Antsy

Now that I know I'm only going to be at WEBB for 1 more week, I'm starting to get impatient. What am I going to do when I'm no longer there for 20 hours a week, not to mention all the hours I spend on the bus every day? I have no idea.

A semi-answer may have come yesterday afternoon when I ran into 2 friends on the bus. One was Adriana, who I see sometimes on the bus in the mornings when she is going to work and I'm going to WEBB. But the other was Marcli, who I met at camp a month and a half ago, and have only seen once since then. Our schedules are basically totally opposite and we were never able to find a time to get together. She cuts hair and I wanted her to cut mine, but we couldn't even find a time for her to do that, let alone just spend some time hanging out. She gave me her new phone number, and I definitely think that was providential, because not only had I sort of forgotten about her, but I also would have had no way of getting in touch with her if I had not run into her on the bus. She doesn't even take that bus, she just got on with Adriana so she could talk with her more, and she was going to ride it through its whole route and get off again at the terminal. Crazy, hilarious, and very convenient for little Christine.

So maybe I'll have more time next month to get to know people, to practice my Portuguese. I now have two "friends" who know a little English, enough to help me with my Portuguese if I get stuck, which I very often do (as evidenced by the story at the end of my last post.) I'm sure Gwen will be coming up with more things for me to do as well, and at this point I feel like I will just be happy having a routine and having something to do. We'll see if I still agree in a couple weeks. I would appreciate your prayers for that transition, because I am not looking forward to having so much more time and not feeling very useful if I can't fill it. I am praying that I can find some sort of real responsibility, something that I can work on every day and sort of handle on my own instead of having to ask Gwen every time I have a free moment, "is there anything I can do?" I think that would be better for both of our sanity, haha. But we'll see what happens.

One week from today I'm getting on a bus, at 10pm, to go to Assis Chateabriand. Friday November 2nd is a holiday in Brazil, and Thursdays before holidays can often turn into holidays as well, as is my case. So I will spend the long weekend at Lar with Joaquim and then we're going to Cascavel on Monday morning to get that visa of mine renewed. Keep praying for that, that there are no surprises or problems at the last minute. And then, Lord-willing, I will be free and clear to stay in Brazil until February. So great! I'm really looking forward to getting out of Londrina for a weekend, having a break from everything, and just getting some fresh air. It's been 2 months that I've been here and everything is great, but everybody needs a change of scenery and a change of pace sometimes. Mine seems to be perfectly timed, and also can't come soon enough!