"He is wearing purple pants."

"Clap, clap, clap." (Standing at the gate and clapping your hands is the normal way to call attention when you live in a country where every house is surrounded by walls).

I was with Carter in the bedroom, Denielle was with our guests in the living room. (The living room has a sliding glass door through which we can see the front yard and through the iron bars to the street.) Denielle came into the bedroom.

"Do you want to get that?" She asked me. "He is wearing purple pants." I had assumed that it was our other coworker who was also coming over this morning for prayer meeting. Our coworker is doing well at embracing gaúcho culture but I've never seen him wear purple pants.

"Clap, clap, clap."

"OK," I said.

I should find a good picture of gaúcho dress so that you can picture better what I saw when I went to the gate. Here is my best shot at a good description. Long hot days in the sun, on the back of a horse have led to a specific "costume" a traditional gaúcho will wear. Boots made from genuine cowhide, if they are really classy they will still have the fur. The pants, or calças, are baggy, but not in the urban-hiphop-showing-off-your-plaid-boxers sort of baggy. Tight around the waist and ankles, gaúcho calças balloon out from the waist and then are gathered back in and tucked into the boots at the top of the ankle. In some cases, a rope serves as a belt and also secures a large knife -or whatever new cell phone is on the market- and an assortment of other things. In other cases, a normal leather belt with a belt buckle large enough to make any Wyoming cowboy proud will be used. A long sleeved short is equally baggy on the sleeves and accented with what we might call a bolo tie (or in my family a hanky tie, because whenever dad wore/wears one, we like to kid him that he took it out of his back pocket and hung it around his neck). When the occasion is special, the tie will be silk and be fastened by a ring and pendant. Over the shoulder he will have a wool pouch where he can store provisions for a day out on the trail. And of course, the hat. Less defined than a ten gallon Stetson, it still looks classy on the right head. Wide rim, braided chin strap and a round (but not rounded) dome, it serves its purpose to keep the sun off and make the rain run off the shoulders.

Back to the purple pants . . . this guy had it all, though I didn´t see a knife. It was hard to concentrate on what he said, the purple was so bright.

"Oh Tio," he said, "I work with herbs." His hat was a nice shade of white. It looked good. He was wearing a white shirt.


"I´ve got herbs that will make you healthy." I looked around for his peddler´s cart and thought maybe I´d taken a step back in time. With pants like those, he might have a pet monkey but looked like he was on foot. "These herbs will help with back pain, diabetes, indigestion, headaches,  . . . ." He went on and on. I was waiting for the little black bottle to come out of the folds of his calças. Or maybe he got lost from the circus and was asking for money to buy his bus fair back to the big city. But all I could see was the black folder that must have contained his lists of products.


Then he smiled and revealed a row of shiny gold teeth.


"No thank you," I said. " Not today." We had company inside.


He said ok and turned up the street to the next house, whose residents could hear all of the conversation he had just finished with me, to try to sell his goods.

"Bummer," I thought as I returned the ten steps to the house. I should have looked at what he had. Who knows, maybe I could have found out a little bit about him. His family, where he is from. Then who knows, maybe I could have shared the gospel with him and he could have shared it with the folks at the next house he was about to call on.

Maybe that little bottle of castor oil and the dancing monkey would have shown up after all.