Take a picture

Today I found a tick trying to burrow into my skin as I was outside chatting with the girls. My hands itch so much sometimes it’s hard to sleep and I am constantly feeling like something is crawling on me. The southern sun has the most intense rays that burn your skin within minutes if you are not careful. Working out on the farm with 70% humidity, intense direct sunlight and me in pants and a long sleeve shirt. All the while the mosquitoes are eating away at me and the giant fly bottuca is buzzing violently in my ear. These are some of the temporary discomforts one might feel while living in the forest…

Sometime I wonder if I am crazy and tiffany and I laugh and say “well if we can’t do this now, we’ll never be able to do it.” And I think we’re right; sometimes it’s better to live in discomfort to be able to really live. Being here on this mountain, in this forest, with these women has been more real and true than anything else. Cut off from society, from Internet and television, from pop culture, from traffic and pollution and smog may just be worth the eternal scratching of my bites.

To use the Internet we must walk 30 minutes to the bus and then we still have a one-hour transit period. The ride is beautiful.  We pass by farms, and mountains and people. Sometimes I feel like were on the set of Jurassic park or we are living in a place that isn’t real, its just so beautiful it almost seems fake.  Once we get to the city Morretes we are happy to be in the company of other folks and we are free to wear shorts because we know we are safe (just for a while) from insects. 

Then we go back home to our small town called Rio Sagrado where everybody knows our name, they know where we are from and they know what we are here to do. Within 30 minutes we have stopped to kiss and talk to 3 families, we are integrated, this is it! We get home to our little house and Chris is waiting for us with the most delicious dinner you could ever imagine and we talk and drink coffee and eat.

To try to paint out Chris in words doesn’t do her enough justice but in this poem I hope to try and convey who she is:

Chris

           

She’s the smallest warrior you ever saw

She has the biggest heart and the biggest mouth

The whole town’s gossip is now mine

This place is no longer a village

             It is our village

When she screams it makes you laugh

How could she ever hurt an ant

As she smacks a bee and knocks it dead

She’s so cute.

She knows the land and understands lunar cycles

She understands centuries of knowledge

And she’s scared of heights!

Chris, I wish I could hug you all day

And put my feet in your boots and work your fields forever

Girl, you my hero

And you can’t even understand this!

This next collection of words tries to embody everything that is around me

In a few words our life looks like this:

My life with Ti in Rio Sagrado with Chris

We live with

45 chickens

3 grown dogs

2 puppies

One quacking duck

1 black cat

1 Large-flying cockroach

And with…

2.5 Brazilians

Daily we experience…

A sun full of sky

A sky full of mosquitoes

Mountains

Manioc

Music

And (because food is an experience)…

Beans

Rice

Bread

Jabuticaba Jelly

Coffee

Our activities include…

Laughter

Gossip

Strength

Emotion

This is the Brazil I love.

So basically, Every day is a challenge and a victory!

We are lucky to be able to go on a little vacation this weekend. We are going to Foz do Iguacu, these amazing waterfalls located in western tip of the state of Parana and bordering both Argentina and Paraguay. We are meeting up with a great friend and are going to have a temporary stay away from the beasts in the forest; I think it will be nice! We’ll be able to play in a different place and in a different way. Foz boasts the country’s oldest national park so we will most definitely be aproveitando (taking full advantage of) this place and hiking around. Should be fun, tomorrow tiffany and I have a ten-hour bus ride to look forward to and an epic weekend up a head… adventure is out there!

Love,

L

Beer and Futebol

Morretes, PR, Brasil

30/10/2010

Curacu, the best tasting Brazilian beer; it’s dark and sumptuous and just makes sense.

Two American girls in a small bar order two beers.

It doesn’t take more than 30 seconds to realize that we are the only girls at this bar. Hasn’t this happened before? This scene is quite common in small Brazilian towns. It sure beats walking into a brothel for a beer… but that’s a whole different story.

Back to the bar, and the girls. Two beers, and two girls and one table and one conversation and music, Jim Morrison- The Doors, oh yah that’s right I am from Los Angeles, and Jim… he was too.  Small laughter from the girls, then Offspring comes on and then Pink Floyd, we catch ourselves singing and wanting to join in on the fun.

A drunk Brazilian man asks us where we are from. “America” we exclaim!

“Oh really, which part?”

 I proudly smile and say, “California”, always a winner around these parts!

We small talk in English until the man realizes we speak Portuguese and then we have a real conversation.

“So girls, the bar is going to close down in 15 minutes because of futebol.”

“Huh, you are going to close down your bar, on a Saturday when you could be making money for futebol?”

“Yes, finish up your beers!”

I quietly tell Ti what is going on and we figure it would be nice to join in on the fun. There is promise of a barbeque at this match and we have not eaten all day, hence the beer. We slyly ask the boys if we could join them and we are received with a very enthusiastic yes. We get in a car and arrive at the field.

In Morretes they have a soccer tournament once a week where the community members get together and play. We sit down at the table with other folks and I eat a pastel and relish in its amazing flavor. The game has started and Ti orders another beer, we get lost in conversation and forget to watch the game! “DOH!”

We are meeting a friend at the bus station so we leave hastily and laugh at the situation. We always end up in the best places; we’re lucky that way.

Thoughts from the top of a mountain

 

Morretes, PR, Brasil

1/11/2010

 Abrolhos

The wind running across my head and through my hair could be no more pleasant than a kiss from my love, it reminds me that the world is unforgettably beautiful and that freedom is real, and that maybe one day it will “ring from sea to shining sea.”

The walk up the treacherous mountain, stopping every few minutes to stabilize our breath, walking up 90 degree slopes, and up water streams, and through the forest, these are some thoughts from the top of the mountain:

How did we get here? To Brazil? To the world? To this magnificent place?

None of these questions have answers and none of these questions matter. The only things that matter are these sights, this feeling of accomplishment, and this feeling of insurmountable joy.

Conjunto de Marumbi, a mountain chain surrounding Morretes has been climbed by thousands of tourists and even more locals, It’s importance to the small town in Brazil is immense, it is a playground for children to discover the rainforest, to discover the strength of their bodies and the amazing things it can do for you when you push it and pull it up steep mountain sides.

I’ll never forget this wonderful day, the fear I felt climbing down the mountain, sliding instead of walking and ripping holes through my pants. Conversing with a young traveler in French, laughing at myself, and falling and getting back up and doing it all over again.

Marumbi

You have shown me

That anything is possible

For a young girl like me.