Of Idioms…

Since I am in Wales visiting my sister (she married an Englishman), I have been thinking a lot about idioms.  Those phrases that people use that make perfect sense to people with whom they share a nationality, but which cause a lot of head scratching for those who don’t.

For instance, in England, they use the phrase “lost the plot” to say someone is out of their mind.

In Brazil, the idioms have the added ‘confusion benefit’ of being in a different language.  Americans would refer to clunker cars as lemons, whereas in Brazil, the word for a car that’s a lemon is a pineapple.   I’m not sure why people associate poorly running vehicles with yellow fruit, but apparently we do.

In America, it rains cats and dogs, but in Brazil (were idioms based in reality) you would be more likely to be clunked on the head with a knife and fork than a cat or dog.

And then there are the phrases that when translated into English make no sense whatsoever.  In a bakery we were often helped with the phrase, “Pois não” which literally means, “Because No.”  Although, it might sound rude, it was an expression used to offer help.

"Sei la" literally means, "I know there."  It's used to mean, "I don't know."  So, apparently, if you know there, you don't know here.

"Legal” has the same meaning in Portuguese that it does in English, but it can also mean that something is “cool”.  This is helpful to know so someone’s not offended when they’re told that their new car is lawful, when what they were hoping to hear is that their new car is the best thing on four wheels.  

The truth is that once you get past the confusion of a new idiom, they’re fun to add to your vocabulary. 

At the very least, you can enjoy the look of bafflement on someone’s face when they have no idea what you’re saying.

Do you have a favorite idiom?

Of Whipping Cream…

Before moving to Brazil, I was a child of Cool Whip.  For me, the topping you put onto pies, cakes, and sundaes came from the freezer and had to be thawed.

In Brazil, we couldn’t find Cool Whip. 

We were left with two options. 

The first was a box of powder that after being added to liquid and beaten made something that resembled whipped cream but by no means tasted like whipped cream.

Our second option was real whipped cream.

In Brazil, a lot of dairy comes from either boxes or cans and is shelf stable.  We bought our first box of whipped cream and carefully put it into the fridge since warm whipping cream won’t whip.

After pulling it from the freezer we got out our transformer (Brasil is 220 and all appliances we’d brought from the States including our Kitchen Aid were 110).

We hooked up the mixer in the living room to the nearest transformer and crowded around to watch our whipping cream turn into luscious whipped cream.

Excitement grew as the cream thickened more and more.

Excitement faded as the cream began to clump together and we realized we had created butter.  Butter is all very good but not quite as exciting as whipped cream.

We did eventually learn to whip cream properly.  We abandoned all the boxes of chemicalized powder in favor of real, genuine whipped cream.

And became whipped cream snobs.

After our return to the States, with Cool Whip in abundance, I find I no longer enjoy the taste or the thought of the chemicalized fluff.

So, although I find whipping cream in a carton in the refrigerator section of the supermarket, rather than in a can on the shelf, I find myself committed to the pursuit of real whipped cream.

In honor of whipped cream, I’ll share a favorite recipe from Brasil.  I have Americanized it so there is no need to pursue the more exotic ingredients.  If you wish to make that version, look up Mousse de Maracuja on a search engine.

One can of sweetened condensed milk.

Enough juice to fill the can and perhaps a little extra if you like things tarter.  You can use pure passion fruit juice, which is the proper way to make it.  I was unable to find it in any local supermarkets so I used lemon juice instead.  It is important not to use any juice that is sweet or the result will be too sweet.

A small carton of whipping cream.

Combine the condensed milk and juice.  Whip the whipped cream being careful not to turn it into butter.  Fold in the juice/milk mixture.  Refrigerate until chilled.  

Enjoy!

 

Of Christmas Trees…

I was born in Oregon, where pine trees grow on trees.  Oh wait, that doesn’t quite work.  Well, anyway, pine trees are common there.

It made me quite spoiled. At Christmas, we went to a u-pick tree farm and were instantly surrounded by gorgeous trees and the unforgettable smell of pine hanging crisply in the air.

In Brazil, pine trees were almost as rare as white Christmases.

Eventually, I decided that we needed a tree of some kind.  Using a piece of Styrofoam I managed to cut a semblance of a pine tree that would slide into another half creating a lopsided white Christmas tree that didn’t fulfill our Oregonian expectations of what a Christmas tree should either look—or smell—like.

The next year I decided to try to create the same effect out of plywood.  I was making plans when my parents came home from the store with a fake pine tree causing a great deal of excitement.

It is, after all, hard to hang ornaments on a Styrofoam tree.

We took it out of the box and stacked the pipes before laying out the branches and sorting them according to size.  We put the metal ends of the branches into the holes on the green pipes and stood back to admire our work.

After years of not really having a tree at all there was something thrilling about seeing something that resembled a real tree.  It might lack the smell and be merely a collection of pipes, wire, and whatever it is they use to make the phony needles, but we were happy.

Thinking about real versus phony trees got me thinking about real versus phony Christmases.  In Brazil, Christmas didn’t feel real at first because we had none of the trappings with which we associated the holiday.  But the truth is that a real Christmas isn’t about fireplaces, snow, sleighs, or even real pine trees. 

It’s about celebrating our Lord’s birth.  He is the real Christmas.  The greatest gift.

I wish you a very blessed and merry Christmas, celebrating the real reason for the season.

Even if your tree is a lopsided one made of Styrofoam.

What is the weirdest Christmas you ever spent?

Did you find it made you more grateful for the true meaning of Christmas?

 

Of Ants…

Rules ants should observe. 

1.       Stay outside. 

2.       Be small.

3.       Stay outside. 

4.       Be shiny. 

5.       Work hard.

6.       Did I mention stay outside?

7.       Never bite.

8.       I mean, never, ever, ever bite.

The ants in Brazil do not conform to these rules.  I suppose the ants elsewhere might not either, but up until moving to Brazil I had spent all my meager ant-observing time in Oregon. 

Although Brazil is full of ants, three made the biggest impact.

Ant number one (pictured above) conformed to a few of the ant rules.  It was shiny, never bit me, and, I’m assuming, worked hard.  Unfortunately, it failed to observe rule number two.  I don’t suppose I can really blame the ant for being at least two inches long.  To be honest, I found the ants to be kind of sweet.  I could observe them and contemplate the verses in the Bible about ants, without regretting standing still long enough to do so.

And without straining my eyes since they were large enough to be seen from a helicopter.

The second ant, which made a biting impression, was the fire ant.  These nasty little things were small, shiny and did for the most part stay outside.  They broke rules number seven and eight.  Yes, I do realize rules number seven and eight are basically the same, but eight rules are far more impressive than seven.

If you accidentally stepped into the midst of a swarm of fire ants, you very quickly became aware of your mistake.  This happened quite often since fire ants were everywhere, doing who knows what while they waited for unsuspecting humans to fall into their trap.   I often imagined the little ant general insanely yelling for his troops to attack and bring down the giant.  They followed his lead with gusto and the ensuing pain sent us running for the nearest water faucet to wash them off and cool the burning bites. 

I have never been the type to kill a bug with my finger, but in the absence of a faucet I would grab the nasty insects off me and roll them into tiny squished balls.  Take that you nasty ant general!

The last ant to make my top three is the invader ant.

 Invader ants did not conform to the most basic of the rules laid down for ants.  So basic, it made my list of rules three times.  Three times, ants, and you still didn’t follow it.  In other words, they did not stay outside.

For reasons known only to their tiny insectoid minds, these ants would take it upon themselves to invade our porch, or a corner of our house, or our whole house.  Friends told us to welcome the invasion because the ants would carry away any other unwanted guests with them such as spiders, or centipedes. 

We weren’t too keen on having our house invaded, even if their tiny antish brains thought they were doing us a favor.  I’m sorry, but there is something about the thought of ants cutting a swath through my bed while I’m in it that cures me of seeing anything altruistic in their invasion.

No, I prefer my ants, biteless and outside.

Definitely, outside.

Of Cashews…

Cashews are one of my favorite nuts.  Like most people I knew they grew on trees but had no clue about the work that went into harvesting them, until the year my family decided to send them out as Christmas gifts.

Cashews grow as part of the Caju fruit.  The fruit can be used to make the juice, and although I like the nuts, I hate the juice.   

The nuts are covered with a thick, impenetrable shell.  The first step is to set the nuts on fire.  I do mean that literally.  Using a jury rigged metal pan, we placed the nuts over the fire and allowed them to catch on fire to burn off some of the acidic oil contained in the skins. 

We removed the now blackened nuts from the fire and set about breaking through the shells.  Since the shells have the impenetrability of a Kevlar vest lined with crocodile skin, this step was miserable.  Adding to the fun was the fact that the shells were full of an acid that would eat through your skin.

We pulled on gloves to protect our hands but found that the acid wasn’t picky and soon the gloves had holes eaten in them.  Hunched over make shift tables made of bricks, around a fire entirely too warm in the afternoon heat, we used hammers and brute strength to get the nuts out.  More often than not the nuts came out in pieces, and a whole nut was cause for celebration.

We had intended to make the nuts into Christmas present but there is nothing very festive about crumbs of nuts in a pretty bag tied with ribbon.

We improvised by deciding to make the nuts into brittle.  Other than the acid-burned hands, making cashews the old-fashioned way was an experience not to be looked down on.  It gave us a better appreciation of the work that goes into the things we take for granted.

And gratitude is worth the price of acid-burned fingers.

Of Pizza…

My family loves pizza.  At one time my parents owned several pizza restaurants and we had pizza for dinner at least once a week.   

We generally like Barbequed Chicken or black olive pizza. 

In Brazil, those two flavors weren’t on the menu.  Instead they had pizza with chicken, a thick creamy cheese sort of like cream cheese, and quail eggs.  Hard boiled quail eggs.  On a pizza.

As you can probably tell, I thought hard boiled eggs on my pizza was a little odd, but I did eventually get used to them and didn’t even mind them.

Brazilian pizza also has very little sauce.  And by little I mean it barely colors the crust.  They make up for the lack of sauce by serving it with ketchup and mayonnaise.  Yes, you did read that right.  Mayo on pizza. 

I did not become accustomed to mayo, although I did put ketchup on my pizza.  It really isn’t bad.

During trips to Belem we would have a choice between two American restaurants.  McDonald’s or Pizza Hut.  One time we chose Pizza Hut and got the all-you-can-eat lunch where waiter continually brought pizzas around to the tables.

We loaded up on the pepperoni pizza, barely sparing a glace for any of the other flavors.  The waiter told us that we had eaten more pepperoni pizza in one meal than they usually sold.  So apparently, Brazilians think as little of America’s number one flavor of pizza as we thought of mayonnaise on our pizza.

In the end, pizza is a universal food, and almost no matter what the toppings, my family enjoys it.

All except the mayo, that is. 

In July, several of the people to whom we ministered were driving home late at night.  It was too dark to see the hole in the bridge, and the sticks the locals had put in to warn people of the danger had fallen.  The van flipped and the mother of two of the little girls I taught as well as one of the children I taught were killed.  Others to whom we ministered were seriously injured, including one lady left in a coma.  I have found it difficult to write my blog since then since I have always tried to write with humor.
Today, I would like to share an excerpt from a devotional I am writing.  I hope it encourages you to remember the providence of God, and hope you will bear with me in both my delay in writing and not having a humorous article this week.

Romans 8:28

A fallen tree was nothing to be thankful for. 

While living in Brazil, it was a forty-five minute trip to the nearest town over bumpy roads, interspersed with gates that had to be open and shut.  If it had rained, the trip took a lot longer and each gate added additional weight of mud to the bottom of my shoes.

And then there was the frustration of finding fallen trees across the road.  Although, we carried a machete in the car, sometimes the tree was big enough around that it required a chainsaw.  Oftentimes, the tree was covered in thorns, vines, and or fire ants.  I can honestly say I never came across a fallen tree and shouted praises to the Lord.

Until the day it saved a life.

We had gotten up early and needed to take a trip to town in spite of the fact that the roads were still muddy from the night before.  After a long trip slogging through the mud we came to a tree that had fallen across the road.  Too thick to get through with a machete it meant a long trip back to the house to get the chainsaw we’d forgotten.

By the time we got home it was close to twelve and we decided to eat lunch before we set out again.  While we were eating two boys from one of our meetings showed up and asked for a ride to the doctor.  Their sister had a bad pain in her side.  They, like most of the people to whom we ministered, had no car and we were their only ride.

Concerned we rushed out and with their help managed to clear the road and pick up their sister.  She’d been carried between two family members to the top of a hill too dangerous to descend while wet. 

We rushed into town and took her to the hospital where she was taken immediately in for an emergency appendectomy.  We were told that she was within minutes of it bursting and taking her life.

If that tree hadn’t been in the road and delayed our departure into town in our only vehicle, Raine would have died.

It’s always easier to see the hand of God in the big changes in life.  It’s harder when it’s lost keys, a bad cold, or a flat tire.

I try to remember the lesson of the fallen tree and wonder if my lost keys might mean I avoid a wreck, or that bad cold might mean a worse health problem is discovered in time.

The Providence of God is not only in the big things, but the insignificant, the mundane.

Things as small as fallen trees.