It's been more than a month now that I've started this adventure in Brazil. I think it has been the most eventful month of my - in the meantime - 21 year life.
Because that was the topic I ended my last blog post with: my birthday.
On Saturday morning, March 17th, after a short night, I went to CTA (Centro de Tecnologias Alternativas da Zona da Mata) with some students of the working group on agroforestry, named Grupo Apeti de Agroflorestas. We got there by bike and I think it was the most special bicycle tour of my life. We cycled through a beautiful place of rainforest: Recanto das Cigarras (literally translated as "Cicadas' Corner", or "Hoek van de Cicaden" in Dutch). It's named this way because you can hear the cidadas very loudly. I would compare this sound with the sound of crickets (in Dutch: krekelgeluid), but much louder. During the bike trip we also heard some monkeys... Pretty awesome to start your birthday this way.
When we arrived at CTA, we worked on the surrounding forest, we gathered dead and overflowing plant material and spread them on top of the bare ground, to increase the organic matter of the top layer. We also had a taste of mangoes and passion fruit. Amazing!
After the same beautiful trip back home during midday, we had lunch and relaxed a bit: everybody was tired.
In the evening, just before going to a Calourada, a nice surprise awaited me when my housemates got me a real Brazilian cake and salgadinhos (snacks).
It was a birthday I'll never forget! Thanks everybody!
Last week I got to know the groups of the Agroecology department at UFV: GAO (Group of Agroecology and organic farming), SAUIPE (Group of Integral Health in Permaculture) and Grupo Apeti de Agroflorestas (Group of Agroforestry). I'm participating with these groups, but I mustn't forget my other assignments too.
One of them is participating in the organisation of 'Troca de Saberes' (In English: Exchange of Knowledge), which will take place during the annual and national 'Farmer's week' in mid July at UFV. With a group of students and some professors, there's a weekly meeting in which the event will be build up bit by bit. In smaller groups of students, different themes are taken care of.
I'm also expected to carry out a research study, which will be a life-cycle assessment on the production of bamboo. Tomorrow we are going to a small bamboo farm, to see what it takes to produce bamboo.
Something else: Forró (Brazilian music and dance style). Yes, you've read it correctly: Dance style.
Many people told me I should try, so I thought: let's give it a go! In the picture, you can see Micael and me in the dance room. Micael is a teacher of Forró and he helped me with my inscription. I'm going to take this opportunity to give it my best shot!
Last Sunday we went to play football with some housemates and friends. It was hard for the gringo to deal with the heat, but in the end, it was nice to play. When we went home, we came across two capybaras!
Another nice prospect: Coming Thursday we're going to Salvador de Bahia until the following Wednesday. Coming thursday and friday are holidays in Brazil due to Maundy Thursday and Good Friday. Together with Luca, Luca, Elisabeth, Silvana and Gustavo we're going for this citytrip. We (six people, five nationalities) are all looking forward to this trip a lot!
In the next post I will write about our travel to Salvador de Bahia.
Thanks for reading and take care!
Luc
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