of food for the boat, Bota Fogo and the team called As Onças both had some time to do some quick shopping, with their priority being the purchase of hammocks to use as beds on the boat. The riverfront is lined with boats that are strung with hammocks and such boats are the main mode of transportation between Santarém and other river towns. We were excited to join into this tradition and everyone got a big kick out of selecting his or her hammock and then bargaining over the price with the market vendors.

The other two teams, Dar Um Jeito and Paz, went straight to the worksite where they accomplished a huge amount of labor, far beyond what seemed possible for one morning. They hung the roof over the new deck, they installed a custom gate on the opening of the deck, and they finished painting everything on the deck and building. We thought there would be some finishwork to do after this morning’s shift, but these two strong teams (along with the hard work of the other two teams the evening before) guaranteed that there is no unfinished business on the job we set out to do.

In the afternoon, we followed up on an invitation from the local university to present some of our work to an audience there. Each team had selected photos and/or video to present and Jesse helped to translate things so that we could communicate with the sizable audience that showed up (maybe 50 people?). The audience was kind and attentive and their questions at the end indicated to us just how important U.S. foreign policy is to other parts of the world. We answered questions about the international interest in the Amazon, the state of the world under U.S. President George W. Bush, and the future prospects of the new U.S. President, Barack Obama, whose inauguration many of the audience members had just watched. (We, unfortunately, missed the inauguration because we couldn’t get access to a TV with the proper channel.)

After our speaking gig, we hit the basketball courts again and generated quite a bit of enthusiasm once more. A few people from the university even joined us down at the courts to see what was going on. We won a game and lost a game, again because of the refs’ tendency to call any physical contact a foul. Throughout the game, like most evenings here, there was lightning flashing in the sky out in the distance. This time, though, the clouds started looking a little more ominous close to us, so we all started gathering up our things and heading into cabs for rides home. The downpour that hit simultaneous to our departure was awesome. Never have we seen rain that was so . . . WET.

The streets started to flood and some cabs couldn’t make it down the lane where we stay. Some of us had to walk in through knee deep water, one of us lost a flip-flop forever (Shana), and all of us have a story of a tropical storm that we will never forget. Once we all got home we organized for our river trip, hoping that the weather would break soon.

As mentioned already, our purple biker today was Alec Tappin.




A Santarem license plate.


The poster put up advertising our presentation at the university.


Laundry drying in the side yard of a house.


A man selling fish on the street in Santarem.


Chickens that we saw on a porch on our walk through Santarem after our presentation at the university.


Sophie took a beautiful picture of the clouds, shortly before a monsoon-like storm.


Team Dar Um Jeito speaking to Santarem college students about their experiences thus far during the trip.



Joe helping Chris get the last pieces of wood on the veranda while the final touches are being applied.



Looking through the newly painted latis boards, we get a shot of the ladies finishing up the painting on the veranda.


Precious moments with the local children.


Nonverbal communication has become key for Lucas in communicating with us.


Walking through town.


The beautiful clouds of the storm that we later got stuck in. Looks can be deceiving. Later that evening, we were waste high in rain water, trying to get home.



We finally finished the construction on the boat house!

Out of the Office -- HA!

When you read this we will be on a boat on the Amazon, first going downriver a bit to visit a community there, then up into the tributaries of the Tapajós River, where we will visit other developing communities and go on a hike in the rain forest. Our website will be updated (we hope) on Saturday, January 24. Sorry we didn't finish whole blogposts for today yet. We will post them on Saturday.

Huge day today, including finishing our work on the construction site, to everyone's amazement (including ours). Speaking gig at the local university, more basketball on the banks of the Amazon, a HUGE tropical storm that flooded the streets and our camp (everyone's okay), and packing for our river voyage. Please forgive us for being out of touch.

Today's purple biker was Alec Tappin, who saved Shana Dhillon from an almost-painful fall off of a hammock. (Can you imagine after all we've done in the past few weeks if our biggest injury was from a hammock accident?) Alec's cat-like reflexes (maybe he's been watching his own beloved cat, Puma) saved the day, as Shana tipped toward a full flip, but he caught her and righted her before most people even realized anything was happening. Alec is a treat to have around no matter what, as he is about a foot taller than most Brazilians. He is quite a spectacle (and very handy when we are trying to put up a new roof!) He's also just a wonderful, lovable person, so we are blessed to have him among us.

Tomorrow's Purple Biker: Joey Cacciatore. He was AMAZING on the basketball court tonight! Everywhere the opponents let the ball fly, Joey was there to snatch it away. His great athleticism tonight makes him worthy of the Purple Bike, along with his overall good humor and his easy comfort when working with the kids. Thanks, Joey!

Amazon 2009: Day Fifteen (Monday, January 19)

Today’s video was produced by the team As Onças.

Our morning began with a pouring rainstorm beating on our roofs even before we awoke. We called a thirty-minute delay and stayed in bed, then realized that the sky was clearing so it was time to get up to go to work. All of us went to the worksite this morning because we had construction work to finish and we had the kids to teach and entertain.

Our slightly late arrival meant that the kids were very antsy once we got there. They were so eager for us to appear that we could easily get them to gather around and repeat some lessons from other days, use our new “English phrases” flash cards, and then get them running around all over the sand without much persuasion.

At the same time, a smaller group of us separated off and helped our construction supervisor, Seu João, build a framework to drop roof tiling over the new deck. Once this new roof is installed, the kids will be able to gather outside but still out of the sun. Perfect!

The construction practices here have us all pretty stumped, as virtually every wood joint is accompanied by a hand-hewn notch. That is, every time two boards come together, they take this 19th-century-looking tool that is sort of a backwards-curved hatchet or something like that and they knock a divot out of it to make the two boards fit together like Lincoln Logs. Our new power saw doesn’t help all that much in this task, so we are all learning to use the strange new/old tool, along with chisels and hammers to make things go the way our hosts want them to go. Chris Verrips, our SMC-based construction expert, is pretty fascinated with it all. He’s taught João a thing or two, but he has learned much more than he has taught.

Along with today’s construction work, we needed to keep on painting to get this building looking as nice as it can before we leave. A small crew kept working its way around the building for the umpteenth time, as the paint really soaks into the wood and there is apparently no such thing as primer up here. The got a solid next coat all over the white part before we hurried off at lunch time to catch ourselves on Brazilian TV!

We hustled up to Georgete and Jaime’s house, where they had placed a TV in their entryway for us all to see. We all packed in there on the floor and eagerly awaited our big debut. When we first arrived, we were all sitting up and leaning forward, laughing and talking and trying to keep track of the news as it unfolded. As time went by, we began to lean back, then slump down, then lie down, then fall asleep as a full 56 minutes went by before our story hit. We all popped back to life and oohed and ahhed over the pictures they showed, but we really couldn’t tell what they were saying about us. By the time it ended about 4 minutes later, we were so tired and hungry that we just hurried back to camp to eat lunch (really great fried whole small fish) and we didn’t even talk about the TV program again. We still haven’t gotten the web address at which some of you might be able to watch it, but if we do, we will post it here.

After lunch most of us skipped siestas to get back to work. Two teams were sent into town to buy their hammocks for our upcoming boat trip and to do other shopping and errands that they need to do before we leave. The rest of us hit the worksite HARD and got more done in a four- (or so) hour period that we imagined possible. When we finally knocked off, it was almost dark and a rainstorm seemed to be bearing down on us (though it never caught us). Once we got back to camp, we realized that we had spent more energy than we actually possessed and that we were all REALLY tired, even though we were content with our accomplishments.

The work group came back and admired the new hammocks that the shoppers bought, along with some of the souvenirs and gifts that they had found. In the morning, the groups will trade places and today’s shoppers will work and the workers will shop. Even with these breaks, it seems likely that we will complete the parts of the job that we expected to finish before we leave on the boat.

We’ll tell more about our upcoming boat trip tomorrow, then we will “go dark” for a few days while we are incommunicado in the Amazon.

Our Purple Biker for today is: Marie Cacciatore! Based on how much she is doing for our group, we could easily have her ride the purple bike everyday. Marie is a fabulous contributor to everyone’s experience here. For today, though, it seemed clear that Marie is our most transformed group member of this trip. She has blossomed as our top visualist (not including Marcia) due to her excellent photography and her impressive art skills. She is also a great support person who is an informal therapist to many people along the way. Further, she has shown how gutsy she is on a number of occasions, most notably when she became our power saw expert a couple of days ago. We’ll all be interested to see if people back home notice a difference when she returns. For today, though, we’ll just let her enjoy the purple bike. Congratulations, Marie!


Work hard and play hard!

Making progress on the porch.

Margeaux teaches one of the children English.


Domiciano and Cassidy take a fall after spinning around in circles.

The kids are always enthusiastic to help with the painting whenever they can.

Diana found a grasshopper!

Shana uses the homemade flashcards to teach one of our youngest students English.

Seu Joao, perched atop the latticework, preparing the posts for the roof.

Finishing touches on the house.

Seu Joao measuring out the next balance beam for the roof extension.

kids enjoying a cooling snack during a hot day.


Josialda taught us some of her karate skills.

Enjoying downtime in between games and construction.

Dar Um Jeito relaxes in our newly purchased hammocks that we will use on the boat trip.