Week Two

6 days in and I am already in the wilderness. That was what was going through my mind as we approached the lake we would be canoeing on for the weekend.  I spent last weekend participating in a staff canoe training trip. Me and my roommate got up at 5:00am to leave for the trip. We had to take the subway to the center of the city where another instructor was waiting with a car. The subway was uneventful, thankfully. Even at 5:00 in the morning the subway was packed with people, and my massive backpack full of gear didn't help the situation. I felt some serious stink eye on me more than a few times while on the train. I could feel their thoughts; who is this gringo with his obnoxiously large pack, smelling of B.O. (because I didn't have time for a shower), taking up space on my train. However, I didn't have time for them and their grumbles I was going camping.

The training was at a lake in Parabunna (I think that is how it is spelled... or what it is called). Parabunna is about and hour and a half outside of Sao Paulo. We met with two more instructors, loaded up our gear and then drove to the put in. I spent most of the car ride trying to sleep in between attempts at conversation. at this point in my journey I was still basically responding in one word sentences. I would be able to catch maybe every three or four words and there were still many words that  I didn't understand. I was pretty quiet  on the drive.

From what I can gather from my travels there are two kinds of roads in Brazil paved and maintained, and then giant dirt paths that were dug once and never touched again. Our put in sat at the bottom of a small mountain range. the road down to the lake looked like it had been hit by a WWI shelling. it didn't have pot holes but craters. The car scraped bottom on the road more than once. The change in scenery was dramatic. there is very little transition between the city and the rural. once you leave the city you are in the rural. This Rural isn't some quaint rural like Boone or some small podunk town in west virginia. It is dirt poor. Houses built from scavenged material. there are some big houses teh country estates of the rich but mostly it is poverty and wilderness.

The lake we paddled on is like something out of a national geographic special. Our putin was at what looked like the boat drop for what used to be a resort that had long since been abandoned. It was beautiful as the forest was slowly reclaiming the structures around the putin. We met up with the rest of the crew for the weekend did some introductions loaded boats and paddled to our basecamp. The water had a deep blue green tinge and was clear for about half a meter down. it was surrounded by dramatic grassy hills. the hills reminded me of Max Patch or PennyVaun in Wales. They were beautiful green grass covered hills. they were primarily grazing pasture for livestock. The shores were so steep that  thought the lake was made by a dam. It was not it was totally natural. We pulled up to the island of our camp and the first thing that struck me was that I didn't recognize and of the vegetation. This shouldn't have surprised me what with being over 5,000 miles from my familiar woods, but it shocked me still. I didn't even recognize the grass, it was a different grass, the trees were different everything was different. Everything felt like magic. We slept in hammocks, for several reasons. First of all they are cooler so the hot nights are easier. They are not very hot for a brazilian but they still be me the uncomfortable sweats. Second, it does less impact to the area. Third they are easier to carry. Fourth and most importantly the islands around the lake are infested with LEAF CUTTER ANTS, real live freaking leaf cutter ants. Like the ones that carry leaves to their nest and grow the fungus that feeds their colony. These ants are super aggressive, and will cut through almost anything, (they told me as i was poking a stick into the hole of a nest cause  i wanted the ants to come out and play). The net protects us and our stuff from them, Because they have a nasty habit of swarming at night and covering people sleeping on the ground or without nets. We set up camp and heard some bird yelling. they were not tweeting but yelling. The one flew out from the trees and it was a TOUCAN. What is this magical place, that only existed in the magic TV box before? I stood staring at our hammock city with its toucans and capybaras and leafcutter ants and knew that this was going to be a great weekend.

It was an amazing weekend. The Staff at Outward Bound Brazil are amazing people. Almost exactly like the people at Other Outward Bounds, they like to play in the dirt, and are very good at playing in the dirt. If they hadn't been speaking Portuguese I would have thought them Americans. They were my people. Our trip was lead by the most amazing guy named Atila, pronounced Atchila. Hey spoke english and portuguese and spanish. he had spent most of his life working for NOLS and various other organizations spending time paddling the amazon and rivers in colorado and california, I was drooling all I wanted to do was pick his brain.

However I spent most of my time working on my portugese. I could understand what was being said when I had a context for the conversation or lesson. However, when we were just around the dinner circle and the group was just chatting giving each other shit or making jokes I would be totally lost. I would get really frustrated with myself. I wanted to know what was being said, I wanted fluency. I felt a little like a failure when I could only get the gist of what was being said or I missed a joke or question. I was talking to Atila about this and he said that I just have to keep reminding myself that this was only my first week. They are speaking with a ton of slang and speaking very quickly you should be happy that you can get the gist of a conversation. I understood what he was saying but it was still hard for me to accept. I am used to being the one with an excellent vocabulary. I am used to being the poet or the philosopher, the one who is amazing at understanding and expressing himself. However, this doesn't happen when learning a new language and especially with full immersion in a new language. I am not used to trials by fire. I am the one who gets it the first try and this was not happening at all.

However the rest of the training went amazingly despite my frustrations. I was talking to Atila going over my check off review. he said that I had all the hard skills his only worry was that I didn't have the ability to teach or lead effectively of efficiently because of my still developing Portuguese. It hurt a little when he told me this but only because that was exactly what I would have put on my evaluation. I knew I had the skills it was just a matter of the most important aspect the language.

This week I spent trying to improve my portugese. I started using a online vocabulary bank to practice vocabulary on online flash cards. I also started trying to speak even if it was broken and poorly constructed. I would become comfertable making mistakes speaking,  and I would speak more. i now carry my dictionary around with me everywhere.

My portuguese has increased. I now hear the word breaks in speaking. Before this week. I would only be able to pick out a word or two amongst of stream of portuguese sounding nonsense syllables. I can now hear  where words are breaking. I can hear a word i don't know and look it up. I am still working of building a filter for the slang and common silence fillers and language patterns, these are things that only full immersion can prepare you for. Though I am still far from where I want to be, I get closer and closer everyday, each day i understand more and more, and my speaking gets better and better.

Most of the week I spent helping prep for my first big trip. I will be going on a canoe trip back to the land of the magic lake of magic. This time as a part of the leadership. I will be shadowing two other instructors. The participants are kids I have been working with in the schools. we are going to spend nine days exploring the magic lake. Sometimes i have a hard time believing all of this is real. I have small moments of clarity in between working where I realize that  i am at a school in Brazil playing games with students or I am preparing gear for a nine day expedition at a lake with leafcutter ants. Ants that are so common they are a pest. Those little moments are something close to what nirvana must be like.

The city

Sao Paulo is the largest city in Brazil, the largest city proper in the southern hemisphere and Americas and the world's eighth largest city by population. The metropolis is anchor to the São Paulo metropolitan area, ranked as the second most populous metropolitan area in the Americas and among the ten largest metropolitan areas on the planet. For comparison, New York City, is none of these things. The city is so big that it could be raining in one section and the rest of the city would have clear skies.

I have been trying to find a metaphor to describe Sao Paulo, I have not been able to. The writhing, befuddling, thriving, astounding, beautiful living mass of human endeavor that is Sao Paulo is beyond comparison.  Its might is measured in raw numbers not in influence or political importance or cultural history but in pure measurable space, and staggering numbers. My closest frame of reference is Asheville, North Carolina. The weight in difference between what I know and don't know about this city could stagger a team of oxen, 1000 head strong.

I gonna tell you about my little corner of Sao Paulo. I live at the top of a hill in a quiet artist's district in Butanta, Sao Paulo east of city center. from its outside appearance it looks a whole hell of a lot like the river district in Asheville. Living ruins is something that comes to mind. The houses here are tiny, and all smashed together next to each other. most of them are literally sharing walls like apartments without the apartment buildings or landlords. Everything here has gates and locks and bars and barbed wire. Sao Paulo feels like a city of walls, and gates and barbed wire. to an american with no previous experience it look slike these places are the most unsafe but it is actually the places without walls and gates and barbed wire that are the most dangerous. The favelas are places where locks and gates are a luxury.

the people in my neighborhood are from what best I can gather middle, to lower middle class and working families. they are poor, they don't have a great deal but they are not impoverished, they are not despondent. Living in the city is expensive and they do the best they can with what they have. There is a lived authenticity in this neighborhood that is really cool for me to see. it is also safe enough for me to walk to and from the store at night. there is a dead end at the corner of my street that opens up onto a huge vista of the center of the city. I like to look at it at night. all the skyscrapers are filled with their lit windows. you can't see the stars here in the city but the cityscape at night is a close second.

it is the little things that are most striking to me when thinking about Sao Paulo. America seems to have an aesthetic of sterility. Everything is whitewashed and right angled and neat and clean and organized, everything gives off a don't touch me vibe. there is a little bit more love of chaos in Sao Paulo. the houses are a little off. things are clean but not setril. things look well loved, lived in, touched. things look like they have a history  and want to incorporate that into their future.

Not to romanticize the city too. there is trash everywhere, litter seems to be as much a part of the streets as the concrete. the streets are in a constant state of disrepair, and there is construction everywhere on every street corner. I will be walking down the streets to the stop and be greeted by the smell of the local bakery, with stuffed breads, and greasy fried heaven wafting from their open shops and then turn a corner or the wind will change and I am met with the smell of open sewage. the streets are lined with huge eucalyptus trees and other trees in bloom whose names I don't know, and next to them are broken down shops or broken street lamps or tangled clumps of power lines.

The city is sprawling in every sense of the word. open and free, and natural but also a little vulgar, and blunt. Every inch of usable buildable space is occupied either by street or house or business. there are no suburbs they have long since been consumed by the mass that is the city.

I haven't personally visited any of the favelas, but the school that I work at is located very close to a major Favela. they look exactly like they do in the movies and on the internet. they are almost impossible to describe without having seen them in person. It is like impacted despondence. Poverty so real, so all encompassing that it is like water to a fish, you can't really conceive of it. I would be a liar if I said it didn't scare me.

the idea of a hole in the wall or greasy spoon in america is put to shame in Sao Paulo. There are bakeries on almost every street corner and they are only a little bigger than my house. at one point they probably were a house. there are shops running out of dorm room sized spaces, where the the checkout counter is also the entrance to the shop. there are mechanics and bike shops that have a work space the size of a dorm room. Shops are fussed with homes, where they only thing that differentiates most of them is that the shops are open.

Open air and natural light are standard  Almost all the shops and business open out to the street and open air. restaurants are almost always open air. It doesn't get very cold in Sao Paulo. I am here for their winter season and it feels like summer in Boone. the lowest it has gotten at night is about 57 and I have already experienced to days where it got over 85, while the average is about 75. The cold is not a major problem here. especially for someone who has lived in Boone. 57 may be cold for a Brazilian but it doesn't stop being shorts weather for me until about 49. Most of the houses and buildings use passive solar ideas to help cool their houses, and to much success. the houses have tile floors and the windows are often closed or tinted, or have slats. My house has no air conditioning and even on the hottest day it s still nice and cool when I return.

Pictures and words are insufficient to describe the city.  I think it has to be lived in to be fully understood. I love it here. I love the city. The public transit puts most others to shame. The food and the people are hard to describe and constantly keep me interested. I am slowly step by step becoming more familiar with this massive thing that is Sao Paulo.

I have always been a little afraid of cities. I am a rural boy, by nature. I like the wild places, and spaces where you can be the only person for miles. Cites are not my natural habitat. I am adapting, and I know that if I can thrive in Sao Paulo almost any other city will be a breeze.

My first week

I arrived at Sao Paulo at 9:45am. I was smelly, and tired, and hungry, and suddenly overcome with the feeling you get right before you sky dive for the first time. What had I just committed to? Needless to say I was in a perfect mental space to have just arrived in a foreign country. I shuffled through the airport security and customs and baggage claim  like the rest of the smelly, tired, hungry airplane cattle that had gotten of the plane with me, and then entered the place where other people claim other people who have gotten of the plane.

I have had experience with this chute before. It is the place when people hold up signs with names they have not yet connected to faces, or families wait with handmade signs to welcome back their loved ones, the places where teary eyed youtube videos of soldiers returning home from war are made; that was where I was. Normally I like the chute it is a places of real pure excitement  it is the first sign that you arrived. You get overwhelmed with the newness or nostalgia  However, this was not how I felt, all I really felt was that I had to poop, really really bad. I am a morning pooper, anyone who has lived with me for an extended period of time, especially in the wilderness knows this about me. I poop within minutes of me waking up. Though I would not describe what I did on the plane as sleeping (it was more like blacked out fits inbetween quietly cursing the person in front of me to a slow early grave for reclining the seat so far back that I could have licked their ear, and wanting to remove the leg privileges of the child behind me whose default setting was seat kicking). However, my body was use to pooping about two hours before 9:00 and it was ready to move my bowels. I quickly found a restroom, and after I relieved myself, my mood instantly lightened. I was still smelly, tired and hungry but at least my life had returned to some semblance of rhythm.

I met the roommate Moaci, at the chute for arriving cattle. Moaci doesn't speak a lot of english. when I met him I was hit by the full brunt of just how far from fluent I am. I fumbled through a few phrases and greetings and then we both met up with Andreas who was the program coordinator for my program and was also the person with the car. The car is crucial Sao Paulo is a massive city.  The airport I arrived in was on the far north west section of the city, and the house that I would be staying in was in the east section of the city. the car was necessary.

Andreas speaks english very well, which was a welcomed comfort in my less than prime state. We didn't drive directly to the house in the city instead we drove to Andreas's house on the outskirts of the city. His house is located on a large plot of land in what, for all intents and purposes, was a jungle for me. I met his wife and 6 month old daughter, had a long shower, even longer nap, and then ate all the food they served for lunch. I had finally recovered from the grecian tragic myth that was my plane ride, and gained the majority of my faculties back.

I immediately tried to contact the motherland, and the mother. My regular phone did not work in Brazil. I thought I had been smart taking a phone a friend had used when they went to england, thinking that it worked outside the US in england it should work everywhere that is not America. It is the little things like a network error message that can really smack you right in the amerocentrism. I tired the internet but there was no internet at the house. It wasn't even that there was not internet that I could connect to without a password. there was literally no internet at all. at first I thought this was a joke. I thought my computer was broken, that the X ray machines at the airport had fried its tired silly little processor  but after the 30th check I realized that I couldn't immediately contact anyone outside of shouting distance, from me. My computer had instantly been turned into an overcomplicated pen and notebook, and I was confronted with my first test.  I had to socialize with people in a foreign language in a foreign place. Holy fuck what had I just committed to.

I did my best, there was a lot of feverishly reading social cues, and body language, and voice tone, and fumbling through conjugations and a limited vocabulary, but I did it. I managed to survive my first social setting. A wave of relief crashed over me on the car ride back into the city and back to the house.

We arrived at the house said goodbye to Andreas, and Moaci gave me a quick tour of the house. I say quick because there is no other form of tour for the house, you can literally see every room and spot from the middle of the main entrance way.  The house doubles as a gear warehouse so my room is a bed and the walls covered floor to ceiling with gear. I found my room to be comforting. I find ridiculous amounts of neatly organized gear to be comforting. I think this is a sign that I have done far to much adventuring in my life. I unloaded my stuff, and promptly went to sleep.

The next day I started work. The first day and week were filled with many exciting things that I feel require their own separate blog posts. I must write about the city, and the food, and my work, and my house, another time.

I spent the majority of the first week, trying to take it all in. I have no real reference point for what I am doing. almost everything is totally new to me. I left my camera at my house here in Sao Paulo. I was not going to be a tourist, I was not going to distract myself I was going to be totally present in where I was and what I was doing. I finally became comfortable. I was no longer worried about what I was doing. I had arrived. the people I am working with are amazing and inspiring, and kind, and patient. the work I am doing is deeply powerful. I am learning tons about my self and humility and presence, and social cues.

I have learned so much, and most importantly I have learned about the Goiaba. it is the most amazing fruit, each form it takes only improves on perfection, and anyone who has not eaten or tasted fresh goiaba is and forever will be less of a person and your life has only ever been half lived. .

Phase 2 complete

I don't like planes. I don't like airports. I don't like bureaucracy. I don't like crowds. Getting to Brazil involved all of those things. I considered phase two to be the preamble to my adventure, the prologue. How I handled the plane trip to Brazil would foreshadow how I handled Brazil.

I bought my plane tickets about three months out from when I actually planned to leave. I did this to get a cheaper price. I paid under 1,000 dollars for a round trip ticket. However with a cheap prices comes a few drawbacks. I had two flights one from Charlotte to Newark and then from Newark to Sao Paulo, my final destination. My Flight to Newark left from Charlotte at 6:05am. I did not consider this when I bought the ticket. I got home after taking my final exam and moving all of my stuff out of my apartment, and had about three hours of sleep. then my family loaded into the car with my stuff to drive to Charlotte. The upside of being at the airport at the buttcrack of dawn is that, no one else is there so security goes smoothly. The downside is that you are at an airport at the butt crack of dawn.

I arrived at Newark at 8:05am. I then had a 14 hour layover. For those of you who don't know Newark Airport, it is a congealing puss bubble on the open infected blister that is Newark. I had the pleasure of spending 14 hours in forced captivity at this airport. My Flight was over 14 hours aways so the airport would not send my checked luggage straight to my final destination. I spent the better part of 6 hours with all my luggage, contemplating the difficulty of my dietary restrictions in a place like Newark. I had called my Mom to tell her that I had landed safely in Newark. For Mothers Day I had planned to write my mom a letter and then hand it to her at the airport in Charlotte. Not only had I forgotten to hand her the letter at the airport but I had forgotten to write the letter. In truth I was trying to have the phone call makeup for my lack of a mother's day letter. 

While I was sitting in the food court, talking to my mother, I saw out of the corner of my eye what looked like a bird fly bye. At first I couldn't process what had just happened. Then to all my amazement and horror a small sparrow hopped up to me in all its flea, dust, and dirt ridden glory. I could have vomited right there in the airport food court. Now don't get me wrong I love the critters of the earth. I have let bees lick the sweat from my arm and spent hours digging for worms, but I am also a firm believer in Louis Pasteur and his controversial Germ Theory. It wasn't just that the bird had gotten into the building but it was nesting in the roof above the food court, along with the pigeons and bubonic plague. That was the defining moment when I decided if I were to ever be king of the world I would erase Newark of the map and start over from scratch.  

Despite not enjoying planes or airports I have a fair amount of experience with airport security. However something in the air at the security checkpoint in Newark turns everyone in the line into a bumbling,  fumbling,  incompetent pile of mush, including myself. I had to go through the full body scanners and they must have detected the overly high iron content in my blood because they were marking place on my body that didn't even have clothes on them, like my hands and feet and exposed legs.Newark airport also has a grand total of five power outlets for the entire complex and their internet is behind a ridiculous paywall. 

I decided that in the bleak hellscape that is Newark airport I should practice working through my discomfort.  I would have similar challenges in Brazil. I needed to find ways to cope with this, in a fairly controlled and safe environment. I often tell my friends when they are going through a stressful time that the problem is an opportunity to practice zen presence. I often do this just to poke fun but here was an opportunity to practice what I preach. I tried to be present in my discomfort, to see what was bothering me and how it was affecting me. Once I gained some composer I would start analysing my issues. 

A deeply close friend of mine Stiles rader says that she knows I am really uncomfortable when I start philosophizing. This is a deep truth philosophy is a safety blanket of sorts for me. It gives me a sense of control over the situation. 

However, control was the exact problem that was making me worry. Control is the reason I was stressed about Brazil, and the reason I hate planes, and airports, and bureaucracies, and crowds. All of these things require me to turnover my control to forces outside of myself. They poke at my deep existential fear of the arbitrary. I hate planes because I have no control over them, and I am of arbitrary importance to them. I was worried about Brazil because it had gained a life of its own it was set in motion and when I passed the event horizon I no longer had control over what would happen. I needed to stop analysing, and simply be present. 

I found myself repeating a mantra in my head, "This is okay, where I am is okay, I am okay", "I am okay, this is okay". I felt like I was sitting on a rock surrounded by rapids. I had to become aware of the warm sun on my back and the safety of the rock before I could swim through the rapids. It was okay, where I was, was okay, I was okay. I spent about four hours practicing I found that walking helped the best, not with any destination in mind, just moving. Then I boarded a plane for brazil. I felt ready, I was still worried but I was processing my worry different. It wasn't, bad but there. I was reminded of a quote from my favorite Youtuber, comedian, and amature philospher Zefrank1. He has a quote that says, "we must teach our kids that the world is mostly safe". That is not to say that the world is without danger, real and serious danger but how we react to this danger is important. The world is mostly safe, This is okay, where I am is okay, I am okay. Phase Two was complete. 

phase 1 complete

               This was probably the hardest phase for me to complete. over two years of work to make this happen. I started learning Portuguese in earnest about two years ago. I had never thought that it would create such an amazing opportunity for me. I started learning Portuguese because Spanish was impossible for a sophomore to get into. Even with priority registration and twice the hours of a normal sophomore  come registration every Spanish class would be full. 

              

I went into my first Portuguese class with no discernable language skills, aside from two paultry semesters of latin, that were a poor excuse for a language class. My professor was Brent James and he is by far the best language teacher I have ever had. he brought to his class an energy that was totally infectious. he clearly love romance languages, Portuguese especially. instead of rote memorization and worksheets he would have us listen to songs and then translate the lyrics. We watched movies, and read short stories, and learned the important grammar first even if that meant going out of traditional order. I instantly fell in love with the language. 

Brazilian portuguese is like the beautiful child of french and spanish. The words are smooth and flow together like french but they have rhythm and energy like spanish. The grammar is far easier than spanish only conjugating about four people instead of the six in spanish and the words are easier to pronounce than french. I knew I wanted to master this language. 

I spent the next two years with a weekly hour private tutor session with a native speaker, named Vilma. She was also an amazing teacher.  She is incredibly patient she would sit as i butchered her language, forgetting words and even forgetting what I was trying to say mid sentence. with her help I mustered enough portuguese to make going to Brazil a real reality. 

I started putting ideas into motion. I knew that the summer of 2013 would be my last major hurrah where the school could still be to my advantage. I wanted my crazy adventure to be worth school credit. so I decided to make it part of my internship for Recreation Management. I wanted to work with an organization that was a leader in the field I knew I would shoot for either NOLS of Outward Bound. I did research and found that Outward bound has a school in Brazil and the first of many stars aligned. 

I sent a cold email to the director of the program. I spent two weeks drafting the email in my broken english. I spent many an hour pouring over my dictionary and good translate trying to craft the perfect message. When I sent the first message my heart skipped a beat. I was filled a mixture of excitement and dread. I had just sent my most fervent wish out into the terrible either that is the internet and how I had to wait for the gods to reply.

I didn't know what to expect. I had some but not much experience and they had no clue who I was. some college kid, who speaks only borken limited portuguese sent them an email asking about working with them. The odds seemed stacked against me to say the least. 

I received an email about three days later, from a guy with a Brazilian sounding name. My stomach dropped. it was a letter as terrifying as any college acceptance letter. I opened it and began reading. Not only was it a letter expressing excitement at the possibility of me interning with them but it was also totally in english. I was hit with my first wave about the reality of what I had just committed to. 

Those waves only got bigger and stronger as I edged closer to making this trip happen. Fall semester was when things kicked into high gear. I sent an official resume and letter of introduction. and a few days later I received an email welcoming me abroad. They were equally as excited to have me as I was to be able to attend. They would provide me with housing and food and transportation while in Brazil. In return they expected a enthusiastic, energetic, driven, and flexible intern.

That would be no problem on my part. at the very least I was excited to the point of incoherent mumbling and approaching incoherent yelling. I spent most of fall semester on cloud nine thinking about what I was about to do. Then spring semester came and I was yanked from my excited haze like a broken satellite falling to earth. I was pushed to the edge of quitting more times than I would like to commit. I received sticker shock at the price of my adventure almost twice a month. tuition and fees to feed the bureaucracy were obscene by themselves. They were placed on top of a plane ticket, and vaccinations, and medications. Making this trip happen was the biggest bureaucratic nightmare that I have ever faced, and I have made a habit to go against the grain of the university bureaucracy. 

I considered calling the whole thing off on more than one occasion; the trip seemed to expensive, I didn't think my portuguese was good enough, the action of going to a foreign country totally on my own was stomach turning and physically paralyzing. Somewhere around the time I bought my tickets I had passed the event horizon. I couldn't stop now. I had already started bragging to people about this reality. I had already bought the ticket. they had already agreed to host me. The events that I had put in motion had gained their own momentum and all I could do was ride along. 

On may 8th I got my finale vaccination for yellow fever and phase one of my trip was complete. I would be boarding a plane for brazil in three days. In three days I would be starting the second phase of my journey the plane trip. Come even hell and high water I was going to brazil, and that filled me with a terrified excitement that doesn't have words. It felt like thunder in my stomach, terrifying, powerful, foundational, celestial, and beautiful. I was going to Brazil and because of that everything was going to change.