Last night we got to listen in to the neighbor’s beats. Well, it was probably a kilometer away, but I could still hear that Habanera rhythm pounding through the midnight air.

“What is Habanera rhythm?” you ask. Habanera is a very popular drum rhythm in Caribbean music and some Hispanic music genres. The story as I got it from Wikipedia plus maybe other sources is that it comes from English country dance in the 17th century. One day, the Spanish royal court visited some kind of English peasant fair, and liked the dance so much, they brought it back to Spain with them where it become a dance of the royal court. From there, of course, it spread through the Spanish colonies to the Americas.

And so now we have dance music that can be played long into the night with this English country dance rhythm. I do not know when they quit because I stuffed my ears full of air conditioner sounds and went right to sleep.

The van we drive is a 2014 Volkswagen Kombi towing a rented trailer. This van is absolutely amazing.

This van intrigues me because it’s basically the modern version of the VW Bus. Sadly, 2014, was the last year this van was manufactured by VW. The vehicle has no frills to speak of, unless you count seats as a “frill.” This is OK, because who needs all the bells and whistles? If your car is too expensive to run, just get a Kombi. It’s a simple 1.4L engine, with no automatic transmission, no power steering, and no electric windows. These are all things that you don’t really need, and just give out, which costs you money. It’s an enjoyable experience to ride in. I don’t think I’ll get the opportunity to drive it. I’m afraid I’m the “barbeiro” of “barbeiros” so I think I’ll just stay seated in the back. Yesterday, the driver ground the gears six times! The riders, of course, have no mercy on the guy.

The Kombi, and some things in the house, like “instant heat” electric shower heads and kitchen faucets, get my mind going on all the things we waste money on in North America. Houses with a hot water heater and a pipe each for hot and cold aren’t really needed. An electric shower head is so much cheaper than all that and gives you the same, or maybe even a better experience.

On to the work, which is the reason I am here in the first place. I don’t feel a need to give you a rundown of every place cleaned, and some of the things covered in the ACD/CDR Brasil group (https://t.me/+TerFAqFdDihkYTlh). We get up in the morning (of course), eat breakfast, then head to the house we will clean that day. We suit up in rain suits and gloves, and get out the pressure washers and the sprayers filled with disinfectant and bleach. The cleaning solution is to help break up the mud on the walls and ceiling.

Yes, you read that right, I said ceiling. The places we’ve been working since I got here have been right by the river levee (or dike, as some call it). The river overflowed the dike and the ground floors of all these houses were submerged.

To continue, once the solution is applied to various walls, ceilings, and other items as needed, the pressure washer is utilized to unstick previously stuck-on mud from these surfaces. It’s amazing how well a concrete and tile home will clean up with a good bleach and pressure wash.

After a good morning’s work, we head home for lunch. But not before everyone’s favorite time of the day, bath time! I can say that I had never been pressure washed before I came here, but I can also say that it is not a bad experience, especially in a rain suit. It feels surprisingly pleasant. This pressure wash typically occurs twice a day, at the end of the morning’s work, and the end of the afternoon’s work.

So far, in the evening, we pack up our equipment, then sing a song to the people we cleaned for that day. After this, the volunteers, tired, bedraggled, and wet (or dry, if the rain suit succeeded in its job) though they are, clamber into the Kombi and begin their trek back toward base camp.

At base camp, we have supper and socialize for a while, then the cooks head back to their temporary resting place to catch some shut-eye before repeating the whole experience the next day. So then, all of us introverts retreat into our corners and do our things (like write blog posts) and talk to our people before also then retreating to our mattresses and sawing logs and/or catching shut-eye.

All in all, so far it’s been an enjoyable experience, but some times you do have to just stop and reflect about what it must be like to be the people in these situations. To have all your belongings ruined in a flood and to have nowhere else to go but back to your muddy, flooded out home. All you can do then, I suppose, is square up your shoulders and keep going.

I don’t feel like those words do them justice, but there they are.