El atropello de la FSB a nuestras paredes.

En las últimas semanas, mientras que caminaba, y circulaba la ciudad de Santa Cruz encontré imágenes redundantes de la FSB en nuestras paredes de edificios. No se quién sea esta entidad de la FSB, lo que se es que no tiene descriminacion contra ninguna pared. Las letras de “FSB” estan en las paredes blancas, paredes azules, paredes cafes, paredes rosadas, paredes anaranjadas. Sin embargo, las buenas intenciones que la FSB de adornar nuestra hermosa ciudad ha tenido un efecto contrario y nos han ensuciado la ciudad. La ironía de esta entidad de la FSB es que parece que no respeta ningún tipo de propieda; publica o privada. Tristemente hemos llegado a saber que la “FSB Vuelve” viendo nuestras paredes sucias. Al la FSB – ya que ahora sabemos que volvieron, serian amables de darnos la dignidad de tener nuestras paredes limpias de nuevo?

(English translation)
In the last few weeks, as I walked, and went around the city of Santa Cruz I found redundant images of FSB on the walls of buildings. Who ever is FSB did not descriminate against any wall. White walls, blue walls, brown walls, pink walls, orange walls, no descrimination. However, the good intentions of FSB to decorate our beautiful city has had an oppositive effect and has instead polute it. The irony of this FSB entity is that it seems that it does not respect any type of property, wether public or private. I guess we all know that the FSB is back, sadly we have come to this knowledge by seeing the poluted walls of our cities. To the FSB- we get the point, now can we have the dignity of our clean walls back?

Why do birds sing?

Past nights – Laying in bed – Listening to birds singing – Wondering why they sing.

I’d find myself walking distracted around Bluffton every spring at any given time of the day. Repeatedly the starting hour of my “Economic Development and the Environment” class was the sacrificial cow. Every time the weather outside was beautiful, my classmates along with my professor would know that I would be arriving 20 minutes late or 10 minutes the least.

If my University offered Bird Communication as a Bachelor of Arts, I’d be the first one to receive an Honoris Causa.

I remember walking several times through the grass looking up the sky and whistling to birds, trying to find them. Everything was growing: the trees were growing leaves, the tulips were opening, the prickly shrubs were getting more bristly, the squirrels were coming out, and the skies on them days were as blue as we could perceive them.

So I aimlessly and randomly decided to communicate with the birds. Since I like to whistle, and hum songs, why not do them with a purpose?

Every time I was outside I listened to what the birds were “singing.” And after days of listening I decided to try it on my own. Walking around campus every time a bird sang, I tried to repeat it, and wouldn’t get a response. I gave up. No more whistling.

Three weeks before school was out, I heard a bird singing, and I whistled to its tune.
I heard a response! Then I whistled again, and I heard a response! And there I was looking at the trees again and whistling and the bird was responding. After 20 seconds of our conversation (by the way I dint have a clue what I was saying), the bird flew besides me two times, and sat in a branch at a tree in front of me.

It was a red cardinal.

It was a time of quietness, awe, and surprise.

- I looked at the cardinal, and (he/she) looked back.
- Tilting and moving his/her head so he or she can
have a better view of me.
- It was two seconds that felt like five minutes.

Never had I experience so close to birds before.

I had two more experiences after that, one with another cardinal, and another with a blue jay.

This story leads me to think, perhaps if as human beings we start listening to each other closely, and try to establish communication we can get a lot of awe moments with each other.

Swish, swish, swish….

Everything has to start somewhere, sometime; otherwise it never started, and never was. So with the words of swish, swish, swish I begin my description of the sequence of events, of thoughts that I’ve had. I get amazed on how words can communicate what we have in our thoughts, and how we feel.

I was in Sao Paulo last week, went to a concrete conference to see what is going on in the concrete market of South America. The day after, I went to a Bourbon Festival at Sao Paulos “Central Park.” I was accompanied by Ryan, a Californian born American. As we were going through the park., I notice that one of my air bubbles from my shoes had popped., I felt uneven. As I walked, I felt that my left leg was way lower than my right one, I had an unnatural, unconscious strut. Not mentioning the amount of pain that it was causing my hips, I decided to POP the air pocket from my right shoe. Who in Sao Paulos “Central Park” would have a knife with them?

Ryan and I approached this outside vendor, and after 4 minutes of trying to explain that we need a knife, she asked us for what. There was not a second, that she lost sight of either Ryan or I. I moved, her eyes moved. Ryan moved, and she moved her head.....

Nevertheless we got the knife. As I holded the knife in my hand, it was difficult for me to make the decision to stab my shoes air bubble. Who in the world would willingly ruin their shoes?

Would you pop your shoes air bubble, just to make it even with the other shoe?

The more I thought of it, the more I did not want to do it. But I knew it had to be done. I took the knife in my hand, I took my shoe off, I placed the tip of the knife on top of the air bubble and I pressed. To make things worst the damn knife would not go through, the rubber was to strong.

I pressed.
I pressed.

It went through. It was finished.

Not believing what I had done, I put my shoes back on and walked. Two minutes later I realized that I had made the right decision. I was now walking even again; I no longer had an unnatural strut.

This even made me think of how things may be in life., and how at times it maybe required that we do something that we don’t want to do to balance our lives - giving something up for our benefit, our comfort, so it may not hinder our growth.

Swish, swish, swish, swish…as I walk around Curitiba, I get reminded of the decision I made last week.

The First

This is the First.