Kite-parinhas in Cumbuco

Wow. I have now survived two days of kiteboarding in Cumbuco with my Portuguese speaking Brazilian instructor Marcelo. I've got to say I was a bit hesitant at first about going with a portuguese speaking instructor, but the boys at the kite shops assured me I understood enough Portuguese that it would be ok. And it has been. Good news though, Marceloa does speak a little bit of english, like red, black, 11 o'clock and dude. so awesome. It has been such a cool way to learn Portuguese by also learning how to kite. I feel like everyone should go to a foreign country and try to learn something in another language, it is awesome. 

We started off the first day, with 2 hours in the afternoon on the beach. Marcelo showed me how to set up the kite, we talked about some of the safety aspects, which involved much rolling around in the sand, not quite so comfortable let me add, and then we finally flew the kite (at least together) on the first day. Now I'm sure you can imagine as an outside not knowing alot about kiting or a bystander on the beach must have though it was fairly hilarious, that I was wrestling around in the sand with the kite, I'm sure it looked a bit like wrestling an elephant seal, minus the wild animal, but still lots of squirming and rolling around on the ground. 

Day 2 of kiting began once again on the beach. The morning was filled mostly with me flying the kite on my own and learning how to land and launch the kite. Mid-morning the police came down because there were some kite-boarders out on the water who were jumping over people who were swimming. As you can imagine this was a safety factor, the police both on their horses and in their truck drove over to the area on the beach. Marcelo explained what was going on and why this is bad kite-boarding etiquette. We took a break for lunch before heading out to the lagoon for my first water session, a little south of Cumbuco. This lagoon was a salt water lagoon right behind the ocean. It was awesome, imagine waves breaking at a beach on one side, then look on the other side of the sand and there is a flat calm saltwater lagoon. Even though it was sheltered from the waves (read good for beginners) the wind was still strong and good for pushing the kite. (FYI There were a few really good people at the lagoon, locals and foreigners alike doing jumps and spins and other crazy things I am nowhere near trying to do). 

I liked the water stuff alot more. First thing we did was body dragging, basically practicing moving the kite and being in control of the kite as it drags you along in the water. Kiteboarding for those unfamiliar is a kite, flying overhead which moves you in a specific direction, and a board on your feet, helping to propel you through the water. No board for me today. I practiced with the kite minus the board in the water, to work on control of the kite, and then I practice some safety moves up wind. A great day all in all but I'm a touch sunburned in a few places where the sunscreen forgot to be applied. Oops : ) 

Tomorrow holds fun filled adventure at a different lagoon, which should 

be less crowded and even more beautiful. Marcelo and I are taking a dune buggy to get there so more adventures to come! The moon is also rising as I'm sitting here writing this blog, and it's big and full and orange. Nice! 

Ok so I'm off to have a few Caiparinhas and some delicious dinner in town. The big slogan in town is that Cumbuco is the place for Kite-parinhas. ha ha. It's all over the t-shirts; it secretly should be the motto of the town. I'm off to go live like a local kite-parinhas and all!

 

Peixes E Camaroes!

Saw on the news there is crazy flooding in Sao Paulo. Some guy was using a coffee can to scoop water out of his car window. There has been 35 days of non-stop rain in Sao Paulo. Good thing I am in Ceara! I arrived yesterday, took a walk along the main street on the beach and sipped a coconut while watching the waves. Life is good.

 Fortaleza reminds me of Fort Lauderdale. There is a main beach tourist strip with beach on one side and high rise hotels on the other. I am staying at the Diogo Hotel which is one block off the beach strip but very nice. In my first afternoon there I tentatively try out my Portuguese with a

friendly guy working at the front desk and am slightly successful.

 

Day 2: I walked further down the beach and the highlight was I ran into the fishmarket here. There were mostly shrimps (camaroes) of different sizes and colors, there were mariscoes (mollusks), and calamari. There were also lots of red snapper (prango? I think…), some mackerels, tilapia, and a very large part of a fish that is debateably either shark or ray. Ooh and there were also triggerfish and grunts. The fishmarket stalls are right on the beach in front of the fishing boats (also on the beach). In the back of each stall fishermen were processing and filleting freshly caught fish. As you can imagine this was a highlight for me today. Next to the fishmarket were some guys in tents offering to cook any fish that you could buy at the market. So I bought about a 1/5 lb of camaroes (shrimp) took it next door and enjoyed a delicious garlic prawn meal beachside! Very cool. I felt like a local as I tried to ask questions

 about where the fish came from and what type of fish they were. 

Also in speaking with someone from tourist information, they happened to know the name of a PADI scuba instructor working in town and gave me his contact information. Apparently the dive shop closed in Fortaleza and it’s just this guy that runs the one dive boat in town. I’m hoping to be able to get in touch and find out more information about diving in Ceara. Also sorted out some more plans for Joao Pessoa today, staying at a place called Pousada da Luz for a while. Looks nice, quiet, right on the water. I ate at the restaurant at the hotel tonight, I was exhausted, but had a nice chicken dinner with passionfruit sauce, mangoes and rice. The wine however, is absolutely horrendous. My advice: Do not drink any white wine if you come to Brazil. I’m holding out that the red might be better but I’m not sure yet.

 

Day 3: I traveled today up to Cumbuco, a small little coastal town about 30 km up the coast from Fortaleza. The front desk clerk at the hotel in Fortaleza advised me not to take a taxi because it was too expensive, and I was a little daunted by using the bus, so I settled for the middle of the road price wise and took a private vehicle up there, which turned out to be a tour bus. And there was some confusion as to whether I was taking the tour, or just catching a ride. Needless to say, I did see part of the tour for a while before I realized what was going on. I’m staying at the Cumbuco Guesthouse, run by Mario, a German guy that’s been here for almost 6 years. The Guesthouse is nice and clean, with a hammock outside and one block away from the beach. One interesting house rule here is, and I quote from the Welcome Packet, “It is forbidden to bring ‘Brazilian Ladies’ anytime inside the Guesthouse.” So all you rico suaves that may be coming to visit me, aghem Thomas, watch out for Brazilian Lady Friends. Anyway back to Cumbuco…..the town is about 4 blocks long and six blocks wide with dirt streets. It has a great laid back feel. Cumbuco is a big kiteboarding town, it’s where the world championships were held last year, and I am about to go on my first kiteboarding lesson, in about 2 hours!  I’m a little nervous, especially as it’s going to be taught in Portuguese. But the wind is blowing, the sun is out, and it’s about 80 degrees, so I’m off to hit the beach before my lesson! Hopefully will check back in with some crazy stories about learning to kite!

 

Trials and Tribulations of Traveling

As you all know there are many trials and tribulations associated with traveling these days. It seems the airlines are always getting you with extra baggage weights, size of your carry-ons or extra fees for window seats and more leg room.  One of my first big accomplishments on this trip was meeting my luggage requirements. Brazil is the only and let me repeat ONLY destination on Delta where you can fly in economy and bring TWO suitcases, BOTH up to 70 lbs (35 kg) for FREE. Now a days that is almost unheard of. And with my many uh, er, interesting requests from Brazil included in my luggage I weighed a ginormous sigh of relief at the airport when Bag 1 came to 67.5 lbs and Bag 2 came to 69.5 lbs. Whew! Step one complete.

 (The interesting items I mentioned in my luggage, for those who didn’t get a chance to talk to me before I left, were three giant tubs of seahorse vitamins, which arrived in a box marked keep refridgerated, and three ziplock bags full of siran carriers, which I was told looked like glass beads, but to the naked eye looks like white powder. Gulp. What will customs think.)

 However that joy of meeting my luggage weight, was outlived when, 30 seconds later, I was informed by my helpful and friendly Delta agent that there was a problem with my return flight from Brazil. I’m thinking, it’s in 279 days what do I care, BUT the big thing was……my flights weren’t changed…….Delta decided to cancel their direct flights from Fortaleza to Atlanta leaving me, er, stranded so to speak in Fortaleza without a way to get back home. Perfect you might think for me, because we all know I’m going to go native and not want to return (don’t worry Mom, you know I always wind up coming back….). So despite my luggage accomplishment, now my bigger problem is that I have no ticket back. We eventually solved that problem and take note as of right now: I have a ticket to return to the US on the 8^th of December 2010.

 Now unfortunately, Delta sent me the most round about way possible to Brazil. So as you may have already gathered they had a direct flight from Atlanta (read: airport of lost luggage from many people’s, especially mine, past experiences) to Fortaleza. AND one would think it would be fairly easy to get from Boston to Atlanta. The bad news is that to fly direct from Boston-Atlanta meant an extra $200 in the price of my ticket, so sigh, I am routed through JFK New York.  Unbeknownst to me, I am upgraded  for my two US flights Boston-NY and NY-Atlanta to first class. I can only hope to express the utter and sheer surprise when they called my zone and the stewardess showed me to first class.

 No worries getting to NY. In NY I was to spend some quality time in the airport, supposedly about 2.5 hours, with my flight to Atlanta departing at 3:45 pm. But my 2.5 hour lay over turned into an 8.5 hour lay over! Bad news folks: there was weather in Atlanta. There were tornado warnings with heavy rain and wind closing the airport for a good three hours in the late afternoon. It was an 8.5 hour lay over in NY with many ups and downs. 1^st, I am happy to be in first class where I have free booze! And an attentive crew catering to my whim. Secondly, I’m nervous I”ll miss my flight to Brazil, and since Delta only flies there every other day, perhaps a long awaited stay in Atlanta I never knew I was desiring, will be in order. Or third, maybe it’s not so bad, a flight attendant by the name of Dustin M Long has provided some witty banter and entertainment so perhaps the hours I spend on this plane in NY won’t be so bad. I finally make it to Atlanta around midnight……I race off the plane and have to run from one end of terminal E to the farthest place at the Atlanta airport, Terminal T……so after much sprinting, with some very heavy bags,  I was the last person on the plane. Whew.

 I made it, my bags didn’t. no big surprise. They arrive 4 days later, when I am in Cumbuco.

What's a Fulbright and How did I get one....

So I'm in Brazil on a Fulbright Scholarship. What is a Fulbright scholarship one may ask? A Fulbright Scholarship is a cross cultural program sponsored by the US State Department to promote cross cultural understanding between the US and other countries. There are different types of Fulbright Scholarships, those where foreigners come to the US and those where US citizens travel abroad. We all know which one of those categories I fall into. Fulbright sponsors US citizens to study abroad in any of 155 countries worldwide. (Make note: NONE of those countries are Pacific Island countries, which I personally find discriminatory and outrageous.) Each year there are approximately 7500 US Fulbright Scholars; I am one of those 7500. The primary source of funding for the Fulbright Program is an annual appropriation from Congress to the U.S State Department, so write your representative and thank them for contributing to my crazy trip to Brazil. Within a country where Fulbright operates, there are two basic programs: a research program and an English as a second language program. For the research program you can design your own research study and work with someone in the country, to promote crosscultural understanding in your topic area. The other way you can get a Fulbright Scholarship is by teaching English as a second language in your country. Since my area of expertise is marine biology, I applied to the research program. To give you an idea of the size of the Fulbright program, just within Brazil alone, I am part of a cohort of 36 research scholars and 5 teaching scholars that were awarded this year.

As I mentioned in my first blog, this whole process of applying for the Fulbright Scholarship started about a year and a half ago.  Step 1: come up with an idea to do research in a foreign country (ahem not a Pacific Island Country or Territory). OK I’ve got some idea of wanting to do seahorse research and now thanks to Dr. Vincent and Dr. Rosa, in Brazil. Step 2: July 2008, I email to the Duke Fulbright Committee a half page proposal outlining my idea and potential in country contact. Step 3: By early September 2008, write a two page research proposal, timeline for work and project budget. (Did I mention that trying to figure out a budget for 1.5 years in the future is kind of a daunting task?) So as I’m collecting my thoughts on these documents, and at the same time I’m also collecting recomendations- three professional ones (thanks Lisa, Rafe and Jen), a foreign language recommendation (Jake- you are the best!), and last but not least a recomendation from someone in Brazil willing to work with me (Dr. Rosa….needless to say you are amazing). 

 

Ok so let’s take a second to digress and talk about the foreign language requirement. Fulbright states that in order to apply to do research in a country, you must be able to prove fluency in the country’s language. I noted the asterisk next to the country of Brazil and realized if one could prove fluency in Spanish, and enrollment in a Portuguese language class, then theoretically one could get around the Portuguese fluency requirement. So I talked with a Georgetown Spanish professor, and with no other options for a Portuguese language class in rural coastal North Carolina, enrolled online at the University of Wisconsin for Portuguese 101.

 

Back to the application process. With all my documents and recommendations in order, I turned in my documents to Duke (Sept 2008). Two weeks later I had an interview with the Duke Fulbright Committee, conducted partially in English, partially in Spanish, and partially in Portuguese.  Conjure up in your mind, sitting around a square table with six colleagues, grilling you about your latest proposal in multiple different languages. Whoa is right. I was expecting part of the interview to be conducted in Spanish,  the big surprise however, was when the woman conducting the interview said with  an evil smile on her face, “Lindsay we have two portuguese speakers  here with us around the table. We’re going to have them talk to you and see if you can understand them.” Talk about panic setting in, I had only been in my online Portuguese class for about 2 weeks and 1 day, and I had yet to really open the book. The man to my left spoke first (he identified himself as a native Brazilian speaker), and thankfully he was really easy to understand. It sounded mostly like Spanish and I was able to repeat almost verbatim what he had said to me. The woman on my right, was from Portugual, and from the second she started speaking, it sounded like French gibberish. Thankfully when I admitted I could understand nothing of what she said, everyone around the table laughed and we all agreed that it was a good thing I was applying to go to Brazil and not Portugal. So with the interview behind me, I waited three or four more weeks before Duke informed me they were recommending my application to the US State Department! Then in mid January, I learned I had made it through the next round, and the State Department was recommending my application to the Brazilian State Department. The Brazil State Department then evaluated the numerous proposals for in country research and determined mine, on Habitat Preferences of the Longsnout Seahorse in Ceara, Brazil, was worthy of the illustrious Fulbright Scholarship. So on a sunny afternoon in early April, after a run to clear my head, in the driveway of 5006 Bogue Avenue, in Morehead City, NC, I found out I had become a Fulbright Scholar.

 

Here's how it starts......

Back in July 2008, while working on my masters in Fiji, I had this idea. What if I could get a Fulbright Scholarship to study seahorses somewhere in the world? So I wrote to Dr. Amanda Vincent at the University of British Columbia, a well-known seahorse biologist with whom I would like to do my PhD , and said I'd like to apply for a Fulbright to study seahorses in southeast asia. Dr. Vincent wrote back and suggested I get in touch with Dr. Ierece Rosa in Brazil, because her lab was one of the best. Dr. Rosa wrote back immediately and said she would love to work with me! So we put together a proposal for me to study longsnout seahorse habitat in Ceara (a northern coastal state), Brazil. After a long evaluation and interview process, both the US State Department and Brazilian State Department decided my proposal was worthy of a Fulbright Scholarship!

So here I am about to leave for my year long trip to Brazil and with my departure only a few days away, I still have a few details to sort out. I am flying into the capital of Ceara State, Fortaleza.  Where am I staying, might you ask? Well......I don't know is the short answer. I'm planning on vacationing for the first few weeks trying to get a handle on different towns and places where I might want to rent a room or apartment.  Ceara is well known for kite boarding, so while I'm here, I plan on picking up the favorite local watersport. Then in February, I'll spend another few weeks in Paraiba (another coastal state further south of Ceara), where Dr. Rosa and I will sort out the final logistics for my research. She is a professor at the Universidade Federal do Paraiba, in the city of Joao Pessoa.  I'm also excited to travel to this part of Brazil because it is an area known for its scuba diving! Hopefully while I'm here I"ll be able to mix a little business and pleasure and get in the water for a dive.

After Joao Pessoa, I'll be heading to Sao Paulo for Fulbright Orientation before starting research in March! Or atleast that's the general plan, with lots of room for flexibility, adventure and crazy stories. With my first few weeks in Brazil it will  also be Carnaval time! Carnaval is the annual festival in Brazil that takes place 40 days before easter that is a time for camaraderie, freedom, no work, and parties day and night! I'm not sure where exactly I'll be spending Carnaval but guaranteed it will be an experience! 

That's it for now. I'm off to squeeze those last few items into my suitcase. So wish me luck, check back for more stories about my adventure and if you fancy a vacation to Brazil- Just let me know!