The beautiful Fire, a friend from Cambridge, is arriving tomorrow morning in Brazil for the World Social Forum! I hope to show her the best of Brazil while we’re at it– four days in Salvador, a week in Belém, and three more days probably on the island of Marajó.

She also nudged me to post pictures from the last forever. So here they are.

São Paulo: (see more)

“A Party at Alex’s”

The Brazilian Town

The mall is full of it.

Brasilia: (see more)

Brasilia Cathedral

Congress Building

President’s first stage

Universo Paralello:

Main floor stage

Pratigi Beach

Sand Sculpture

São Luis:

Down a street

Over the “river”

Overgrown building

Lensois Maranheses: (see more)

Dunes

Dunes

Dunes

As I get better at understanding Portuguese conversation, I start picking up on funky peculiarities. Like, the Portuguese word for “everyone” is “todo o mundo” (“the whole world”). A little voice in my head always translates it as meaning “even Thailand”. “Vamos pra o bar antes de restaurante, e o todo o modo fica feliz.” (Let’s go to the bar before the restaurant, and the whole world will be happy), and I imagine the Thai all parading through their streets. But there’s something beautiful about the phrase. In English, every time we say everyone, we reassert our individuality– that there are a bunch of us ones for there to be an every of. In essence, we say “I mean all of us here together– but don’t think I’m calling us a group!” The Brazilian, on the other hand, one day meets a visitor from Thailand and thinks “Oh, you’re who I’ve been talking about all along!”