Coach

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Bom dia!

Well, I've arrived in Belo Horizonte - the flight here was a bit problematic. Atlanta was a bit stormy, and the planes couldn't get out onto the tarmac, so I ended up having my flight pushed out about 5 hours, causing me to miss my connection in Brazil. So after arriving in Sao Paulo I ended up having another 7 hour layover. In total, about 27 hours of travel.

Airports are seriously wierd places - the sheer number of people and unlikelihood of ever seeing anyone again prompts a lot of spontanous conversation, if you open yourself up to it. I met a military contractor who was in Iraq, a farmer from Southern Brazil - and probably one of the nicest most peaceful people I've ever met, a retired woman from Toronto, who had been traveling to Brazil to build a house for herself in the NE of Brazil - she didn't speak Portuguese, and she had a limited disability of requiring a walker, but she seemed to possess such a faith in the life that she was attempting something that most people even without these "barriers".

The weather here is nice, around the mid 70s, pretty cool by local standards. I've been talking with my friends about some different possibilities - I think I'm going to spend at least a month, maybe two, here in Belo, and hang around Gordon and Teca's (Jose's parents, who I'm staying with) community center in one of the favelas here in the city. It's a good chance to practice and develop my Portuguese, and see some pretty cool stuff. I'll be talking with them about some possible work areas in Brazil - there's a Habitat for Humanity development project in the Northeastern sertão building rainwater collection systems and wells that I might get involved in (and of course, I would really like to, and it seems I will have the chance to visit some of the MST settlements).

Otherwise, there's plenty going on the city since I arrived, so I'll definitely be busy. It's long in the planning and a pain to get down here, but now that I've arrived it's as every bit seriously cool as I thought it would be.

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Comments

[jellis]

Superb
Glad to see you made it there safely. Did you manage to read about the tar in heaven in the Constitution-Journal while in Atlanta? Alas, before we end up as litter patrol minons in that utopia in the sky we can only hope to be as totally sweet as that woman you met on the plane, moving to Brazil while confined to a walker. Phenomenal it is, that human spirit. On the flip side, today I went for a 17 mile bike ride through Finley National Wildlife Refuge (binoculars around my neck the whole time), mowed my yard, built an incubator box for the baby chickens we'll have soon (coop comes next), and discovered that my pond is home to two not-yet-identified turtles. Not as cool as Brazil, but almost liveable. Tomorrow I am off to a wilderness area in the coast range for a dayhike with Mae. I imagine that you, as well, are doing the same old shit--passing time in some urban wasteland--just with a radically different environment. Reminds me of Thoreau on the oppressive nature of habits... It is moments like these when--as I search for an excellent phrase--I wonder what Jon Suter would say. But then I remember: Who cares, he's in fucking MISSOURRI. And you're in BRAZIL. And I think that's all I need to say. BLAHDOW!!!!! ~Josh