Following our extended stay in Sarasota, we were back on our journey and this time headed to Brazil for a couple of weeks. We’ve been so fortunate to have the kinds of experiences we have had during our first 29 months of this chapter of our lives, and the two weeks we just spent in Brazil are right up there with all of the other incredible experiences. A little over a year ago, our friends, Jolly and Pure Hammi, mentioned that they would be taking a trip to Jolly’s village in Brazil where he grew up during July of 2026 and given our current lifestyle, we should consider joining them. This past May when we saw them again in Indiana, we talked a little more about the idea and it looked like a very real possibility that we could make it work. We didn’t have a lot of details but as the month of June progressed, we made the decision to join them. The trip is something Jolly does every two years with the youth group he leads at his church in Kent City, Michigan. They interview kids from the church youth group and this year selected 13 of them to take a mission trip to his home village. The idea is to worship together, build relationships, interact with the indigenous families working at and attending the school, as well as serve the training center in which Jolly grew up from the age of five to 17. It was a trip unlike anything I have ever done and similar to a trip Sandy took to Guatemala 25 years ago. It will be hard to capture everything we experienced over the last couple of weeks, but the highlight for me (and I think for Sandy also) was getting to know and spend time with 13 absolutely amazing teenagers and Jolly’s family.
Let’s jump back to Tuesday, July 21st. The flight options and prices led us to book a flight out of Miami and so we picked up our rental car the day before and drove to Miami on Tuesday morning. We returned the rental car and then checked out a couple of lounges in the airport, but they were too busy. We each grabbed food and coffee in the food court. We decided to keep our bags with us for this trip because we had two connections to make and felt better about having them with us. We always travel with carry-on size bags but usually check them just to keep things easier – not this time and it all worked out just fine. We took off on our LATAM flight to Lima, Peru at 5:10pm. They served chicken and potatoes for dinner; I watched the Michael Jackson movie (very good) and Sandy watched We Live in Time (also very good). We landed in Lima at 9:30pm Central Time. We picked up some food at the lounge in Lima and then left Lima a little before 1am Central Time, moving our clocks forward two hours and then landing in Brasilia at 7am. Passport control into Brazil was easy and we boarded our last plane and took off a little before 9am. We landed in Cuiaba about 90 minutes later and moved our clocks back an hour to get back on Eastern time – Cuiaba and Florida are in the same time zone. Our rental car wasn’t scheduled until Noon, so we got some food in the airport and I walked to find an ATM – first at a local bank and then at the mall that is five minutes away from the airport. Once Noon rolled around, we went back to the rental car counter, and the paperwork took quite a while. Nobody at the desk spoke English and my Portuguese is almost non-existent, which means Google Translate got a little workout. We headed out of Cuiaba at 12:30 and we made it to Chapada dos Guimaraes by 2pm. The drive was easy but I could not figure out the speed limits because no matter what the signs said, the cars were setting their own pace. I later learned that the signs are basically just suggestions.
Our stay in Brazil was at the Ami Training Center. It’s a program associated with South America Missions and they offer a three-year training program for students from indigenous tribes around Brazil. These students live on-site for their training program where they learn Portuguese if they do not already know the national language (they all come from tribes that speak their own language), they learn various stories from the Bible, and they learn how to teach the Bible to the people in their tribes. The students we talked with came from tribes in the states of Amazonas and Rondonia. Chapada dos Guimaraes is in the state of Mato Grosso. Some students have to travel up to three days to reach the school taking boats and buses. Even with Google Translate, the verbal interaction with the students was limited, but the non-verbal communication worked perfectly. They were welcoming of our group and we had a lot of fun together. The students seemed to generally range in age from early- to late-20s.
Upon arrival, we met Jolly’s parents, Dan and Julie. We had been warned by Hammy and Pure (Pure Hammi’s mom and dad) that we were going to love them and that was immediately clear. They warmly welcomed us with a delicious lunch of rice, beans, meat, potatoes, salad, and green beans and then walked us over to the small casa that would be our home for the two weeks. We had no expectations of our lodging – we thought we may be in separate dorms with the students, so we were thrilled to have our own space and own bathroom.
After unpacking and taking a short power nap, Julie took us on a mini-tour of the campus and then the four of us went into town to get a few things at the grocery store and get dinner. We ate at Nice Steakhouse and had a picanha dinner (that is steak cooked Brazilian style – meaning delicious) along with fried fish that was great, yucca, fried plaintains, and a local beverage.
Afterward we went to the ice cream/coffee shop where Dan and I had espressos to keep us awake for our late night coming up and Sandy and Julie had ice cream. We were back home at 10pm and we took another short nap. At 12:30am, Sandy and I followed Dan to Cuiaba to pick up the group of 20 coming in from Michigan. They had a transport vehicle ordered, so they only needed to use one seat in our car and to transport some luggage. Our car was tiny – we called it a clown car. It was a Fiat Niro. We got to meet some of the kids briefly and one of the group leaders, Mark, rode with us back to Chapada. We were home at 3:30am and in bed at 4am.
Thursday was a day to ease into the purpose of the trip for the whole group. It was a later start than what we would end up normally having (we started around 10am because of the late night). After brunch, we got to know each other by going around and telling our names and associating them with a food that starts with the same letter as our name. It was very effective. Our group totaled 24 people including us, Dan and Julie. The 20 from the Kent City Baptist Church was made up of Jolly, Pure Hammi, Pure 3, Pure 4, and Tzatziki Sauce. The two group leaders were Mark and Niki. The 13 kids were Ellie, Ellie, Sienna, Liv, Laura, Aubry, Katie, Trevor, Osker, Jake, Jackson, Peter, and Aaron. We did a group tour of the full campus and realized later on how vicious the bugs can be. Many of us (if not all) ended the day blanketed in bug bites around our lower legs, ankles, and feet. (Julie warned us about the bugs and encouraged everyone to use bug spray, however, we did not heed her warning.) We had some hangout time in the afternoon and then watched some of the kids join in the afternoon soccer games with the locals. Dinner was at the cafeteria with the students and staff who are on-site even though most of the students are back in their villages for the winter break. We had Brazilian hot dogs which are made in a delicious sauce which you include on the bun along with ketchup, mayonnaise and shoestring potatoes – messy but delicious. Through the discussion on Thursday evening, we learned that with the tribal marriages it is common for mates to be arranged at a young age and couples are married as early as 13 and start having families not long afterward. Regarding deaths in Brazil, it is not common to have embalming, and burial usually takes place within 24 hours. We could spend hours writing about the things we learned on the internet regarding the heart wrenching impacts of loggers and ranchers on the indigenous people of Brazil, not to mention the impacts on the rain forest. We were in bed by 10 on Thursday night.
Friday introduced us to what would be our normal schedule and it was intense for us as we are accustomed to setting our own schedules. The majority of our days starting on Friday and going through the next Friday had us setting our alarm at 5:30am, meeting with the group at 6:30 for reading time – they were focusing their time on the Book of Mark during this trip – breakfast at 7am at Dan and Julie’s home (which was always the main meeting place), starting work around 8 or 8:30, pausing for lunch between 11:30 and 1:30 with the locals (almost always rice, beans, salad, and some kind of meat), working in the afternoon until around 4, soccer and cleaning up for dinner until 6, dinner around 6 at Dan and Julie’s (every meal was great and I was especially impressed with the lasagna night – wow! – Julie’s lasagna was one of the best I’ve ever eaten and I ate four pieces and wanted to eat more!), devotional time around 8 when the kids were assigned certain chapters from the Book of Mark and they would talk about different aspects of their chapter, and then home around 9 or 9:30 to get some sleep and start again the next day. Some of the nights after dinner we would have acai ice cream with lots of topping options for dessert. That was a great option – very refreshing and I think on the healthier side as far as desserts go. The work projects our team tackled included the building of a sidewalk around one of the campus homes, painting the interior of one of the campus homes, and screening one of the campus homes. There were a few other miscellaneous projects but those were the big three.
The team ran a Vacation Bible School for the young children living on campus where they told Bible stories, sang songs, did crafts and played outside. The team also had kitchen and cleanup assignments to help prepare meals and cleanup after the meals. It was a great orchestration of activity to watch and to join. We had the option of stepping out to do our own thing at any point but we genuinely enjoyed the interaction with the team and found ourselves sticking to the crazy schedule way more than we imagined before we made the trip. Sandy and I spent a couple of days on work prepping the sidewalk site and a couple of days working on the screens. We also participated in one day of the Vacation Bible School. The team enjoyed hearing from four missionary couples regarding the challenges and rewards of their occupations.
Outside of the workdays, we got to experience a little of the area around Chapada dos Guimaraes. The first Saturday we all went into town and visited the farmer’s market. We had breakfast there as well. We all walked around the downtown area on our own – Sandy and I spent some time in a coffee shop by the main plaza.
For lunch, we all went to Restaurante Penhasco. They had a wonderful buffet and the restaurant overlooked the terrain reaching back down to the city of Cuiaba. Beautiful location. We headed back home for a short rest and then we all went out to the Marimbondo Waterfall. The water was too cold for us, but the kids didn’t mind and they had a good time wall-climbing and jumping back into the water.
Dinner was back at Dan and Julie’s – sandwiches and a birthday cake for Sienna’s birthday. I got to read several books to Pure 3, including Doctor DeSoto, which became a favorite for the trip. We had a hard time going to sleep that Saturday night because our bug bites were especially itchy that night.
Our first Sunday was rather relaxed. Sandy and I worked on the electrical plug for the cement mixer so it would be ready to go as soon as the sidewalk team was ready to start pouring concrete. We needed to create an adapter for the machine, which matched the Brazilian plug format, to the extension cords, which matched the US plug format. Dan picked up what we needed and we were able to complete our assignment.
In the afternoon, the group did a two-mile hike (some did a four-mile run) through the forest and then up a road in the area. It was a nice afternoon walk and we saw some monkeys in the forest on the way back. The temperatures while we were in Brazil ranged from upper 60s at night to mid-90s during the day. It is the dry season, but we were surprised with one afternoon rain shower during the second week.
Sandy and I had a couple of afternoons where we went into town – grabbed popsicles after a hot day, enjoyed kombucha, ice cream, a little grocery shopping – just taking the chance to go in and experience Chapada. We found time to get some things done related to our normal life of travel – office day, logistics planning for activities later this year. We planned to do our office day work at the coffee shop in town, but the Wi-Fi wasn’t cooperating, so we headed back to Dan and Julie’s and got our work done there.
Our second Saturday night was a lot of fun. The mission team put together a series of games with the locals in the main conference hall. The power was going in and out a bit, which added to the fun as many of us used our phone lights to illuminate the building. The games included things like: eating four crackers and seeing who could whistle three times first; a balloon relay race that involved sitting on the balloon until it popped before the next teammate could go; another balloon race where teammates would guide balloons into a garbage can without using their hands or letting the balloon touch the ground; an egg on a spoon relay race where a ping pong ball was used instead of an egg; it was all super fun and the locals and visiting team had a great time interacting with each other.
The next two days, our group went to the National Park and did a couple of hikes to several different waterfalls. The hikes were through some beautiful areas and especially the second day where we visited four different waterfalls and saw gorgeous views across the plateau and varying terrain.
I braved the cool water at one of them and headed underneath one of the falls. That was a sensation I didn’t expect but should have considered. The downforce of the waterfall created its own low pressure air system, and I found myself struggling to catch my breath – I am sure it was a combination of the low air pressure and the cold water. It was a cool experience. Lunch after the first day of the hikes was a treat. A church group from Cuiaba came to Ami and cooked a Brazilian churrasco and it was wonderful. They made sausage, chicken, and steak and all three were fantastic. I eventually camped out next to the grill and ate meat coming right off the grill. So good!
That brings us to our last day and travel day. After breakfast yesterday, Jolly worked with a local friend of his to extract on my hand near my thumb what seemed like a bicho do pe – a tiny flea or worm that causes a lot of itching and can eat your flesh if it is not removed. It felt better right away once it was extracted. Sandy and I left Ami at 10:30 and Electrolyte Ellie and Liv rode with us to Cuiaba and the airport. We had interesting conversations with the two of them the whole ride. After returning the rental car, the four of us went upstairs to shop and eat while we waited for the rest of the group to arrive about 90 minutes later. Everybody checked in for their flight (we were on a different airline than the large group) and they all went through security after we said our goodbyes. It was emotional to say goodbye after spending so much time with everyone the last couple of weeks. Sandy and I had time for one last coffee with Dan and Julie before we had to say goodbye to them. Wheels were up at 4:45pm out of Cuiaba and we landed in Sao Paulo at 7:40pm with a time change of one hour ahead. We cleared passport control and security and made our way to the lounge in Terminal 3. There was a line to get in, but we waited and had some food in the lounge while we waited for our next flight. Our Delta flight departed from Sao Paulo at 10pm and we moved our clocks back an hour. Dinner was chicken, potato salad, a roll, and a brownie. Sandy watched the Billie Eilish movie and I read quite a bit. Sandy got about three hours of sleep and I got around five hours. Breakfast was bacon and egg or tomato and egg sandwiches and we landed in Atlanta just before 7:30am this morning. Passport control was quick and because we carried our bags on we were able to jump on an earlier flight to Minneapols. We landed in Minneapolis at 10:15 this morning and took the bus to get our rental car at Hertz.
Final reflections on our trip to Brazil. This really was an amazing experience. Our intent was to meet Jolly’s parents, see where Jolly grew up, volunteer at the training center, and be able to hang out with teenage kids, Jolly, Pure Hammi and their children. We didn’t know what to expect and the schedule and work were harder on us than either of us imagined it would be. But, the fact that we could have chosen at any point to step away and do our own thing is testament to the group of people we were with. We found ourselves not wanting to miss any of the time we could spend with them. I could write many positive things about every single one of the 13 kids who were a part of the youth mission group, but I’ll summarize it by saying that every single one of them is impressive in their own right and then as a team they are incredible. They accomplished so much during the two weeks at the training center. They each have bright futures and we hope that we are able to stay updated on their paths ahead. Since we don’t have children, it was an honor to be accepted by and to interact with these special 16 to 18-year-olds and to learn from them, including new lingo – crunchy, granola, buns, zesty, rizz, and fat nap. It was a joy to get to know Mark and Niki. They are incredible humans and took their roles as leaders seriously and provided enormous value during the two weeks. We learned so much from Mark about the “construction” work that was being completed. Getting to spend the extra time that we spent with Pure Hammi and Jolly’s family was a highlight. I especially treasured the reading time I got with Pure 3 and also seeing how fast Pure 4 is developing. She has a whole new personality since seeing her race weekend in Indiana in May and it was fun to see her continue to change during the two weeks we were together.
Dan and Julie (Jolly’s parents) are fantastic. I can’t believe what it took to organize everything that was happening around their home for this large of a group and they did it to perfection and made it seem like it was a walk in the park for them. Special people for sure. We are thrilled to now have them as friends, and we look forward to seeing them again. We are filled with gratitude for being included in this trip. It truly is an honor and without a doubt it is a lifetime highlight for us!
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