A Child's Christmas

Every Christmas brings back fond memories of how we celebrated in Brazil.  For years, the ritual was the same.  We would practice daily for weeks for the Christmas program that always took place at the Church at around 3PM on the Saturday afternoon before Christmas.  Mom would buy boxes of candy from a distributor and we would have an assembly line set up, filling up the bags that Santa would hand out at the program.

After the program, we would head out for a walk to the ice cream parlor.  (Remember, it was summer down there...) We would get to the gate and Dad would say, "Oh, wait!  I forgot something.  Be right back!"  He would dash in and take the presents out from their hiding places (which we had already found) and put them under the tree.  As we got older, we would wait impatiently at the gate, rolling our eyes, knowing what he was doing, but thinking it was funny that he still had to play the game.  When we got back, it would be, "Oh, look!  Santa must have dropped by while we were out!"  We had already felt the packages, shook them around and had some guesses about what we were getting.  But, sometimes he succeeded in being especially sneaky and took us completely by surprise.  Like, when Charles and I got new 3-speed bikes!  That was something!  And, I'll never forget when I got my OWN cassette player.  I could listen to my own tapes and to whatever radio stations I wanted to in my own room.  That was unforgettable.

Presents were opened on Christmas Eve at night.  We always had guests over who had nowhere else to go.  We would sit in the living room and read the Christmas story from the Bible and sing some hymns.  Christmas was definitely about Jesus first, with presents as the icing on the cake.  We took time in opening the presents, each one opening one so that everybody could see and then it would be someone else's turn.  Not like the frenzy I've witnessed in many places as an adult.  We always got something that we really wanted (the bike, the player, etc.) and then clothes.  One year, I got a pair of jeans, brand new indigo blue jeans.  Too tight.  I had a growth spurt and my Mom wanted me to take them back.  I begged to let me wear them for the night. I was serving one of the guests coffee (very hot coffee) and tripped.  Coffee all over the new pants.  My mother was absolutely disgusted with me because now she would not be able to return them.  Money was tight for them and now I can look back and understand why she was so mad.  

Our festivities would wind down at around 11PM and soon a knock would come at the front door.  "Pastor, can Rachel come over to my house now?"  That was Adelia, my friend since I was six years old.  For years, my parents let me go down the block and spend Christmas Eve and New Year's Eve with her family.

Me with the Ogama family, 1982

Even though they were Japanese, they celebrated the Brazilian way: a feast of finger food, every kind of goody you can imagine, tapas style.  Several weeks before, they would have built a huge manger scene, taking up a large coffee table.  They made hills out of paper bags, ponds out of mirrors, trees and bushes out of sticks and little potted plants.  The manger scene would be at the top of the hill and the clay shepherds and magi were out towards the opposite ends of the table.  Every day we would move them a little closer to the baby Jesus.  On Christmas Eve, they would arrive.  We opened more presents, mostly things we had made for each other.

Those days were days of waiting.  They were centered on the gravity of God becoming human, of the babe promising love and redemption.  

Now my Christmases are a huge contradiction.  I have been involved in some form of retail sales for the last 25 years.  When I had my brick and mortar shops, I was exhausted by the time Christmas Eve came around.  Now that it is all online, I am still exhausted.  We depend on these sales to build our businesses, but it takes away the ability to wait, the expectancy.  And, then the commercialization of it all now...  it's just disgusting.  A big part of the problem for me is that I have no children, so I can't replicate the traditions that my parents instilled in us.  The joy that children experience is still real.  They are the ones that make the celebration fun and exciting.  But, then, we all have that child within and that is the challenge: to make each year be a Child's Christmas, where innocence and abundance meet the Child made Man.

Feliz Natal!!!!

May 2012 be a wonderful one for us all!

Letter to Marian and Frank, January 6, 1973

My Aunt Marian kept many of the letters my mother, Donna Biel, wrote to her.  She returned them in 2010.  Most are recorded here.  They were not entered in chronological order, so the best way to view them is by year, found in the index on the sidebar.

Dear Marian and Frank, Lisa and Eric,

Since I didn't write anything on the Christmas letter, I now will make an effort to tell you the news.

Before Christmas, I helped an agronomist missionary family as they got their things ready to move to another city.  The seven of them slept here a night.  A neurotic lady from our church came a week before Christmas and stayed for four days.  Cliff had programs for three days in various places so he didn't have time right away to talk to her family.  She has had mental problems for over twenty years and has stayed here before.  She calls many times or stops by to talk, then I listen for an hour to two hours.  About the only way I can help her is to listen to her problems.  Her husband says he has a cross to bear, but the family could try to be more understanding.  Another family that has problems is a Church of Christ missionary family.  When she is overtired or under pressure, she has emotional outbursts.  They have been in Brazil for one and a half years and now are packing up to go back to the United States for the other couple that works with them wrote to the U.S. recommending that they be ordered back.  I feel sorry for them for they have many things to sell, then have to rebuy them when they get back.  They were a risk to be sent here for they spent two years in Africa and she had emotional problems there. 

The Church of Christ has different ideas.  They don't use instruments in the church for the Bible says "to make melody in your hearts" which they interpret to be without the help of instruments.  Also, they don't celebrate Christmas for they say we don't really know the date of Christ's birth, which misses the whole point.  Some date has to be chosen so that we can observe it.

Helen is happy to have a second hand bicycle.  It's been about two years since she decided that she was too big for her tricycle.  Charles's old bike was traded in for a new one.  Rachel got science sets which have a microscope.  For a science project in school, Cliff helped her build a telegraph, which she got a good grade on.  Another father helped his child build one.  Cliff said it was going to be a battle to see which father got the best grade.  The kids are enjoying the kitten born in the first part of November.  Another one was given away on Christmas day.  We think our kitten has a hernia.  Cliff says that some day it may bump its head too hard against a post.

Next week we have Vacation Bible School.  The children have vacation now until February 12th.  Then Helen will start first grade Brazilian School.  Right now she is half way through the first grade English course that I give in the mornings.  Charles doesn't have too much homework, but Rachel does, so I have to supervise that during the school term.  The teacher makes them work hard.  Every two weeks they have to give a book report.  Even though Charles doesn't have any competition, as he is the only one in his class, the teacher says he is doing very well.  At times, Rachel lets things pile up and doesn't get good grades on a test, but her final grades are alright.  Rachel, almost eleven, is 5 feet 2 inches tall.  Charles is almost nine and is getting too heavy.  We decided we should eat more fruit as all of us could lose some weight.

Some more urine tests done show that Helen doesn't have an infection, but she continues to wet.  The urologist in Minneapolis wrote indicating that a medication which was given last July at higher dosages, so now she is taking it for two months at a lower dosage.  Our field representative of the mission office said that we can take her to the Mayo Clinic when on furlough.  I hope that the problem is solved soon.  Before Christmas I spent many hours sewing plastic pants bigger for the night wetting, but the biggest bother is daytime wetting.

Our church was used in December for Baccalaureate services for college graduation for those who are Protestants.  This week a junior high school (included ages 14-25) held services here after first going to the Catholic church.  cliff had the service for the junior high school.  A week before Christmas, Cliff attended graduation of the first class in our Bible Institute in Londrina.  There were six that completed the three year Bible course.

We had an enjoyable New Year's with the Louie Becker family who live one hour from here.  We played games with the children, went for a walk to the park and finished the day by singing Christmas songs and eating my birthday cake.  Just before Christmas, we got a tape Cliff's family sent.  We enjoyed hearing it even thought most only said a few words.  It seems like they had a hard time thinking of something to say with everyone sitting around and watching them when they were trying to talk.  Seems like Frank found it the easiest to talk.  I haven't had Lutafisk or however you spell the fish dish.

We haven't gotten a letter from you in a long time.  Hope you will write us right away when the baby is born.  LaVonne wrote that Lisa is quite the artist, that she sent Mike a picture when he was in the hospital.  I hope to get Helen to write to Lisa before I mail this.  It's almost 100 degrees today and we are at the swimming pool.

Love,

Donna and Joey

Letter to the Beiwel's, December 27, 1974 (Friday)

 Rachel Biel, around 12 years old.

My Aunt Marian kept many of the letters my mother, Donna Biel, wrote to her.  This is one that I wrote to her family when I was 12 years old. She returned the letters in 2010.  Most are recorded here.  They were not entered in chronological order, so the best way to view them is by year, found in the index on the sidebar.

Dear Uncle Frank, Auntie Marian, Lisa, Eric, and Juliana,

Hope you had a Merry Christmas.  We had a pretty nice one though Christmas Eve was more excited.  We opened our presents that night and went out for supper.

Thanks for the stamps, Uncle Frank.  I sure appreciated them.  I didn't have hardly any of them.  I hope you like the "1 cruzeiro" that I enclosed.  Seven of them make 1 DOLLAR.

Sorry to hear you (Lisa) and Eric had chickenpox.  I hat it when I was 4 years old.  I'm also sorry to hear you both will be wearing glasses, but many people look prettier in them.

For Christmas, Helen got an Egipcian game called CARCARA.  We had it the last time we were in the States.  It sure is fun!  Mom and Dad are playing it right now- scoring:  Dad-1, Mom-0.  I got a dart board and nine darts, we sure have fun with it.  I gave Dad a little flashlight which you could adjust 4 types of screwdrivers on to it.  He sure was happy with it.

I'm happy to hear that more books are coming even though you shouldn't have gone to the bother and work of doing it all.  My little library is finally starting to grow.  It has some real nice romance books by Grace Livingston Hill.  Lately, I read an excellent book by Corrie Ten Boom.  It's called the "hiding Place".  She hides Jews in this little place in her house in Holland and than gets caught for it and goes to a concentration camp.  You really should read it.

Lisa, Helen really misses you.  All the time she talks about is "When we get to the States, Lisa, Polly and I will do this, this and this."  She really misses you.

I can hardly believe we're going to the States in one year and at Christmas!  I always wonder if it is fun to ice skate.  We still have our roller skates, but I wonder if it is the same.

Now I have 1350 stamps.  Most of them are from Brasil.  I've 200 Brazilian ones and 151 American ones. 

This last few weeks we went to two special films: Jesus Christ Superstar and Godspell.  Have you watched any of them?  I liked Godspell a lot better than Jesus C.S.S.  Mary fell in love with Jesus in J.C.S.S  In Godspell the disciples were dressed as clowns and Jesus had a huge blonde afro.  He also had on a Super Tea-shirt on and overalls.  Some things in it were just a riot.

Well, I guess I'd better end now.  With Great Love,

Rachel Biel

PS.  Oh, yeah, I forgot to tell you that I'll start school (Both B. and A.) on March 1st.
PPSS  Dad's planning to take us (Charlie and I) on a bike hike.  We each get to choose a few friends to go along.  We'll stay out about 3 or 4 days.  My bones are aching to go (and so am I). 

Tchau

See you, I mean.
Write you later, alligators.

Letter to Lisa, 1969

Dear Lisa,

Grandma Biel wrote that you are sick.  I'm very sorry to hear that.  I hope you and your family are better now.  I'm on vacation now until the middle of February.  In Brazilian school I passed to third grade.  Do you have a school picture you can send me?  We had a storm which took some tiles off of our roof.  Many trees were blown over.  Two people died because of the storm.  I stayed for four days at friends homes while Mama and Daddy were traveling.

Merry Christmas

Rachel

Letter to Marian and Frank, December, 1971

Dear Marian, Frank, Lisa and Eric,

I see that I won't get many letters written if I don't make copies.

Joey seems to enjoy being back here.  It was nice to come back to the same house and only unpack clothing.  Within a couple of days, we were back to normal.  The girl who worked for me called the day we arrived and was here to help me the next day.  Helen was bashful about speaking Portuguese again, but within a week she had no trouble.

Joey has taken on two more preaching points twice a month.  One is about 45 minutes from here and the other is on half hour from there.  Another pastor was serving them, but he has a bad case of hepatitis so they will probably become a permanent part of our parish.  They are happy that Joey plays the violin as they haven't had anyone to accompany them.

I was gone for five days to a regional retreat for women.  Two from here went with me.  It was a long 11 hour trip to the ocean front.  We enjoyed the retreat but it ended with the sad news of a fatal car accident of the pastor and his wife, of the church where the retreat was held.  The pastor had given a talk 36 hours before the accident.  They hadn't taken their children along on the trip.  They had been her for 12 years from Germany.  Relatives from Germany were called to come and get the three small children.

Two afternoons I have taken women to visit a shut-in.  Since these women are in their 60's or 70's, they prefer German.  Joey studied for on month, twice a week, to learn some German.  The school year is over and he hopes to continue in March when classes start again.

Joey teaches the women's choir soprano and alto parts by playing the violin.  We will sing three hymns and one will sing a solo.  The children's program is on the 19th.  We have a confirmation service on January second where four will be confirmed.

We had a Thanksgiving pot luck at our church- about 45 Americans counting the children,.  At the dinner a missionary was telling of his recent trip with six children, wife and trailer driving for two months from Minnesota down to the Panama Canal then through the west side of South America coming up through Argentina and Uruguay into Brazil.  This pastor used to be with our mission but works now with the the Lutheran Free church.  They stayed with several missionaries in other countries and he said we should be thankful we have more religious freedom and friendly people.

 Charles Biel, 1971

Rachel and Charles are doing well at the small mission school in Maringa.  Charles is the only second grader.  He hasn't been having school in the afternoon so he went to a private Brazilian school where he finished first grade- doing just the Portuguese.  Next semester he will stay three afternoons a week at the American school and will have a Portuguese teacher go to his school.  Rachel has one classmate in the 4th grade.  The teacher says they are working harder this year.  There was some talk of reducing the hours at the American school and doing Brazilian school, but the math system is different and would be confusing and they are assigned a lot of homework in the Brazilian school since they only go for three hours.  A new couple will come in July for the American school so we hope that they will continue at that school.  It looks like in August I will have to start teaching Helen first grade as the mission that runs this school only accepts first graders if there is one from their mission and they don't have any.

 Rachel Biel, 1971

I have taken Rachel to see ballet put on by students of this city.  It was well done.  This week we went to hear a piano recital of the students studying in their ninth year.  One girl was from our church, who is the organist, and graduated from the course, in all, eleven years as there are two years of introduction.  Rachel is continuing lessons after we got back and is in the introduction.

Helen has been going to a nursery school every morning.  She still wets up to four or five times a day, so I think she will have to have another dilation of the urinary canal.  It will be six months in February since the last time, and the doctor said that it is usually done every six months until it is no longer necessary.  I'm planning to have her taken to an urologist in January and think she can have it done in our city.

I've been doing painting in our guest bedroom, Cliff and my bedroom and the dining room.  A sixteen year old boy did a good job in the living room.  I hoped that he could do more of the painting, but he helped while he had a cast on his left arm and when the cast came off, he went back to work on his regular job working as a bellboy at a hotel.  He had helped paint the hotel for seven months.  Some of those days that I painted were 100 degrees and when I put the paint on, it dried instantly.  I certainly got tired of painting but am glad that it was done. 

I have joined the English club which meets once a month.  It is mainly for Brazilian women to practice their English.  There are about 10 American women in this city.  One lady who speaks English that moved here in August is Dutch.  She came here 25 years ago and stayed in a German speaking community for four years, then went to Canada for five years and then to the U.S. for 15 years.  When they were here for the first time, their only child decided to stay here to marry.  This Dutch couple came to retire and be by their only grandchildren, but can't enjoy them much as they don't speak Portuguese.  They say there is no place like Santa Barbara, California, and may go back there.  He went with Joey to a rural area one Saturday for church services and visited with the members in German.

We have a kitten that drinks out of a doll's bottle.  The mother cat was run over by a car.  The kitten eats bread wet with milk.  We still have our big cat, Blackie, and our dog, Velvet.  Rachel bought gold fish with her money but didn't have a fish bowl for them, so they were in a regular bowl.  One day when we were gone in the afternoon, we forgot to put the cat out so she had a delicious meal of fish.  Charles wants a canary or a rabbit but I doubt that we will get them as it ends up being mother taking care of animals.

Happy to hear your folks got down to see you, Marian.  Hope you can do that more often.

Helen misses Lisa and Polly- especially when her neighborhood friends went to school in the afternoon and she was home alone.  I tried to read to her every day.  Now they have vacation for 2.5 months so she is busy playing.

Rachel made a list of the Yearling Books like "The Good Master" that her school bought.  Now I can't find the list.  We are going to borrow some "Jack and Jill" from one of the families to see if she likes it better than "Children's Digest" which she gets now.

Hear you went as a family on one of Frank's trips-  hope you had an enjoyable time. 

Who lost the most weight by Thanksgiving?  Joey and I lost 10 lbs. the first month back.  We didn't diet- guess it was getting back to a normal routine.

A blessed Christmas!

Love,

Donna and Joey

Letter to Marian and Frank, January 20th, 1971

Dear Marian and Frank,

I can't get my pen to work, so will peck away.  You will be happy to know that we got your books on Charles's birthday on the 15th.  Everyone was delighted and Charles found his two cats in the lovely cat book.  We saw the movie, "Doctor DoLittle" a long time ago.  It is an interesting book.  I started the book by Catherine Marshall and am enjoying it.  We have read only one of the condensed Reader's Digest- about the Maya family.  I have been busy reading books but also make Rachel read some to Helen.  A special thank you from all of us.

Mary wrote that Louie and Rosie have a boy born on my birthday.  Happy to hear the news and must write to congratulate them.

Thanks for the pictures.  It is the first time that we have seen Erik.  He has curly hair like Lisa had.  Marian and Lisa look very nice in the pictures.

You asked what we did on Christmas Day.  We went to a home where four families that are related got together.  It was a pot-luck dinner and very good.  It turned out to be a hot day.  We were pleased with the plays for the program that was held on Christmas Eve.   At 10:30 a visitor arrived at our home and stayed overnight.  She missed a bus to go to Cianorte.  We didn't know her before and found her to be very pleasant.  She was here this week on her way back to her home in Porto Alegre. 

Off and on, a lady who is 69 years old comes to our house, has slept here two nights and has had several meals.  She isn't quite right in her mind and none of her relatives in our country church want her for when they have tried to help she got the police to believe that they took money of hers and then the relatives had to pay.  she has been at an old folks' home in the capital of this state, but managed to get away.  She didn't have but one dress so I gave her one of mine in order to wash her dress.  The relatives know that she is staying at a home for transient people and that she comes here often but no one has done anything about it.  The lady never married and has only nieces and nephews close by.  Very sad but she talks a lot and I only understand half as he sometimes puts German in with her Portuguese. 

Mary wrote that they might get a humidifier instead of a drier.  No one has said how much we should send or did someone pay for us?

While we were in Londrina for our spiritual retreat we took the children to see the "Love Bug" about a car called Herbie.  It was cute- showing how he could win races but when his owner didn't pay attention to him, he would have temper tantrums.  "Ben, the Bear" is here this week.  We saw it in the States almost four years ago and they don't remember it. 

I heard Minnesota got a lot of snow this month.  We have had a lot of rain causing flood over the main highway to our capital, so barges have had to take people and small cars across.  Today was one of our hottest days- about 100- right now the children are swimming in the rain, or rather, downpour.

We have a seminary student coming for part of the time when we will be gone.  Now Joey is busy with Vacation Bible School in two churches.  Two girls from the Bible Institute are helping.  Also, Joey has to go to Cianorte (1 hour drive) often as he is on   commission for our mission public school.  Next month is a five day Bible camp right before Lent starts.  Starting next month I will visit women that seldom or never come to Women's Bible meetings which start again in March when summer vacation is over.  Rachel and Charles have off from school until February 9th.  I try to take them swimming several times a week.  Rachel knows how to swim, Charles will dive from the shallow side and can swim a short distance and Helen likes the water, but won't put her head under.

I have asked my Dad to get three second hand sleeping bags or air mattresses.  We won't be staying at any mission home as those are for one year furloughs.  They would give us money to rent a furnished apartment but we hope that won't be necessary as we hope to stay with our brothers, sisters, and parents.  I think the only deputation will be visiting churches in Brooklyn and Columbus, Ohio on the way to Minnesota and then later we will go to Havre, Montana, perhaps by train as the latter pays for half of our support.

We just heard that we will be having physicals at the Mayo Clinic when we are on furlough.  Apparently, the clinic was happy to have the opportunity to study those that live in tropical or semi-tropical climates.  There are many types of worms here that they have never heard of in Minnesota.  Charles just had a blood test, an X-ray and gets hysterical whenever anything is done.  He had a sore muscle in his leg and the doctor ordered tests, but everything was normal.  I don't know how it started, but he is the worst when it comes to shots.  Three people have to hold him down.

Joey is teaching Charles how to play chess.  The cards you sent we played once showing how they had to follow suit and the highest card takes the trick.  But, we didn't explain about hearts yet.  While in Londrina we got a memory game consisting of pairs.  Most are animals, fruits, and different designs.  Usually, we play with about 40 pairs at once- all are turned over and mixed up.  So far, Charles has been the winner.  I remember in what area one was turned up that I want, but I don't do well.  Even Helen does as well as I do much of the time and she doesn't even pay attention to the cards that are turned up.  They are calling me to play a game now.

Love,

Donna and Joey

Sorry but this typewriter jumps and we haven't been able to get it fixed.

Letter to Marian and Frank, December, 1969

 Rachel and Charles Biel

Iguazu Falls, Brazil, 1969

My Aunt Marian kept many of the letters my mother, Donna Biel, wrote to her.  She returned them in 2010.  Most are recorded here.  They were not entered in chronological order, so the best way to view them is by year, found in the index on the sidebar.

Dear Marian and Frank,

I had this letter written before Thanksgiving but never got any further.  We are busy with Christmas poems for Sunday School, two plays which include youth and adults.  This time of the year it is difficult to start practice early as the school year ends in December and many are taking final exams, but for those who did well all year, they don't have to take final exams or at least, not in the subjects where they did well.

This year we had Thanksgiving at our church with 90 people present.  Almost all who came have children that go to the mission school here.  Last year it was held at the mission school with 60 and it was crowded.  The school children gave an enjoyable program.  Of those present, one other couple are Lutheran, some Baptist and most are from the United Missionary Society.

The first week in December we were gone for four days to the beach where we had two days of business meetings with our mission representative from our Board.  Rachel and Charles stayed with members of our church.  We were not to take our children along, but took Helen and there was one little girl for her to play with.  We enjoyed seeing the other missionaries but had to travel one day to get there and another to get back.  On the way back, Helen had a fever and was vomiting. 

Helen will have her tonsils out on the 30th of this month.  We have a doctor who is a specialist in child anesthesia.  She will be at a Catholic hospital run by Germans.  Helen recently got over a light case of the chicken pox.  Last month she had the mumps.  Charles recently had German measles with a high fever for one day.  When he had the mumps, he was in bed for almost three weeks due to re-swelling and fever.  Rachel has been very healthy and hasn't missed a day of school.

The children continue to be much larger than those of their age.  In the small mission school, Rachel has to sit with the 4th graders who are her size and her classmates, the 2nd graders, sit in smaller desks in front of her.  Grades 2-5 are taught by one teacher in a large room.  There are fifteen-  five of these are second graders.  Rachel's teacher says that she is reading very well. 

A few days before Christmas Charles graduates from the nursery-kindergarten school.  Hopefully in August he will start first grade at the mission school.

In January we will go to a family camp called "word of Life" which all but two of the mission families from our church will attend.  Some of the families I hadn't seen for three years as we went on furlough, then they did when we got back and we live too far away to make a visit unless we take a vacation.

Cliff continues to travel often.  Recently, a week at the Bible Institute in Cianorte, three days to a pastor's meeting in another state.  This last month was one of confirmation of nine in the country church, 11 in the city church and almost the same number in a neighboring city plus a class to be done this month at a chapel where he goes twice a month.  For five weeks we had a girl from our country church doing confirmation as family is moving soon.  When Cliff was traveling, I had three lessons a day with her.  It seemed like there wasn't much time left after preparing for women's Bible studies, taking and getting the children from school, going to sewing class for two hours every day.

At the end of September, I went to a four day retreat for women held in Londrina,  a two hour drive from here.  Two women from the country church and three from here went.  It was the first retreat held in this area- we had 65 women.  It went well except for problems of language as some older women understood only German and others understood only Portuguese.  We feel that German was used too much and hope they will gradually will use it less as the youth prefer Portuguese and soon these will be a part of our women's group.  In the morning our Bible studies were divided into groups of Portuguese and German and the rest of the program was given in either language.

In the end of October, we had our yearly festival in the church with dinner of barbecued steak and potato salad, cakes sold in the afternoon plus a bazaar of clothes.  This year everything was sold.  Now with this money plus money that the members have pledged we plan to finish the church tower and put in bells.  I helped with the bazaar held for Charles's school.  They are working on the construction of the Japanese Methodist church where services are held in the same building.

We have applied for a three month furlough from June to August in 1971.  Then we plan to come back to Maringa.  Time seems to be going very fast and before we know it, we will be visiting with you.  Soon two of our neighboring missionaries will be gone on furlough and the only American of our mission nearby will be Gaylord Grant in Londrina.  We have become good friends with the German missionaries in Campo Mourao, an hour drive from here.  The only other American missionary in this state where we have our church is a nine hour drive from here and the rest are 12-30 hours drive in other states.  This state was where our mission work started but now that we are a part of the Lutheran Church of Brazil and many of our mission churches don't exist or only remain only as preaching points, we can go to wherever we receive a call.

Cliff has become a good photographer.  He takes photos for weddings and confirmations and makes the copies that they want, thus he didn't have time to get our pictures done yet from the vacation in July. 

 Wedding at Querencia do Norte

We went to see the waterfalls of Iguacu which are higher and greater in volume than the Niagara Falls.  They are in our state, a seven hour drive, mostly on dirt roads.

Sete Quedas with Kathy Fedde

By the time you get this, Christmas will be over.  We hope you will have had a joyous one.

We haven't gotten your new address.  How do you like your new home?  I suppose that by now, Erik is a busy little toddler, getting into things.  Does he walk yet?  Here there is never a dull moment. 

If things don't go right, Rachel says that I don't love her.  She's very emotional.  At times she tries my patience.

It seems like a long time since we have heard from you, but I realize you could say the same to us.  Hope you are fine and will write soon.

Love,

Donna and Joey

Letter to Marian, December 9, 1968

My Aunt Marian kept many of the letters my mother, Donna Biel, wrote to her.  She returned them in 2010.  Most are recorded here.  They were not entered chronologically.  The best way to sort through them is to use the index on the sidebar and view them by year.


Dear Marian and Frank,

Thanksgiving has come and gone and soon Christmas will be here.  This year we celebrated Thanksgiving twice.  We were in Cianorte the day before Thanksgiving and seven families were present.  There were few children as most were in the hostel for school.  We had turkey for the first time since we have been in Brazil.  We didn't have a long visit as it had been raining and started again on our way home.  We almost spent the night on the road as it was terribly slippery.  I took us two hours to go 22 miles until we got to the tarred road.  The other dinner was here in Maringa with about 60 present- 2 Baptist families, 2 Methodist, about 7 from the United Missionary Society and us.  After dinner the school children gave a program.  Both dinners were pot luck.  I made 5 pumpkin pies and salad.

Our church held its annual fund raising drive the 24th of November.  Some of the men came here three days before and made wooden benches, tables and put up canvas on top for shade.  The women had a bazaar of embroidered pillowcases, aprons, tablecloths, and little girls' clothes.  Women made potato salad for dinner and steaks were barbecued by the men.  In the afternoon, cakes were sold.  We ended up throwing some potato salad away and cakes were sold very cheap to get rid of them as the attendance was poor.  It was a lot of work plus very hot in the days of preparation and the day of occasion.  It was a lot of work, but the fun and fellowship- and the profit made it all worthwhile.  One of our missionaries told of his church which prepared 170 chickens and 3 steaks and had 65 chickens left and many steaks.

On the day of our bazaar, Rachel woke me up at 1 a.m. to tell me that Velvet, our dog, was having puppies under her bed.  I thought the gestation period was 3 months instead of 55 days so thought we had premature puppies.  There are 3 male and 1 female.  They are mostly white with a little black on them and have a smooth fur- the mother is part poodle and all black.  The children are delighted to have puppies around.  We have an empty bedroom upstairs where they stay but at times Velvet moves them under Rachel's bed.

Rachel and Charles's baner-ha school had a bazaar for which I baked 9 duz. cookies and gave 2 aprons from our bazaar.  Rachel is having graduation on the 19th of this month from kindergarten.  She is over half-way done in first grade Calvert.  Rachel is doing very well in school.  On most tests in this course she has gotten 100.  She loves to read and reads her books to Charles.  We plan to send her to Brazilian first grade in February.  In August we hope the mission school here will have second grade.  Charles didn't get many stars for good behavior at nursery school.  He was the youngest one there and even though he couldn't sit still for long he has learned some songs.  While I teach Rachel Calvert in the afternoon he plays next door with a 4 year old boy and gets along well with him.  Helen is starting the "why" age.  She has several little friends that she plays with and older girls like to take her for a walk.

For Christmas we are expecting the Dahlen family.  They are in our language school.  I helped her shop in early march while our husbands were at a conference.  They have a girl Rachel's age and Charles age- a boy.  She will stay with me while her husband visits other mission homes which can only be reached by dirt roads and she doesn't want to go with due to arrival of a baby in February.

The middle of January we are going to a Bible camp about an 11 hour drive from here.  Other families enjoyed it while we were here on furlough.  All of our missionaries should be there and it will be the only time we get to see several of the families.

Once a month Cliff goes to where we lived before (Loanda) and serves 3 other places, too.  The farthest is a 4 hour drive from here.  When he goes, we won't have church services here.  Due to his traveling or having church services in the morning once a month in our country church, I give Confirmation two or three times out of four in the month.  It is held at the same time as Sunday School.  the youth in our country church and one here are planning to present a play for Christmas.  The Sunday School will have some poems and sing, our adult choir will sing two hymns and the same for the youth.

The end of October we had a one day women's retreat.  Women came from several cities nearby and from our country church.  In all we had 75.  Our women's group made chicken-rice soup for dinner and cakes for coffee in the afternoon.  Dona Ana from Curitiba was our speaker.  We discussed the ecumenical movement and evangelism in our church.  We divided into two groups- one German (led by a pastor's wife who is from Germany) and I led one of the two Portuguese groups.  The points discussed are to be sent to Switzerland in preparation for study of the Lutheran World Federation to be held in Brazil in 1970.  We think the study could have been more profitable had we been able to discuss this in each church before this meeting and leaders would have been better prepared for the discussion groups.

Since there is summer vacation from school now until the middle of February, we are planning to have a week of Vacation Bible School in the city and another in our country church.  VBS was held in July for the first time in these congregations and enjoyed very much by all.

We had some very hot weather- 98 to 100, but now it is cooler at 85 to 88.  We have had very little rain which has been bad for the crops.  Some larger cities have had to ration water but thankfully, we have plenty of water.

Pete and Elna Mathiesen

Karen, Mark, Kristine and Paul

(courtesy Karen Mathiesen)

We continue to have many guests- example this week- the family of the German missionary who lives in a neighboring town, an intern from a seminary in the U.S. who spent 16 months in church in Curitiba, and Mathiason's from Cianorte.  We enjoy the visits for we seldom had them in Loanda.  I have a good helper so the extra company isn't more than we can handle.  The lady who helps me now is married and a sister to the last one I had who left to get married.

We wish you a Blessed Christmas and happiness for the New Year.

Love,

Donna and Joey

 The day Rachel printed her letter to you she was mad at her friend Lillian and wouldn't put her name down.  Charles started coloring the picture.  Each stripe on the shirt is a different color and the girl has purple hair.  I will try to send it later.  How does Lisa like Erik?  Is he as good as she is?  Your son arrived on Brasil's day of Independence and Grandma Biel's birthday.

Letter to Marian and Frank, March 23, 1969

 Mom, Charles, Rachel, Velvet and Helen

Dear Santa,

Your presents arrived safely and we thank you very much.  We paid just $.50 duty on it.  the children were thrilled to get the package.  I just finished reading the book you sent and enjoyed it.  I often saw Orthodox Jews in New York.  I learned a lot from the book and thought if only we as Christians would spend that much time studying the Bible!  It was very impressive to see how much time and effort they put into study of their holy books, however, I can't imagine the Jew of today doing as much.  Joey hasn't had time to read it yet as it came 2 days ago.

Last Tuesday Helen started vomiting in the morning but didn't vomit until night time, but then I called a doctor as I was worried of dehydration.  We are having another heat spell- 92 to 94 every day, very dry, and terribly dirty.  The doctor said she had pus on her tonsils.  I gave her 2 shots and other medications.  She is fine now but we can't get her to eat so I'm giving her Vitamin C orally.  She had worms and took medicine for that.  In all, she has lost about 2 pounds - her face and abdomen aren't so chubby anymore.  She likes to go around singing, "I'm a little flower of Jesus, open your mouth to sing and close your eyes to pray."  She dearly loves the 4 cats we have now- acquired most of them this last month.

Charles is busy getting into everything imaginable.  He is terribly stubborn.

Rachel enjoys the Brazilian school from 8 to 11:30 the from 1to 3 she studies with me.  In 2 more months we will be done with her correspondence course then in August she will go to the American school.

 Mom home schooling Rachel.

A lady in our church teaches sewing.  I told her starting in July that I would like to study sewing.  It would be 2 hours every day- hopefully I wouldn't have to go more than 2 to 3 months.  I hope to make some shorts on my own but I need more practice.

 Mom sewing.

For a week after carnival I was without a maid as she ran away with the husband of the lady who cleaned the church on Saturdays.  They were neighbors.  A neighbor lost her maid during carnival when she ran away with her boyfriend.  Now I have a married lady who for $20 a month works 7:30 to 4:30 or 5:00.  She lives far away so if we want to go out at night (which is very seldom as Joey has most meetings or church services at night) then a girl from our church will come.

Today I took the children to see "Uncle Tom's Cabin".  It was over their heads but I tried to explain some of it to Rachel.  Joey just got back from church services out of town- 9:30 PM and decided to go to the movie- first one we have gone to in about 4 months.

We just got a letter from Harvey.  He says Frank has been traveling a lot.  Sounds like there will be quite a flood this year.  When we were home there wasn't hardly any snow.

Starting tomorrow a 23 yr old Brazilian lad will start to live with us for 1.5 months while he awaits his papers to go to Germany for a year.  He is not of German descent but has spent one year in the States and now wants to go to Germany.  He is from our church in Londrina and his sister teaches English here in this city.  They both speak English very well as she lived in Londrina with some of our school teachers.

Love,

Donna and Joey

 Donna Biel

Letter from Donna, , Minneota, Monday, January 1968

Donna with Helen, Marian with Lisa, Rachel

Winter 1968

My Aunt Marian kept many of the letters my mother, Donna Biel, wrote to her.  She returned them in 2010.  The most interesting parts are recorded here.

Dear Marian and Frank,

Thanks for the birthday cards. ...  

It certainly was good to hear Louie's voice Friday.  Saturday Joey left for the Moorehead area where he will be until Friday and when he gets back we are going to see Louie at Mary and Harvey's.  Rachel is getting excited about the wedding.  We didn't say much in case they decided to wait awhile.

...  After the wedding we want to stay one night with you and one at Cynthia's, then we will go back to Mary and Harvey's and fly from Minneapolis ...  We decided it was best to leave from Mpls. as it will give us more time to visit Julia, Stan's and your folks.  We only saw Julia's on Christmas day and now we won't see them as they have chicken pox.

We have a nice stroller that we are wondering if you want to use, if not maybe Cynthia can use it.  You can take Lisa on long strolls.  Its seat can be put in three positions- straight up, partly back or lying down position.  It has a basket in back for diaper bag or groceries and top on it for shade.  We will bring it down when we go for the wedding.  

I was glad to see our barrels go on Saturday.  A trucking firm from Marshall got them and they will go to New York.

 Rachel is kept aware of the world news.  The other night she said she couldn't sleep thinking of the bombs that fell in the water and the ship in Korea.  Thursday will be her last day of school.  When Helen sees a bus in a book she says "Rachel".

We haven't had the flu but Helen and Charles had mattery eyes and colds and Joey has a cold.  The reason, I now find out, that my sister, Nyla, was crabby on Christmas Eve Day was that she had the flu and was sick all the week she was here.

Helen now gets out of the crib by herself.  She is quite a clown.  She put on Rachel's coat and said, "Hi, Rachel" so we all called her Rachel and she giggled.

My family is having a family reunion for us on the 11th.  We will leave her the 15th and be in De Witt the 16th for rehearsal.  The 5th we will be at Harvey's and on the 6th we go to the Cities as on the 7th the children have their last dental appointment.  The have had their teeth covered with a fluoride coating and I am going to have it done, too.

We are giving our TV. to Rosie and Louie for their wedding gift.  We are taking it this weekend as we won't have room when we take our suticases.  The T.V. is a floor model.

All for now.  It won't be long and we will be in your neighborhood.

Love, 

Donna and Joey

Feliz Natal! Merry Christmas!

 

Every year I like to make a fun Christmas graphic and this year I used a picture of me when I was about two years old.  This was in front of our Christmas tree in Loanda, Parana.  On either side are my two dogs, Juba and Laila.  

Wishing all of you a wonderful Chistmas 

and all the best in 2011!

Cada ano eu gosto de fazer uma grafica original para o Natal.  Este ano, usei uma foto de mim tirada em Loanda quando eu tinha uns dois anos.  Estou em frente da nossa arvore de Natal.  Os meus cachorros, Juba e Laila, estao do meu lado.  

Desejando um Feliz Natal e tudo de bom 

em 2011 para todos voces!