Team's Successful Return

The team arrived safely in Kansas City on May 4th. The experience of a lifetime will remain in our memories for years to come. We will now share this experience with Rotarians in our home district and welcome our Brazilian GSE team, which arrived safely on May 14th. Their team leader is Podalyro Neto, who graciously hosted us in Santarem.

End of Week 4 and Rotary District 4720 Annual Conference

Today is the last day of the Rotary District 4720 Annual Conference presentations. The GSE Team is scheduled to make a presentation to the assembly and have prepared a summary presentation for this event. The openning ceremonies were held on Thursday, April 29th at night and the programming has been half days since then. Last evening the program included a talent show with several Rotarians volunteering to sing, play instruments and share other talents with the participants. The program ended at 1:00 a.m. making for a short night sleep. We have been able to meet several Rotarians from our earlier visits to Manaus and Santarem. These reunions have been very enjoyable and rewarding.

Our week has been filled with professional visits and tours of the city sites. Yesterday we enjoyed an hour and half boat excursion around Belem, enjoying the sunset and evening city lights. The boat ride included performances of regional dances and music, which added to the festive flavor. We had toured the botanical gardens earlier in the day, mesmorized by the abundance of life and beauty of the virgin forest.

This week marks the culmination of a wonderful cultural and professional experience for each of our team members. The trip wasn't without its unforseen events, but in the end can be viewed with great success and satisfaction. The team learned a great deal and the host district provided a wonderful experience for our members. Our host families went out of their way to make the visit enjoyable and provided a wonderful opportunity for personal growth and understanding of Rotary International's service above self mission.

During the three-city visits our team has presented to eleven Rotary clubs and the District conference, we have visited universities, churches, theaters, emergency communication centers, hospitals, ambulance services, fire and police headquarters, nature centers, social service agencies, performance arts centers, pre-schools, schools, open air markets, parks, beaches, artesan and craft shops, aviaries, museums, rivers, boats, jewelry makers, public health centers, secretaries of health, laboratories, ports and docks, sacred art centers, theological seminaries, live butterfly exhibits, farm houses, rubber plantations, islands, resorts, medical clinics and dance studios. We have traveled over 15,000 miles by plane, boat, car, bus, van and by foot. We have visited villages, towns and cities up to 3 million population. The foods we have savored run the full range of typical native Brazilian culinary offerings. It's difficult to capture the immensity of natural beauty we have witnessed during this Amazon trip. The people and generous Brazilian spirit have been a delightful presence everywhere we have roamed.

As we prepare our bags for departure on Monday and return to the USA, our hope is to reflect on this month-long experience and share the things we have learned with the Rotary District 5710 upon our arrival in Kansas.

Beginning the Final Week

Last weekend we spent two days at the northern town of Salinopolis, which is a beach resort community for the residents of Belem. The shore community is located about 100 miles northeast of Belem and about a three-hour drive away. The beautiful white sandy Atlantic Ocean beaches and dunes are bathed by the diluted Amazon River waters. This phenomenon of reduced salinity is influenced by the annual variation of water flow from the Amazon River, which reaches its peak in June and ebbs to its lowest level in November. During the lowest period of river effluence the increased salinity results in a large fish kill when the fish from the Amazon reach the Atlantic waters.

The GSE Team members enjoyed the opportunity to relax, swim and hunt for shells on the beach. The vacation home of our host family was a delightful retreat and the home-cooked food was delicious.

After our return to Belem we began our week with a tour on Monday of the local island of Mosqueiro. It rained very hard on Monday evening knocking out the electricity in parts of the city.

Last week we also visited the campus of the Federal Rural University of the Amazon (UFRA) the regional equivalent of our land-grant universities, such as K-State. This university offers programs in forestry, land management, fishery, veterinary medicine, agricultural engineering, botany, animal husbandry, and ecological sciences. Yesterday we visited the state historical museum and a famous flora and fauna research institute, founded by a Swiss scientist for which it is named, Emilio Goeldi.

Today and tomorrow the team members will be conducting individual professional visits to various organizations, including the emergency management agencies, universities, tropical disease institute Evandro Chagas, the theater, churches and art centers. The week will conclude with the annual district conference and a special presentation by the GSE Team to the district membership of 1,100 Rotarians.

The team will depart via Rio de Janeiro for the US on Monday, May 3rd and arrive in Kansas City on Tuesday, May 4th.

Belem Experiences

During the first few days in Belem we have met with four of the six Rotary clubs, making brief presentations and getting to know their membership. The largest club is North Belem with nearly 40 members. The remaining club memberships are numbered in the teens. All Belem clubs meet in the same location, which is on the 12th floor of a building, which is owned by Rotary. Their staff prepare all Rotary meals and their office secretary keeps every club's attendance records.

Belem is a large city with nearly 2 million population and serves as a port of entry to the Amazon region. The city was established in 1617 as a Portuguese settlement at the mouth of the Amazon River. The Jesuits had an early presence in the education and religious catecism of the Brazilian natives. The early settlement was comprised of a fluvial defensive fort, church and administrative center, which later served as a hospital. The city center is located on a small river penninsula, the older buildings are located on the waterfront, while as the city developed it migrated inland. The metropolitan area now expands well beyond this initial penninsula.

We have spent the first days exploring the city, touring their beautiful cathedral, basilica, fort and waterfront park, which includes an aviary, naval museum and live butterfly exhibit. We also toured a museum of sacred art, jewelry and native artisan centers. Pottery from the Marajo Island, similar to Navajo art, is prevalent in this community.

We also toured the Federal Rural University of Para, which has several programs in forestry, agriculture, environmental sciences, fishery, land conservation, botany, veterinary medicine and life sciences.

The upcoming weekend will include a trip to the Atlantic coastal city of Salinopolis, where the GSE team will stay overnight at the vacation home of a Rotarian family.

Week 3 Begins in Belem

Our flight from Santarem to Belem was spectacular and allowed us to experience the vast beauty of the Amazon basin. The river is still in it's rising phase, which will culminate at the end of June. There are areas where it appears to be a flood zone with no defined river, while other times the river is more defined with banks, as it meanders gently toward the Atlantic Ocean. As we approached Belem the river was joined by a number of tributaries and widened to an expanse, where one cannot discern the sea from the river. Fluvial islands and forest are laced with channels of water.

Our team was greeted at the airport in Belem by the District 4720 Governor, Lourenco, Governor-elect Geraldo and representatives from the six Rotary clubs in the city. After a group picture each team member was assigned to a host, who took the GSE Team members to their respective homes. We convened at 7:00 p.m. at the downtown Rotary meeting place, which is shared by all clubs, to meet with the East Belem Rotary Club. Our team made its presentation and then dispersed back to their respective host locations.

The schedule for the week is still being finalized and some confusion remains about the next day's gathering. I'm certain we will work everything out in the end. This experience will be the team's first challenge for individual survival within the Brazilian culture, without ready access to their personal translator.

Departure from Santarem and End of Week 2

Our short stay in Santarem has been quite enjoyable. We have had a restful and leisurely visit in this historic city. It is historic from the point of view of the US in that a number of confederate families emmigrated to this region after the civil war, because Brazil remained a slave country until 1888. Many descendents of these confederate families are still in this region, with American names, such as "Jennings, Wallace, Riker, Harrington,Pits, and Franklyn." A few historians have written about this exodus of the "Confederados" from the southern US States of Mississippi, Texas and Carolinas. This is also the origin of some of the protestant churches in Brazil. During the Brazilian empire, following the declaration of independence from Portugal in 1822, the Roman Catholic church remain the state denomination and no other religions could be observed. It wasn't until after the establishment of the Federal Republic of Brazil in 1889 that other churches could exist openly. The emmigrant confederates brought their Baptist religion and established it in this region in the late 1800's. The confederate families also formed an American colony near Sao Paulo in the South of Brazil, named "Americana."

A number of Americans from the Franciscan Order have also influenced the creation of the Foundation of Hope (Fundacao Esperanca), which is where we have stayed while in Santarem. This combined college and health center has been supported by Rotary International, both from US as well as European clubs.

During our stay here we visited one of two planned communities, which were established in 1927 and 1934 respectively by the Ford Motor Company. This was a source of rubber for the automobiles that Ford was producing during this pre-World War - II period.

We also had a very relaxing weekend on the Tapajos river, which we traveled by boat from a Rotarian's home to a beautiful recreational area up river.

We leave by plane for Belem this afternoon.

Arrival in Santarem

Our team arrived at 3:00 a.m. in Santarem and reached our destination at the Hope Foundation at 4:00 a.m. This is a college dormitory setting in Santarem, which is linked to the Catholic Church. We had to wake the staff in order to gain access at this ungodly hour of the morning. Even the security guard was asleep at his post. We rested until 11:30 a.m. before gathering with the Rotary leadership. We visited two agencies, one similar to a Head Start program and another a children's rehabilitation program. Santarem is a city of about 300,000 population that is located at the confluence of the Tapajos and Amazon Rivers. This is a very large fluvial port and a large agricultural center for Cargill, which exports soy and rice. This is also a regional educational and health center. Recently, the Brazilian government decided to subdivide the state of Para and create a new state of Tapajos. Santarem will become this new state's capital. Belem will remain the capital of the other half of Para.