Oi friends!! Greetings from the coast of Parana!!
We are currently studying marine biology and conservation at an extension of the Universidade Federal do Parana`s center for marine science and education on the beautiful coast! These last few days have been phenomenal! Leaving Curitiba was sad but this place is great! I got to say Brazil gets better everyday and my love grows, it grows so much!
We are learning about birds, so many birds!! My favorite one is the brown booby! The most magnificent creature I have EVER seen. We were working with the people at the rehabiliation center and got to see penguins, birds, sea lions and a turtle!! SOme of the folks much braver than I got to feed the penguins!!! So cute, my heart melted!! We have been taking walks on the beach and finding far too many dead birds but we have learned a lot from these deaths. We must be more careful with our damn consumption patterns because these behaviors hurt wildlife all over!
Yesterday however was the best day, arguably one of the best of my life. We got to take a boat ride to the Ilha do mel (Honey Island) hiked around the forest and in the sand. Went swimming in warm water, massaged eachother, splashed water and drank caipirinha`s on the beach ( in true brazilian fashion!) we drank brazilian beers and enjoyed the island and eachother and the magnificent ocean and trees and ahh!! Only words AHHHHH i loove it here!! On the way back to land they played music on the boat and everyone got down and danced for thirty minutes! I sat on the boat and drank a SKOL and could not stop smiling, damn i love these people, i love this place, thank god this exists, please i never want it to end!
We spent today surveying and mapping burrowing owl nests and they were so cute, then it rained on us and we were soaked and very unhappy but then we got to change and went back to the marine center to study macrofauna and benthic organisms and got invited to a beach party by cute brazilian hippies!! We are all excited to practice our portugeuse and make some new friends.
I am looking forward for the things we have planned for the week; dissecting a sea turtle, releasing penguins back into the ocean and more talks and more fun!
Viva Brazil.
Amor y Paz
Lazzuly
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
Curitiba Days
Oi!
Brazil e maravilhoiso.
These past few days have been so fun! We are in the city of Curitiba, located in one of the most southern states of Brazil, and known as the ecological capital of Brazil. Many metropolitan cities around the world have modeled their transit system after the system in Curitiba, and this city was the first city in Brazil to instill a rigorous recycling program. Throughout the city there are patches of forest that are open to the public and this city boasts large populations of Araucaria trees, trees native to this area, and these trees are home to many beautiful animals and special birds! It is a city bustling with energy! It was colonized by Europeans, mainly of Portuguese, German and Italian descent. The architecture is beautiful and colorful and the bus system is phenomenal!
While in Curitiba my group and I are studying Portuguese. I am enrolled in the intermediate class because of my experience with French and Spanish and I feel that this class is a good fit for me. However, SPANISH is NOT SO SIMILAR to Portuguese as one might like to believe( I sure thought I could get away with Spanish). There are many false cognates and lots of vocabulary words in Spanish that do not even exist in Portuguese and as you can imagine it gets crazy!! Portuguese is an extremely powerful beautiful language but it is very hard. I get frustrated during class while we conjugate verbs and create different tenses, but in the end it is very rewarding.
Aside from school, we have been doing fun activities. As this week is host family week I am living with a Brazilian family in the suburbs of Curitiba in a lovely home full of incredible people. I have a host brother Guilherme who is 20 years old who is so fantastic and a sister named Barbara who is 14 and is so incredibly intelligent and mature! We have fun going back between my Portuguese-SPanish mix of vocabulary and English. Oh the joy of culture and language!
We have visited this beautiful opera house surrounded by trees, visited patches of forest, visited the marvelous botanical gardens that are home to over 7 varieties of Bromeliads! My friend Mia was telling me how they have perfect geometry (like acorns) and how incredible it is that so many different varieties could be so perfect. Bromeliads have become one of my favorite plants. While in the Atlantic Forest we saw many of them growing on the forest floor as well as on the tree branches as epiphytes. They intrigue me with their shape and their astounding beauty. Needless to say, they never cease to make me smile!
Aside from these fun things we went out last night to a Rio style barzinho (bar). My brazilian brother took me out with some of his friends and some Americans met us at this bar. They had a live band playing samba and it was so incredible! It was the Brazil that I had imagined in my childhood dreams. There were several drummers, saxophone players, there were guitars, flutes, voices and there was samba!! As a brazilian daughter (papa is from Brazil) you cannot even imagine what shame I felt not being able to dance. So instead I was creative and danced Salsa with my brother and it was just as fun! After 1 liter of caipirinha, 1 cuba libre, and 3 brahmas I went down to the main dance floor with my lovely friend Maria and I tried to move them hips the way they do it here and I still could not master it, but thats alright because we had fun, and we laughed and most of all we danced.
Today, we learned SAMBA! And I was laughing inside thinking, "oh gee thanks, why couldn't we have done this yesterday?" It is so hard, mostly because I do not like structured things, but im hoping to lock my door and blast some music and practice.... hahaha!!
This viajem is PHENOMENAL. I love Brazil, I love this program and I love the people who I am experiencing all of this with. Each and every person on this trip is so talented, and so beautiful and I could not have asked for a better group of homies.
Tchau Cobras!
Love
Lazzuly Mello.
Curitiba, PR, Brazil.
Brazil e maravilhoiso.
These past few days have been so fun! We are in the city of Curitiba, located in one of the most southern states of Brazil, and known as the ecological capital of Brazil. Many metropolitan cities around the world have modeled their transit system after the system in Curitiba, and this city was the first city in Brazil to instill a rigorous recycling program. Throughout the city there are patches of forest that are open to the public and this city boasts large populations of Araucaria trees, trees native to this area, and these trees are home to many beautiful animals and special birds! It is a city bustling with energy! It was colonized by Europeans, mainly of Portuguese, German and Italian descent. The architecture is beautiful and colorful and the bus system is phenomenal!
While in Curitiba my group and I are studying Portuguese. I am enrolled in the intermediate class because of my experience with French and Spanish and I feel that this class is a good fit for me. However, SPANISH is NOT SO SIMILAR to Portuguese as one might like to believe( I sure thought I could get away with Spanish). There are many false cognates and lots of vocabulary words in Spanish that do not even exist in Portuguese and as you can imagine it gets crazy!! Portuguese is an extremely powerful beautiful language but it is very hard. I get frustrated during class while we conjugate verbs and create different tenses, but in the end it is very rewarding.
Aside from school, we have been doing fun activities. As this week is host family week I am living with a Brazilian family in the suburbs of Curitiba in a lovely home full of incredible people. I have a host brother Guilherme who is 20 years old who is so fantastic and a sister named Barbara who is 14 and is so incredibly intelligent and mature! We have fun going back between my Portuguese-SPanish mix of vocabulary and English. Oh the joy of culture and language!
We have visited this beautiful opera house surrounded by trees, visited patches of forest, visited the marvelous botanical gardens that are home to over 7 varieties of Bromeliads! My friend Mia was telling me how they have perfect geometry (like acorns) and how incredible it is that so many different varieties could be so perfect. Bromeliads have become one of my favorite plants. While in the Atlantic Forest we saw many of them growing on the forest floor as well as on the tree branches as epiphytes. They intrigue me with their shape and their astounding beauty. Needless to say, they never cease to make me smile!
Aside from these fun things we went out last night to a Rio style barzinho (bar). My brazilian brother took me out with some of his friends and some Americans met us at this bar. They had a live band playing samba and it was so incredible! It was the Brazil that I had imagined in my childhood dreams. There were several drummers, saxophone players, there were guitars, flutes, voices and there was samba!! As a brazilian daughter (papa is from Brazil) you cannot even imagine what shame I felt not being able to dance. So instead I was creative and danced Salsa with my brother and it was just as fun! After 1 liter of caipirinha, 1 cuba libre, and 3 brahmas I went down to the main dance floor with my lovely friend Maria and I tried to move them hips the way they do it here and I still could not master it, but thats alright because we had fun, and we laughed and most of all we danced.
Today, we learned SAMBA! And I was laughing inside thinking, "oh gee thanks, why couldn't we have done this yesterday?" It is so hard, mostly because I do not like structured things, but im hoping to lock my door and blast some music and practice.... hahaha!!
This viajem is PHENOMENAL. I love Brazil, I love this program and I love the people who I am experiencing all of this with. Each and every person on this trip is so talented, and so beautiful and I could not have asked for a better group of homies.
Tchau Cobras!
Love
Lazzuly Mello.
Curitiba, PR, Brazil.
Tuesday, September 14, 2010
Montana Beija Flor - Leila Land
Helllo friends and lovers,
I am in Brazil! Been here for two weeks and so much has happened it´s hard to know where to begin.
We arrived in Miami two weeks ago and ten strangers were akwardly talking and getting to know eachother. Now we are family and can surely hold a conversation.
We arrived in Sao Paolo to then transfer to curitiba, spent a couple hours in the city and then off the the Mountain Reserve. We arrived late at night, one hour up this incredible mountain and into a lovely ´paradise! a biological reserve like no other! when we arrived we were greeted with kisses from Leila, the owner of this reserve- she owns 50 ha of land and is making it into a national reserve. It is so beautiful. We slept in a bunk house, ten of us, 7 people one side, three on the other. We stayed up late every night talking and discovering each other. I have made great friends, and they are all wonderful!!
Everday we were served fresh bread, butter, jam, cake, coffee and tea for breakfast, fresh vegetables, salad, juice, beans, rice, manioc for lunch and for dinner we always had soup! Yummy yummy soup!
We had classes in a hut next to the water and learned about deforestation, frogs, birds, ethnobotany and the list goes on. We were taught by this man names Andre whom I love! We walked up this hill everyday to make phone calls and passed through patched of olf growth forest, and banana plantations and palmeiro plantations... this is sad but words cannot truly explain!
This program is incredible!! We are literally being taught by the leading scientist in this country about everything ecology, conservation, resource management. I am learning so much!! We went to a private forest reserve and walked for 7 km through this amazing patch of undisturbed land, it was like a fairy-tale to be there!! I am eager to share pictures and I will do so very soon.
It is hard to fill the gaps on these past two weeks so while in Curitiba I will try and add to this post and show images and try to explain what has happened in the last two weeks, because it seems like a dream.
I am so happy here, I love this country, I love these mountains and these birds, I love the call of frogs at night, and the clouds from the forest rolling into the dining room. I love the forest and its people, I love the artisans and their crafts and mostly I love seeing this all first hand because it is incredible!
The Atlantic coastal rainforest has been destroyed so much that less than 7% of the original forest remains. I have a special place in my heart for this forest, and I will never forget it! Luckily, I got an internship working on a manioc farm so I will return to this magical paradise in October and savor every second of it.
Love you guys!
L
I am in Brazil! Been here for two weeks and so much has happened it´s hard to know where to begin.
We arrived in Miami two weeks ago and ten strangers were akwardly talking and getting to know eachother. Now we are family and can surely hold a conversation.
We arrived in Sao Paolo to then transfer to curitiba, spent a couple hours in the city and then off the the Mountain Reserve. We arrived late at night, one hour up this incredible mountain and into a lovely ´paradise! a biological reserve like no other! when we arrived we were greeted with kisses from Leila, the owner of this reserve- she owns 50 ha of land and is making it into a national reserve. It is so beautiful. We slept in a bunk house, ten of us, 7 people one side, three on the other. We stayed up late every night talking and discovering each other. I have made great friends, and they are all wonderful!!
Everday we were served fresh bread, butter, jam, cake, coffee and tea for breakfast, fresh vegetables, salad, juice, beans, rice, manioc for lunch and for dinner we always had soup! Yummy yummy soup!
We had classes in a hut next to the water and learned about deforestation, frogs, birds, ethnobotany and the list goes on. We were taught by this man names Andre whom I love! We walked up this hill everyday to make phone calls and passed through patched of olf growth forest, and banana plantations and palmeiro plantations... this is sad but words cannot truly explain!
This program is incredible!! We are literally being taught by the leading scientist in this country about everything ecology, conservation, resource management. I am learning so much!! We went to a private forest reserve and walked for 7 km through this amazing patch of undisturbed land, it was like a fairy-tale to be there!! I am eager to share pictures and I will do so very soon.
It is hard to fill the gaps on these past two weeks so while in Curitiba I will try and add to this post and show images and try to explain what has happened in the last two weeks, because it seems like a dream.
I am so happy here, I love this country, I love these mountains and these birds, I love the call of frogs at night, and the clouds from the forest rolling into the dining room. I love the forest and its people, I love the artisans and their crafts and mostly I love seeing this all first hand because it is incredible!
The Atlantic coastal rainforest has been destroyed so much that less than 7% of the original forest remains. I have a special place in my heart for this forest, and I will never forget it! Luckily, I got an internship working on a manioc farm so I will return to this magical paradise in October and savor every second of it.
Love you guys!
L
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About Me
- Lapis
- UC DAVIS undergraduate interested in changing the way people think about their food, resources and learning more about ecological interactions to better understand natures perfect balance.