I had begun to draw inspiration from the moon to express my mind, but she has been hiding herself for the past few days. I wonder why, she left me in lurch under the deep blue sky when my own blues were haunting me. But I was left with no time to mourn over that.As they say, time and tide wait for no man(woman…)
It did not take me long to get over that phase.
My room has become a haven; not just for me.It is now a meeting place where we flock in after a tiring day out. Intimacy lingers in the air. There is happiness, love and trust. They say I am naughty and it came as a surprise; I knew it to be true, but it had taken time.
Exams are around the corner, so are interviews and training at other schools. If I pass, I have new horizons to hover, if not…I don’t want to think of the if not right now. I have been taking dance classes more seriously as they have brought great people and the sense of seeing a dream coming true into my life.   My backdrop is taking good shape.  Except for the deranging tut’s and the not so frequent (thankfully!) pop-up of the lovelorn reminders,  life is smooth. Hope the tests and trainings go well and give me no more heartaches!

Winter (<–link)started here in the South today. No snow, not that cold, sunny days, lack of rains…. Ah…Tropical countries…  I’ll also take opportunity to show some photos/slides a friend of mine took for a College paper. It is based on Brazil, its colors and also the World Cup fad that is around. The name of the paper is “Proxêmica”, which means the study of the influence of the environment on the individual, on each person.  She took them in a popular commerce center downtown Sao Paulo. Worth showing to you guys  These were taken just some time back, so you can also have an idea that weather doesn’t change much when seasons change.

 her favorite…

 my favorite…

Photos by Karen Ássi

These are (from left to right) Larissa and Karen Assi, two of my best friends.

Not much to say this week… Just to show and comment a bit on the world cup and some recent news. Those pics below were taken last week a bit before Brazil´s fist game. I was at school with my co-workers and we were expecting an array of goals. The game turned out to be terrible, but at least we won. The thing is, there is no “at least” when it turns to soccer team in a Brazilian mind…

Seems like the world stops during a Cup match. This is the school street, a commercial one on a weekday at 4pm. Everything closed and not a soul on the streets. Just me taking pictures…

These are some of our students right before the game. This picture seems blur, which tells me I still need to learn how to use a camera.

If you read my last post, you might remember I talked about Patricia, a nice friend who was getting married. She also took dance classes at the same school I do. On the post, I show her dancing with some of our gentlemen there. Here she is on her wedding day dancing with her husband. It was a simple, yet wonderful ceremony. As Daniel( her husband) is Jew, it was a typical Jewish wedding. They flew to Hong Kong yesterday, where he works. Well, then. Enjoy.

As for Brazils second game against Australia, we think it was quite better. But didn’t convince much. Anyway, if we lose… we still have the Amazon.

Every month there is dance practice at my dance school. This one was last week, and it was also a celebration of its 2 year anniversary. The place was quite dark, so forgive me for the edition but I thought it would be a nice opportunity to show something more that I love to you guys.

On the dance floor, rhythms like salsa, merengue, rock, samba, bolero, zouk, etc. Five hours of dance in a row and my feet are still sore. Below there’s my friend Patricia. She is one of my friends and also one of the first persons to enter the school as it was inaugurated. She is getting married tomorrow and will leave to Hong Kong then to the USA. The owner of the school ( also my dance teacher) made a sort of farewell speech and then she danced with some of the best dancers there.

Below there’s my friend Liliana, Patricia’s sister. I met Lili at work, and she was the one who introduced me to the dance world. Great dancer and friend. Oh,  yeah, the guy is Rodrigo, one of the best dancers there too. I love dancing salsa with him.

I liked this pic below so much, that I decided to play with it a bit. I’ll probably give that to my friend as a gift. This one I know she can take to Hong Kong…. I could have taken more pictures, but then you know.. I was busy dancing. And this is another dance-show and tell post.

I remember when I first started writing here that I didn’t want to use this space to show my writing prowess(which I think I haven’t accomplished…). I mostly wanted to show the places I have been to, to show the Brazil that many people don’t have the opportunity to see or simply to describe to the world where I live in, in a very simple way. The politics, the soccer games, the violence, the Carnival in Rio and whatever may be on the news can be seen and read anywhere. I have never wanted to do much. Just practice my English, know some people’s thoughts through here show what I have got

Since I have purchased my camera,which for some might sound as a  simple thing, to me it was a very important step taken since I have to buy everything I own, I have neither done anything interesting nor had time to come to the net. But then, here I am and still taking my first attempts on taking pictures( understand: make them seem good). This first set was taken last Saturday on my way to some friends’ house.  These first two pictures I’m standing in front of a square and in the distance, buildings and houses can be seen. You can see I live in a high part of the city. it is close to Cantareira ridge, so the hills start right close to home. I like high places. Maybe that´s why I love living on the 13th floor…

The streets in the neighborhood are calm. We  don’t have snow in the end of the year- our summer, actually- but people usually put on lights  on those houses. At night, it is something really beautiful and it’s the time when there are more cars on those streets. People like to see them.

I have a thing about houses. I like the the way they are drawn, built, decorated.. I could enter all those houses just to see them if they let me. Here in my building, each floor has 8 apartments. Can you believe I have made myself known to some of my neighbors so that I could see their apartments? Borrow some ideas, see the colors on the walls, the view from their window… Am I normal? I don’t know… maybe it’s because I have never had one. Blah! Some people like cars, other flowers, I like houses…

Below, that’s another picture of another square close to where I was going to. Uhuhuuu, I turned the camera a bit….uhuhuh…cool effect…

Finally in their house I didn’t take many pictures. First because I already know how lovely it is inside. But then, here are some. On this one you can see the poodle Maggie dressed in Brazil soccer whatever. You know… The World Cup… And then below, there’s a bit of the other living room part.  After I left, I went to my dance class. Later that  day we had an anniversary ball. The dance school is 2 years now. I danced so much that my feet are still sore. But the  pictures come on next post.

Isn’t she cute????

And today is Valentines day here. But just for boyfriends, girlfriends and married couples. Yeah… beautiful day outside too!

Have a nice week you all!

This weekend was busy. Work, dance classes, church meetings and a birthday party. The meeting was a kind of a debate on the Da Vinci Code movie. We as Christians (Protestants/Presbiterians, to specify) found it important to know about such polemics and whether any has foundation. It is nice that we do so, especially for people who has no idea on the Bible and think they can know everything through a guy that is a Paulo Coelho like. Anyway, results on that later.

Later I went to a student´s birthday party at a place that was supposed to be a pub. But of a pub it just has the name ” Saint Patrick’s Pub“. Nice place, close to home, good music and band, but not my kind anymore. I prefer to sit at a nice place, have some food food and good chat with people. One good thing that I could also appreciate was a nice German draft beer. Too expensive, but worth it. We didn’t stay long. My friend and I later went to another place and then I could have my so wanted chat and something better than beer to have. I enjoyed it very much. Please, forgive me for the dark pictures. At church, they were showing a  National Geographic data show documentary on the film, and at the pub the lights were half off thus both places were dark. So there it is. My weekend.

“Hey, Mr Dj… Music.. makes the people…”

Next weekend we´ll have an anniversary ball at dance school. That means 5 hours of dance,dance and dance too. Hope I´m able to share a bit more on that.

Oh, and yeah.. My brother Wilson came over too. This is him after a good lunch watching one of Brazil soccer games…

Have a nice week!

P.S. why did my footprint show me I have 200 visitors fro New York at about the same time? Geez…