Lost on the bus....

in a big city, as I must get in every big city, DC, Ha Noi, New York. What´s more hiliarious is not knowing any Portugese and trying to navigate my way from one bus to another bus... one street to another street. People trying to help from every direction but no comprende.

But the city is beautiful and I break through the language barrier here to find the kindness that exists. I find my way home to the homestay and I walk around this neighborhood, watching people and their connections with one another. Watch the diversity interact here. Me, my braces, my curvaceousness, my lack of language skills, feel completely at home in Brazil even as an undeniable ´tourist´.

Music store after music store selling guitars and compact discs,; it makes me nostalgic. I would travel forever and escape from Maine if friends and family weren´t there.

Emotionally I´ve grown and that includes the complicated stuff-- because in the past six months I´ve been blessed with people who care and friendships that I feel will last a long time if not a life time-- despite anything and everything-- and i~m so thankful for that when it was once what I feared, and what I thought I couldn~t have.

The big buildings are overwhelming; I must move to a big city just so I could admire them and the people in them. My friend says I have a fetish for it. What I have a fetish for is the lights at night and the energy 24/7 and the ART.

I like Sao Paulo because you learn from it by being in it. I was privileged enough to be in Mai Chau, Viet Nam immersed by mountains and green pastures and I loved that too but only as a sanctuary... somewhere I could hide from the organized chaos that I love in my life.

When writing a poem beginning with the idea of love, it´s a cliche but the line...

´there´s no lover lovlier´

maybe

´than the taste of my fingers on your lips´
as though they were dipped in chocolate
and I was that delectable´

and then go with it

´and let you savour all that~s emotional
from my pores clogging your escape from
my feelings that are now yours´

and if i want to get really spoken word, i~ll go


´like my body and my mind and the design
of my soul that you´ve navigated until I lost all control
of my muscles and my tendons and my toes
and my heart still
believing there´s no lover lovlier
than the taste of my fingers in your mouth
and the air of your aura keeping my being
breathing.´


Completely lame, but something like that, it´s what Sao Paulo does to me. I get to look at the situation of violence and gender here soon. I get to truly grasp my privilege as an American woman here and try to investigate why I feel almost at home in a city in which im a stranger. The point of this post, as always, i~m growing.

OK- end with some Jigga lyrics
"I move onward, the only direction,
can´t be scared to fail, searching for perfection´
precisely!