I came across an old mission buddy on Facebook this week and we’ve been reminiscing since. He reminded me that when we were working together in the mission office (he was Assistant to the President and I, the financial secretary), that a 17-year-old new convert (“…the boy with the long hair”) had come to us and asked us to teach his attorney uncle about the church because he was getting a lot of flack at home. My friend remembers it this way:

Carlos came back after we gave that discussion, so excited that his uncle was telling the family to lay off Carlos, that the Church wasn’t a bad thing. He went on and on about how impressed his uncle was with you. Then he suddenly stopped and looked embarrassed. “Uh, my uncle was impressed with you too,” he stammered. I just started laughing. I didn’t need his uncle to be impressed with me. I tried to tell him it was okay, but he was determined to remember some good thing his uncle had said about me. Finally, he looked up grinning with an “I got it!” look on his face. “You know what really impressed my uncle about you? Your shoe size! He said he never saw feet that big in his life!”

So you were the reason the heat came off Carlos, allowing him to stay active, go on a mission, marry Monica, be a bishop, stake president, mission president, and now the First Quorum of the Seventy. Steve! You made a GA!

He’s referring to Carlos Godoy of the First Quorum of Seventy.

Today I visited the Museu Paulista (the old Museu do Ipiranga), which was built to commemorate Brazil’s independence from Portugal in 1822. I actually learned quite a bit and came back to the hotel and read up on the event in Wikipedia as well, so I have a fuller view of that slice of history.

The building was dedicated in 1895 or so and is striking from a distance, albeit a strange ochre color. Upon getting closer, you realize that it is very shallow — almost like a façade from a Hollywood set. It is very wide and ornate and seems to be a mixture of architectural styles, but mostly neoclassical. The grounds are beautiful and terraced with fountains and oddly oriental-appearing stone beasts, fish, American- (or Nazi) style eagles on poles and surrounded by lush tropical foliage.

At the bottom of a very long and skateboard-filled promenade sits a stack of marble stairs, plinths, bronze lions and ornate and patinaed heroic-sized sculptures at the Praça de Independência. It reminds me of something one would find outside of Buckingham Palace in London and commemorates Brazil’s independence. It has an oddly-placed gas flame that seems like an afterthought on the eastern side.

From a history perspective, our old mission office was in Porto Alegre on Avenida Princesa Isabel. Today I finally learned who she was and what part she played in Brazil’s history (basically finally freeing the slaves after a very slow process begun by her father years earlier. He happened to be out of the country at the time. This did not happen until 1888 and perhaps reflects to some degree why Brazilians lag behind even the US in their cultural treatment of different races).

Today is starting to look more like winter. The sky is grey and overcast and there is a distinctive chill in the air this morning. The last few days here have been clear, with temperatures hovering in the 70s. I suppose it was too good to last.

One of the co-workers who was to arrive this morning sent me an email last night indicating she had misconnected on her flight in Atlanta due to thunderstorms and that tonight’s flight was booked full. We had a full agenda scheduled, so I’m not sure how this is going to shake out, but it definitely throws a wrench into our plans here.

The other co-worker is arriving this morning as well — on his first trip to Brazil. He was to meet up with the first person and together, come in a pre-arranged car to the hotel. I hope he is able to figure out how to get from Guarulhos Airport to the other side of the city, where we are staying. I don’t envy his position right now. He served a mission in western Canada and I’m pretty sure that didn’t include language skills (“Eh?”).

I spent a quiet day yesterday, visiting both an antiques fair and the MASP (Art Museum of São Paulo), then moved to my long-stay hotel a couple of miles away.

After arriving in a quieter neighborhood and deciding to walk to the grocery store for some food, I chuckled as I followed a trail of blood drops for several blocks along the way. They were like clockwork at about every 6-8 inches, dime-sized and just drying. Eventually they stopped (or turned the corner).

Not sure if it was from dog or man, but it reminded me to be careful as I walked around this city of 20 million.

After many years and this second physical attempt, I found the grave of Betty Maud Clements in a Blumenau, Brazil cemetery yesterday morning. Her granddaughter — who died two years afterwards — is buried in the same grave.

I genuinely loved this quick trip to Blumenau and feel like really accomplished something good.

I spent the rest of the day site-seeing, reminiscing and generally enjoying the first city of my Brazilian mission in 1978-79.