The Fate of a Bean

Many days I have left you in utter suspense about the fate of our dear Bean. So to resume where I left off: We arrived back at Centro, trying desperately to remain optimistic. Maybe Bean has super-kitty ears and he’ll hear Carminha’s pot banging (signifying meal times) and come racing down from the hills? We left a spit trail all the way back so that perhaps he would smell his way back. We couldn’t help but think about the territory he would have to cross, guarded by vicious farm dogs that have been known to bite even humans (we often carry sticks with us to ward them off). Noon came around. Carminha banged the pot. We ate rice and beans, but there were no feline beans. The sun set behind the hills. Carminha banged the dinner pot. We ate rice and beans. No Bean. Night fell, we went to sleep. No Bean. We dreamt of ferocious mountain lion attacks and pouncing wild jaguars. Morning came. No Bean. That afternoon, Dani decided to hike all the way back up to see if she could find any traces of Bean’s livelihood or demise. When she reached the top, she found one little orange kitty meowing and trembling with fear. Overcome with emotion, Dani lunged at Bean to try to hug him. This startled Bean, and he scampered into the bushes. Eventually he came back out and let Dani carry him down the mountain. Celebrations ensued upon their return. For a few days, we didn’t even mind Bean’s annoying mealtime meowing. Even though he pounces on our faces during the night and torments us during mealtimes, we are glad to have our gatinho back.

Bean joins our morning yoga sessions

Bean pushes me to stretch further

Making mischief in a tree

Kickin' it with Brasileiros

Ever since Max arrived and bought a soccer ball in Muriae, we’ve been playing around with it on the lumpy grass patch next to Centro (at Iracambi). When we kick it too hard (no pun intended, trust me, I already used that one up in the title), it goes off the edge and into the forest below, which always makes for exciting bushwhacking ball-retrieval adventures. While this added exploration component adds an enthralling twist to soccer, we longed for the real thing. When Claudio (the owner of the bar in town and the son of Carminha, our beloved cook/savior) told us that we could play indoor soccer with him and his friends in town, Max, Georgia and I were determined to go. It finally worked out for us to go into town last night (they play on Monday), so we gave ourselves the Neymar do (to fit in) and walked for 2+ hours, arriving in Limeira around 7. We devoured many delicious meat skewers (complete with farofa and garlic sauce) and ate various other snacks in lieu of dinner. We watched from across the street as our fellow players arrived and chilled at the bar. They all looked to be in their twenties to early-thirties, and they were all men. Our thoughts were along the lines of, “well shit, prepare to get clobbered and lose a little dignity.” We combatted our intimidation and wandered over to introduce ourselves and practice our Portuguese. When we asked Claudio, “do girls play?” he answered, “Yeah. Tonight.” Well, at least their expectations of our skills would probably be pretty low, so maybe it wouldn’t be a big deal if we got creamed.

We headed over to the field, which was an indoor concrete surface surrounded by a chain-link fence. They play 5 on 5 for an hour straight. Aside from the players, there was a substantial crowd there to watch and socialize. We got there a little early, so we stretched a bit while scoping out the players in the previous game. They looked good. They had moves. They were fast. Their game ended at 9 pm and we split into teams. Max and I were on one team, Georgia on the other.

I was a little timid at first but then I got into the groove. Scored a nice goal and all the Brazilians went wild. Playing with them was the most fun I’ve had playing soccer since I went to Chile in 2008. Everyone was playing for sheer enjoyment. After every eventful play, outrageous noises were squawked by the crowd. Everyone was a great sport, but not for lack of friendly teasing (also hilarious). Our teammates had no problems passing to girls. Botched moves drew guffaws from the crowd, but no one actually cared. There was no pressure, but everyone played hard. I found myself grinning while playing.  I can’t really pinpoint why it was so much more fun than playing pick-up in the states, or why I played so much better.

Scored a couple more goals and megged a dude (they went WILD for that one!), and when I scored a fourth goal from my half (I honestly got pretty lucky), they stormed the field. I clearly reached the zenith of my Olympic-bound career last night, so I end on the best note possible and kiss soccer goodbye. Just kidding, we’re playing again next Monday (maybe I can get 5??).

After we finished playing, we all headed back over to the bar and had some nice Brazilian cool down (literally) beers. Can’t say I’ve ever had a beer right after playing soccer, and damn was it refreshing! When we got back to Centro everyone was asleep. I felt cool. Today I feel sore. But still cool. The end. 

Here I am, taking the field. They let me keep my number!

A Trilha Alta: Bean gets high

For Nanas

Author’s Note: I wrote this post on July 7, 2012 C.E., the day we embarked on our dawn adventure. Some of you already know what happens. Others don’t. At the time I wrote this post, no one at Iracambi knew what would happen (unless someone can secretly see the future).  I will do a follow-up post revealing the subsequent events regarding Bean, even though they have already unfolded. Right now I feel like J.R.R. Tolkien. Just as he knew the fate of Frodo and The Ring that followed their great adventure, I know the fate of Bean that followed his great adventure. So I leave some of you in dire suspense, sensations of power pulsing through my veins, remnants of beans running through my intestines (My new Iracambi motto: "Eat beans every day." Thank you, Dr. Dre [PhD in both sentence structure and botany], for the poetic template).

---------------------------

This morning we awoke at 2 a.m. with a mission: to conquer the Trilha Alta (High trail) by sunrise. We pulled on our adventure clothes, packed a hearty breakfast, and set off in the moonlight. The six of us hikers found ourselves to be seven when we looked behind us to see our trusty kitten, Bean (a.k.a. Feijão), following us. We tried to convince him (?) to turn back, but Bean had made his decision. He was coming with us to the top. Bean inspired us to press on, even when we found that our verbally given directions through the windy, hilly trails were quite unclear. We forded streams and climbed steep, rugged terrain. Signs of our elusive forest companions presented themselves in many forms: a pair of eyes here, a rustle in the trees there, the entrance to a burrow, poop. In certain parts, the trees began to thin and we could make out majestic silhouettes of hills and peaks bathed in the moonlight. During breaks to catch our breath, strip layers, and hydrate, Bean lapped water out of the cap of Sasha’s Nalgene. When we crossed raging rivers, he serenaded us with a chorus of meows from the opposite bank before finally sucking it up and crossing. Aside from this slightly annoying tendency, Bean was no longer our kitten. He was our faithful canine, trotting alongside us through the forest, embarking on mini adventures but always returning to graze our hiking boots. As we climbed higher and higher, our hopes of finding the actual High Trail diminished, especially when our path dead ended. Alas, we turned around and took the other fork. After hiking upwards for about two hours, clouds practically tickled the bugs in our hair when we saw the outline of a sign: “TRILHA ALTA à COMEÇO.” We couldn’t believe our eyes. Two hours of what we assumed was aimless wandering (exaggeration) had brought us to our destination. It was surely Bean’s stellar leadership and strong initiative that got us there. We silently marched along the sacred trail (with cat-like tread) until we reached our viewpoint destination around 4:45 a.m. In the dark we could see that we were perched on an exposed bit of mountain, looking down on layers upon layers of fog-bathed hills (all the hills in the region must be spotless by now, with all their bathing). We had an hour to kill before it started getting light, so we basked on the stretches of (seemingly) volcanic rock, stargazin’, spoonin’, snoozin’.

I awoke as the sky began to lighten, beckoning me to watch the constantly morphing view. The other day I learned that the rising and setting of the sun occurs faster in the tropics than in higher latitudes. This morning I noticed that the colors and brightness changed especially quickly, creating a dramatic effect. As we watched the sky’s performance, we unfurled and devoured our delicious breakfast of Carminha’s cake and homemade bread with guava jam and homemade cheese. We fed Bean generously (a rare treat for the kitten, who normally begs and begs at every meal without reward). This might have been our fatal (potentially literally) mistake. Contented and satiated, Bean ran off…and didn’t return. We ended up waiting on the rocks for two hours for our (not so) trusty gatinho to return, but to no avail. We returned as six instead of seven, and are desperately hoping Bean finds his way back before he gets eaten by the jaguar or mountain lion (we saw its menacing poo) that apparently dwell in those very hills.

More photos coming soon (probably)

Note: Wrote this post a while ago. This is actually what I was doing exactly a month ago. I’ll (hopefully) post about what I’ve been up to here at Iracambi after this.

My last full day in Rio commenced with an improbable reunion with an old friend. Turns out a friend I met when I spent a few weeks in Bolivia in summer 2009 lives in Rio and works 4 blocks away from my hostel, so we met up and spent the morning together. Got to catch up on life and learn more about what it’s like to live in Rio. Met back up with the others, grabbed a blended Açaí (a new food obsession), and hopped on the subway to Parque de Flamengo to check out Cupula dos Povos (The Peoples’ Summit), a Rio +20 event put on by NGOs and indigenous tribes and organizations from Brazil and around the Americas. I approached Parque de Flamengo expecting (not actually) to find a park full of flamingos. When we arrived, it seemed the anticipated flamingos had been driven out by gangs of cats. Not even a pink feather in sight. These cats knew their hood, stalking around like they owned the place. They seemed to have taken over a little corner of their park – probably their operation headquarters. Reminded me of the Aristocats. Despite witnessing this obvious center of activity, we proceeded to join the throngs of people surrounding the booths of the event. Many people wore colorful costumes, and music and dancing livened up the scene. We browsed different stands, some giving information about NGOs and environmental issues, others displaying and selling crafts made by the indigenous. We attempted to join The Peoples’ March that was happening in the area, but failed due to distance and cramped stomachs. Liz made it via taxi and reported it was awesome – tens of thousands of people marching, many dancing in costume. She also happened to run into the guy from Pomona who we’d been trying to meet up with. Further proves my point that Rio is actually a small town.

                When we finished exploring the booths, buying souvenirs/yummy things, marveling at the awesome trees in the park and enjoying the beautiful view of Pão de Açúcar above the water, we headed back to the subway station to return to the hostel. Just as Sasha, Carole and I were heading into the station, we saw Georgia and Emma (who we had lost hours ago) heading in at the exact same time. We deduced that there is a special magnetic field between the members of our little adventure group, because the rate of our convergence when separated was incredible (we didn’t have cellphones).

We got back to the hostel and I got to witness the most impressive bitch-out I’ve ever seen. A woman from São Paulo was frustrated with the hostel for changing her reservation and for the lack of hot water, so after ranting to us for a while, she called the hostel employee up to the room and went non-stop for about fifteen minutes. I didn’t understand much of her angry Portuguese, and I also didn’t understand how she could string so many words together for so long. I want to see this girl in a freestyle rap battle with Nikki Minaj. That evening we went to a delicious Brazilian Restaurant in Ipanema called Bartholomeu and met up with some friends, including Danny Schwartz! Always fun to see friends from home in different countries. It was a fun, delicious dinner. The Portugal vs. Czech Republic Euro Cup soccer game was happening, resulting in excitement and uproar in the restaurant when a goal was scored (Portugal won). We returned to the hostel and sipped some Guaranas at the bar, then called it a night because everything we wanted to do was too far away/expensive and we had to rise early to catch our buses back to Iracambi the next morning.

That night in the hostel there was only one bed left so Sasha and I sneakily shared it. We were moved to a coed room, which was significantly less pleasant. Snoring, stench, drunk men stumbling in late at night… At around 4 am some drunk dude came back and insisted that a bed that a woman was sleeping in was his. She produced her hostel card with that bed number on it, and he didn’t even have his hostel card, but he made a huge fuss and made her move beds (she had already been sleeping there for like 6 hours). In the process he woke up the whole room (and by “process,” I mean a half-hour argument). My clever alliteration for this day’s hostel events: Histrionic hostel happenings.

More on Cupula dos Povos:

http://cupuladospovos.org.br/en/2012/07/final-declaration-of-the-peoples-summit-at-rio20/

Day 5 – Até logo, Rio

We enjoyed our last hostel breakfast and caught a bus to the Rodoviária (bus station). Based on instructions from the hostel people, it would take 40 minutes to get there, so we had plenty of time cushion. Well over an hour had passed, and we were still on the bus. After enjoying classic waterfront scenes of Rio from the bus windows, we found ourselves winding through narrow favela streets. The bus stopped at the janky favela rodoviária (not the one we wanted), and we exchanged glances of horror. We (thankfully) decided to stay on the bus, and eventually ended up at the correct bus station (the hostel had sent us to the right one after all). We barely missed the earlier bus to Muriae, so we caught the later one, leaving us time to gorge on delicious pão de batata and pão de queijo (TOTALLY worth it).

The combination of my satisfied belly and the comfortable bus seats (they tip back impressively far) brought me to a slumber that carried me through the 7 hours of bus rides. I wouldn’t know if I missed 5 drug busts. The part you are all waiting in suspense for: We made it back to Iracambi alive.

Crazy trees at Flamengo Park

Pão de Açúcar

Festivities

Sasha saving Flamengo Park by supporting this tree

Hostel bar with Danny, Euro Cup game in the background

Bidding farewell to Rio from the bus window

Resurrection: Bloggo Redentor

In the struggle between journal and blog, each of them vying for my attention, it is likely apparent to my faithful (and disappointed) readers that my trusty teal journal won the competition. I suppose the expressional niches (of journal and blog) were all too similar, so naturally one had to outcompete the other for the nourishment of my mind.

Yet I am the master of my thoughts and actions (I’d like to believe I’m not possessed), and although I do share initials with both Lotka and Volterra, I, Laura Consuelo Varon Muñoz, choose a different path for those feeding on my observations. This blog is not extinct; it was merely in hibernation. While studying the life history of this fledgling blog, I recently discovered fossils of old blog posts that never encountered the world wide web.

The point of the previous two convoluted paragraphs is: EXCLUSIVE UNPOSTED BLOG ENTRIES FROM THE PAST MONTH+ COMING SOON!

Sorry (not sorry) for all the ecology references (present and future)... I am living in the middle of a forest.