Ain't no blizzards 'round here...

at the same time 17.5" of snow fall on Brooklyn...we get a little sun in the Valley

Three cities and a baby

Being back in Brooklyn was at first a little bizarre--as if the past two weeks hadn't even happened. A fever dream in the middle of a freezing cold holiday flurry. My tan line and my deep sense of relaxation (and this blog) are my constant reminder that I really did just pick up and have a few adventures.

One of the ideas for the trip was to visit Frances in Capao as she prepared for her first child. I won't lie, pregnancy, labor, children, mothering, are all a bit frightening to me. Being with Frances and reading Ina May Gaskin's Guide to Childbirth while I was in Capao has at once exposed me to my own fears around childbirth, and the fears that many of us women in the US harbor--as well as help me overcome and address some of these fears. The way we pregnancy is represented in the mainstream media goes something like this: women is pregnant, fine, she is then overcome with labor at an inconvenient moment and often needs modern medicine to come to the rescue. The idea is that your body, your womb, your vagina, the whole kit-and-caboodle, can't really *do this*. You need help. Case in point (but this time men with guns to the rescue).

Luan

Frances and Diego were really beautiful to witness as they got ready for their new baby. A true inspiration. And guess what?? Luan arrived at 4:04am Monday morning. A home birth. A beautiful boy. Mama is recovering well in the sun of Capao. Congratulations family!

Now, I'm waiting for my cab to JFK to whisk me away to LA, the next leg of this here adventure. I'm deciding whether or not to take my laptop...the idea of traveling without it is almost too good to resist...

Fumaça finalmente

Me and Fumaça, we went all the way. To the top that is. I headed out at 7:30am to beat the guided groups (chatty guides are *the worst*) and the heat. The straight up climb for about 40 minutes leads to an ethereal plateau that once feels like the moon and like you should see cows grazing. The sky was full of puffy, thick clouds and I was welcomed by pretty much every bird and bug that lives in Capao. And even in a swift little snake.

The view from midway up...

the edge

over the edge (ray ray don't look!)

and I thought I was all alone until I heard a flute--a man tooting away at the top of Cachoeira da Fumaça!

Yesterday, I ate.

Sexta-feira (Friday), Frances and I hung out at her sweet little maison and ate. I mean, we also did a little yoga and talked and talked and talked and cooked. Oh yes, and I, um, blogged. The sun was out and after the long day before with Campinas and magic Israeli rasta tahine, we were ready for relaxation. Diego e Kiara went to Ciabra, a neighboring town, to do some shopping and Frances and I were left to our own devices (and our stomaches).

cafe de chapada

I had my first cup of coffee in a week with these little cookies I bought at the mercado--they taste like they were made with butter from cows fed really hearty hay and grass, almost like sheep's milk. Foi delicioso.

cafe a manha chez Frances

F is a wiz in the kitchen. She made yogurt, fresh acerola juice (suco de acerola), tahini sauce, teriyaki soy protein stir fry, eggs with arugola and majoracao, toast and ghee and cucumber tomato salad...and I'm sure I am forgetting a few things.

We finished the day off with the weirdest and tastiest pizza I've ever had. For days I've heard about this pizza. It was the first and only restaurant in Capao for a very long time. The owner is a Swiss guy who very clearly loves his pizza, his restaurant and pretty much everyone who comes in. In short, he was extremely friendly and happy to see us. Kiara had been to this joint fifteen years earlier when she visited Capao. She said the pizza is almost exactly the same--still perfect.

psychedelic pizza

It's made on a light bread dough so the crust is light and crispy. There is a bit of tomato sauce, a layer of grated carrots, mozarella and then pesto made of majoracao (brazilian basil--a bit spicy), garlic and green olives. The condiments that accompany the one and only type of pizza served here are: soy sauce, spicy honey and olive oil. Weird, I know. Heavenly, who knew? Diego doubted we could eat the Famiglia size, but Kiara and I ate the man and the pregnant lady under the table. With a beer to boot. Never underestimate an 82 year old italian woman who is willing to pick up and live in rural Brasil for several months. And never underestimate a Swiss fella with a vision for pizza. Did I mention that he grows almost every ingredient? This pie alone is worth the 24 hour trip from New York.

Magic Israeli rasta tahini

Nir e Nati started making tahini out of necessity. They are an israeli couple who met in India (Frances says that Nati was living in some cave in India and Nir read about her and decided that she was the woman for him and went to India to find her) and decided to move to Brazil to raise a family. They settled in the Vale do Capao and built a spiral-shaped adobe house with an open air meditation deck on top that gives you a 360 degree view of the mountains. They built a compostable toilet (very popular here in Capao with the permaculture community--coolest one so far at Campinas), a small pool for their son, Ganesh, and worked the land to grow various vegetables and herbs.

Nir (left) e Nati (right) in their tahini studio

The one thing that was missing was tahini. Nati has stories about how she tried to find tahini in India (not easy) and they realized that it was just too expensive here in Brazil, and not very good either. They started making it to satisfy their tahini needs and have launched a business making tahini, peanut butter, tahini/peanut spread, and these little energy balls with cocoa, tahini, coconut, guyana, and other goodness. They were incredibly welcoming--as is everyone here in Brasil--and we stayed and chatted til the fireflies came out.

I bought a kilo of tahini to bring back to the states--so don't worry my tahini loving friends, there will be magic rasta tahini for all!

And back in Brooklyn...

Pablo e Lemon. Eles moram no Brooklyn. Photo credit, Ray Ray S.

Campinas

The days of the week don't really have names here, they are more to keep time, which seems very biblical. Thursday is Quinta-Feira or "fifth day." Well, feira means day, holiday, market, all sorts of things--which is very bahiana. Like belleza, which translates into beauty, but people say when they greet you "Ola! Belleza!" 

So on the quinta-feria, the goddess of all things belleza made this:

Frances and I walked from her place in Los Campos/Entrada Fumaça to Campinas (about an hour), an intentional community that has been around for about thirty years. We ran into a few friends of hers who give beijos on the cheeks and on her belly, exclaiming belleza! of course. Arriving at Campinas, we find some very dreadlocked, rasta kids stoking the wood fire preparing a lunch of squash stew, pasta salad, and rice. At this point in time Campinas is a bit smaller than it has been in years past--about thirty families could live on the land, cultivating various projects. Today it is a bit more of a communters commune, with folks coming in and out, but as with any community there is always an ebb and flow.

One of the founders, Nede, had just returned and she was petite, strong and all business. She had taken a sixth month siesta from Campinas to make some money working in her ex-partners pizza shop in town. Downtown Capao is a whole other story. Maybe  a bit like Woodstock, I imagine. A new girl had just arrived the day before from Germany and her one year old, Louie, was crawling around on the floor pretty much just licking the ground and eating dirt. At one point he picks up a lead pencil and Frances says, 

Um is that a pencil in his mouth?

and the girl responds, Oh yes, he eats everything! He eats ze bugs, ze trees, za dirt, it's all sooo natural.

Hmmm, but that's lead, says Frances.

He is so healthy, no problems with ze digestion, notheeeng...

Right. A few minutes later I look over and li'l Louie is splashing in his own pee on the ground. I say to his mama, 

Uh, that, er, water is "new."  

Oh! Is it xi-xi?

Xi-xi?

Pee. 

Right. She goes over and mops up the floor, but not really, then wipes her baby down with dirty xi-xi rag. This is all sooo natural! We are in nature, right? Pencils for everyone! Mama then goes to climb a tree and Louie crawls outside and starts cramming fist fulls of mud in his mouth. Nede, is tossing over very disapproving looks.  Frances is just pretending like she isn't really seeing any of it. I play a bit with Louie who makes low grunting gutteral noises as he plays.

Frances preparing the alavante, which she will use as
an antiseptic soak after her baby boy is born

We go on a tour of the herbario, one of the few successful projects of Campinas that brings in money for the community. Nede runs it of course. Apparently the other cofounder is returning soon, after an absence of about fifteen years, to open a Waldorf school on the land. It all sounds very mythic--the return of the founders. At the herbario, there are vibrant greens and flowers with every medicinal purpose one can imagine. The Chapada Diamantina, the forested area of Bahia, is semi-arid land. The soil needs to be worked vigorously to grow things beyond various fruit trees and flowers. The land at Campinas is very rich and has been worked very hard by thousands of people over the years. 

A girl blows a conch shell to signal that lunch is ready. Nede has chopped up a beautiful salad of bitter greens and herbs from the garden. And if you have the ovaries, you can sprinkle some of the hot pepper oil on your dish. The peppers are the size of small beetles--you know what they say about small packages...I get up to get Frances some more pasta salad and the german girl says, 

Excuse me, but we try to make sure that everyone gets one serving before going for seconds. 

Of course, but, this is for Frances, ela esta muito gravida.

Yes, well there are many who have not eaten their lunch.

Right. Two men went up just before me and filled their plates. And people have been chatting and eating for about an hour. And lunch is served at pretty much the same time everyday. And three people blew the conch to alert everyone that food was ready. But no matter, I sit back down. I only took a little bit at the beginning to make sure there was enough to go around--I should've realized the loophole when everyone else sat down with heaping, piled-high plates. Frances goes up herself after to get her damn pasta and the girl says nothing. Later, she tells Frances about the same rule (though Frances e Diego lived in Campinas last year) and then asked who her man was. Oy. Nede, sits across from me and says some things in portuguese that I don't understand, but you can tell that she has a bone to pick already. 

I sit outside and let the perfect day rest on my skin. My legs are definitely browner than they were a week ago. As we get ready to leave--Frances with her borrowed birthing pool and alavante bouqet in hand, Kiara with a bundle of fresh herbs for her soups and frittatas, and I with very warm skin--Diego is called back to the kitchen by Nede. Very frantic. Turns out that li'l Louie did the inevitable. He took a big ol' baby poop on the floor and his mama, Madame au naturel, wiped it up with her hands and went to wash it in the food sink. Nede hit the shingled roof and the new girl was done for. Diego translated the scolding into german so there was no mistake. Some lessons are hard won. I couldn't help but smile just a little at the thought of the scolder being the scolded. I think it all really just struck because it was the first time since I've been in Brasil that someone wasn't really all that welcoming. Another gringa in the mix, né?

I just heard that some people consider this area a vortex, which makes total sense. Karma is very instantaneous in these here parts.

This Valley Girl's got a new valley...

I started up the trail to Fumaça (big waterfall where the water evaporates before hitting the ground, thus creating a smokey effect) this morning, toute seule. The trail is basically rock stairs straight up for two hours. It was seriously divine. I also learned that if I am by myself and there's no one to hear me say, Damn, this is hard, then I don't say it, and I don't even really think it. I'm going to keep chewing on that one for a bit.

On the way up to Fumaça

And then after this hike in the roiling, yet comforting sun of the Vale, I head out on another adventure to RioChino, the local swimming hole. The walk there (about 4km) was the most peaceful and exquisite place I've been in years. These photos hardly do this place justice.

A few donkeys and motorinos only passed me on this road..

RioChino swimming hole (there's Frances e Diego!)

Vale do Capao

The internet has been out for two days because of a rainstorm, such is life in rural Brasil...here's what's been a'brewin'.


I made it to Capao, where it is, yes, raining. It is so beautiful and magical here in the Chapada that it doesn't really matter. Frances is ginormous and glowing gravida gorgeousness and Diego is a bearded knight in shining armor as he appears at 6am to pick me up at the bus station in Palmeiras. I was also greeted by Keke, part of Frances's birthing team and Kiara, Diego's spry 82 year old Italian mother. We speak french, natch.

The whole ride back to Capao I soaked in the beautiful surroundings, the extremely bumpy road (serious negotiations with my bladder until we stopped and I peed in the bright shiny morning light of the road to Capao) and the fact that Frances's doctor has a mullet. He is argentinean and quit a successful medical career as an epidymiologist in Buenos Aires to become a puppeteer. Business up front, party in the back. Bonjour, Capao, eu adoro.

principessa da capao

I have a princess bed at Kiara's for the first two nights and I take a long nap to the sounds of the kids playing next door. The rain floods the houses a bit and then we take a delicious lunch prepared by Kiara and accompanying smokey babaganoush and deliciously garlicky jaca (a brasilian fruit that can be made into nearly anything) hummus made that morning by Frances. She has quick become a wizard of Brasilian, organic, creative cuisine. I'm so happy to be here. 

Little bug wings lightly coat the floors, the windows, all conceivable surfaces. These winged ants don't live more than a few hours and they leave behind their translucent, brownish wings in memory of their unfulfilled teeny lives I suppose. Muito bichus. And birds (one that sounds like a kitten mewing!) and every color flower and herb and tree. I am overwhelmed with the richesse. 

the porch of Kiara's casita, where I swing in the hammock and read about natural birth 

The evening's exercise consists of eating more soup and bread with little local avocados com, stewed tomatoes a la Kiara and killing mosquitoes--Frances and I are a deadly duo. I am full full full!

The Unofficial Mayor of Salvador

It always happens that right in the moment I can never remember how to say something appropriate. Seems very Dana. But here, in Brasil, it's more that I remember just after I mumble some nonsensical blur of engfraportugelish the actual way to express that which I'm trying to impart on the generally innocent brazilian bystander. No one seems to mind, and for the most part it works. Et ca c'est la vie ici. Easy, tranquilo. A place where you can point at the empty seat on the bus, temporarily forgetting the term for seat is "lugar", say "Esta personne?" and the person shakes their head (maybe thinking, "uau, gringa doida") and the seat is mine. 

This kind of kakimame communication and buzzing about is the charm of Bahia e Salvador. And the unofficial mayor of Salvador? His name is Glazer (though it flashes Antonio when he calls me on the portable he secured for me). Glazer, met me on the corner up the street from Rogerio e Flavia's to take me for some sopa and give me more medical supplies to bring to Frances e Diego--he is a trusted and beloved friend of theirs for many years. 

Aspirator? Check. Heart monitor? Check. Rubber gloves? Check check check.

I quickly learned that Glazer knows everyone in the Barra (lower neighborhood) and we basically say hi to them--being everyone--as we squirrel our way through the streets picking up imosec (immodium for those not so fresh moments), ibiprofeno, 3 crazy tshirts to wear on New Year's Eve (though they seem highly flammable, so don't wear near an open flame or even if you are very warm potentially), e os otras coisas. We say 'tudo bem?' to the butcher, the baker, the sopa maker and his mother, all the ladies 'ola querida!', some friend at the department of information (we stopped for "information" on what, je ne sais pas), oh, and even his pilates teacher. He has lived in the neighborhood for thirty years. I get the distinct feeling that he has networks in high and low places, possibly a higher-up in the Salvador gay mafia, and could manifest most anything desired. All of this in the package of a short, roundish man with stylish thick glasses, snazzy sneakers and an engaging, rapid fire chatter.

Glazer asks, Where would I like to go? I respond, Can we see the sea? He says, Of course, and off we go, winding through the piles of bottles, sugar cane remains, trash, cobblestones and the streets teeming with afterwork holiday shoppers. I follow him into a building and up to the fifth floor. I ask where we are going, he says, my pilates class. Glazer seems to always have a plan so you just have to trust. We knock on the door, he explains something to his smiling, welcoming teacher, and she leads me through the confused class in mid-posture to the window, pulls aside the taut white curtain and points. Et voila. If you lean in, tilt your head at the right angle there it was. The sea. Or, the Atlantic, rather. She then lovingly guides me over to the other window for what I can only assume is another view, and yes, there it was again. We giggle (oh, there's a whole other post coming on how Bahian women embrace their eternal girlish playfulness), I spend a few moments embracing the waves and the setting sun and then we are on the move again. God, what I wouldn't have given to stay in that class and do some pilates--my sciatics are killing me.

We kavetch about our aching hips like old women and take a soup together. He tells me that he has to warn off sweets, but then we order um bolo (the cake). We split it and we tell his liver to just relax and enjoy. To get the medical supplies we head up to his place, a tiny brightly painted apartment with a disproportionately large flatscreen and his proudly displayed collections of buddhas. He is an ardent buddhist. Very matter-of-factly, he says that my bus ride that evening to Palmeiras (near Capao) will be hell with my aching sciatic nerves so he lays down a little mat, a sheet, and pulls out a big automatic massager. He says its helped him, So lie down. So far he hasn't lead me astray. For the next fifteen minutes he leans into me with that massager and my hip pain is temporarily relieved. 

I tell him its a first to have a man buy me dinner and massage me and not expect something more. Pretty much I'd have to be darker and with penis to do it for him anyway, so we are a great match.

Oh and in the elevator he says, you know you'd have trouble if you stayed her in Salvador. Why, I ask. Because you have a huge ass. Ha. Maybe the smallest at Porta da Barra beach, but big enough for the unofficial mayor of Salvador to note. 

Next stop, Capao, the hippie kingdom of Bahia, where Frances e Diego are nesting and getting ready for the newest member of their family. 

How do you tell a gringa from a brasiliera?

Turns out that anyone not from Brasil is considered a gringo. Even if they speak the most perfect portuguese you've ever heard, know how to make exquisite bananes e quejo com tapioca, and can fasten a sarong into every conceivable form of covering. It´s not a bad thing to be a gringo here, it´s actually rather endearing. I received a discount from the boy at the mercado who said normally he is R$300 but for me, gringa, he was only R$50. Well, well, it pays to be a gringa, I suppose.

I've heard various interpretations of the history of "gringo", but Paola, my hostel comrade from Uruguay who studied history before becoming a line cook and traveling 7 months out of the year, says it came from Mexico when they were demanding that the US military leave. The US military wore green and the people would shout "Green, Go Home!" which turned into green-go...gringo. Hadn't heard that one before, can anyone of my many readers confirm that?

Paola gave me this colorful explanation as we swam  in the river Imbassai this evening. We walked down along the beach with only the moon and stars and twinkling beach pousada lights to guide us. Again, the ink black water was warm like a relaxing bath and after my day of napping and feeling crummy I was reinvigorated. If you dipped your feet down too far you would hit the cold water and maybe some algae which felt a little unnerving given the absolute blackness of the sweet water river. Some kids trounced down the bank with a little radio, laughing, our heads bobbing in the water like coconuts as we watched them.

The other way you tell a gringa (me) from a brasiliera (not me) is by my shoes (and lack of wearing a bra--these gals love 'em high and dry). Which leads me to the next little ditty about Imbassai:

One outfit, three days. I hopped the onibus to Imbassai thinking I would take a day trip. I stayed three nights. I didn´t bring any extra clothes and have rinsed my shirt and skirt out in the brownish tap water of the hostel and blasted them dry with the room fan. Just goes to show you don´t need much. I did manage to bring my toothbrush and an eyelash curler (why that was floating in my bag, who knows...). I also made the transition from my brown slip on loafers (one size too big) to the traditional Havaianas sandles. This is how I shed my New Yorker and embrace my brasilian surroundings. Quando na praia...

ay, gringa!

havaianas, the bahian flip flop--a must.

done and done.

tchau e beijos little shoes!

I am destemplada

It means hot and cold interchanging moment to moment. I´m a bit oversunned, ay gringa, and feeling the sneaky bastard little cold I´ve been avoiding, trying to weasel it´s way into my evening of dancing. Fucker. So in trying to infuse my brain with happy, healthy tho
ughts, here´s what I got:

Brasil. Life is so simple. Yet the phones are bizarrely complicated. Its a mystery whether you dial the operator, the area code, both or none, when calling someone.

Brasil. A country so rich with beautiful flora and fauna to eat. Yet everyone eats unripe tomatoes.

Today I ate a whole fish, walked on the beach in the rain, bargained successfully for a beautiful pair of earrings for Kiki, played many games of thumb war with the hostel bebe Noel, and fed little macacos (teeny monkies) bits of bread and watched them chase some kittens.

River Imbassai

Me and macaco

Brasilian Pablo e Lemon

Noel and his awesome bed head

Of course there´s not a bug living in your foot

Eventhough it was raining when I got to Imbassai, it was a nice change of pace to Salvador. Its just before the tourist season (ie Christmas) and the weather was a bit crap so the town was quiet and sleepy. Mango, caju, coco trees line the roads. I met Erika right off the bus as we tried to divine our way to the beach. In Brazil you get dropped off the highway and then have to figure your own way to the coast. You can hop on a motorino or taxi or just walk. I stopped for a salad of shrimp and octopus and itty bitty garbanzo beans and the mandatory Skol (cerveja). The sun was not really making any kind of appearance, clearly.

After we get to the beach, the cloudy cloudy beach, the conversation goes as follows,

I think I have a bichu do pe.

What is a bichu do pe?

Its, you know, a bichu, a bug, and it goes in your foot and lives there.

How long has your foot been bothering you?

About 2 or 3 days.

Hmmm...I´m sure you don´t have a bug living in your foot.

Ya, you are right, probably.

So we settle down and pretend like it is sunny and order a beer, and Erika starts to look at her toe. Eduardo our waiter, hereafter to be known forever as Dr. Eduardo, kneels down mumbles something in portuguese and then whips out what looks like wire cutters and proceeds to dig into Erika´s toe. I´m a bit in awe. I offer her a sip of beer, given the circumstance. For 10 minutes he digs out little things and its pretty effing gross, and then their is obviously some sort of finally. He is wiping these "things" in her hand.

I ask, hey what´s that?

Eggs, says Erika.

Oh. I drink some beer.

Here is the action captured on film.

 

Dry run, wet friday

Yesterday I got to the rodoviaria (bus station) at the exact moment that my bus north was leaving. Boo. So I went back to Salvador, had a lovely dinner of carne del sol and pirao do aipim and beacoup das cervejas. Flavia and I chatted away into the night with her beautiful crafts, playing dress up with necklaces and brincos (earrings) and celebrating her upcoming adventures in January. Boa sorte dear Flavia.

So nothing lost, except I wake up early to go back to the rodoviaria for going to the beach and its raining. All. up. the. coast. But I go anyway. Wish me luck. Peut-etre I return back in time for spaghetti dinner at the book store and a talk on wikileaks.

Boa sorte me!

Wednesday in pictures, mostly.

I am staying with Flavia (see my blog roll) and Rogerio in Salvador, Bahia. I looked at his books of photography this morning as I drank very strong coffee, suco de guyava and ate some version of a pineapple (smaller and whitish, but delicious). His photos of Palestinians in Jordan and Lebanon are beautiful. One photo of a woman holding a large key, the key to her home she was forced from after 1948, with the intention of one day returning to her home and using that key again, moved me to tears. The clear, unwavering commitment to a future that is so unsure is something I am not wholly familiar with and au meme temp it is this same vision for justice that keeps me going. Ok...I digress a bit. I'm two days of beaching, walking and speaking a Tower of Babel mouthful. So let's just get on with some pictures...worth 1,000 words right?

Today is the feria, Nossa Senhora da Conseicao da Praia, and I "celebrated" by traveling to the Itaparica Island, just off the coast of Salvador. The water was bathwater warm, I ate little fried fish and found many "tresors" in the sand. We went a bit off the beaten path where a few families (babies, kids, dogs AND horses) were picnicing (splashing, running, kicking soccer balls/sand/eachother, and loads of laughter).

boy riding his pet horse

older boy hassles kid on the horse

older boy #2 throws sand at him

And then I ate this crazy fruit (acajou) that is the actual fruit of the cashew nut...it made my teeth and throat feel weird. Call me gringa, but it was a little trop bizarre.

and then I became uma sereia bahiana (mermaid of bahia).

The end. Fin. Finito.

from a glacier to a beach

I pride myself on being able to sleep without interruption on an airplane. Usually, I fall asleep before the plane takes off and wake up for a moment in the middle to see the clouds and lights below and then fall back into sleep until the plane begins to descend. Not this time. I was half asleep and my head whirled with portuguese phrases, french conjugation and even some spanish nouns and adjectives scattered about in there. I was wrapped up like a mummy on this glacier posing as an aircraft and unable to sleep. I woke up as the sun was rising and flipped once again through my blue portuguese notebook hoping something additional would stick in my portuguese-baby brain.

I watched the sun rise out a crack in the window shade...the sky going from a violet to silver to rust and rose, and there I was, mummified and remembering this feeling of relief and release in being above it all. I opened to a page with the words YOU ABOVE ALL scrolled across it. I don't have any idea when I wrote it, I just remember hearing or reading the phrase somewhere and knowing that it was important enough to write down. Like, Dana, remember this, it will mean something later. Et voila.

Messages coming from all over to remind me that taking this trip, by myself, is a bit of the divine. And if I had my doubts, all was reassured when I saw the masses of flesh a praia da barra and spent the day swimming, eating roasted cheese with oregano and molasses (ain't no hot dog that can touch that beach snack) and laying in the sun. O fundamentilismo da bunda (the fundamentalism of the ass--as theorized by R) dominated the beach and I have never seen so much greased up, slicked down, squeezed and dimpled flesh as I did today. I had the smallest booty on the beach believe it or not. I like to believe I could fit in, um, that way.

Well, there's always tomorrow.

boa viagem

Thrill me brazil,
show me just enough.

Can't sun my tits there, but Brazil it's ok,
because my blood's gone cold and I will forgive anything if I can be warm again.

I savor my eggplant tonight, soon to be aipim, guava and pinhãos.
I read about traveler's diarrhea, which I know well, but have always just called it plain ol' diarrhea.

A teacher once told me she didn't poop all the way through some spiritual trek across Nepal. 
Soul sausage is the actual Chinese medicinal translation.

Oh thrill me Brazil!
Rip the hair right out of my soul crotch
follicles and all.

Show me a shoulder, a brown one, my own
blending in with sands and root vegetable skins,
parts puffy and crinkly to the touch
by the end.