A typical day in Brazil... using photos!

There is no typical day! Every day is truly different, here's a glimpse of one day. 

Arrived to "Survival Portuguese classes" at 8:30 AM, this day, we had Person of the Day (POD) introduce our schedule and a fun exercise before we start class. Then we had group presentations on each different neighborhoods that we visited. It was an emotional experience for some. A few groups went to the biggest slums in Brazil.Then we had a synthesis of what we had learned in our first week of Brazil, we talked about our assumptions and lessons learned.
My assumption: not being able to communicate with people and build relationships due to language barrier. Lesson: You can communicate through emotions, laughter, your body, and even silence.

Lunch time! I went to a small venue and practiced speaking Portuguese. This day, I had lunch with Sneha outside of the medical campus. She's hilarious. She also took these amazing photos. With her amazing camera. (Hint hint, Dad!)

For my Community Health class, our professor had us all draw "Body Maps". What do I embody? It was truly a hard time for me. I love these thought provoking exercises, but sometimes it can be too forced. In the end, I decided that I really wanted my body to be simple. For one, I knew that my hands on my body would be holding other hands. It symbolizes my enjoyment of companionship, relationships, and intimacy. Then I realize, my hands symbolize much more and I wanted to focus my time on it. I have my grandmothers hands (or dad's) To me, it represents my dad's hard work and how much I want to become a good parent. It also symbolizes privilege  Some are born with no hands. Hands are very useful. It represents my love for rock climbing and being active. It symbolizes my flaws too. I have nails that are growing strange bumps on them. That's because I was not eating healthy and needed more nutrition. My hands are something I don't really like. It displays my insecurities. So much more, but anyways..  The green on my chest represents an electrical interpretation of my heart beat. What my heat beats for (or what I want) is a heart, home, and cross. I couldn't think of much else. But I think it symbolizes my want to de-attach my spirit from the world. For Jesus says in Luke, "What good is it for a man to gain the whole world, yet lose or forfeit his very self." (Luke 9:25)

By the end the class, we were all tired and cranky. But we weren't done with the day. We were scheduled for "Community Building". That usually means doing check ups on how our group is functioning. Well.. instead, we had our Trustee Fellow, Sarah, say, "We have a suprise! Follow me!" So we walked a few blocks, up the 21st floor of an apartment building, to see the entire 360 view of Sau Paulo. It was gorgeous!

The city is very populated and extends forever. 

That wasn't the only part of the suprise.. we still had an activity to do! And it had to do with fruit!

We had to compete in our groups to name all the exotic fruits in Portuguese...

Then eat it! (That's a a Guava fruit.)

Now... some random pictures of me, a potato, and some cool friends. 

Tami

Caio 

Sneha


And since we're on the topic of cool people, here's a collage of the Doan Family. 

Later babes, 
Lynn