Simple Women in Extraordinary Times

Last weekend I went to Caixa's Cultural Centre and saw a great exhibition called Simple Women in Extraordinary Times. The idea was to give women from Brazil, Cuba, Israel and Palestine a camera to shoot what they loved and what the hated. The result was followed by an interview and is kindly (and sometimes strongly) touching.

E.g.: Abiail, from Brasília, talking about she loved, said:
"To get married to the partner I choose. To see my children well, and with a conscient and independent sense of freedom. To travel heaps. To live in a better country, where citizenship, conscience, solidarity and cooperation thrive. I want to be kissed when I'm 80."

In the International Women's Day, I'd like to thank all the determined, loving and inspirational women for their example and wish every single woman strength to keep fighting for their rights and the respect they deserve, so we can build our own destiny our way.

How does it feel to be back?

How does it feel to be back to Brazil after 16 months abroad, mainly in a developed country, where everything seems previously thought, organised and easier? Not an easy question!

Certainly, some “normal” facts are now annoying and uncomfortable. Taking precautions in order to avoid being mugged bothers me profoundly; constantly seeing the wealth gap between rich and poor feels really wrong; and the big-brother-star success concept is frustrating.

On the other hand, the list of great cultural and personal aspects doesn’t seem to end soon. Meeting family, being surrounded by long term awesome friends and realizing the power of the networks in my job hunting effort are bringing me comforting happiness.

Amongst the cultural and natural things, highlights go to:
- Ever green scenery;
- Tropical fruits;
- People aware, discussing and acting upon social issues;
- A good number of companies, individuals and media channels engaged in the sustainability dialogue;
- Client oriented services and kindness;
- …and, to top it up, the feeling of being one in the crowd of an Ivete Sangalo’s show, what should probably be considered the most energetic spectacle on Earth!

Wanna feel a little bit of it? Play below, enjoy and start planning your trip to Brazil!



The lyrics, by Jorge Ben, say (free translation):

"I live in a tropical place
Blessed by God
And naturally beautiful
How wonderful!
In February
There is carnaval
I've got a beetle and a guitar
I support Flamengo and have a black sweetheart called Tereza"

See you here!

New Zealand - Small is Beautiful

As I spend time in New Zealand, I quite like what I see. A place where:

- the Maoris (indigenous, who migrated from Polynesia 12 centuries ago) are acknowledged, respected and integrated in society;
- any person, independently of age or nationality, can have his/her opinion heard before a bill is introduced to be discussed in Parliament;
- economic freedom and transparency rates are amongst the highest in the world, while bureaucracy and taxes are relatively low;
- skilled foreigners (from builders to engineers) are super welcome;
- environmental conscience and practice is very advanced.

Noticing New Zealand combines some of the most important things a society could value - ethics, respect to nature and social integration - I started to wonder why it developed that way, differently from so many other places which struggled with corruption, wealth concentration, environmental disasters and violence.

I'm certainly not knowledgeable enough to have an answer for that, but it seems to me that the isolated environment, the small population, and especially the combination of the Maori deep respect to nature with the European ethics and hard work has a lot to do with that. More important than the foundations facts quoted above is the way they were integrated, with both Maori and Europeans fighting to maintain what they considered fundamental virtues, but also negotiating and giving in when it came to everything else - notably in the last 4 decades.


The inside of a Maori meeting centre

Beautiful Waiheke Island, a 35 min ferry ride from Auckland




The Parliament and the National Library




And here comes a story to illustrate the Maori relation with nature.

One day Rata
went into the forest
to cut down a totara tree
to build a canoe.

When he had finished
he went home to sleep.
During the night
the birds and insects
and fairy people of the forest
helped put Totara upright.

Again Rata cur him down
and again he stood up.
So Rata hid nearby and watched
then asked the children of Tane
"Why are you doing this to me?"

"Because you disobeyed
the laws of the forest.
First you must have a good reason
then you must ask permission
to cut down a child of Tane."

Rata was ashamed
and begged their forgiveness.
And so the children of Tane
helped Rata build his canoe.

Exploring amazing museums in Hanoi

Women's Museum

This morning I went to the Women's Museum in Hanoi, an experience that touched me quite a lot.

I knew women participated in the Vietnam war, but I didn't have any idea about how crucial their role was. Besides being soldiers on the battlefields, women led associations; planted and transported almost all the food; sewed the clothes; built 10.000 km of tunnels for protection, transport and education; took care of the wounded; and delivered messages to soldiers pretty much everywhere.

The most amazing thing, though, is not what they did, but how they did it: with love, without losing the tenderness, in spite of the terrible circumstances (as we can perceive from the pictures, objects and diaries in the exhibition). They sewed while in prison, wrote letters to elders and loved ones, served food with a smile and, with all that, kept everybody connected, hopeful and enjoying brief moments of joy.


Museum of Ethnology

In the afternoon it was time for the Ethnology Museum, with information, pictures, objects and constructions - both in and outdoors - from the various ethnic groups that formed the Vietnamese nation.

The part that I liked the most was the open-air exhibitions, particularly one building: the Central Highlanders' communal centre.

For those tribes, the highest, biggest, most beautiful and most important construction was the space that hosted spiritual ceremonies, parties and community gatherings, which also represented the male power.

Although the villages remain nowadays, these sort of spaces are rapidly disappearing, whereas other symbols of status (e.g. the individuals' house windows) are more evident than before, probably showing us that we've not always been taking the wisest path.

Back to the Essence

Some days ago, I had the incommensurable pleasure of reconnecting to the essence of life, taking a 2 days trek north of Luang Namtha, Laos.

The nature was exuberant, and showed us its beauty and power. The rain was pouring down, the terrain was super slippery and the greenest sights, forest-like smells and gentle touches from life in the mountains were breathtaking.

In the evening of the first day, after 7 hours walk and many falls on the mud, we arrived to the harmonious Akha village. Its 175 inhabitants were pretty excited to see us (they only see visitors about once a month) and taught us simplicity stands hand by hand with happiness. The dwellings were really basic, but everybody was always welcome. The rice based food was yummy, children had a lot of attention, romantic love was encouraged, and gates and ceremonies kept the bad spirits outside (as well as the community united, I must say). No wonder the Akha people go to the town every week, but always come back to the village.

A big thanks to Green Discovery (who promotes low impact eco tourism), to our amazing guy (who knew all about the forest and connected us to the culture of the village) and to my 3 fellow trekkers (the best company I could wish!)


The Akha village



In our sleeping hut



Yummy mountains food

A taste of Lebanon in Sydney

Last Sunday I was invited by Manny to visit Punchbowl, the suburb where she lives. I knew it was a mainly Lebanese region, but it's more: it really feel like a little Lebanon in Sydney. People speak Arabic, the markets have a different display, the posters on the walls are from Lebanese singers, Arabic styled clothes are sold and people eat the most yummy Lebanese food and sweets.

In order to live a little bit of all that, Manny showed me around, we bought some really good sweets and went to have lunch with her brother and father. I'm very glad we did, as I learnt a lot of things.

As you might know, Lebanon was created to be the Christian state in the Middle East. So around xxx% of the population is Christian, but another xxx% is Muslim.

Therefore, there's an ongoing tension. Formally, it is one country, but the education people receive at home segregate them into Christian Lebanese and Muslim Lebanese.

Discontent with this situation, Manny's father (who is Christian married to a Muslim wife) joined a political party which advocates the creation of one secular state comprised not only by all of Lebanon, but also Syria and Jordan. The idea is to acknowledge the difference but unite people around a bigger dream and, in his words, "let God decide whose religion was wrong when we die".

Full moon festival

Back in Sydney, I continue learning about Asia. Last Monday, Joey invited us to play Mahjong, a very popular Chinese game which mixture some elements of dominos and poker. It was quite fun, but the first challenge was to read the pieces, as the symbols were in Mandarin. In the picture beside you can see SuSu with the symbols of good luck.

After playing, we ate full moon cakes, a very, very, very (can’t say very enough) dense cake, made of lotus seeds, with a yolk inside, not salty, not sweet. At this point of the year, Chinese people give each other this sort of cakes as part of the celebration of the full moon festival.

This festival happens because of the following legend:

“The earth once had ten suns circling over it, each taking turn to illuminate the earth. One day, however, all ten suns appeared together, scorching the earth with their heat. Hou Yi, a strong and tyrannical archer, saved the earth by shooting down nine of the suns. He eventually became King, but grew to become a despot.

One day, Yi stole the elixir of life from a goddess. However, his beautiful wife, Chang'e, drank it in order to save the people from her husband’s tyrannical rule. After drinking it, she found herself floating, and flew to the moon. Yi loved his divinely beautiful wife so much he did not shoot down the moon.”

Indian culture

Last weekend we had an awesome Indian Cultural Day. Organised by Siddharth, we started with an Indian movie, followed by discussions and high quality Indian food.

Some things that I learnt:
- India produces around 800 films a year (almost 3 per day!)
- Going to the cinema is the typical Indian program for the weekend, as it’s quite affordable. The films are the equivalent to the Brazilian soap operas and generally show an imaginary world, very rich people and a happy end.

More than that, something that called my attention again about Indian culture is how they are serene when they take decisions. In one part of the film, the boyfriend of the main character said she shouldn’t talk to other men. Instead of swearing at him, she said she needed to think about their relationship, and it would be helpful it he did the same.

Darumas

Tonight, I went to a Japanese restaurant with AIESEC and had a bit of a class with Kana about Japanese culture.

Kana’s parents are Japanese, she was born in Australia, speaks Japanese and is going to live in Japan for the next 5 months.

The most curious thing I learnt today is about the Darumas (picture beside). Daruma is a wooden made doll, without arms or legs and with white / unpainted eyes. In New Year’s Eve (the most important family occasion), people paint one of the eyes and make a wish. When the wish comes true, they paint the other eye and, in the next New Year’s Eve, burn the “complete” Daruma, which brought some king of happiness to the house.

More info: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daruma