A Beautiful Gift

A friend wanted to surprise me for my birthday. A creative, beautiful friend. Fiona Murphy, you really surprised me! Thank you!!! How touching!

Playdates

So what can one do every afternoons with two small boys with this weather??
Here I have a lot of impeding factors:
- my smallest is too young to join all these "clubes" where they proposed sport activities - capoeira, football, swimming, gymnastic. When he is four it will be easier.
- the layout of the city, and the area where we live do not provide outdoor playgrounds that are convenient. In Beijing we used to meet friends outside and below our tower, there were always a few playing in the shared structures. Here if there is a playground or two in Lago Sul, they will be empty mostly because nobody wants to drive to a playground located along a main road full of traffic and exposed to the blasting sun. Furthermore most people have nice gardens and prefer staying home. Therefore the social aspect of going to the playground is obsolete.
- and in any cases, this is the rainy season and most times playing outside is not really an option.
- but unlike Beijing, indoor playgrounds are limited in numbers, they are usually in the city (count the km) and in malls. I try to avoid.
- and being between holidays (Christmas and Carnival) there is little options to organize art classes home.
That said, each kids has a good number of friends. So I started inviting them at turns at home, to entertain each others. There was that day when I ended up having three over, and for longer than expected. But in most cases, it is bliss for them (and for me). The kids are playing together quietly, busy building lego worlds, playing doctor, making a mess or just watching a movie. See how happy they are.

New Arrivals

When moving to a new place, we can shed our uncomfortable stranger's coat more quickly with the help of a few new friends.  In fact, finding friends is maybe the most important thing when moving. Much more difficult than finding my way to the supermarket.  I have the impression I already mentioned this before (here here and there).
In any cases, there is this family that has been preparing his relocation for a few months, making a pre-assignement trip with his wife in november, dropping suitcases along the way, finding a house, choosing a school, getting a visual on what it is to live here. In other words, this family is arriving here much more prepared than us - not only mentally, but logistically and linguistically. I am envious. Furthermore, a couple weeks ago, on their first week, a greeting crew" was generously organized by a colleague's spouse, emailing a bunch of us to meet the newcomer.  How wonderful. It touched me again, thinking how much such small gathering can make a immense difference in the adjustment process.
So in the matter of one morning, this lovely new lady got to meet a bunch of other lovely ladies, and get a full briefing on the situation here. All this while our kids met each other and screamed their head off played. And this while we binged on coffee and cakes.
Our conversations quickly geared from light to introspective, from serious to desperate: "what do you do? what kind of work can be found here? what kind of work permit can we get?" Answers are candid, desperate or frustrated. But one of us summed it all: either make a baby, work from home or go golfing/horse ridding/kyte surfing.
A few weeks later, it is all business as usual, with the integration process running its course: the newcomer  invites us all to celebrate her son's birthday. Cake, pool, furniture breaking, kids screaming wildly. All back to normal, no need anymore to talk about what we expat wives cannot do here.
Have a bit more cake, dear.

Wet

Before our departure, it had been raining for a while. So I was expecting sunny weather upon our return, as I was assuming that "summer" in Brazil coincided with sun. Isn't that we keep the best time of the year to take kids off school for two months? Just to clarify, living in the southern hemisphere means having upside down seasons, and also upside down school holiday calendar. In other words, the Brazilian summer is also coinciding with Christmas. Therefore, kids here, in the Brazilian school system, are off for two full months. And they will only get two weeks off in July.
So I had imagined that these kids would get a hot sunny summer holiday. Well, no. Poor kids. January is a rainy month. I mean, rains are more like downpours. Or like a bucket of water falling on our head. Tropical rains. Lots of wind and horizontal rain. And many times, a grizzle of rain, more like Vancouver's grey grizzle. And most times, a sky covered in clouds and grey. And more humidity than ever before. I found today a pair of shoes that started collecting mold. A reminder of my days in Congo, where wood furniture, clothes, books, leather articles were all rotting.
But I feel we are lucky. Our kids are back in school, so I only have to manage their activities in the afternoon, not all day like the Brazilian moms... And our house has so many windows opening to our lush garden that it is actually very enjoyable to be home, and to watch it fall outside. When it is not raining here, we can see in the distance the clouds moving over the city and discharging themselves on one Asa or the other, depending on the moment. It is very pristine.
And furthermore, it is easier to keep the house clean... My little monkeys are mostly playing inside, enjoying their many toys received over Christmas.
But don't misunderstand me. When the rainy season comes to an end, we will all be happy...

Athos Bulcao

Brasilia is a city withholding many hidden treasures. Athos Bulcao is one of these major contributor  to the creation of the city, yet his name and work are unknown by most.  This lack of fame is only paralleled by his immense legacy, with more than 80 buildings around the city integrating his ceramic artwork, reliefs and mosaics. The creative patterns he played with, their vibrant colors and their playful combination have also illuminated many of the works of Niemeyer. The French school also has a few of his work integrated into its buildings (but not from Niemeyer).
Bulcao does not believe in inspiration. For him, there is talent and hard work. "Art is cosa mentale" he says, quoting Leonardo da Vinci.
I am quoting here this interesting site:
It was Niemeyer who brought Bulcão to Brasilia, having met him as early as 1943. (...) Bulcão once likened their relationship to that between filmmaker Federico Fellini and composer Nino Rota: Bulcão worked to create graphic moments inside of Niemeyer’s volumes — which might mean designing a room divider, a bas-relief or a tile composition to cover a wall. At times Bulcão’s work calls to mind the math-play of Max Bill, or the generative iterations of Sol Lewitt. Bulcão’s orientation was not so much artistic as architectural, and the net effect is nothing short of mesmerizing.
Here is few images of his work:

Thank you Google. 
I came across the work of this important artist because of my kids and their teacher. At first I heard them pronounced this strange name (a-tos-boo-con). Then slowly, after numerous collages and drawings brought home, I came to interest myself a bit more about Bulcao's legacy. And slowly, we have started to spot Bulcao's work here and there around the city. Emmanuel is best at pointing it out.
Only today I realized that the entire primary school was in fact creating and working following Bulcao's inspiration. A group called Triade was invited to familiarized the students with the artist's work, and learn from him in various workshops and ateliers.  Interestingly, Triade received several recognitions for its contribution to the promotion of the historic heritage of the city.  Here is a little movie about how Triade is working with the students.
Today by accident we came across Niemeyer's Igrejigha - the tiny chapel with lyrical proportions - in the asas. We stopped, paused in front of the azulejos (ceramic tiles), and felt happy to live in such an interesting place.  Later, this interesting exhibition of our children's work gave us something more to be proud of.

The New 30

When one hits the wall of a new decade, a few options are possible: escape alone, celebrate, or get plastic surgery. Since I have kids and a husband I love fondly, escape is not an possibility. Plastic surgery is neither an option for me. Brazil has more strange-looking creatures altered by surgical knifes than anywhere else in the world, and their encounter is a proof it is not a good idea on the long term. (That topic is entirely for another blogpost; in the meantime read this). Therefore, celebration is certainly the best antidote to forget the wrinkles, presbyopia, white hair, and memory loss awaiting me sooner than later.
As I look back at forty years of my life, I can say I am pretty happy of my choices and my path. Of courses there are some slights regrets, people that I miss and regret, and events that were missed. But overall, my path has been rich and happy, at times difficult, but that certainly makes me a stronger bitch lady.  My only wish would be to have more time each day to do all these things I love doing, to have more time with everyone I love.
In that sense, celebrating tonight with friends is a way to ensure I do not spend more time pondering on the past, neither planing ahead my next time years. To be in the present, to be fully living the moment is the best antidote to aging. So my dear darling hired a DJ, invited my best new friends, found someone to cook a delicious paella to feed all, dimmed the lights, and here we go, we had an awesome party! Happy Birthday to me!

Thanks everyone for the great evening!!!

Things that Live With Us

Returning in Brasilia means returning to sharing our house (read my previous post). Since we moved in, we also have enjoyed the beautiful view of numerous birds, who come around all day. Sparrows, hummingbirds and green parrots are the three types I can recognized, but there a number of other (unidentified by me) species who come around our garden. The green parrots are the loudest and the funniest, keeping on flying around arguing in pairs at any hour of the day. They are so numerous, and come around so often that the kids have dubbed our house "la maison des perroquets".
Upon our return, we discovered a family of birds nested in the branches of a plant in our deck. Mommy bird probably suddenly worried to see little blond heads peering every now and then on their fragile abode. The little chirps opened their beaks hungrily every time the branches holding their nest were rattled. In less than two weeks, they were gone, the nest was left empty. This is the third nest we find around the house, the first one was hidden in the foliage of the vine with colorful eggs. The other one was hidden in the roof structure of the terrace, from which a little birdie ended up dramatically falling.

Another day,  as I opened the dining room window, I noticed the fattest toad nesting in a flower pot. I am talking about a 2 or 3 pounds heavy guy, completely immobile, not blinking even an eye, comfortably tucked in the little dip created by the shoving of his body in the sand of the pot. The kids worriedly asked me to close the window, expecting the beast to jump in any second. For a couple days we saw him there, sometimes his body to the right, sometimes to the left. And then after another heavy rain, he was gone. I kind of liked him, thinking of him as a good mosquito repellant.
And recently, some kind of strange loud and deep cry was heard, and repeated at regular interval, in the growing darkness of the early evening. At first my mind imagined some kind of large bird - a toucan maybe. It would make sense that something big makes such a loud noise. Looking out and around the house, force to realize that it was not that. The sound was emitted around the pool, and rather from something low. After a few minutes of unsuccessful search, I went to consult my local expert. My gardener confirmed it was probably a little frog, sitting in the pool pipes, signing its head of. She did, all night, for two nights. Her call had more to do with the barking of a seal than anything frog-like. Who would have thought? Or maybe Canadians cannot imagine the wildness of Brazilian wildlife!
I still prefer my fat toad.
Maybe he is a prince?!

Back Home

After 3 days in NYC, 3 weeks in Canada in 3 different cities, coming back to Brazil felt like a necessity. Returning to "our home". Our things. It is amazing that after such a special time away, we felt so excited to return to our own beds, to our own lives. But that is what holidays do to you, they make you happy, and then they make you happy to be back - if they are long enough.
Our flight was smooth, the kids overused the ipads, ipods, mini-DVD players and slightly less the other non-electronic devices. The on-flight food was tasty as usual for everybody; barely-touched trays were returned to the steward. Noam was surprised to recognized all of Panama airport - it is not that big after all. And both kids eventually collapsed of exhaustion less than two hours before landing (out of a trip that lasted more than 22 hours door to door). I call this type of timing a perfect example of Murphy's law.
Upon landing, the Brazilian custom agent took time to analyze our documents, and requested the help of two more officers before letting us go - which brought my two exhausted boys to tears. And of course collecting our suitcases was not the fastest. Just as we reaching the taxi line, my elation to exit the terminal was dampened by my youngest's call, forcing us to change the course of our exiting travel  (me pushing our five suitcases, four handbags, and hauling waddling two kids at 2 AM) in search of a bathroom. But other than that, our travel was smooth. As smooth as it goes for a trip this long with two small hobbits.

2013

Snow Land

It was something anticipated for a long time. Something I have missed for many years now. The snow. The real white snow, fluffy, falling from the sky.  The snow, the cold and the mysterious drape of richness the landscape wears on for a while. The snow that does not melt in 24 hours. The snow to play with.
I love winter. Hard to justify to people born and raised under the tropics, but I love it deeply, it is in my blood. And now after a long period of no-winter (for me the Beijing no-snow land is not really winter, despite its below zeros moments), I was happy to take everyone for a real Canadian one, during the holiday season.
So our landing in the white landscape was successful. For the entire duration of our stay, we had a daily dose of snow, and very mild (winter) weather (read: nothing below -8 degrees). It was wonderful.
The kids enjoyed the pleasures of winterland and there was many first times: sledging, skiing, skating, snow fights, snowman construction. Even ski-dooing for the big boy. The best snow for skiing ever. Grand-papa had as much fun as the kids.We watched a real hockey game, complete with a fight (oops!) and saw a distant cousin repeat her figure skating solo for her next provincial competition. We even did some bowling (a winter indoor sport, that is!). There were more snow days, days with cousins and distant cousins, food at one aunt or another. And lots of gifts. Santa knew about our trip, it was good we prevented him in our letter.
We enjoyed some winter sliding galore in Quebec City with the kids before heading in the street of the old city, where we celebrated the new year with old friends, under the snow, with the music of DJ Boy Georges. We stayed in the most interesting hotel of the region, the Hôtel-Musée of the First Nations, in Wendake (indian reserve). The New Year brunch there was exceptional.
Montreal's streets were covered in snow after the snowstorm of the century, and me pulling the kids around in a sled. The vibrancy of its streets. Visiting old friends after so many years. Good food. Oh did I say good food?! More outdoor fun. More fun with the cousins.
The only damper to all this was dressing/undressing of the kids in little winter mummies, in itself a Canadian mom national endurance sport.
Some pieces of evidence here:

snowman

sliding

happy

after midnight - santa was there (see the plate?)

stockings opening

christmas morning

 unexpected moment: fixing the plower

walking in the woods (1.4 km)

watching hockey

skidoo fans

absolutely the best snow ever to ski

 riding up the mechanical lifts on a tube

native way - but not our hotel room

New Year celebrations in the old city

ridding a montreal bus

small hobbits in Montreal street, post-century storm
hobbits at the biodome

getting dressed

watching the ballet of snow animals from our windows
keeping ourselves well-fed