Today, we had a field trip. We went to the historic town of Penedo. It was a 2 hours bus ride and we had to leave an hour earlier that usual, so the day got off to a bad start. I dozed for most of the trip. It was driving through a lot of fields and some areas with red dirt that looked like Oklahoma. I saw cows, the strange cows like in Costa Rica, and regular cows too. The students were all very excited so it was a rowdy time.
We got there and there was a torrential downpour. Also due to some street restoration (like 2 guys replacing bricks in the streets) the road we needed was closed and the bus couldn't fit down the side streets so we had to walk quite a bit in the rain. The school uniform is pants and closed-toed shoes, so we were all pretty miserable, I think.
We went to a historical theatre that was built by the same Italian architect that built the Governor's palace in Maceio and some other important buildings.It was really beautiful and had 3 galleries, which were like 3 layers or levels, I guess. The top one, farthest from the stage and where nobles sat, was for slaves. I thought it was nice that the slaves got to go to the theatre. Pictures of the outside and inside of the theatre.
We also saw a church covered in gold lief, it was beautiful.
Then we went to some museum or something, maybe it was a courthouse? Our translator was missing, so the presentation was only in Portuguese and I was so wet and miserable I wasn't really paying attention anyway.
We ate lunch at this place that was right on the river. It was beautiful and the food was good, it was a buffet of traditional regional food, lots of steak and rice and stuff. There was a guy hanging right outside, just on the other side of the rail, that was waiting for food. Many places here are mostly outside with just a roof to make it "inside". The restaurant manager told the guy to meet him out back and took the food people left on the table and gave it to him. That was nice.
I also saw a lot of stray dogs with mange and over-grown toenails. In Maceio, dogs hang out in packs on the beach. The dogs in Penedo seem much sadder. There were so many of them too. I also saw a very skinny donkey pulling a wooden cart full of like 5 or 6 boys. I had a Cliff bar but I gave it to a man who was begging because you can't eat coins.
At the end of the day, we went to a market of handcrafts and I bought a cool thing. It's sand in a bottle that is designed to look like water and a house and palm trees. On the way back to the bus, one of the boys who was riding on the cart with the donkey was up in a tree, not high for me, about my eye-level, but high for him! He was trying to use a stick to untie a rope. I asked the school staff if I could help him, and they said sure. So I got it off for him and handed it to him. Then a drunk man started yelling a whole bunch. We walked past some flooded soccer fields with horses eating them. It was rough for me.
There was a rainbow before we left.
On the way back, the kids sang at full-voice and screamed and I don't know how they had so much energy. I was with the kids from about 7 AM to 6 PM, so we were pretty dead afterwards.
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