My daughter, Erin, called from Brazil yesterday, around 2 pm EST. She, also, said the lines for the pay phones were awful, so she had gone back to the ship and "rented a cell phone." I'm not really sure where/how she did that. She had just returned from a tour of the area, including a visit to a local school. She said the kids were on vacation now, but came to school to meet the Americans. She said the school visit was very disturbing. It was almost impossible to communicate with the kids, no one spoke any English. Also, at the end, the tour guide brought in a large bag containing individual size bags of potato chips. Erin said pandemonium broke out, as the kids rushed the bag, trampling and fighting one another to get a bag of chips. She had never seen kids behave so out of control, and the sad thing was, most of the chip bags ended up breaking open and spilling everywhere. After our brief 5 minute call, she was rushing off to get ready for the "welcome reception," then home to pack for a 4am wake up to leave for the Amazon trip. Guess all is well, she's still rushing around, just like home, to fit all her activities into a very busy day! She sounded very happy and content, and when I asked her if she needed anything sent to her, she said "no, she was extremely well prepared.
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Brazil
Hey everyone!
I survived the wilderness of the Amazon! I was only in Brazil for five days, but crammed so much in and had such an awesome time.
Right after the ship got cleared by customs in Brazil, I went on a service visit to a favela, or the slum area where the poor live. We walked through the favela and visited the school there, where we got to play with the children. The school was not a public school, but was funded by private donations and were for the poor who could not afford shoes, books, etc. All kids were welcome, even if they couldn't afford proper attire. Here is an excerpt from my "journal story" that I had to hand in for my Management class:
"My time in Brazil was short and hectic, yet I saw many different aspects of the country and the culture. Although the scenery of Salvador, Brasilia, and Manaus was gorgeous, it is the people that I met who will remain embedded in my memory.
I attended my first FDP to the Calabar Favela in Salvador. It was shocking to the senses to see the mass of tiny shacks lining the streets, all with a double wrought iron door at the entrance. The scrawny children, clad in too small shorts and bare feet, lined the streets as their eyes curiously followed the American outsiders. There was a foul stench in the air as I walked down the first street, and I watched as a stray dog sorted through garbage lying beside the dumpster.
The rundown school was surrounded by a cement wall that children had painted in vibrant colors. As we walked through the gate, children on the upper level of the school waved and cheered as they peered over the ledge. Even though it was their vacation week, at least thirty students between the ages of 7 and 14 had come to see the Americans. At first they were a little shy, but they soon warmed up to us and showed off their skills in Capoiera, the Angolan foot fighting dance. They were intrigued by our cameras - they begged us to let them take a picture with our camera and also loved to be in pictures with us. Their favorite cameras were the camcorders or digital cameras where they could actually see themselves in the picture after it was taken.
The major event that sticks out in my mind and that gave me the greatest glimpse into the reality of their life was when we tried to distribute potato chips to the children. Our tour guide had bought packages containing individually wrapped bags of chips that we could hand out to the children. We were thrilled to be able to give something to the children, and two or three students started to hand out chips from each package. However, worried that they wouldn't all get a bag of chips, they greedily tore the package away from us and started wrestling it away from the other students who had also grasped the bag. It was as if we had just thrown a piece of steak to a pack of hungry wolves. I watched on, helpless and disturbed, and not able to communicate in Portuguese to the children. What resulted was a mass of about twenty students ripping apart the large package of chips, with several of the bags breaking as the chips fell to the floor, left only for the stray dogs to pick up. When there were no bags left to fight over, the children walked along happily eating their chips, some with more than one bag in their hands.
Although this event was probably overlooked by many SAS students, I found it to be an eye-opening experience. We come from a culture where we have access to all the necessities and many, many amenities. I have never gone to bed hungry or worried that I would not be able to get enough food. It was shocking to me that these children were so incredibly greedy and couldn't wait out their turn to receive a bag of chips, for fear that there wouldn't be enough. This experience gave me a glimpse at how lower class Brazilians lived and the deficiencies that they must deal with. "
I felt like such an outsider walking through the favela, with all the adults just sitting on the edge of the road staring at us. We were being paraded through their village with our expensive cameras, backpacks and colorful clothes to gawk at the poverty in which they lived. We all took pictures of the poorest aspects of the favela so we could show our families and friends how poor people lived in Brazil. We were totally invading their privacy. However, when we were leaving our tour guide told us that we had made the children of the favela feel so special. They felt important because we had traveled so far from the United States just to see them. I'm not sure if the children are that naive, but by the stares we received the adults definitely didn't agree with this theory.
I left at 5am the next morning for my 7 hour flight to Manaus, where we started our Amazon trip. I got soo sick on the plane going there... I guess it is not safe to eat airplane food outside of the country. It was awful. But, I was impressed with the flights... they all left on time, were much more spacious than American planes and extremely smooth takeoffs and landings.
When we first got to the Amazon, we boarded an open riverboat that we lived on for the next 3 days. There were 25 students on my boat, and I went not knowing anyone on my trip. We departed the port, and went to see the "meeting of the waters" , the point where the 3 rivers converge and create the Amazon River. It is a scientific phenomenon because the Rio Negro is blacker and much warmer than the Salomar River, which is brownish a cooler. ( i might have mixed that up) Anyways, when the rivers meet, the black and the brown colors mix and it looks really cool. You'll have to see the pictures.
Next, we stopped at a plantation and saw some of the trees that Amazon people harvest things from... the cocoa tree, rubber tree, cilantro, lemon grass. It was pretty cool, they picked lemon grass and we brought it back and they made us lemon grass tea for dinner. They also showed us how they get the latex rubber out of the tree used for tires, etc. The boy at the house had a pet spider monkey on a leash, the only one I saw all trip. There was also a parrot in a tree over the shed.
That night we went piranha fishing with bamboo poles in a small motorized canoe. I wasn't lucky enough to catch one. When it was dusk we went hunting for alligators and after about an hour, our guide caught a baby alligator and we all got to hold it. AWWW cute, huh? When we got back to the boat, they distributed hammocks for us to sleep in on the top deck of the boat.
The next morning we bathed in the Amazon River and jumped off the very top of the boat as they were cooking us breakfast. tons of fun! We hiked in the jungle for 3 hours that afternoon. It was so awesome. Our guides were the best- they told us about all the different trees that cured diseases, animals, etc. I ate so many different nuts and leaves in the jungle that they would find for us to try. One thing I passed up was the larva found in a nut shell tho. I was so suprised, almost everyone else tried it... said it tasted like coconut. Eww gross!
That afternoon we went to an Indian village where we played soccer versus the Brazilians. While the guys were playing soccer, we went over and played with the children. One of my friends commented on how cute it was that some of them had lighter streaks in their hair and how cool it was that they had "natural highlights." One of our guides overheard this and replied that they weren't highlights from the sun, but rather caused by malnutrition. I had never heard of that before and it amazed me to see how many of the children had discolored hair.
The next day was the best hike because it was in the Primary Rainforest - the kind you see in the movies. It was soo incredibly cool. Green everywhere, leaves that were taller than me, such cool shaped trees. Saw a few cool bugs and caterpillars, a really big walking stick. And appropriately, it poured for awhile on our hike. At one point, our jungle guide was blazing a trail for us with his machete, and we got so lost. So, he left us by the river side and followed the river back to the village where he got the boats to come and rescue us. It was pretty funny.
Living on the riverboat was interesting... no privacy at all, you slept 6 inches from the next hammock and when the hammocks got swaying I was being hit by both my neighbors, Audra and Richie. The food they made was ok, but you never really knew what you were eating. They had this weird flavored rice and beans at every meal. don't think I will every eat that again in my life. I lived on the fruit- the pineapples and watermelon were soo good. It was really roughing it too, we are lucky we had a toilet, but you couldn't throw ANYTHING in the toilet, we used a trash can to put toilet paper in and so it always smelled so gross.
I made a really good friend in this girl Tara, she is a soccer fanatic, lives in PA and goes to Widener. We hung out a lot and had a good time.
Our plane flight back was at 1 am, and we landed at the capital Brasilia at 4 am, but with the time difference it was really 6 am. We had a huge layover, so they took us on a 3 hour city tour.....yes, it was still dark out and our bodies felt like it was 4 am. I slept thru the entire thing, which was really rude since I was in the first seat, right in front of the tour guide. oh well.
That's basically my trip to Brazil in a nut shell! It was tons of fun and I met so many cool people. Did ruin some clothes tho... it was sooo muddy, and they have this reddish clay that cakes onto your shoes. My pants (yes my nice aber khakis!!!!) and shorts are ruined, and it was such a good thing that I bought those boots before I left...definitely key.
I'm sorry this is a novel... so much happened in such a short amount of time!!
TO ALL THOSE WHO SENT ME MAIL, THANK YOU SOOO MUCH!!!! I think I had 10 pieces of mail (3 of my good friends didnt get any!! i gave them a letter to open lol)... my friends were all so jealous, and it was soooo exciting! I loved hearing about EVERYTHING!! I read the letters several times lol. Mom, the v-day package was awesome- what a nice surprise!! and Mandi, thanx for the pic!! You guys are the best, even tho you can't brave a snow storm to send me a bday card. blah blah. totally J/K!
Alright, well I've probably put you all to sleep by now. I haven't felt well since I got back from the Amazon. Had a bad headache, slight fever today and every time after I ate got these really bad stomach pains. really weird, might go to the Dr. tomm. but maybe not since his hrs are 8-9 in the am.
Miss you all tons!! 83 more days... Keep writing!
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Tanzania
Hey everyone!!
Hope everything is well in the States. I left Tanzania seven days ago and am 30 hours away from India! I was dreading the 8 day stretch from Tanzania to India, complete with class every single day, but I have kept sooo busy it seems like we just left yesterday! And of course I still haven�t written my e-mail. Sorry, I�m slacking!
My experience in Tanzania was different from that in the other countries because I didn�t get to interact with the native people as much. After hearing about the negative reactions of people in Dar es Salaam and how many of my friends felt unsafe as Americans walking around, I am glad that I was on a five-day safari. My steward even told me that some members of the crew were robbed at gunpoint. Some of my friends who stayed in Dar es Salaam said they saw people wearing Tshirts of the World Trade Center being hit and also saw video games with the object being to blow up the Trade Center. So I am glad that I went on safari, and I had an absolutely amazing time in Serengeti and the Ngorongoro Crater.
This wasn�t a fake luxury safari � this