The Final Days

Coming back to Florianopolis was a shock. A month away from the magical island had turned it into a distant dream. Seeing the bright colors and feeling the hot sun of Brazil quickly turned the dream back to a reality and all my memories of life on the island came back to me.

Over the weekend I visited my Brazilian family, visited Praia Mole, the beach I used to go to, and attended a friends graduation party. All the things that seemed strange and exotic the first time I arrived in Floripa now seemed familiar and comfortable. The people who I had greeted as a foreigner there only to learn, I now greeted as a friend with stories and lessons to share in my now improved Português.

My next and final stop was Rio de Janerio. I could now easily converse with my previous couchsurfing host with whom I could barely communicate with before. All the smells reminded me of the feeling I had when I arrived in Brasil that first time. I remembered not being able to imagine spending a whole seven months in such a foreign land. Now it’s the United States that seems like the foreign land.

Leaving Brasil I finally understand what all the study abroad advisors meant about it expanding your horizons or giving you another lens to view life. While I considered myself tolerant of all people and cultures, I never fully understood how true it is that it takes all kinds of people to make a world. After meeting people from all corners of the globe I really understood how beautiful and important each culture is. I could look at my habits and beliefs objectively from a distance and see how they are by no means superior than any other, and in fact, like everything in the world, contain many weaknesses that must be separated from the strengths. Perhaps the greatest boon of study abroad is being able to sort out and recognize, with clarity, what is universally helpful and harmful.

Another important lesson was the importance of working or having a purpose while travelling. After a day or two of seeing a city, it became necessary to do more than passively consume packaged experiences. I needed my experiences to have a context and understand how those experiences could apply to my life at home and change my world-view. I think to do this you need to stop being just an observer and actually immerse yourself in the productivity of a place.  I had much richer experiences working, studying and meditating than visiting Christ the Redentor with other tourists. You should approach another country not as a spy gathering intelligence but as an apprentice, practicing living in another world. If you are in Brazil you need to be a Brazilian for a while. Otherwise the benefits of your journey may be superficial and short-lived.

Retracing My Steps (Part One)

After Buenos Aires my next destination was General Rodriguez: Home to Tribe Isacar of the Twelve Tribes. Those who read my first entry about WWOOFing at the Tribe in Brazil may wonder why I would go back. The reasons are several.

1.     Most farms in Argentina are suffering economic hardship and don’t have productive work in the winter. The tribe on the other hand needs more workers for their numerous projects.

2.     It is much easier to practice Spanish in a community of 70 people from all over South America than working alone in a field.

3.     The tribe provides work clothes, does the laundry, makes a lot of mate and cooks incredible meals.

4.     For whatever reason I am still extremely interested in religion as well as community life and felt like I had more to learn.

While I was at the tribe I dug 4 meter holes for composting toilets, chopped a lot of wood, cared for the organic vegetable garden and helped construct a gigantic lodge. There were 7 other WWOOFers from Belgium, Germany, South Africa, Argentina and Brasil with other visitors daily. It was comforting having people from “outside” to discuss and at times critique the tribe.

While I was there I saw another baptism. He was a man who became an orphan at nine years old and was homeless since the age of nineteen. It was clear that the community had brought healing and meaning into his life, something that he expressed quite often. On the other hand, a 23 year old girl who had joined the tribe three years ago was visited by her sisters from Australia who she hadn’t seen since. Naturally her sisters were concerned and convinced her to leave the tribe without any notice and go back to Australia.

My feelings about the Tribe are still quite mixed and I can only conclude that like all things, it has good and bad aspects. It is clear to me that their faith does not lead to the truth or even tolerant views (in regards to homosexuality or equality of women) and yet their actions always seem positive and tolerant while providing a different model for human relations. Can positive actions and motives excuse what is in my opinion, radical views and perhaps even brainwashing youth?

Also, the tribe in Argentina wasn't as harmonious as the tribe in Brazil. I would attribute this to the fact Brazilians are generally more sociable and that Argentina had a single leader. Apparently all the tribes have a "head of the community" but I didn't even realize there was one in Brazil. What has always turned me off (and most people I think) about communities are the little problems that turn into big conflicts as people try to change others' behavior. In many places leaving a dish in the sink or personal items in the shared space can mean an hour of dispute. I was shocked to find none of this in Brazil. However, in Argentina the ideal of love, harmony and equality sometimes seemed sacrificed to a sense of entitlement as people tried to enforce rules. When a problem arose it was sometimes expressed as frustration and a command rather than a friendly suggestion and request. Nonetheless, conflict was minimal overall and as a whole, the organization was equally impressive as in Brazil.

After revisiting the Twelve Tribes, I continued retracing my steps to visit my couchsurfing host in Buenos Aires. Uruguay was next, a lovely old European country full of farms and quaint cities. Then I would revisit Florianopolis and Rio de Janeiro before my flight back to Vermont. 

Cabin and Fruit Trees

Other WWOOFers

Constructing a lodge

The Main House