| Week 6 | |
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This has been quite a week around here. The first group of fishermen arrived this morning, so preparations have been in full swing. There is a huge aquarium in the main lodge that had a few leaks in it last year. So for three weeks Phil, Armando and a slew of other people have been working to get that bad boy up and running. The tank has been dismantled, re-mantled, and dismantled again. They have glued and drilled, filled and drained the tank at least a dozen times. Well, last night they finally got everything up and running. And it is beautiful. There is a waterfall, plants in the rocks, and beautiful plants all around it, about 10,000 small aquarium fish, a turtle and a handful of peacock bass. There are still a couple of small leaks, but nothing major.
My work schedule has changed once again. I now work with just Philipino from 8-1:30. I teach English to the little kids from 1:30-3:00. The kitchen, housekeeping, and security staff members have class from 4:00-5:00 three days a week, and the fishing guides meet nightly from 6:00-7:00. I stay busy. Philipino misses spending the whole day with the other kids, but he has come a long way in just the few days that we have worked together with out the other kids. He read his first story all by himself this week about a chipmunk and a bird. He also cracked me up during an activity on grouping objects. The assignment was to choose which three objects belonged together and to explain how they were related. For example a slide, a seesaw, and a swing set went together because they were all playground equipment. The truck pictured did not belong. The next group showed a dog, a monkey, a stuffed bear, and a fish (not a goldfish but a lake fish). Philip got very excited and circled everything but the stuffed bear and yelled out, "I know! I know! They are all pets!" You know any other kid would have said they are all real animals and the stuffed bear is a toy. But NOT Philip. Nope. He lives in a world where monkeys, and dogs, and huge fish, and tapirs, and toucans are all family pets! We had to take a moment to discuss that while his answer was 100% correct, not all kids had those animals as pets! I am still intrigued by the monkeys. Chica has managed to find a way out of her cage, and just wanders around this place at her leisure. She and Bobby (Phil and Ruth's spaniel puppy) have been playing with each other. It starts off pretty cute with them playing gentle and quickly turns into body slams, and bites with dog barks and monkey chirps thrown in. (I really wish I could explain a monkey chirp!) Bobby usually peters out before Chica, and Chica doesn't ever want to give up. Today she grabbed Bobby by a hind leg and took off with him. Scott and I were afraid that Chica was going to try to take the dog up a tree. I lured Chica, while Scott called Bobby. It was a team effort to save the dog! It was ten pretty funny minutes! There was one animal here that could not be saved! It has been quite a scandal around these parts. They had a deer named Bambi that was hand-raised and tame. Well, the manager of the warehouse told some local hunters that he would pay for meat. The local hunters came back with Bambi. While Phil and Ruth were in Manaus last week, Bambi was served for dinner in the employee kitchen. Everyone knew about it but no one said anything to Phil. Phil kept asking, "Have you seen the deer? Have you seen the deer?" It had been 5 or 6 days since anyone had seen it. Someone finally fessed up and Phil was HOT! The animals around here are a huge draw for the tourists, and are well maintained. There is a standing order against any kind of hunting or killing any of the animals on the property. Earlier this week, one of the guides went into Barcelos. I gave him 10 reais and asked him to buy me two flashlights and a piece of chocolate candy. Mind you the 10 reais is about $4. He came back with 2 nice flashlights(Scott: I wouldn't go so far as to call them NICE. They'll do, but we're not talking a Mag-lite or anything), a nice sized box of chocolates and some change! Scott and I were like two seven year olds at Halloween! We ran back to our cabin, spread the whole box of candy out on the bed and discussed which one we would try next. It's been six weeks since we've had candy and we laughed at how excited we were over such a non-event! The Brazilians know how to make candy. It was $4 well spent! I was planning to go into Barcelos this morning when the guides went to pick up the Americans from the airport. I woke up an hour early to be sure that I didn't miss my ride. Just as soon as I was ready to leave, a rainstorm commenced. I decided that there wasn't anything I needed badly enough to ride in a boat in the rain to get! I'll try again next week. There are only 5 guests here this week. Hoyt and Betty Fincher are here for 2 months. They only sort of count as guests, they are more like family. Hoyt is a legend…more on that later. There are two men from Florida who make peacock bass lures, and a guy from Texas who makes all of the peacock bass replicas. The arrival of fishermen means an elevation in food quality (although we've had no complaints thus far), Coca-cola, and electricity that stays on full-time. Welcome, friends! For this is a whole new world! The arrival of the fishermen also meant our first delivery of mail. We got three letters from Scott's family, a bill or two, and a ton of junk mail. HELLO! Where have our friends gone? Mail, letters, little notes to your buddies in the jungle…take out a pen and a piece of paper and write!! I sent several letters to friends and family about three weeks ago. Phil mailed them from Manaus. Well Brazilian mail service lives up to its reputation because as far as I know, no one has received a letter. If you get a letter with a Brazilian postmark from me, send me an email or write me at the office address so I know that it made it! Betty also brought the current issues of People and Newsweek. I cried as I read through the People. It was full of stories of how the people in the US have come together since the WTC bombing. We watch CNN occasionally but it is just a bunch of political mumbo-jumbo. We should have our satellite dish up and running by the end of the week. We will be able to stay in tune with the world a little easier. Now about Hoyt…he and his wife own a western wear shop in the Fort Worth Stockyards. They are great people and if you ever want to meet a down home Good-Ole Boy, just give Hoyt Fincher a call. He is a fishing fool! The guides will tell you that he wears them out. And the guides are all strong, healthy, young men. Hoyt is not exactly a spring chicken, and he never misses a meal either. But he fishes from sun-up to sundown and will go to some pretty extreme lengths to get a good fish! Last night Phil had a little pep talk with the guides and from what I could follow (he was speaking Portuguese) I think he told the guides that they weren't allowed to sink the boats to get them around tree stumps anymore, no matter how many times Hoyt asked them to! The water in the river has receded quite a bit and has left a nice white sand beach. Tomorrow, one of the little girls here is having a birthday, and we will have a party for her out on an island beach. That is all for this week. More in the weeks to come! |