Floods in Brazil: The hunt to save memories from mud

"No one is looking at the sofa or the television. Everyone is searching for photos or keepsakes. Absolutely everyone," says Gustavo Oliveira, the founder of a volunteer group helping clean up flood-ravaged homes in the southern Brazilian city of Novo Hamburgo.

People here have lost not only material possessions, but spaces and memorabilia that define their identity and the meaning of their lives. "One of the most impressive scenes I saw was a man who found his wedding ring in the mud. He immediately put it back on his finger," added Oliveira, whose group has already helped clean up more than 60 houses.

Like other cities in the Porto Alegre metropolitan region, Novo Hamburgo was hit hard. Entire neighborhoods were completely flooded and many people lost everything. The level of Lake Guaíba, by which the city is located, stood at 3.73 meters (12.24 feet) on May 28, significantly higher than the normal flood mark of 3 meters.

Across the whole federal state of Rio Grande do Sul, at Brazil's southernmost point, almost 90% of towns are affected by flooding. Some 169 people have died due to high water levels and heavy rainfall since the end of April, and another 56 people are missing.

According to civilian protection authorities, more than 580,000 have had to leave their homes, with 55,000 still sheltering in emergency accommodation.

Even in these dire straits, saving treasured possessions is one of the biggest concerns for many people and communities. And not everyone is as lucky as the man who found his wedding ring.

Embodiment of home and family

Oliveira tells of a father who found badly damaged photos of his family. "The photos were very blurred," he said. "He showed us pictures of his children, but you could hardly recognize their faces. But he talked about the pictures in great detail, as if you could see everything. In his mind, you could still see a lot there."

Many are stunned when they see the state of their homes. The feeling of entering a place that once housed a family, that was tidy and cozy, but is now completely destroyed, is one that Luciana Gastal from Sinimbu, a small town two and a half hours away from Porto Alegre city, knows all too well. The house of her deceased grandparents, where she spent her holidays as a child, was among those totally flooded.

"For me, this house was the epitome of a home, of a family," she said. "And now the things from the kitchen are in the living room, the things from the bedrooms are in the kitchen. Everything is in a mess and in the dark." All the furniture had to be thrown away.

Gastal was only able to save a few photos, her grandfather's watch and her grandmother's crocheted and embroidered scarves: "I was able to tear a page out of a dry photo album, it was my uncle's wedding photo. I gave it to my cousin, who lost everything in the flood. A photo of my daughter with her grandmother was soiled with mud in her bedroom. That really touched me."

In front of every house, a mountain of garbage

When it comes to the clean-up, flood victims are often under pressure to act quickly, which often means having to suppress their emotions. According to Gastal, this is precisely when it is important to get help from people who have no sentimental attachment to the place that has been destroyed.

"It's very different being inside cleaning up your own mud, compared to being outside cleaning up someone else's mud," explained Gastal, who lives in Porto Alegre.

She spent two weeks in Sinimbu, not only cleaning her family's house, but also helping to clean up other people's houses. "I started walking through the street," she said. "There was a mountain of garbage in front of every house. I started picking things out of this garbage before a digger cleared it all."

Sinimbu is a town of 10,000 in the Rio Pardo river valley. Founded by German immigrants, it has a long agricultural tradition. The water reached a height of 3 meters here, flooding all the buildings.

The story of a town

The levels of damage are so great that Gastal fears the history of the town will be erased. "There's no museum here. The entire history of the town was in these houses," she says. To save at least a part of this history, Gastal and two friends launched the "Our Roots" project on social media.

They gathered plates, glasses, cupboards, beds, chairs, figures of saints and religious objects. "In front of the school where my mom was a teacher, there were several old, high-quality chairs and tables that we rescued. I also found a very nice science kit, which must have been 60 years old, and some laboratory equipment. We collected very valuable things that we will sort through and give back to the school."

Our Roots used social media to recruit carpenters, volunteer cleaners and professionals who could help restore the items.

The refurbished items are to be returned if the owners can be found. If not, the tables, chairs and beds will be donated to people in need, Gastal explained: "We already donated one item we found to people who had lost everything."

Even though a significant part of the town's history has been lost to water damage, recovered objects can be important elements to reconstruct and hold on to memories, she says. "I see so much love in these items. A colorful kettle we prised from the trash can become a vase for flowers and breathe life into a house."

This text was originally written in Portuguese.