Aspirations and Jabuticaba...

Happy November, friends!  My new goal this month is to write a blog every single day.  I can't promise that anything exciting will happen, nor that they'll all be interesting, but we'll see how it goes.

 A family from one of our ESL classes invited us to go to a chacara, or farm, to pick jabuticabas.  Unfortunately, Jake was pretty tired out and couldn't join us.  The little farm was only about 10 minutes away, and has been in their family for only about 8 years.

Jabuticaba-the skin outside is edible, but it's pretty bitter.  It's the inside that is most delicious!

 They grow directly on the tree branches themselves, and, as you can see, in little clusters.  I get really grossed out by clusters of anything (especially insect eggs), so it was hard for me to start picking them.

I've also turned into a pretty big city girl, so I had to get over the fact that ants were crawling all over the trees.  It was nice to have a chance to get to know the family better, and to see their little farm.  There were roosters, and all sorts of fruit trees, including tamarind.

One of the most interesting things on the property were the monkeys! They were pretty fast, so it was kind of hard to get a picture, but a couple of them turned out, including a video! 

Rodrigo and his son, Arthur, trying to entice the monkeys with pieces of bread.

There they are, eyeing the bread! They even ate out of Rodrigo's hand!

 After jabuticaba picking, we ate a snack of sweetened black coffee (cafezinho) and pao de queijo.

Arthur and Annalise

Marilane and I-she's the wife and mom, and quickly becoming a dear friend!

It was great to spend time with this family, as well as experience something new.  Marilane told me that you can make jam out of jabuticaba, so I'm eager to try that tomorrow.

Love,
Ashleigh