Happy Robbery to You

The night after we arrived here in Barretos was Larissa´s (Esdras´sister´s) birthday. Jess and I made a big double batch of brownies from a new recipe we got off the internet. We made it into a cake by adding a topping that Marli had used on a cake when we were in Piracicaba. It turned out to be a great combination. Anyhow, we were all in the kitchen at night eating and talking. The kitchen here is separated from the rest of the house, in the backyard behind the pool. I guess you´d call it a summer kitchen, but since it´s summer year-round here, they use it year-round. It´s nice that you don´t have to heat up the whole house when you cook.


So, while we were in the kitchen celebrating Larissa´s birthday, a robber managed to get into the house and make off with money and a cell phone. (It´s the cell phone that Esdras lent us while we were travelling, so for those of you who have the number, don´t bother phoning anymore.) Not only that, but he took off with one of the controllers for the automatic gate at the front of the house. So all the controllers had to be changed and the frequency to open it changed as well. I know it´s a creepy feeling to have your house broken in at anytime, but it´s especially ´uneasing´ when 10 of us were here and were wide awake. There´s a humorous side to it, though. All of us have have been suffering from post-robber syndrome. Any strange noise at night sets us all off.

One night I woke up to what I imagined was the sound of the front gate opening. I lay in bed trying my best to reason myself out of my irrational fears, but just when I would get them under control I would hear another strange noise. Eventually I got up to make sure that the window was indeed locked (so that the robber wouldn´t squeeze himself through the narrow metal bars on the window I suppose :) and Jess was like, `Oh good! Are you awake too?!´ She, too, had heard noises and was also working herself up to the panic stage before she realized that I was awake. Eventually we realized that it was just a terribly windy night and things were blowing all over the place. Eventually, when I still couldn´t relax I just gave up, put earplugs in, and had a great sleep until the morning. Esdras dreamed one night about the robber walking past his window even though he wasn´t sleeping next to one, and we´re all sensitive to the dog barking at night. Many of our jokes include the robber in some form or another. At least it´s fun to laugh at ourselves!