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The journey from Fortaleza was quite good, I slept most of the way, and only had one change over... Where I actually panicked and thought that the bus was leaving with my rugsack on it, but all was fine!
Arrival in S. Miguel was pretty good. My coordinator here was extremely kind and showed me the small town the same day. It is so small that you can walk from one end to another in about 10 minutes. Everyone here knows everyone, so when walking along the street (there are two main streets parallel to each other, and the a few smaller streets leading off of the big ones) everyone greets each other. Being new here, people tend to do a lot of staring, especially as I am considered big and white here. Children were actually afraid to approach me because of my size... Great for my self confidence...
My accomodations are by far superior to anything I had imagined... I have a whole house to myself! With a kitchen, living room, bathroom and bedroom!
S. Miguel is a small town for Brazilian standards, it has about 1,000 inhabitants, plus a further 500/600 people living outside of the town in the muncipality. It has running water and electricity, but no proper sewage system, toilet waste runs into a deep tank underground, and sink water just feeds to the gardens. The tallest building is the church as there are no two story houses. Despite S. Miguel being so small, you have a richer section and a poorer section called "Café Quente". In Café Quente most houses are build with bricks only, and have poor sanitation. There is no rubbish pickup in this area, and when it rains, the houses are more often than not flooded. In the rest of the town most houses are bricks with a cement layer. No house is completely closed up at the top, there is a small gap between the roof (tiled) and the walls. Therefore allowing loads of insects to come in, including birds.
There are two veggie/ fruit shops, one receives fresh produce on the Monday, and the other on the Wednesday. There are a few mini-markets, where most other things can be bought. There is no bakery, unless you count the one in Café Quente, but it's hygenic conditions leave no room for bread cravings.
At one end there is a dirt football field where the men often come together to play a game. There are a few bars here and there as well, and Friday night's are surprisingly noisy. The biggest bar in the market place has music blaring all throughout the night, and most of Saturday too.
Supposedly it's meant to be rainy season, but there hasn't been much rain and crops are dying out. People don't starve to death if they don't get their crops, but it does make life more difficult for them, especially as the last few months they have been spending time and energy into farming instead into doing other things to make money.
Hope to have given you a general view of the town I'm in....
- comments
Mamã Muito interessante! Uma realidade bem diferente da que vivemos na Europa Ocidental... e que, no entanto, é vivida por milhões de pessoas em todo o Mundo. Continua a actualizar-nos, também com fotos. Mtmtmts xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Alex Paulo Meca It's really a tiny place to live at. Those places tend to be like living with the family. One of the but is the lack of goods if aiming something more then food and a shelter. The roll you are playing is very important for that people, not just because you're helping them, but you're showing them a diferent culture enriching their isolated world. As your mam said, you're having your experience too, as your world is very diferent: more goods less human touch. Kusjes
Hélio Meca Retrato muito pitoresco; o nosso Portugal de há 70 anos atrás tinha coisas muito semelhantes. Ainda me lembro de se ir buscar água à fonte com bilhas de barro no dorso do burrico da vizinha; não havia água corrente e isto acontecia nos arredores de Tomar onde passei férias algumas vezes. Beijos dos avós.
Luís Uma autêntica viagem no espaço e no tempo! Certamente vais dar outro valor a muitas coisas que aqui tomavas como certas e fáceis. Tudo a correr bem, miúda! Beijos