Everyday Vida

Recently, I remarked to a friend that I don’t know why its taken me so long to update my blog. she said – sometimes its hard to make stories out of the every day. True dat. And its amazing how quickly life becomes the every day. Even if you are in another hemisphere. But the every day - though sometimes can be as banal as the every day – can also be full of surprises and cosisas lindas. But before the every day kicked in, in September my friend Betsy visited and besides having a wonderful time in Salvador, we went to the beautiful, deserted (well kind of) island of Boiapeba. It was stunningly amazing and we passed the time away on the beach (which was about 5 mins away from our eastern-inspired pousada complete with a meditation space) reading, playing canasta and drinking fruitoroksas. We felt grateful for this peaceful tranquility because getting there was the worst 2 1/2 hour boat ride ever. Well not ever for me – ive had one worst. But for Betsy definitely. Everybody on the boat got sick (except for the one other American who didn’t stop talking the entire time about boat rides which was the last thing you wanted to think about) and its probably a good thing otherwise we all would have completely freaked out by the huge waves that were literally crashing up over us in our little catamaran. And then in the middle of all the internal and external commotion the boat drivers (sailors? Navigators?) called out “Baleias! Baleias” We all got up from our positions which we had been holding on for dear life and wobbled to the front of the boat to see the most beautiful site of whales, huge brown whales diving in and out of the water. In pairs, alone , close to our boat and far away. It turns out the end of winter is the time to see them and we had hit the perfect spot.
So after Betsy left, life became the every day. No more tour guide and host, no more seeing amazing creatures of the sea– now it was time to buckle down and start on the post-production stuff I need to get down in order to begin the edit of my film. This is basically not much different from working on documentaries at home. A large part of it consists of me running around Salvador asking people to do things for me for free. But this time in Portuguese. And I was very amused to see that the place where I am doing a lot of my work – TV UFBA (which the television station for the university here) is totally un-brasilian and just like media outlets in the U.S. I could be back at ABC news. The head of it is completely stressed, they all work long hours and they need you to talk quickly (Diga!) so they can get back to their own work. It’s the first time I’ve seen this in Brasil. Aah the joys of working in the media.
And lets see what else - I went to a totally fancy, fun party a couple a weeks ago. It was at the penthouse apartment with a 180 degree view of the city (which basically means you can see the ocean and the bay) with a pool, waiters serving processco and an awesome dj that totally spun music that had everyone on the dance floor. Yes it was early and mid-90’s hip hop with some stevie wonder, rolling stones and Motown thrown in. basically it had my name all over it (its true as I get older, I get more predictable). Apparently this guy plays at a tire shop (!) which turns into a club every Friday at like midnight. Which means in Brasil means like 1:00 AM. Gots to check it out.
The next week after the debauchery I went on a Caminadah da Lua (moon walk) with 2 friends of mine – one an American who literally just made her dream come true by moving here after visiting for the past ten years. She is starting a non-profit to rebuild all of these old, abandoned houses around the city and make them into service centers for the poor. Anywho, a woman organizes this walk every month on the first night of the full moon (did I mention that another friend of mine who visited commented that Brasil is “very seventies”). We took a beautiful long walk on the sand and practiced different exercises incorporating the four things we were told that that are fundamental to helping a person be whole: Oracao, Fe, Entregar, Silenco – Prayer, Faith, Surrender and Silence.
And last night things came to a full circle (I love when that happens!) when I saw the son of slain South African Activist Steven Biko give a speech here in honor of the 30 years of the death of his father. The room was packed and everyone was giving so much love to the son of this icon that had was an inspiration for Biko remarked that he had only been in Salvador a few hours but it felt like home and looking out at the audience he could be back in South Africa. I added in my head – or Brooklyn, or Harlem. And as he pointed out it was coincidently the 40th anniversary of the death of Che Guvera. There was a lot of revolutionary spirit in the air.