2 of 3: Peruvian Wedding & Events

A true glimpse of Peruvian culture was Matt and Edith's beautiful wedding. It was an elegant, elaborate reception and church ceremony. Definitely one of the nicest we've ever been to, and also a lot of fun. We were able to spend time with Edith's family and friends, who were warm and welcoming, and we all were really excited to be a groomsman/bridesmaid/flowergirl. The wedding celebration was a weekend-long party, starting with the rehearsal and dinner, wedding, and then a Sunday dinner at the bride's parents' home.

The rehearsal dinner.

Cousins! Eri and Baby Joaquin sleeping at dinner.

Eri getting her hair done before the wedding. She also
had her first manicure for the occasion and chose red polish.

What a big girl!  She was very well-behaved during the Aqua
Net and bobby pinning process.

Eri was excited to wear a white dress, "just like Aunt Edith."

The flowergirl and the groom.

Explaining the flower-sprinkling duties was somewhat confusing for Eri.
It was even more confusing for the wedding planner when we explained
that Eri would need help down the aisle because she doesn't understand
directions in Spanish and she's 2. 

Last minute adjustments.

With the dapper groom.

Right before the entire basket was dumped at Edith's feet.

Watching "the part where they get married."

Our new sister.

What a lucky guy.

The newlyweds' entrance at the reception and
Matt impressively giving a speech in perfect Spanish.

Dinner entertainment was native dancing.

The first dance.

Geoff with the bride; Brye and Eri in the back with the groom.

This guy and girl were the equivalent of the singles who catch the
garter and bouquet at American weddings, though we're not sure the
relationship lasted much longer than the next few hours. 

They couldn't cut this thing fast
enough for a certain someone. (Not Eri.)

Eri and Geoff on the dance floor.

Just the girls dancin'.

Brothers and groomsmen.

Day-after-the-wedding party at the bride's parents home.

Doin' some handy work in the backyard with Uncle Mark.

Trying to soak up as much Baby Joaquin time as we can.

Eri and her new amiga.

The first time for our Peruvian friend to eat
Macaroni and Cheese and the 1,736th time for Eri.

The Magic Cuy Game. A guinea pig (cuy) is placed in the center box,
surrounded by 10 numbered boxes with little openings.

Bets are placed by picking the number of the box you
think the cuy will run into.

Eri, who has just learned to identify numbers,
was excited to place the coins on the boxes for people. We were happy to show her
important real-life application, such as gambling. 

When all bets are placed, the cuy is made sufficiently dizzy and the box is lifted. 

The suspense in the crowd is palpable.

The cuy runs into a box and the winner gets his payday.

El Magico Cuy and his bookie.

When they're not earning a buck, the cuy are man-handled by kids,
both of which are better than what happens later (see the Peruvian cuisine notes.)

The two newest members of the Steeves family.
(Cute hat, sister.)

Halloween in Brazil

This American holiday, called "Halloween" in Portuguese, is celebrated here, though with much less fanfare, i.e., no copious amounts of delicious little candy bars next to the Christmas lights in Target, no trick-or-treating, no packs of sexy nurses or school girls bar-hopping, no razor blades in apples, etc. 

Kids at Eri's school changed into their costumes at the end of the day for an outdoor dance party while the teachers handed out suckers. The boys were super heros or something bloody, the girls were witches (except our little ladybug Eri) and Geoff wore a mask that stole the show.

Our First Visitors: The Hughes

Our first house guests: Scott, Molly and baby boy in utero! 

Their arrival was highly anticipated and their departure was sad. They were in the process of moving from Santiago, Chile, where we visited them in August (see post appropriately titled "Chile") back to Kansas City, where our lifelong friendship began, when they stopped in Florianopolis for a week to see us. We loved showing them around and showing them off to our friends here. More pix to follow.

Eri burst through the security area at the Florianopolis airport and ran
to Scolly emerging from bagage claim. 

It was cute how she flung herself into Molly's arms,
but we were really happy she didn't get shot by the policia.

The beaches here look pretty much like the ones in Kansas City.

Showing off. Molly had work to do, much to Eri's dismay,
so she upped her distraction game.

Lunch at the beach.

"Voo livre" (paragliding) was awesome. Here I am on final descent while
the instructor is encouraging me to open my eyes
so I don't miss how fast we're approaching the ground. Yep, I know.

Eri running to give me a hug after I landed alive.

Portuguese to English translation:
"Run straight off this cliff and hope for the best."

Scott's super smooth landing.

On the river.

Looks like a native.

Victor, Eri and Scott. Spinning is universally fun for
children and universally tiring for adults.

Two hemispheres of friendship.

Frickin' Finally

Mr. Potato Head, Baby Natalie, Mickey and the gang finally were released from captivity along with pretty much everything else we own. As the boxes were opened, their joyous cheers were audible. Oh wait, that was me.
Yep, last week the movers arrived with our household goods. Everything was packed up in California at the end of May. What happened in June, July, August and half of September? As far as I can tell, a workers' strike at the arrival port in Brazil and sheer incompetence. Quite frustratingly, our household goods sat one hour from here for a month prior to delivery. I nearly went to the loading dock myself, but they still had our car, too.
We are now happily unpacking and Eri, who asked almost daily where the movers were, is feasting on Cheerios and Goldfish crackers once again and we're using non-plastic cutlery and sleeping on beds that don't inflate. Yay.
I took some pix of the chaos, but they're not so interesting. Photos to follow when the dust settles (and is swept up and Swiffered sufficiently.) Meanwhile, here are a few from the last couple weeks.

At school.
Learning Portuguese and to be sure-footed.

A little light reading.

FYI, she washed her hands in between pictures two and three.

I never knew Brazil had so many kayak-able rivers.
Turns out Geoff had a pretty good idea this was the case.

Looks like he's do pretty well on Eri's playground toy pictured above.

Conquered another one!

Tidbits

Even the animals are beautiful: People here adorn their little dogs with bows, not unlike the ones Eri wore as a baby, as well as little jewel stickers on the dogs' ears, like earrings, and between the dogs' eyes, like a Bindi, presumably to represent marital status.

Everything is slow: After two and a half months, the plumber is still coming back again next week to fix one of our bathroom sinks. It took two weeks for the locksmith to change out and add more locks, probably because he did just one per day, each of which took half a day. And, we still don't have our household goods. Sigh.

Most things are inefficient: Per consulate rules, we had to upgrade one of our apartment's external doors. Our "custom door" was delivered by two guys with backpacks and a saw. Unfortunately it was unpainted, which meant two more guys came to stain it and then sat for half a day and literally watched the paint dry before adding a second coat. They did multitask by drinking crappy instant coffee with me and helping me practice my portuguese.

People are so nice: One of my big pre-move worries was we'd have trouble making friends. I thought for sure we'd be thought of as those stinky foreigners in the computer lab, probably because Americans are so impatient with foreigners. However, we love the celebrity status we have here. We already have lots of friends, who invite as over and out-and-about and even drive us around town as we wait for our car (yep, still).

Brazilians love the United States: Whenever people find out we're Americans, they immediately tell us the list of U.S. cities they've visited (usually New York, Miami and San Francisco) and ask us if we've ever been to an amazing restaurant called The Cheesecake Factory.

Accents: Geoff and I take a language class for foreigners at the university. Interestingly, I think I understand better when a non-native speaks portuguese than when natives speak. Their accents are also very distinct, i.e. we can easily identify the Germans, Italians, etc., which explains how people know we're English speakers when we talk in portuguese.

Everyone is always on strike: That's all.

Lost In Translation (But Really Cute)

Eri had her first ever school play! And we had no idea what was going on. Especially when the children dressed as barnyard animals took center stage. 

One thing we know for sure, Eri was adorable singing and dancing with her amigas. 

(See below, far right (the white one).)