A Night in the Sky

This week Jeyson did 2 more night flights - one with an instructor....

And one with me! I haven't flown with Jeyson in a long time so I didn't want to miss out on the opportunity - maybe even the ONLY opportunity I'll have to fly at night!

Here's what the inside of the plane looks like at night. Everything seemed so different at night!

We flew for 2 hours (I believe the total minimum hours of night flights is 5). We flew over to nearby Goiania and Jeyson did 3 "touch and goes", meaning you land the plane and immediately take off again as you go off the runway. Goiania is a huge city (1.2 million people) and has an actual airport for commercial airlines. It was so strange for our tiny airplane with 2 passengers to come in for a landing right after an airbus!!! It was especially neat to hear the interaction between these huge planes and the control tower.

Since there were so many planes going through the airport, at one point the control tower had us just keep circling around the city until we were scheduled to land. All I can say is WOW! I can't even describe how incredible it was to fly around Goiania at night with windows on all sides (unlike in an airliner where you just have one tiny window if you're lucky :)

Looking at the crazy road system in Goiania, it's hard to believe it's a planned city!

And of course, you can't have a major city in Brazil without a soccer stadium!!

Welcome until 2018

It's here!!! What's here? My permanent visa!!!
You may remember that when I first arrived here in March 2008, we started running after ALL of the documentation needed for my permanent visa here in Brazil. The process even included a surprise visit from the Brazil version of the FBI at our house! I was totally approved and even had my name written in the official books in Brasilia (seriously!). I was issued a temporary, handwritten paper that allowed me to remain in Brazil and I just had to wait 6 months for my official permanent visa identification card to be printed. 6 months?!? Little did I know it would take even longer!

Yesterday, 1 year and 3 months later, my card arrived!!!

It is so strange to see Stephanie, Brazil, and Permanent on the same card.....do I really live in Brazil?!? Very surreal! As you can see on the card, my name is listed as Stephanie Ciotta Braun. It's funny, when we got married in the States, I changed my name to just Stephanie Braun (dropping my maiden name), but when I began the process here, the Brazilian government workers said that my name was too short and that I needed to at least include my maiden name as my middle name! I guess it's because Brazilians have such long names (4 names is normal here) so in Brazil I'm officially Stephanie CIOTTA Braun :) Also, you will notice on the card that it's valid until September 23, 2018 so at that point I'll need to get a new card printed....hopefully it will be a little faster this time! Until then, with this card, I'm welcome in Brazil until 2018!

Night Flight and Other Happenings

This has been a busy, busy week with no extra time for blogging until now. Here's what we've done:

This week Jeyson had to do a night flight as part of his training. Actually, technically, the flight did not HAVE to be a night flight, but he needed to practice "ILS approaches," which could only be done at the extremelly busy airport in Brasilia. The only time available to practice several instrument "touch and goes" is in the middle of the night, around 1 or 2 am. So...Jeyson went to Asas around 11pm, took off with the instructor at 1am, and came back home around 5am! Imagine how challenging it was to drink just the right amount of coffee to help stay awake, but not too much to need to land to use the bathroom during the flight :) During the landing approaches, Jeyson had to use the hood to cover his eyes from seeing out the window. It was challenging, but he did well. This week was also the kick-off for the teens small group at house home. We invited the teens over to roast marshmallows, which grabbed their attention since most had never done this before. Considering the small size of our church, we were very happy that 4 teens came out! After a few ice breakers, the group seemed comfortable and open and interested in the idea of meeting together for small group Bible study every Thursday. One girl, Julia, even said she would like to have the group at her house sometime so she can invite the teens from her neighborhood! On Wednesday we also participated in our church's new small group for young couples. The group was also small there, only 4 couples, but hopefully with time it will grow. There, we met a neat young couple who got married this year and just became Christians recently.

Another busy part of the week included 10 hours of meetings on Friday for our mission to discuss and vote on changes to the leadership structure. Rocindes (below) has led the mission a president for many years and has felt the need for Brazilian pastors and leaders to also be a part of the "board of directors" of Asas. So, after many long hours of meetings, the leadership model will change. Rather than Rocindes be the president, we will be led by mixed group, including members of the mission as well as pastors and leaders who are also invested and effected by Asas de Socorro.

By far though, the most fun part of the week involved the whole Ciotta family and: On Tuesday evening we all met online on a giant conference call from New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Mississippi, and of course, Brazil. What fun! The virtual family party involved lots of laughs and catching up. It's hard to imagine life without this awesome, free technology!

2 Years in Brazil

I'm so excited to tell you that today is my 2 year anniversary of living in Brazil!

It's almost hard to believe that 2 years have passed already since we left the States together after getting married. Where has the time gone! It's incredible to see how much has changed and how much I have adapted to my new reality....sometimes it's hard to remember what some parts of life in the States are even like. It just feels so natural and normal to be here. We love being able to serve full time in the place God has put on our hearts....it's just great!

That isn't to say that there weren't days over the past few years that I've felt like this....

..... tiny, weak, fragile, and unable to fly in light of the process of adapting to a new life, language, people, and culture!

And there are days over the past 2 years that I've felt like doing this.....

and high-tailing it back to my comfort zone!

(Great picture, Jeyson! That's the Braun's dog galloping across the lawn :)

But after 365+365 days here, I truly can say that I am so content to call Brazil my home and call what I do day-to-day my life and ministry.

I am so thankful for the many wonderful friends that God has given me to laugh with and depend on (like these two women Camila and Rose who are also missionaries with Asas de Socorro). Even though these women grew up on the other side of the world from me, it's amazing that as sisters in Christ we have SO much in common!

And I am SO thankful to have an amazing husband who has been a constant source of encouragement and support along my journey adapting to a new reality.

And of course you - on the other side of this blog! I am so thankful for your encouragement and interest as we've shared countless stories and feeling about our new lives and work!

2 years down - many more to go!

Walls and Bikes

Hi, this is Jeyson - I thought I'd have a try at blogging this week....so here goes!

When you come visit us here in Brazil one day, you'll probably notice a major difference when we're taking a walk down the streets....walls. Walls, walls, everywhere! Before coming to Brazil, Stephanie had never really seen a house surrounded by a wall, like many of you haven't. So, when we posted a picture of our house (months ago) it's easy to see why it was so confusing. We posted a picture of our house...but all you saw was the wall! Where is the house?!? So, this post is dedicated to clearing up the confusion of walls.

This picture shows our house.... with the gate open,

Within the gate, you can see the car garage (where Stephanie is standing), as well as part of our huge lawn! (ok, actually the lawn in the front is about 12 ftX 6 ft - but it's green and cools the house so that's what counts!)

...and the main entrance to the house. (please excuse the bike...more on that later!) As you hopefully can see, the house is in the middle of our property and surrounded by, but not actually attached to, the surrounding wall. The trouble is that it is impossible to actually take a picture of the house since when you back up to take a picture of the whole house, you have to walk outside the wall. Here actually, driving down the street, you can't see what houses really look like ever - all you see is a wall. Only when you walk through the gate can you get a view of the house. As strange as the wall situation sounds, many (if not most) places in the world are like this. In fact, people here are amazed that the houses in the States do not NOT have walls for safety and privacy. It's all a matter of perspective of "normal".

This is the view of our street. That's our car parked there....although it always comes in the gate at night for safety. Can you see the grey splotches every few meters? Thats dried up cement! During construction, most house builders can't afford to have access to cement mixers and so they mix up the cement right there on the street with a shovel!

Ok, back to walls, here are more examples of walls around the neighborhood. The wall around the green house looks pretty small but is actually 2 meters tall. Its just the grass surrounding it has never been mowed! If you look closely, you will notice an electric fence above the wall, to deter people from "hopping" it.

Most builders actually build the wall that goes around the house first, and then build the house! Why you might ask? Well, so people don't steal the bricks and building materials before the house is finished, of course!

Pictured: Tempting loot for thieves laying around! (ie, bricks and tiles :)
More walls in front of each house....

Here's a house in the middle of construction. Here in Brazil, people don't really worry about fires since, as you can see, there really not much that can burn down!

(There I am walking Bobby down the street.) Some people can't really afford to build a wall so a wire fence will do. These neighbor's have a vicious dog that helps protect their house and car and Bobby likes to have a barking match with him every time we pass by!

Well another fun thing that happened recently is that we were able to get our hands on a tandem bike! Stephanie had really been wanting one so we could ride to the airport every so often and get some exercise in. However, they are extremelly rare here and the few that we saw for sale in stores where about 1.500 US dollars!

Well, recently we were able to borrow one that had been given to the YWAM base in Goiania. The base there is surrounded only by rough muddy roads and the thin-wheeled bike does not handle that too well. It had not been used in several months and was in need of much repair, so they agreed to let us use while we're in Anapolis, it in return for me fixing it up.

The bike is actually old and kind of "home-made" so it needed some modifications. One problem was that the front chain, called a "timing chain" fell off every couple of meters we rode and it could not be adjusted. The solution I found was to throw a few parts I had lying around the house to make a chain tensioner. So far it is working great and the chain has not fallen off!

Another problem was that it did not really have brakes since they were rusted together. Some lube and adjustments got that problem fix. It's in process, but we're having a lot of fun!

Whenever we ride around the neighborhood people love to marvel, since most people have never seen a tandem bike before. The other day we passed a group of kids playing soccer in the street. A little boy (about 5) stared at us with a dropped jaw. After a second he called out "WOW! I have never seen a bike like that in my WHOLE LIFE!" Very funny!

Finally...Pictures of Jeyson's Trip

Finally, the long awaited pictures of Jeyson's recent trip. He's gotten far enough in his training that he was able to join a missionary pilot from SIL (Wicliff in Brazil) on a 5 day trip in Mato Grosso, transporting missionaries and indigenous people who work Bible translation and their supplies to isolated places. I had the hardest time trying to narrow down the pictures so there's a lot! Enjoy!

Getting ready to take off from the Asas hangar in Anapolis Monday morning.
See you in a few days!

Joy (the other pilot) and Fritz (who accompanied the flights during the trip)

One of the trips was to a tribe in the Pantanal....the world's largest wetlands. The few existing roads that there are, are completely flooded and unusable for 6 months out of the year.

Some amazing views of the marshland

Landing strip ahead

Here they picked up three indigenous (Bororo) women and took them to receive training to learn how to translate the Bible into their language.

The women were dropped off in a canoe at the place where the plane landed.

Each day was had anywhere from 1-3 flights and at night Jeyson got to stay with a missionary family in a larger city, Cuiaba. Some amazing views from the next few days...

A small island with trees looks like it could be a tiny piece of moss in a puddle :)
During the flights, they flew over many small tribal villages. The following pictures are of Xavante villages.

So many trees!

Villages built by the edge of the water...

Villages surrounded by an endless sea of trees

The river system is the only way to get around, other than airplanes....needless to say airplanes are much more efficient in long distances like these!

Dropping off a 70+ year old missionary who has faithfully lived among the tribes of Brazil, translating the Bible into their languages.

She always has the pilot fly over the tribal village to alert the tribe to meet her at the landing strip. She brought gallons of gas for the outboard motor they use to get around.

What a privilege to be part of this work....what a joy to be a small piece of the bringing the Good News of Jesus Christ to extremely remote places!

It is so exciting to see Jeyson's hard work and training being put into action - a small taste of the ministry ahead