Thoughts On The World Outside

It seems that everywhere I look, there is pain. Cancer, hunger, war, unemployment, death, heartbreak, and sickness seem to be strong in this time period. Usually, it is afar, but currently, friends and family seem to have been stricken. The worst part of it is that in so many situations, we feel powerless to do anything.

The worst part is that we still have so much, despite all the things we have lost. That we have so many blessings, while simultaneously having so many curses. This human duality that allows us to exult and cry. To everything there is a season?

At The Airport

And for a moment between the taxi and flight, I have a minute. Jack Johnson plays in the background at the airport cafe, while the voices at the tables next to me vacillate in nasal Brazilian Portuguese. Yet somehow, this netherworld is a strange sort of home to me. I guess I have always been here. Somewhere stuck in-between, touching a number of cultures and people. Thick nostalgia runs over me, but I am not sure what for. Maybe it's just the note of longing somewhere in Johnson's resigned voice.

In Brazil, they don't say I miss you. They say saudade. Though it doesn't translate exactly, Saudade is the feeling of loss that falls over you when something you desire is gone.

For me, it's leaving the home, never to really return. It's being strong when I don't want to. It's leaving someone you wish you could always touch...because you must. Love? Saudade.

First Thoughts from Brasil: Again

So I feel like being in another country requires a patience that is difficult to come by. I think that my biggest hassle wherever I go is the lack of functionality. Maybe that is my fault. Maybe my comfortable egotistical modern American lifestyle has spoiled me. I want what I want when I want it, and that just doesn’t happen once I leave the comfort of the US. I guess I like to think that our nature is less bureaucratic. It seems to me that it is. I guess that’s why people pay the bribes elsewhere. It is easier to pay the bribes, than wade the mazelike government structure that is paternalistically “helping” the people.

I wonder if Obama’s administration will lead us that way. People are calling it a new day, and I guess for me, it is very positive too. The conversations about the Great American Devil have stalled, if but for a moment. I just have a hard time thinking that some well-intentioned actions have disastrous consequences.