Praias e Festas

I'm sitting down to write this blog entry next to a beautiful pool surrounded by palm trees, flowers and other manifestations of nature. Five friends and I spent the weekend at the paradisaical Praia do Rosa. Despite winter and a rainy forecast, the last three days have been perfectly sunny. The town is completely ours and all the inns and restaurants lining the streets are closed for the season. The beaches are equally still and tranquil.

The days were spent swimming, reading and walking along the edge of the sea. During the nights we returned to our cabin full of twisting wooden posts, yin yangs and other nice touches. With samba music playing and caparinhas in hand, we cooked a variety of dishes on the grill. The first night was our interpretation of the famous Churrasca (barbeque) of steak and chicken. We also cooked rice with some rubbery shellfish we found on the beach. The next night was fish donated by the fishermen we met and a pizza that became a mushy calzone after falling through the grill.

Since I wrote last I have been trying to take advantage of all my remaining time in Brazil (less than a month left). I've gone kayaking, taken my first samba and salsa dance lessons, and tried to make it to the beach as much as possible. I've also turned 21 which included a party at my host parents house.

Over twenty-five people from the States, Brazil, Chile, Mexico, Columbia, Poland, and Germany fit into our little house for the birthdays of me and my roommate Lucky, who's birthday is one day later than mine. There was crab soup, squid pasta, fish, oysters, shrimp and mussels all freshly caught. After midnight there was a cake and I handed over the birthday status to Lucky and the festivities continued until morning.

Unlike my other posts, this time I have no photos to share after getting sand in my camera but I have borrowed a few from my dear friend Maria.

Seafood Feast

 

The twenty-first Birthday Party-goers

 Praia de Rosa

Halfway Home

It’s been three and a half months since I left Vermont and there are three and a half months until I return. It seems like it has been a lifetime since I left and the idea of going back seems fantastical. Traveling by myself, I feel like I left a whole world behind to inhabit an alternate universe. The distance isn’t measured in space, but in time, producing the strange feeling that I’m moving quickly even as I stand still.

And yet it has only been half of the time. While it feels like time is racing by, in retrospect, it has actually been taking long and slow strides. I feel like I must take advantage of everything all at once because time is so short, and then I realize that every minute can contain an eternity. Time is the most illusive, shape-shifting concept for me to try to wrap my head around.

I have the freedom to think about such things because I have a long weekend for Labor Day and have decided to declare this Friday my Sabbath (writing doesn’t count as work, does it?). Exams just finished and I am looking forward to some time to relax and enjoy the island. Sometimes I contemplate how later I'll miss the smell of the ocean, the lazy palm trees or the calming breeze when a photo or a samba sends me back in time. I will truly miss the laid-back Brazilian attitude towards life, spending most of a day in a hammock, the poetic language, all the fruits, and the list goes on. I suppose that's one of the reasons for keeping a blog.

Here are a few pictures to keep the blog up to date (more or less):

The view from school

Beira Mar on the bus ride home

The Jesus hill

A pirate ship

The Adventure Continues...

Classes have started and as I expected, it has been harder finding time to write. In addition to homework, I am expected to read the Brazilian news in Portuguese everyday. I am teaching classes in English and will start working with on a permaculture project at the end of the month. To make matters worse, the bus ride to school is over an hour one way and with various other daily tasks, my time for creative ventures can be quite limited. 
 

The good news: I was given the best of host families. Monica and Christina, my Brasilian moms, are both artists and have decorated the house with artisan crafts. They are always saying things like: feel at home, why aren’t you using the pool? you aren’t eating enough! Etc. They also know the best places on the island and their house has a pool, a view of the lagoon and the ocean as well (its well worth the commute).  My roommate is a DJ studying in New Orleans. He has had a little more trouble adjusting since he didn’t speak a word of Portuguese, but I hope I’ve helped him out learning some important words.
 

These first few weeks I’ve been frequenting the beaches and checking out the night life which hasn’t provided much to write about. I also hiked to a village, “Costa da Lagoa,” only accessible by boat or hours of walking. I talked to a teenager there and he explained that the community is extremely close. There are none of the plagues of drugs, homelessness, and crime that you find in the city. But plagues spread and there are developers who hope to develop the area.
 

Whenever I ask old people about Florianópolis they always have stories about how their neighborhood used to be forest. Tourists wouldn’t flood the beaches and fill the streets during Carnaval . The aforementioned drugs, crime and homelessness were almost unheard of just a few years ago. Talking about this shift with an old lady, I asked how she felt about the changes. She said “I don’t like it very much. But at the same time its progress and the future.” Progress, it seems, is when a beautiful beach or a tranquil community gets "developed" and filled with worthless junk and unhappy people to “cash in” on all that value. If its something you don’t like that is progressing, the idea of progress should lose its positive connotations. 
 

On my street, a tourist from New Zealand has already been assaulted on my street and now has a pirate-like scar on his face. Its not strange for cars or motorcycles to disappear (including my host mom's motorcycle) and several houses nearby have been robbed. And I live in a good part of the island! This morning I hitch-hiked to the city and they picked up a dentist who's car was stolen last night and he only had one real (not enough for the bus).

I really must be studying too much if I’m already complaining about effects of development on society and nature. It must be because all my professors are Marxists. Florianópolis is still breathtakingly beautiful, especially now the tourists are heading north. 

One last thing about classes. Here, class is more like a 3 hour discussion. You study before class and then the teacher clarifies it by leading a discussion. Instead of having knowledge stuffed down your throat to be quickly expelled, you have to think, speak, and actually have a grasp of the material. I just need a little more confidence in my Portuguese to speak up more.

 

Costa Da Lagoa

 

Bryan, my American roommate

 Dandara and Raoni, my Brasilian brother and sister

I've been learning to cook seafood: Oysters, Mussels and Shrimp

The Magic Island

    I don't know where to begin to describe Florianópolis. It is a small city of 400,000 on an island with over one hundred beaches also known as the "Ihla da Magia" or "Magic Island." Almost 50% of the land is conserved and the trails through the forests are breathtaking.
    Right now I just finished napping in a hotel (reservations courtesy of International Study Abroad) and am waiting for the other students to arrive. I am finally about to begin my studies after two weeks on the Island. Carnival attracts all kinds of people. During the two weeks I met countless other travelers from Germany, Argentina, Colombia, South Africa, France, England, Lithuania, and the list goes on. I also met some other students here with whom I played poker and watched films (they knew more classic American films than I did).
    Once Carnival set in all work stopped and the streets were filled with crowds and music. There was a day called Bloco dos Sujos where all the men dressed like women except for the tourists who would remark how interesting the event was and take pictures of passing groups of cross-dressers. Luckily I was with a girl who had a pile of dresses she was throwing away and lent me one (see picture below). Another day just had costume parties all over the city. Of course there were also the many parades from authentic drumming lines and dancing to terrible electronica crowded with too many drunk people to move.
    After a week of staying up until six in the morning I decided to camp out in a hammock on the beach and recover my strength. Keeping my eye out for cobras, I hiked an hour and a half over a mountain, which is the only way to the beach except by boat. During the walk I talked with a nice couple from Lithuania who studied permaculture and were working on a permaculture farm in Floripa that hopefully I will see one day. Finally I arrived, covered in sweat, on the beach and jumped in. I spent some time reading and writing until the sun set and made myself a little fire. I didn't have many options, but roasted some apples which turned out quite well and then fell asleep to the lull of the ocean.

Center of Florianópolis

I'm not always the best couch surfer

A dinner of Passion Fruit Salmon

 Its true, all the women in Brazil are gorgeous!

My hammock at the Lagoinha do L'este

Sunrise on the beach

The Tribe of Twelve

When I first arrived at the Twelve Tribes I was absolutely stunned by the grand vista as well as all the pretty details, such as gardens at the base of every tree or little stone fountains. I arrived on Shabbat and spent the next day playing soccer, dancing, conversing and dining. While there are none of the difficult rules of the meditation center, the religious aspect can be oppressive at times and Jesus finds his way into each conversation.

The people here believe that we are at the end of an age and Yashura (Jesus) will come for the final judgement in about sixty years (just an estimate). The duality between God and Satan accompanied by a firm belief that they have found the one true path to salvation, keeps them from appreciating all the many diverse aspects of life. Nonetheless they are patient, respectful, generous, and loving. I have never seen such a cohesive community in my life and I didn’t see one single conflict during my stay. There isn’t any hypocrisy and they actually live what it says in the bible, which has quite a few lessons to learn from. For example, I can only pray that one day I will have their conviction, their love of life and other people, and such strong relationships.

During my stay I learned how to milk and care for goats, grow, package and consume Mate, irrigate fields of lemon-grass, train grape vines, and I learned a song on guitar called: Love Causes Peace to Flow (it actually sounds good). I also managed to avoid being bitten by the cobras that kill you in about thirty minutes, depending on the snake.

More frightening than the cobras was the power of persuasion that the community possessed. The other WWOOFer (person who works on farms for room and board) decided to get “babtised.” Before arriving, she was an atheist studying permaculture in Columbia. Now she is giving away her possessions and her studies to spend the rest of her life serving the tribe. She also won’t see her family again until they make the 3,000 or so mile journey to southern Brazil.

After the baptism I decided it was time to move on and packed my things. I said my thanks and farewells and was granted gifts. These included tribal mate, brown sugar, incence, a lemon-grass candle, and soap. My next stop would be the last: Florianópolis, an island whose praises were sung throughout my journey so much that it had gained almost mythological status in my mind.

http://www.twelvetribes.com/

Home

 My corner

Lemon-Grass

 The farm (Fish and Baptismal pond on the right)

Mate Factory

São Paulo

After a beautiful car ride through the hills of Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo State, I arrived in São Paulo City. I met up with Isadora, another twenty year old Vipassana Meditator. She has already sat four ten-day courses and is starting another once I leave. It wouldn’t be possible to find a kinder, more patient host and she taught me all about São Paulo and the Português language. She introduced me to fruit of the conde, which is now my favorite fruit by far (but its about $5 each) and Calda de Cana, which is even better yet, where you put stalks of sugar can in a big machine and it spits out a cup of pure sugar juice that tastes almost fruity.

We went to visit the woman I got a ride to the city with at a Kabbalah Center and took a “course” that was a bit like a sermon. It was great for my Português because he loudly enunciated every word about how pain and suffering is a signal that we must transform ourselves and we will suffer until we do so. Very few of the participants where Jewish and Brazilians seem open to any kind of belief. Everyone tries everything and has their own unique blend of various traditions. I have seen all kinds of blends of evangelicism, Catholicism, Buddhism, hari krishnaism, ayahuasca drinkism, Candomblé (an african religion), and of course the usual astrology/numerology/tarot stuff. I can't quite make out how you can believe so many things at once but at least its harder to find someone who claims that their religion is the best everwithout any knowledge of the others.

Another night I stayed with a different meditator and talked with her and her friend about politics. Any discussion of politics will have the same subjects. The corrupt government, the inequality, and the fact that everyone complains about problems without doing anything. Well, for the first time I was able to talk to people who actually were doing something. They both worked on conservation projects and her friend was doing research in the Amazon. She has lived in the rainforest for three years studying how replanted areas of the forest develop. It was a relief to see people with conviction and devotion to a cause. There doesn't seem to be many people who think about more than their own livelihood (although I suppose this is a global phenomenon).

After spending a night on a bus, I arrived in Curitiba. It was very futuristic with tubes for bus stops and a veritable army of people in orange costumes that say "Environmental Public Clean-up" with metal tongs to pick up trash. I didn't have much time before I left for the Twelve Tribes, a community of 80 Christians, where I was to live for the next week and a half.

 Isadora

 Ibapuera Park

 A couch of a fellow economist I stayed with after dancing at a Samba club all night

Ordem e Progresso!

 Free music for the anniversary of São Paulo

 Meditation Space

 Curitiba Mercadão (Big Market)

 The Curitiba Bus Tube

 

Ocupa Curitiba (Occupy Curitiba)

Dhammi Santi

When I arrived at the Dhamma Santi meditation center I was immediately inundated with words outside of my vocabulary. I had to learn the names of all the different foods, chores and dishes. I found out that the strange guiaba fruit I was eating was actually guava, mamão was Papaya (people here eat mountains of papaya that comes in a variety of sizes), and Caju was the fruit of the Cashew (the cashew nut is in the pit).

In the United States I took the same course which consists of meditation for ten days without speaking, writing, or anything but meditating. Because I only had $15 to my name, I couldn’t pay (it’s all by donation) so I came here to serve a course. This way I could also work on my Português, get in some meditation, and do something useful. The daily schedule was:

5:30 – 8:00 work

hour meditation

9:00-1:30 work

hour meditation

3:30 – 7:00 work

2 hours of meditation and a discourse

10:15 sleep

            Luckily the people I worked with were all talkative and fun (I heard that in the United States they follow the rule of only talking about the task at hand and when necessary). There were seven people from across Brasil and Argentina feeding ninety people. The only server who was my age was studying psychology and doing a seven month stay.

            The technique consists of developing focus (Samadhi) and observing the sensations to develop wisdom (Pranna). As you focus on the sensations throughout your body, it becomes so much easier to feel a subtle sensation on any tiny part and feel subtle sensations throughout the entire body. The more time you spend the more quickly you notice how you react to any situation, thought, or feeling.

The idea is that every thought and feeling has an accompanying physical sensation. When you try and tell what you are feeling by looking at your mind it doesn’t work. When you see what your body is doing it becomes obvious (more so with practice).  People are so surprised and delighted to hear that physically smiling actually tells your mind to be cheerful. Why the surprise? Are people surprised that the mind and body aren’t completely separate entities? That we are the ones in control of our feelings and emotions? What surprises me is that so few people take the time to understand what it means to be a conscious.

One of the rewards of these courses is difficult to describe. During and afterwards everything is more colorful, vibrant and marvelous. Everything that exists seems to be a miracle. Even your dreams become so much more meaningful and you can remember them all. People call it a Dhamma high. I think this is why you find so many travelers at these centers before they begin their journey.

Dhamma.org

 Rio de Janeiro should be called the Green Mountain state

Welcome to Dhamma Santi

 Home

 Path to the kitchen

Nicolas, a server from Argentina and a guy from Denmark on his way to the World Rainbow Gathering

The Brave Servers