Congrats to the USP EB 2006!!

Yes that’s right! My host LC has an EB at last! After a long election process, the chosen candidates were announced tonight!

LCP – Diogo
VPPD – Renata
VPER – Patrick
VPF – Fernando
PM Entrepreneurship – Rubens
PM Env Sustainability – Super (Marcelo)

Two more Project Manager will be added shortly, one for Education (woo!!!!) and one for Recruitment.

I will be working very closely with Renata once she returns from her CEED. Until then I will be VPPD. I will also be working a lot with all four project managers. I’m very glad that we finally have our team selected.

Back (L->R) : Patrick, Tiaia (standing in for Renata), Super, Rubens
Front (L->R) : Diogo, Fernando

In other news I had a really nice chat today with both Celso and Chris. Celso talked to me about his experiences so far in Victoria and we realized that we were experiencing a lot of the same excitements, problems and challenges. I told him about my ups and downs and talked to him about Brazil. Then I talked to Chris for a while about some different things. It was nice since I hadn’t talked to any of my roomies for a while.

Vinte-Cinco de Fantasma da Ibirapuera!!

Title doesn’t make sense? Don’t worry, it will.

This weekend was my first weekend in São Paulo in a month. ….Ya. And I’m glad to say it was a very good one!

I spent Friday in the office as usual. There were quite a few people there that day, so that was nice. Then in the evening I went with Diogo to the MC transition party. For non-@ers, that is the party to celebrate the new national team taking over. It was at a club in Vila Madalena. Before we went there we met up with some other @ers from GV and one from Campinas at the house of a former GV LCP, Marcelo. We talked for a while and then we drove to the party. There were lots of @ers there. From USP it was me, Diogo, Super, Juan Pablo and Benoit. Vlad was there, and Gu from Itajubá. Plus a bunch of the trainees from GV that I had kind of met before. It was really awesome because they had a live band there that actually played good music!! (Note: Brazil in general plays better music than in Canada). They were playing anything from the theme from Friends to Born to be Wild to some swing stuff. Exactly my kind of music. We left the club around 3:30 in the morning, but the buses and subways weren’t running yet. So I went with some other @ers to a supermarket which had a little bakery attached. Not only was this supermarket open at 4:00 am, but there were a lot of people there! I was surprised. We had some snacks and killed time until the subway was running, then they dropped me off on Paulista and I headed home.

I only got a couple hours of sleep because I had to get up to meet Renata and Tiaia at Sé at 9:30. I managed to get there by 9:40 despite sleeping in until ten to nine. Our plan was to go to Vinte-Cinco de Maio which is a street downtown that is full of vendors selling stuff. We needed to get Brazil stuff for Renata to take with her to Mexico for her CEED. So we wandered around for a while. I wanted to take pictures, but I figured it wasn’t such a good idea to do so in that area of the city. I managed to find some stuff for Canada day in a party store. I bought red and white balloons and plates and cutlery. Corny… I know. After wandering around for a few hours we left the fair and walked around some other areas of downtown and grabbed some food at Habib’s. Then Tiaia had to home to get the tickets for that evening, so I went with Renata to her apartment near Paulista. When we got there, I was soooo glad to sit down. We had been standing and walking for 6 hour straight! We made some lunch – pasta with tomato sauce and meatballs, and then we both had a quick nap. Tiaia came back with the tickets and we headed off once again. The show? O Fantasma da Opera! Yes, I went and saw the Phantom…. In Portuguese! The girls already had tickets and I didn’t. In typical Brazilian fashion, we showed up 5 minutes before it started and still had to buy one extra ticket. We had some great luck though, because we found a lady who needed to sell a ticket because her friend was sick and couldn’t come. It was a $R150 ticket, right near the front. And I paid the student price for it - $R37. So I got to see the Phantom from like 5 rows in for less than twenty dollars! Good deal, neh? It was in Portuguese but I know all the songs well enough to know what was going on. And the singers were great. The whole production was very well done. After the show Renata had to go, so I went back to Paulista with Tiaia. We went to The Black Dog which is this place that has these absolutely famous hot dogs. And what a hotdog it was! It even had Parmesan cheese! Earlier we had made plans for Sunday, and it was getting a little late, so we decided I should just go back with Tiaia to her house. We had chocolate milk and watched Ray, which was quite good.

Our plan for Sunday was to go to Ibirapuera, which is a HUGE park in the middle of Sao Paulo. We walked there, which took around 45 minutes, but we got to see part of a really nice neighbourhood. We walked past an open house, so Tiaia decided we should go have a look. It was HUGE with a pool, sauna, high ceilings, crown molding and more rooms than I could count! And hey, it was only $R11 million!! Anyone interested? We made it to the park, which is gorgeous. And it was a nice sunny day to boot! There are a bunch of lakes and the place was crawling with families and cyclists and joggers. Lots of guys were without shirts, and this in “winter”.

A paradise in the middle of the city

We walked around a little, and then we rented a two person bike for an hour and rode around. I was very tricky to steer! I almost crashed a few times to Tiaia did most of the driving :P Then we went to a museum which was featuring an exhibition on design. It was pretty interesting actually. You can tell that Sao Paulo is very business focused though, because one of the panels was all about the evolution of a company’s logo, and all about their branding. Ahhh… !! There was also an exhibit all about Petrobras and some rather interesting furniture. Then we went to an art museum, but neither Tiaia nor I was that impressed. Not really much of an art museum fan I’m afraid. But outside the museum there were some interesting sculptures. They had one that it you threw rocks at made sounds like phasers from star wars! No kidding! And my personal favourite:

hmmmm.. I'm thinking they are probably not human....

We took a bus back to Paulista and stopped in a little market. They had some really cheap snacks and I loaded up on the rolls of cookies that are only one Real. Seriously. One Real for like 20 cookies. It’s dangerous! Then we went to a restaurant called America for dinner, which was really good. And then I headed to the metro Consolacio, which, in English, could be called Consolation Station :P. (pretty soon I’ll have funny names for every subway ;) )

So it was a really good weekend and I got to see a few of the places I had wanted to see for a long time. Plus I had wanted to hang out with Renata and Tiaia for a while.

My partner in crime (and photographer), Tiaia

On a completely unrelated side note, brazilian numbers keep confusing me! In Canada we would write a large number as such: 1,300.89. In Brazil, it’s 1.300,89. The dot and the comma and switched! It looks so odd to me, and I have to stop every time and figure out what the heck the number actually is.

Oh, and here’s another funny sign for Colin:

Water fountain..... or face wash???

*****

Time of posting note: This morning it was not only POURING but there was also thunder and lightning!! Crazy!

Recycling!

Ok this is getting a bit ridiculous? Haha. Well in my denfense, the previous three posts were written two days ago, but not uploaded. This one is actually in real time. ;) Still... I think my readers will be ready to stangle me soon..... *runs away*

Yesterday I arrived in the office and discovered an email from of the directors of the recyling project I have mentioned before (I think). If you want to read about it, you can go here: http://www.geog.uvic.ca/pswm/

The director, Angela, said she was going to the project office that day and invited me to go with her. So I gave her a call saying I was interested. After sending some frantic urgent emails, I was picked up from USP by her daughter. I am still constantly amazed at Brazilian generosity. Her daughter came all the way to pick me up and then where we got to her house they gave me lunch and chocolate! Her daughter invited me to go see one of her plays (she's an actress) and asked me if I would like to be her conversation buddy, so she could practice english and I could practice portuguese. I, of course, was very interested!

Then Angela drove me to the university of Santo André. She told me a bit about the project and what stage they are currently on. Her english was pretty good, but not quite good enough to allow me to ask very in depth questions. Angela had a meeting, so I was left with Elza, who actually speaks less english than I speak portuguese! So that was intertesting. She showed me around the campus. She studies biology so she took me to see the animals they had there, including mice, tortoises and ..... HUGE spiders.

I came back to São Paulo with Elza, by bus, train and subway. I didn't even know there was a train!

I have a bit better understanding now of the project, and they invited me to come to on of their meetings with the catadores [recyclers] sometime. It seems like a really great project, and I like the approach that they are taking. Instead of just teaching and organizing, they are also focusing on building personal identity and self esteem amongst the catadores. I will be looking into this some more!

Missing Home

OMG a third post. Ya, ya, I know. I like having different things divided up. Like my food.

Anyways, I’ve just been doing some thinking. I’m not sure I’ll actually post this, we’ll see. This is not really what this blog is intended for.

Today was the first day I felt really home sick. Honestly. Even when I was having problems before, it wasn’t that I wanted to go home, but I wanted to be able to live better here. But today, I think three things hit me.

One, Rita left. I’ve been spending so much time with her and I think she and I kept each other grounded. We provided each other with a connection to home and we are both here for the same thing. I think being able to hang out with her was a really big boost for me.

Two, I talked to my Mom on the phone. Granted we were talking about courses, which isn’t the world’s most fun topic, but it was the first time I talked to home since I first arrived. And, to be honest, I was grateful for the chance just to talk. I don’t have to worry about speaking clearly or being politically correct (or AIESECly correct I suppose). I can just be me. Whoever that is.

Three, I watched Igor’s CEED presentation again. I saw all the pictures of AIESEC Vic. Geeez, I love the atmosphere when I’m with you guys. It’s so special, and it can never be duplicated. AIESEC Vic is where my heart lies. I realized today how often I have been thinking to myself “oh, I can’t wait to tell my @ers about this” and “ohhh, that will be a great picture for my CEED presentation” and “Oh, when I get back I’m gonna cook this for the @ers”. Seriously. I really want to make that kind of connection here too. The AIESECers here are definitely my friends, but we don’t have that collective identity. Not like AIESEC Vic. I don’t know how to capture it, or exactly what it is. It’s magic.

And now, after writing that, I feel inspired to try to bring some magic to AIESEC USP. Not Vic magic though. I don't think it can ever be duplicated, and I wouldnt even try. AIESEC USP has to find it's own magic....

Post Rio

On Monday Rita and I slept in because we were pretty exhausted. I had to go to USP for a steering team meeting, so I left Rita with instructions on how to get around on her own for the morning. I met up with her in the afternoon and we wandered around Sé for a while. Then we walked to Liberdade, which is a lot closer than I had imagined. Rita was in heaven with all the Chinese and Japanese food they had there. She bought some things at the market and then we went for Japanese food, which was quite good. She made me try yellow cucumber, which I liked. Ordering was interesting though, because the menu was is Japanese and Portuguese and Rita could speak Mandarin, Cantonese, English and French. Haha, and I was no help. But we managed to get what we wanted. Then we met up with Diogo and a friend of his who lives in Canada and went to hang out in Vila Madalena. The waiter brought around glasses of dark brown liquid. 'What could this be' I wondered? Chocolate? Liquor? But of course, I forgot I was in BRAZIL. So what was it? ......Beans.

Mmmm... Japanese food... in poor lighting

Today we slept in again…. Ahhh sooo nice… and then headed down the Azul [blue] line to Vila Mariana to meet up with Lucy, the MCVP Exchange (National Team for AIESEC Brazil). We had lunch with her and then headed to São Judas where Rita headed off to the airport. I headed home to sort out my courses. Tonight I have a bunch of @ work to do and then tomorrow is back to the office as normal.

I think I am feeling confident enough to start exploring the city more now. I know where more things are and I bought a map to help me get around. I want to get out of the office more and see the city. Right now it’s difficult because the @ers have exams, so they are all busy studying (except Diogo because his faculty is on strike). But after exams hopefully we can organize a bunch of fun activities. I have a couple in the works already.

I have managed to get myself working on a lot of different things. I really want to get something FINISHED because it seems like I have so many projects to do:

· Infastucture team leader

· Education Learning Circle member

· Steering team member

· Corporate Responsibility PBoX advisor

· Making member evaluations

· Doing a CEED application

· Organizing acceptance speeches

· Planning events

And a bunch of little things!

So I will be kept very busy for the next little while!

Rio!

The first thing I ever learned about Brazil, I learned from playing Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego with my Dad. We used to play the original version, where you had three clues for each destination and instead of countries, you went to cities. In the game, if you went to Brazil, you went to Rio. And when you arrived, up would pop a little pixelated picture of a steep hill with a statue perched on top, the city spread our beyond his open arms. I remember always thinking that it looked like such a cool place and I was pleased when our crook decided to escape to that exotic local.

A wonderous sight

This weekend, I was there, and saw it for myself. Rita and I, after some worry, bought our tickets for the night bus to Rio, where we went to the Trainee Reception Weekend, hosted by AIESEC Rio. Marcelo, one of the @ers, was kind enough to arrange for us to be picked up. As soon as we left the bus station you could see that magnificent statue, Christ the Redeemer, looking out over the city. Driving to our meeting place was fantastic, the sun was shining and the water sparkled and city had a vibrant energy to it. We met up with the other trainees at an English school in Ipanema, near one of the most famous beaches in the world.

Welcome to Rio

After our welcome chat we headed to the beach. We were quite the group: four Canadians (a fifth arrived later), a Slovakian, a Dutchman, two Columbians, two Poles, an Australian, a Serbian, an Egyptian, two Nigerians, a Frenchman and a Swiss girl. The beach was exactly as one would imagine a Brazilian beach. Sunshine, huge waves, soft sand and many bikinis. It was very hot, and I made sure I put on a heavy dose of sunscreen. After some soaking up the sun, we gathered everyone together and headed towards that tallest of peaks in Rio.

Could this be any more stereotypical?

As great as the city was, unfortunately the event itself was not so well organized. The bus took us up towards the Cristo [Christ] but we discovered that tour buses could not go to the top. So we had to walk the rest of the way. Twenty minutes, we were told. Try an hour. We walked and walked and walked, and by the time we reached the top, it was dark. The Cristo is lit, so it was still very impressive, but the view of the city was just a sea of lights. Taking pictures was tricky and sadly most of my photos are blurry. The statue itself was amazing, though I think the perch from the top of the hill is too close. From that perspective you can see either the Cristo or the city, but not the two together. The connection between the two is divided. I preferred to observe the statue from a distance. I was also a little disappointed that there was very little information about the statue itself, save for a small unlit plaque near the back.

The Man Himself

That evening we went for dinner at a restaurant across from Copacabana beach, probably the most famous beach in the world. It was night, so we couldn’t see much, but without all the people the beach looked very peaceful.

All of the trainees were divided amongst the Rio AIESECers for accommodation. Pei-tien and I were put together at Gustavo’s apartment, which was in Ipanema and very nice. The next day we were to be picked up in the late morning, but the bus had to go to each house individually and this took much longer than anticipated. As a result, we got a very late start to the day. At one point we stopped at a gas station for some snacks and the bus actually drove away!! We had to wait for it to come back. I never did quite figure out where it went to. Once we were finally all together we headed to a interesting little neighbourhood up in the hills for lunch. We took a street car up to the site and we could see the whole city stretching beyond the old style buildings. While we were at the restaurant they had the Holland world cup game on the TV, so Leonard (the dutch guy) was watching intently.

Cheering (or praying) for Holland

Then we were off to the Pao de Açucar, the Sugar Loaf. It’s an oddly shaped hill that looks out over the whole city. After a long bus ride we arrive at the tram which took us to the top in two stages. Unfortunately, by the time we reached the top, it was once again dark. But I did manage to get a few good pictures of the sunset while we were half way up. At the top we ran into a family of Canadians and looked out over the city. And then it started to rain, just our luck. During a clear day the view would be fabulous, but ours was not so ideal. I was still nice to see though.

The Sugar Loaf

A gorgeous sunset in Rio

Despite not getting to see and do as much as we had hoped due to logistical issues, most of the trainees were still having a good time because of the people. Having such a diverse group led to some very interesting conversations. I tried to talk to everyone over the course of the whole weekend. I had a really good talk with Younes about Egypt and learned a lot about the different countries represented. It was very interesting to talk to the Serbian, who found out after CONADE that his country had split! So he was a citizen of the newest country in the world and we asked him what he though of what had happened. Just don’t ask him about his soccer team ;) I also talked a lot with Carlos, who told me about his experiences with the violence in Columbia. Sadly, he found on the third day that the brother of one of his friends had been accidentally shot during an incident, which was a huge blow.

The Canadians

After the Sugar Loaf we went to a fair which featured food, music and good from the northeast of Brazil. It was really interesting, though I didn’t buy anything. I did try some Caipirihna Maracuja [Passion fruit Caipirihna] and Carlos and Koge talked me into trying some new foods. The first was marrow soup, which was ok but not outstanding. Then then got me to try a small piece of mystery meat, which after I ate they told me was chicken heart. It was kinda chewy. But hey! I tried it!

The third day was Global Village. We arrived quite early and found that very few of the trainees were there. This was the most disorganized of days. We were there but the people who had our stuff weren’t, and we didn’t know where they were. Everything was late and there were few supplies to be had. I was getting a little frustrated that we were wasting so much of our limited time in Rio. I would have liked to walk around the city or something. Eventually the others arrived and we did talk to some people about Canada. Then each country did a presentation. I was nominated to represent Canada. I really enjoyed watching the other ones as well.

Sunday wasn’t what it could have been. Again, we started very late. We were going to a bar to watch the Brazil World Cup match, but when we got there the place was already full. So we walked and found another place which was actually nicer. So we watched the game and had some snacks. They won 2-0 against the Aussies, but they didn’t actually play all that well. But it was fun to be in the world cup atmosphere, and when they scored the cheering went on for quite some time. After the game we piled everyone into the bus and headed for the bus station. I would have liked to make another trip to the beach, or a few more sites, but we didn’t have time. Rita and bought our bus tickets, grabbed some snacks and headed onto the bus. We got back to Sao Paulo around midnight.

Rio is a beautiful city. The atmosphere is very light and the landscape is stunning. I wish we could have seen more of the city itself – walk around downtown, go to the beach, see the sites – but it was still a good trip. I think the fact that we had such a great group of people helped to make up for some of the poor planning.

An amazing group

Brazil 1 Croatia 0

Wow, a post in real time!

Yesterday we had our steering team meeting. We talked about the purpose and function of a steering team as well as started outlining our goals and values. I'm going to be working with Super on the Balanced Score Card and adapting it to the reality of @USP. Should be challenging and interesting work.

Afterwards Diogo drove me to the airport to pick up Rita. The traffic was TERRIBLE so we were really late (sorry Rita!). And why was the traffic bad? Because everyone was one their way to watch the Brazil Croatia World Cup Game!! After we found Rita, the three of us headed to GV where we watched the second half. Honestly, Brazil wasn't playing very well. They weren't running and Croatia had much better scoring chances. But they still managed to pull off a win, and you could tell. For several HOURS after the game you could hear horns and whistles and loud music and general craziness. Soooo many people were dressed in green and yellow! It was cool to walk along Paulista and see everyone.

Rita and I met up with Vladimir, who is a GV trainee from Columbia and was the former MCP. It was nice to talk to him. On the way home we stopped by Tiête and bought our bus tickets for tonight. I wasn't actually that hard, though trying to communicate with the lady in portuguese was challenging. But we have our tickets and we're ready to go.

Right now I'm at the office and Rita is napping on the couch :P Not used to getting up at 6:30 am, haha. I have some meetings around midday and then we are going to head downtown for some sightseeing and shopping. Then home to pack and off we go! Should be a great weekend.

CU-ritiba!

*Note, first of two new posts*

On Friday morning my plan was to sleep in. But Iza woke me up at quarter to seven to ask me, “Are you not coming with us this morning?” Oh well. I got up around 9:00, had breakfast and packed. And then I had nothing to do! My plane didn’t leave until 2:40, but I left the house at 10:30 with the idea of taking my time getting to the airport. I took the subway to São Judas, and then a taxi to the airport. Even around noon the traffic was still crazy! Still, I got there ridiculously early. I was a little nervous about checking in, and the first person I spoke to didn’t speak English, but he directed me to someone who did and there were no problems. So I had loooots of time to kill at the airport.

The flight itself was only 40 minutes, and I got better service than 11 hours of Air Canada! We were given free chocolates and granola bars and nuts and juice. Not bad, eh? Rita and Igor were there to meet me at the airport and then we headed to the university. The @ Curitiba office is about 3 times as big as the @ Vic office, and it has windows and three computers. There were quite a few people there to meet. Igor showed me the botanical gardens, which were really beautiful. Too bad it was a little too dark for really good pictures. Then I sat in on a PBoX meeting to get some ideas and see how they were approaching it. Then Rita and I went with a few of the @ers to a June party being held at the university. It was similar to the one in Itajubá but smaller. They had a live band, and they were playing some seriously corny Brazilian folk music. Lots of people had dressed up in country outfits, straw hats and chequered dresses. We headed back to the office and met up with Igor and then headed home. The three of us were up till all hours making powerpoints for the event the next day. Haha, this is so normal for @ers. Long live the powerpoint!

The Botanical Gardens -
Yes I'm actually in that picture :P

On Saturday we had to get up early and head to the university. We were supposed to meet at 8:00 to go to an AIESEC “random” event. Our rides were not there at 8:00, so I hung out with Rita and Mao for a while. We went for coffees and witnessed some great Brazilian generosity. A whole class came in for some snacks and they bought us all free soup! And it was really good! I don’t think that would happen in Canada. We finally headed out around 10:00 and drove across the city to a park. There, they had rented a little room and the use of a barbeque. We chatted for a while, and then had some presentations about CONADE output. It was hilarious to watch the presentations about leadership and teamwork and then see Rita and Mao say “well… in the work abroad track we didn’t really do anything” Haha.

Mao wondering... what DID we do at the Work Abraod track??

Then we had Brazilian barbeque for lunch. We started off with some sausages (which are not actually sausages but I can’t remember the right name), and then they had some steaks. I had one sausage and then asked for another and Pedro, who was cooking, asked me if I wanted steak instead. I said no, I’d rather have the sausage. He said usually Brazilians start off with the sausages to fill up, and then eat the good meat, so he didn’t understand why another trainee and I had both asked for more sausage. I thought about it for a second and then told him it was because the sausages were brazilian and the steak we had eaten before, so we wanted to eat the brazilian food. This seemed an acceptable explanation for him, and he gave me another sausage. After lunch we had some cultural presentations. Mao did a very long, but very good presentation about Columbia. His mission was to break the image that most people had about Columbia. And he did a very good job, I learned a lot. Next was a Polish trainee, who told us about some polish traditions surrounding Easter and Christmas. Next was Canada, and we had to squish three presentations into half an hour. Rita used a modified version of my powerpoint… what I really mean to say is she butchered my work and took out all the parts that said BC is the best part of Canada and @Vic is totally awesome ;) . Then Igor had a powerpoint about his CEED that was amazingly good!! Made me miss Vic a lot! Oohh ahh ooooh ahh ahhh Victoria!!!!! So many amazing memories!!! But before I get all emotional, let’s continue… Rita finished off with a quick powerpoint about Hong Kong. We all headed back into town and stopped by Lizi’s (@ Curitiba LCP) apartment, then drove over to Habib’s for some dinner. I had some of the mini pizza things whose name I will never remember. Cutting them is tricky though, and in the process I’m sad to say that half a mini pizza ended up flying onto the floor…. !! Umm… whoops. Then I went home and did some research about buses and flights to Rio for next week.

Habib´s, ahhh Arabian fast food

On Sunday morning I made pancakes! They actually turned out pretty well, I think, considering I had never made them from scratch before. Then we went to the fair, which was really awesome. It went on for block after block and had everything from furniture to jewellery to bright green and yellow world cup decorations. It was really neat to wander around and look at everything. I bought some really cool stuff, and it’s really inexpensive as well. We (Igor, Rita and I) had some pastels for lunch, buying the $R1.50 ones before we realized around the corner they had some for $R0.50.

Rita´s really enjoying that $R0.50 pastel

Then we headed to the mall to meet up with another @er, Lette (Rita did I spell that right?). The plan was to go see the DaVinci Code, but neither of the Brazilians had their student cards with them. So Rita and I bought our tickets and then we bought two more when just before the movie started. In the mean time we went for a walk around the city. We went to a really great icecream place. I had peach and strawberry… mmmmmm.

Eu gosto sorvette! [I like icecream!]

Then we walked over to the Oscar Neinemeiyer (sp?) museum, and Rita and I freaked the other out when we started singing the Oscar Meyer Weiner song :P The museum is really cool looking. It has a huge eye outside, and these interesting cones around the outside. Made for some good pictures ;)

Check it out!

Whooooaaaa....

Then we headed back for the movie. We needed student cards to get in, so Lette used my Uvic card and Igor used my “borrowed” card from USP. But they didn’t really check anyways. Too bad, because if they asked we were going to say Igor was from Belarus and didn’t speak Portuguese. Haha. The movie was pretty good. However, there are some parts that are in French, and some in Latin. Normally, these parts would have English subtitle… but not in Brazil! The whole movie had Portuguese subtitles! So for the French and Latin parts I had to try and read the Portuguese subtitles. I actually managed to understand the basics of it. I was the only one who was lost though, because Rita could understand the French. Honestly I don’t think I missed much. After the movie we pondered for a while on the way home. We stopped off for pizza near Igor’s house, and got some interesting toppings. One had chicken and corn and peas, and was really good! And we had some chocolate pizza as well, which isn’t quite as good as the banana pizza I had. The chocolate pizza still had cheese on it, and chocolate and cheese don’t go together well in my opinion.

On Monday morning Rita and I slept in. I got up around 9:30 and had some breakfast. Then I read some of Rita’s book on social entrepreneurship. It’s very interesting actually, and I borrowed it from her to finish it. Igor’s Mom made a fantastic feast for lunch, with meat, fish, veggies…mmmm. Then we headed back downtown. We had a few hours to kill before I had to catch the bus to the airport, so we went and saw X-Men 3. It was pretty good, though I think they missed a huge opportunity to introduce a moral dilemma, but I won’t get into that. The movie ended at 5:00 and the bus was supposed to come at 5:05 so we ran to the stop. But I caught the bus with plenty of time and made it relatively uneventfully back to Sao Paulo. At the Sao Paulo airport, they did the announcements in Portuguese and English, but in Curitiba it was only in Potuguese so I had to listen closely to the numbers. When I boarded the plane I double checked that it was indeed going to Sao Paulo, and it was.

Rita arrives tomorrow in the afternoon and hopefully we can get our bus tickets to Rio and do a little toruing around the city. Then on Wednesday I have a couple meeting and then it's off to Rio!

On an interestering side note, Tuesday is the first Brazil game in the world cup. I was told not to schedule any meeting for that day, because nobody would come :P All of Brazil stops when the soccer is on. But Brazil has to win. I mean not only is the entire population behind them, they even have the architecture on their side!

[This column cheers for Brasil]

Also, I found this particular sign at the university to be particularly amusing:

When in doubt... Run into the wall!

That is all. ;)

P.S. Rita, how did you end up in ALL my pictures??!!!

Good Days

Thursdays are always awesome. Why? Because there are PEOPLE in the office! Thursday is the day of meetings and I love sharing our ideas and leading the meetings and making so much progress. Plus Thursday is the day of my two favourite teams!

In the morning decided to stop by the bank to get some extra cash for Curitiba tomorrow. So I got off the bus one stop early and headed over there. On the way back I had to pass the little café, so I decided to stop and have some tea. They didn’t have any of my usual apple cinnamon (I order it as “cha maça por favor” [apple tea please]), but I had a very nice mint tea. I was also a little hungry, so I ordered a bread thing with three cheeses inside. It was really good. Then I made my way to the office. I turned on the computer, updated my blog and answered some emails, and by then a good part of the morning was gone and people were starting to arrive.

I have attended the last two education meetings, and I think I’m hooked. There are only 5 of us, but everyone is so passionate and dedicated to this project. I love it!!!! I had a chat with Diogo about it on the weekend so I went into this meeting with a strong agenda and a lot of ideas. We had a really good talk about what exactly the project will be, what the goals are, why companies and schools should be interested in this project, and what are we going to do to make it happen. This group is still an “Interest Group” and not a full project yet, but honestly they are doing much better than the two “projects”. We are now ready to begin developing a proposal. Man, I have never been so excited to write a proposal in my life! I really hope this project can be successful. It has a lot of potential, but one main challenge that may hold us back. Can you guess? Language.

I guess I could explain a little about how these projects work for the non-AIESECers reading this. A PBoX is a Project Based on Exchange. It involves partnerships with companies and organizations to facilitate a large number of exchanges which are centred around a specific issue. Our issue is education here in Sao Paulo, which I have learned so much about these last few weeks. Our other issues are environmental sustainability in conjunction with corporate responsibility and entrepreneurship. The education project aims to directly impact the disparity between public and private schools here in São Paulo. The idea is that we bring students from both public and private schools together as a team to work on a project. What that project is could vary, depending on the interests of the team members. The Project Manager of this team will be a trainee from another country. They would work directly with the kids and give them the skills and training they need to create, develop and execute a project. The kids would get to work with an international, so there would be cultural sharing as well. The kids would develop essential skills that their schools might not be offering them. Plus they would be developing networks and a better understanding of the situation and students from the different types of schools. Ideally, social discrimination would decrease amongst the participants. There are still some details to be worked out, but I really want this to happen. It would be such an amazing experience for those kids. The other projects have objectives based around their specific issue, but all PboXes aim to impact a social or economic issue. In Canada, PBoXes have always failed. I don’t think many Canadian companies are prepared to support this kind of a program. Here in Brazil it is very different. The need is great, and so the companies are willing to sponsor programs on a larger scale.

Back to the day! After that meeting, which I left feeling very inspired, I had my infrastructure meeting. We are starting to produce results and my team is really great. I made some plans to help them with their tasks and we decided to try to have everything done within two weeks. I’m really excited to see the end results. The taskforce isn’t a major project, but it’s fun and I think the members are learning and enjoying it. My infrastructure meeting was a riot today, we ended up spending half the meeting laughing.

By then we were all starving, so a bunch of us went for lunch. The Bandejon was closed (another strike) so we went to a little buffet restaurant near the physics building. It was really good. And it was so nice to do something all together. I’d have to say my biggest complaint about Sao Paulo is that it’s so big it makes it really hard for people to get together. Even just going out for dinner together is a major thing because for some people it could take an hour or two to get there. So whenever we have a chance to hang out together it’s cool. It also doesn’t help that some people have classes in the morning, some in the afternoon, and some in the evening. So I might see quite a few people because I’m there all day, but they don’t see each other. Each period has its regulars. Maira and Iza and Koba and a few others are always there in the morning. In evenings are my evening hermits, the guys who come and hang out for hours but never seem to do any work :P Jorge, Fernando, Renato and Rubinho. The others are more sporadic. But getting everyone together in one place at one time is a big challenge. In Victoria we will just spontaneously say “lets all go for dinner!” Call a few people and 20 minutes later we are all there. I didn’t really appreciate that until now.

Once we got back to the office, I helped Renata to make sugar cube envelopes! It was a lot of fun, and we got into a discussion with Diogo about the best way to mass produce them. I also taught Maira how to do meeting output properly and talked to her about some other events we are working on organizing. Then I talked on MSN for a while with Igor and Rita, getting everything organized for tomorrow. I sent a few more emails and then finally decided to head home.

I wish all my days could be this good. Unfortunately they aren’t, but I have to work towards making my time alone in the office more productive. I always seem to get so much more done when I’m working with other people, so I love the days when we have lots of meetings and discussions. But working alone is something I will work on.

I’m really excited about going to Curitiba tomorrow. It should be awesome! Then next week is Rio and I might be going to visit another extension the week after that. I also received an email from the recycling people. I might not be able to go visit them for another two weeks, but hopefully we can figure something out. I really hope I can make it there to learn about their program.

Good music, good food

Tuesday was pretty quiet in the office. I had a whole list of things to do but couldn’t seem to get anything done. Just one of those days where you can’t focus. So I decided to go sit on the couch and read my portuguese book for a while. And I twisted my ankle. Haha. Ya, Tuesday was one of those days where nothing goes right, but lets not dwell on it. One good thing was I was going to the symphony that evening, and it was fantastic! It was a Sala Sao Paulo, which was built in 2004 from an abandoned train station. It’s gorgeous, with a mix of classic and modern architecture. In the main room they have these giant cubes on the ceiling which can be adjusted up to 10m. Because of this you can get almost perfect acoustics, and apparently Sala Sao Paulo has been studied by acoustic engineers worldwide. The music was performed by the Freiburger Kammerphilharmonie from Germany. The orchestra was great and they had 4 awesome singers and a full choir as well. They played a lot of songs I recognized… some Mozart, some songs from Carmen. There was a lot of opera music, but I really enjoyed it. We had seats in the third row, so it was great. The only downside was having to hobble around all evening. When it was time for the standing ovation at the end, Diogo said I could stayed seated :P

Today my ankle was MUCH better. It still hurt a little, but I had only a slight limp. Paulo, Iza’s brother, dropped be off right in behind FEA so I didn’t have to walk far. Today was pretty mellow as well. We need more action!!

I just finished dinner and it was a FEAST! Iza’s parent’s friend from Portugal was visiting, so they went all out with dinner, including fancy plates and cutlery. There was cheese bread and cheese and herb spread to start and then a Brazilian river fish from central brazil for dinner. Iza’s Dad cooked it, and apparently to make it tender you have to bake it with four pounds of salt on it. But it was VERY tender. Plus there was rice and vegetables and a kind of fish sauce. We also had some excellent white wine, and Iza’s Dad kept refilling my glass! For dessert there was a kind of cake pudding dish, and the chocolates I had bought in Campos do Jordao. Then came Brazilian coffee. It was the first time I tried it. I was told that every brazilian family has coffee after dinner, except Iza’s. But because tonight was special we had some. So now I am VERY full. However, I’m still not used to eating dinner so late. I always get hungry at 6:00 but dinner is never until 7:30 or 8:00. Today it was at 9:00. I have to make sure I eat big lunches or else I’m starving by the time dinner arrives.

Tomorrow I have some meetings and then I have to get ready to go to Curitiba on Friday. I think I know how to get to the airport, but I’m going to the domestic one this time instead of the international one I have been to before. There is a metro station nearby, and then I think I will take a taxi.

I’m starting to get to know the subway very well. I can recite the stations as they go by on my way home. Except I can’t spell the first one. I start at Anhngabau, on the Red line, then I transfer at Sé to the Blue line. Then I go from Sé to São Bento, then Luz, Tiradentes, Aremênia, Tiête, Carandiru, Santana and finally Jardim São Paulo, where I get off. Now I’m starting to learn why each of these stations are where they are. For example, Sala São Paulo, where the symphony was, is at Luz. Sé is the old cathedral downtown. Tiête is the bus station. Clinicas is the hospital (go figure) and there’s a whole bunch along Paulista (basically the whole green line). São Judas is the one closest to the airport, so that’s where I’ll be headed on Friday. There’s still a bunch more to learn, and I was thinking of asking the members to tell me about it in Portuguese but I haven’t tried yet. When they speak very very very slowly I can understand most of it, just like reading it. But most of the time it is much too fast. Though tonight at dinner I understood most of a conversation. They started talking about McDonalds, haha. But I understood when Tati said she only liked their icecream and her Mom said that the French fries were very good. Simple stuff, yes, but I was pretty happy. I told them that I understood and Tati’s Mom said she would have to start watching what she says! Haha, I don’t think she has to worry about that just yet ;)

Ok, this was really supposed to be a short post, so no more! tchau

AIESEC Roadtrip #2 ! Itajubá and Campos do Jordão

Another mega-blog!!

Thursday didn’t turn out quite as expected. I had an education meeting, which was actually very productive, and then had my infrastructure meeting. We are finally starting to produce some results! I talked to them a little about what kind of atmosphere we were trying to create and what kind of questions we should be asking ourselves as we work on the office infrastructure. Then around 4:30 Diogo called the office and told me that the ride we were going to get to Itajubá the next day couldn’t take us, and if we wanted to go we had to leave right away! AIESEC in Itajubá had invited us for the weekend to help with some training sessions, specifically ILP (Individual Learning Plan) and CR (Corporate Relations). So Diogo asked me if I could go straight home and get ready. So I said a quick goodbye (Ha! That’s a laugh. There are no quick goodbyes in Brazil because you have to say goodbye to each person) and headed for the bus. I rushed home and packed up some things, making sure I had some food with me in case we didn’t have a chance to eat later. Then I headed back to the subway and took the Azul (Blue) line to Paraisó where I transferred to the Verde (Green) line and went to Clinicas, which apparently is the largest public hospital in Latin America. There I met up with Diogo (after waiting 45 minutes… but don’t get me started) and we found the guy who was giving us a ride. It was already after 9 pm so there wasn’t much to see on the way there. However, we were out in the countryside where there are no lights, so looking out the car window I could see more stars than I have ever seen before. It was gorgeous. Plus the constellations are different down here. I keep looking for the big dipper and Orion out of habit, and not finding them. We were going to another state, Minas Gerais, which is north west of the state of São Paulo. Itajubá is a smaller city of around 80 000, so it’s Nanaimo sized. The AIESEC there is an extension, which means that they are applying to become a full fledged local committee once they complete certain requirements. We arrived there around 1:00 am after driving for around 4 or 5 hours. Our driver, Eduardo, dropped us off where we would be staying, where we were greeted by our hosts, Natalia and Carol, and the Extension Leader, Gustavo. We were tired so we had a snack and headed to bed.

On Friday we got up around 8:00 because Gustavo was going to come pick us up at 9:00. At breakfast we had warm milk, which apparently is fairly standard, and very tasty, especially with chocolate added! Gustavo picked us up and we headed to the University. The University of Itajubá is fairly new. It used to be a school just for engineers, but in the last few years they expanded to a few other areas and so they are now a university. But almost all the students are engineers. You can’t take history or anthropology there, but you can take entrepreneurship and stuff like that. We headed to the AIESEC office (the LC :P), which was a largely empty room. I learned later that they had just aquired an office and that’s why it was so sparse. They had a couple desks, a computer, some chairs and some old AIESEC posters from the 80s and 90s which were very amusing. We stayed there for a while, but Diogo was helping their VPPD (VP People Development) in Portuguese, so I decided to wander off for a while. The campus is quite small, so I wandered around and took pictures. The buildings were very nice and a lot of people were on bikes, which was nice to see. The school was surrounded by hills which often had houses perched on the top. The earth in Itajuba is very red, and so the hills were deep red and green. There were a lot of open grassy areas, so I sat down in the glorious sunshine and wrote down some ideas for how to change our messaging to potential members in Victoria. Of course I still have to sell these new ideas to Sang :P It was such a nice day and I really liked being in the countryside away from the big city for a while. In Itajubá there are no skyscrapers and there are a lot of praças [open squares] with parks. We had lunch at the University cafeteria and then did some more work in the office. Unfortunately most of it was in Portuguese so I couldn’t contribute as much as I wanted to. I ended up on MSN and talked to some of the members for a while. Everyone there was really nice, and they asked me questions about Canada and about my AIESEC experience. In the evening we headed to a bar for some snacks. Unlike in Sao Paulo, where it takes half an hour to go anywhere, in Itajubá it was across the street!

University of Itajubá campus

Saturday started at 8:00 as well. There was a general meeting at 9:00 and Gustavo came to pick us up again. We walked into the room and heard the AIESEC songs playing and people were dancing. It was an excellent way to get some energy going in the morning. Then Fernanda led a session about the ILP. The powerpoint was in Portuguese but I could read enough of to get the gist. Then the members were given time to fill out their ILPs. Diogo and I didn’t need to do this since we have many times before, so told me about some of the stuff he learned from Brodie (the PAI – president of AIESEC international – from Calgary!) and AXLDS in Columbia about leadership. Apparently all the LCPs got to have two days of sessions just with Brodie, and what they learned was pretty cool. It was about the different types and qualities of leadership and what is necessary to run an organization well. I copied it all down ;) I think I would like to attend an AIESEC leadership conference some day. It would be amazing! The LC in Itajubá is doing very well. They have 21 members and they are starting to contact companies about potential TNs. And they are hoping to get a CEEDer to help them as well. After the session we went to a Brazilian restaurant which served traditional foods from Minas Gerais (the state). They talked me into trying some feijuada, which I had thus far avoided. It’s a stew made from beans and pig, but the WHOLE pig, from foot to tail… literally. It actually wasn’t too bad. And I had some sausages and what I recognized as Bete Batata (ya Igor I know I can’t spell it ;) ), but when I told the others I knew what it was they didn’t know it! They called it something else, haha, oh well.

Minas Gerais Food

Not your typical buffet

After lunch we went around the city a little and stopped at the central praça [square]. We went to an icecream place that makes the icecream with real fresh fruit. I asked Gustavo to translate the menu for me, and so I asked for what was supposed to be peach icecream. Haha, when they gave it to me it was almost purple and Diogo told me it wasn’t peach. But he couldn’t remember what it actually was in English. After 10 minutes, he remembered and told me it was plum. So I had plum icecream. Go figure, and it was actually quite good. And the guy there gave me a little bit of avocado icecream for free too, because I was a gringo (foreigner). Then we headed back to the university. Diogo helped with some CR training, again in Portuguese, so I went online and looked into flights. Gol, an airline here, is having a promotion where you can book tickets for $R25 (like $12) so I was very interested. They didn’t have any for Rio or the northeast, but they did for Curitiba! So I snagged one for the way there and then found a cheap flight for the way back as well. But you have to book with a Brazilian credit card, so I ended up using Gustavo's card to book them, and then gave him cash. So next weekend I am going to Curitiba!! But I’ll talk about that later. Gu (Gustavo) dropped me off at Natty’s (Natalia) in the afternoon. I talked to her for a while and then she asked if I wanted to come with her to the supermarket. I said sure, and that I needed to go to the bank as well (because I had given Gustavo all my cash). So we started our quest to find the bank, which turned out to be very close to her apartment. Then we went to the supermacado and got some food and snacks. Around 9:00, Gu came to pick me up and he, Diogo and I went to a June party. It’s basically a fair that they have in June on the days of some saints. It was a bit chilly in the evening, but other that that it was really cool. It’s sponsored by the universities around the city, so each booth was operated by a different faculty. You could go to the physiotherapists and get warm wine with cinnamon and then to the health booth to get chocolate (go figure) and then the entrepreneurs to get cachaca and honey in a bamboo stick! Plus there were Krepes Suisse (Swiss Crepes) and meat sticks and lots of other snacks. I actually ate a lot, but it was all pretty cheap. And they had live music and a bonfire. We stayed there until around 2:00 am and then headed back.

The crew
The sign behind us says Delicious Icecream, and it was!

On Sunday the plan was to go to Campos do Jordão, which I was told is like a Swiss mountain city. And it was! Actually, it reminded me a lot of Whistler Village. The architecture was very European and it was up in the mountains so it was quite cold.

Brazil??

We got there around 10:00, having left at around 8:30. The road there was gorgeous! I loved looking out at the countryside. There were amazing rolling hills and trees scattered all over. It looked almost like an African savannah. There were farms and cows dotted along the roads, as well as some little cities. In the centre of each little city could be seen a church with a tall steeple, and then the city circled around it, which larger houses and buildings nearer the centre and smaller ones near the edged, a kind of semi-flavela. There was one little town that must have had only 100 buildings. All I could think when I saw it was “Anthropologist’s Dream Village!!” One person could easily survey the whole population. Most of the other towns were a little bigger. Itajubá and the countryside was honestly a lot more like what I had imagined Brazil to be from my reading in cultural anthropology. São Paulo is still very Brazilian, but it is also very western. The countryside was all Brazil. I imagine that the people there don’t travel often to the big cities and they probably eat only locally grown foods. There were lots of bikes and more trucks. Everyone seemed to know each other. These were communities, more so than you see in São Paulo. Several of the members of AIESEC Itajubá also told me that they liked being in a smaller city. Some were originally from São Paulo, but they said that even still they were never bored in Itajubá.

Back to the drive! … we started up into the mountains and the view was incredible!! We went around one corner and we were looking out into a valley that was filled with clouds. It was truly amazing. There were more trees in the mountain area. Finally we got to Campos do Jordão. We spent the first hour or two jut wandering around. Diogo had been there several times before so he knew his way around a little. The building are all Eurpoean in style and could have been found in Zurich… or Whistler :P And all along the main street are maple trees from Canada! That is the only place in brazil that they can grow. And so everything was maple everywhere! The restaurants had maple placemats and maple signs and maple decorations. It seriously felt like Canada, except everything was in portuguese. And everything was really expensive too!

Ahhh Whistler... no wait...
FYI those are maple leaves

Apparently the city is famous for is restaurants, beer and chocolate, so we went to a chocolate store and I bought some chocolates for Iza’s family. Then we headed to a chairlift that took us up one of the mountains (no snow though). The view from the top was really nice, you could see the whole city nestled in a valley and surrounded by trees. Then we went for lunch at Santanas and I had cheese fondue, which was very good but very rich. Then we went and met up with a group of trainees who happened to be in the city as well. They went skating (yes there is skating in Brazil!) but we decided to go to the Kilombo. It was quite a drive away on a really rough road that was hard on Gustavo’s poor car. But we made it. A Kilombo is a place where the slaves used to escape to before slavery was abolished. It was a really huge cave with much graffiti added. At the very back of the cave was a little escape hole in case the authorities found them there. It was clear that the cave had been lived in. You could see the modifications and wear on the rock. Maybe I am the only person who would notice, but I thought it was very interesting how they had made a drainage system. Having a hole in the back of course meant that water could run into the cave. They had developed a rut in the rock that the water could travel down, all the way out the front of the cave so that the whole cave didn’t get wet. It was dry when we were there though. We climbed up above the cave and had a look at the view. I took lots of pictures because it was so gorgeous. They have a tree (the name of which I can’t seem to remember) which only grows in this region and is quite endangered. It is also the symbol of the city, along with the maple, so it’s picture was everywhere. It’s a very interesting looking tree. We drove back to the city and went to a restaurant called the Matterhorn for dinner. I had meat fondue this time, which I was a little leery about because you have to cook the meat yourself. But I think I cooked it more than adequately. It was good. Then we walked around a little more, stopping to look at things and to get hot chocolate, which was literally hot melted chocolate! Mmmmm….. Then we went in search of the group of trainees. It took us a while, but we eventually found them. Then Diogo and I joined them for the ride pack to São Paulo while the three from Itajubá headed back home. I ended up in a car with three Spanish speakers and a dutch guy. So we drove home listening to Spanish music. Normally that would be cool, but by this point I was really tired and wanted to get home. They dropped me off at a metro station on Paulista, so I had to take the verde (green) and then the azul (blue) lines to get home. I arrived around midnight and went straight to bed!

A very interesting and unique tree

View from above the Kilombo

This morning I slept in until 10:00 which was fantastic. I won’t go into detail because I’ve already written a lot, but I had a really interesting conversation with Renato, Fernando and Jorge (the “regulars” at the office”) about languages. Tomorrow I am going to the symphony and then on Friday I go to Curitiba for the weekend. And the week after that is Rio! I just have to figure out how I’m getting there :P

There’s probably more I wanted to say but that’s all I can think of at the moment.

Oh, and on a random note, all the AIESECers think I’m crazy because I laugh when I am talking to people on MSN. I’ll be in the office and start giggling and they look at me like “what are you doing?” Funny conversation, I swear!

MASP and more!

Today was awesome. It was warm and sunny and overall really nice. I was locked out of the office again… which sucks, but I found an @er quickly and he let me in. I decided today I was not going to do computer work, even though there was some stuff on the computer I needed to do. Instead, I made a World Cup pool! I stuck some sheets of paper together with tape and wrote out each of the groups and spaces for everyone to predict the rankings in each group. Then I will assign points for every correct ranking, with a prize for the winner. I am going to do another one for the round of 16 once the preliminaries are over. I think it should be fun. I drew some soccer balls (ahh, they are really hard to draw!) and stuck them up around the chart. I also made an activity list with some suggestions and put it on the wall.

Take the challenge!

Then I had a really awesome meeting with Renata. She is doing some case studies for the infrastructure task force and I showed her how to find the resources she needs and how to do everything. And she was really excited about it. Plus, today she found out that she is going to Mexico in July for a CEED!! It’s so exciting, I’m very happy for her. After that, I had a really good chat with Super and Rubens about Pboxes and LC direction. Then Super and I went to another bandejon (the cheap cafeteria) and then caught the bus downtown to Paulista Ave.

ahhhh, Paulista

We walked down Paulista Ave, which is the business centre of Latin America, and headed to MASP, which would be translated as the Art Museum of Sao Paulo. There was a show all about Edgar Degas, who I had never heard of but he’s not bad. They also had some really famous stuff there. I saw Picasso and Van Gogh and Renoir and a bunch of other really well known art. Plus, they had a HUGE bust of Augustus. Ahhh, I love Roman art. It’s so powerful. So we wandered around the museum for a few hours and then headed back out to Paulista.

OK, so I didn't actually take this picture.. It's MASP

We walked down the rest of the avenue and the Super went to go buy a new cell phone and I headed home on the subway. I finally went to what I call the chocolate subway station (Brigadeiro ststaion)

It was really nice to get out of the office, even if I did have stuff to do :P I still have to work some more on my travel plans, but I can’t do anything until I get replies to some emails.

I have two important meetings tomorrow, one for the education learning circle and one for the infrastructure task force. Then Friday should be interesting. I am supposed to be in two places at once to I’ll have to figure that out.

I made sure today to take some pictures! I hope you like them.

Gearing up for World Cup!

P.S. The lady who does nails came beck today! Check it out!

French style!

P.S. You should be able to click on the pictures for a bigger size