Tigist Kipper Kassahun

Create Your Badge

Gente Fina

So it's been about a month since I last updated OOPS.

Things here are pretty interesting in a number of ways, but let me give you little update on the things I've been doing here:

We had a feriada so we had a long weekend and no classes so we went to this place called Canoa Quebrada a little beach town outside of the city that was super cute and super fun and going to bed before sunrise apparently isn't an option.  Super cute places there and we stayed in a hotel called Pousada California; its really fun to see English words and references around here for some reason.  While in Canoa we met some really fun Brazilians with dune buggies and they took us for an afternoon/evening around the beach on the dunes and throughout different parts of the beach, where we just kept meeting more people drank more cachaça and then ended up ziplining of this really crazy cliff into some body of water.  Once everyone had gone and we were all in the water we ate and drank more there too, until we dune buggied back to the mainland at night.  

Back to Fortaleza things have been going well, my family and I are really enjoying each other and there are so many kids around and my mom is too sweet and fabulous.  Living in an up and coming favela has its benefits at times, as in you know everyone in the community and everyone knows you.  

Then there's the part where you might get robbed or knifed, but esse é a vida.

I've been going out on the weekends to pretty much the same places but they're still all so new and fun, followed by beach day every Sunday.  We go to a barraca -  pretty much how the beach is lined with restaurants that have set up tables and tanning chairs for you to just sit along the sand and enjoy a beverage, a snack or whatever you need, while you tan or just cruise people - this place is called a barraca.  So pretty much every Sunday we spend the day at Kabamba which for some reason is the gay barraca, where the clientele is queer and the music is even queerer. 

We spent the last week doing community projects and I was working with another student with a local Capoeira group that trains students in very poor and rural favelas in Fortaleza, to help keep them out of the streets and involved in drugs, that is such a huge problem here and source of so much of the violence, danger and poverty.  Never have I seen such a contrast between rich and poor than here.  Anyway, I got to work with the kids and learn how to do capoeira and make some really talented and fine people(Fernando, Berg, Narcélio) working within these communities and using these tools as resistance. It was the same group that performed for us at the beginning of the program, how crazy!

School is good this is the busiest week we have because this coming Tuesday we are going on a two week excursion through Recife and Salvador, and making a number of stops, one of which is the first Jewish Community in all of Brazil.  We stop in a number of places and meet a number of different people, organizations, and become further engaged with social movements pertinent to the regions we will be visiting.  Then after the two week trip some of us who will be doing our independent study in Salvador will stay there in apartments located on the beach in Porto da Barra - look up pictures on google its pretty cute.  Also, I'm really excited to start doing my research and working with this organization I found in Bahia and just exploring so much!

Anyway I have my proposal due Friday and everyone else is working on it, but I figured this was more important. However, I should return to doing that now.

I miss you guys a lot and love you all!

P.S. Happy Birthday Helen and Happy Tax Day!

fotos

We arrived in Brazil and were taken to what we were told was our hotel for orientation, which in reality is a religious retreat which rents out rooms to groups every once in awhile. Needless to say there are Jesus and Virgin Marys all over the place. The location is pretty isolated and outside the city but it is very pretty, but I´m sick of it. The food is phenom, and everyday it is a different meat a different fruit a different nut made into some other sort of meal that tastes fresher than anything I´ve eaten in quite some time (or ever).

Aside from shamelessly trying to flirt with the gorgeous flight attendants and drinking the free beer on the plane, I´ve had pretty much no contact with any native Brazilians aside from the program leaders and the retreat employees. So I cant wait to get out of here and into the real program
Now some highlights

- i found out about my host family which is a HUGE family in Fortaleza, I have only been notified of 8 members, but I was told that thats only half of them. Apparently they are incredible people though. Additionally, my hostmom is a hair stylist and has her own salon which is the first floor of the house, so obviously my hair will remain looking fabulous.
-the weather is crazy hot or crazy rainy or crazy humid, but consistently crazy on the upside its doing wonders for my skin and hair, never been softer.
- tonight we had a capoiera group come in and perform/teach which was incredible for a number of reasons, as the members of the group were all youth of varying ages that through this program are given a means to make a living, explore their culture and be engaged in something positive and rewarding in numerous ways
-iwill probably be doing my independent study program on funk carioca and its subcultures in the northern region, which would be pretty incredible as i would be living within these communities and immersed fully within the culture, the music, the parties and the violence which is the scary part

all in all things are going well i enjoy my surroundings brazil is beautiful in many ways, and i suppose the fact that theres no cold water and tons of mosquitos is a pretty sweet deal for the other countless benefits

bom noite

p.s. i´m already fluent in portuguese

I suppose I leave soon for Brazil so let's try this thing out.

Brazil's national motto is "Order and Progress" two things I can't live without.

Good people.

Bye!