LTI Brazil, January 27 - Tina

Hi everyone! It's Tina again to fill you in on the last Wednesday of our trip.

The morning started out particularly early for Susan and I! We made it to Copocabana beach by 7:30 to beat all the tourists and get some wonderful time by the ocean. We picked a spot in front of the famous Copocabana Palace to spend the morning. I found the water much more blue than the water I'm accustomed to swimming in in California and also about 10 degrees warmer! Also, vendors walk the beach selling hand-made souvenirs and yummy snacks - my favorite were Globos, a type of Brazilian snack in the shape of a donut.

We made it back home in time for breakfast and spend the afternoon working on networking LTI. For dinner, we had an amazing feast of all-you-can-eat meat! The waiters brought out a constant stream of various cuts of meat and would slice however much you desired onto your plate. There was also a scrumptious buffet featuring pastas, veggies, and salads to name a few.

Michaela digs in!

Following our delicious meal, we headed off to our first Brazilian professional soccer match at Maracana Stadium!! Flamengo vs. Americano. Since Flamengo was the home team, the stands were filled with eager fans decked out in red, black, and white! Our seats were center field and we had a great view of the exciting game. Amanda was definitely the most enthusiastic as she cheer on the team and we all were invested in the game by the end. Flamengo won and the fans were very pleased. Overall, Brazilian soccer is one of the most exciting sporting events I have attended. The energy of the crowd coupled with the suspense of the game makes for an amazing experience.

Maracana - and excited fans!

That's all for now folks! Tomorrow we will see one of the seventh wonders of the world - Cristo! And then Friday is sadly already time for our flight back to Antarctica (Boston). I sure will miss the warm Brazilian climate, wonderful food, and most importantly the amazing people.

Lead
Laugh
Live

Tina

LTI Brazil, January 26- Michaela

This morning started off early, as we all walked out the door at 7:30 am and took the bus to the other side of town for our meeting with the Fulbright Commission. I was a little nervous about meeting with such a prominent organization, but true to the laid-back Brazilian culture we have all grown so fond of, country coordinators Andreza Martins and Bianca Macena greeted us with smiles, matte tea and a basket of pao de queijo. We were also excited to meet fellow Bostonian Adam Singerman, a Harvard graduate currently working for ILRIO, an NGO here in Brazil.

After introducing the foundation to our organization, we discussed our vision for the future of LTI, particularly our long-term goal of creating a global network of leaders by establishing self-sustaining chapters worldwide. With a mission statement that pledges to “advance international understanding through volunteer service to communities,” the Foundation’s goals were very much in line with ours, so although the tone was casual, the meeting was extremely fruitful. The Fulbright staff connected us with a number of potential supporters and partner organizations, most notably the Youth Ambassadors and Student Leaders. These two organizations, headed by the American embassy in Brazil, are composed of underprivileged students from every Brazilian state. The students are selected for academic excellence, leadership potential and involvement in their communities- thus making alumni of the programs perfect candidates to serve as mentors in our Brazil-based chapters! We have scheduled a Thursday meeting with representatives from both organizations, as well as a meeting tomorrow with public interest group Iko Poran.

The day wasn’t all business, however. We visited the Parque Lage, a beautiful collection of tropical gardens. Amanda, Tina and Susan explored the caves and scenic walkways while Dave and I lunched at a famous café in the heart of the park. We even saw the stars of a local telenovela- a Brazilian soap opera- sipping Guaraná at the table next to us. Resident fashionista Susan also took us shopping for stylish Brazilian clothing so we can dress like the natives.

It’s definitely been an exciting day, but I’d better sign off now and go to bed. There’s so much to get done and so many things to see in Rio… all before Friday!
-Michaela

Weekend 2 - Tina

Saturday morning was finally a time for rest. After some good sleeping in, all the LTI MIT mentors, hosts, and some student friends met up for lunch at a Chinese buffet. We shared some jokes and ate way too much of the delicious food. By far my favorite were the caramelized bananas!! Yuri spent lunch making faces at a two year old child whose shrieks of laughter echoed through the restaurant. Mariana also showed us this hot pink fake furry worm attached to a thin nylon string that appeared to scurry through her fingers on its own. She fooled us for about 5 seconds before we realized the trick. Ricardo was a bit more convincing with the worm; I attribute his skill to the look of pure joy on his face as it crawled over his fingers.

We then made the trek to BH Shopping and browsed through a typical Brazilian mall. Much to our surprise, the little boy Yuri was making laugh in the restaurant was also there! He must have been following us.. We saw some super comfortable pillows in the shape of various animals - the turtle was by far my favorite. Speaking of turtles - Michaela and I discovered Tortuguita!! (white chocolate with cookie pieces in exactly the right ratio) I'm sure we've collectively consumed at least 4 packages by now... The tiny turtle imprinted on each bite is too much to resist.

Movie night came next. Lightening filled the sky most of the night but we hid inside and watched some hilarious American movies with the Brazilian LTI students. I think the Brazilians knew the movies even better than we did! I realized many of the strange English quotes they repeated all week came from movies I had seen before!

Sunday was a sad day of goodbyes - little did I know how attached I had grown to Belo Horizonte and the wonderful friends I made. I spent the morning with Deborah's family. Her 2 year old younger brother called me 'princesa' and we played with his toy horses from Avatar while her twin baby sisters adorably slept on the couch. Deborah and I ate a delicious lunch and then packed up for the bus station.

Although I promised myself I wouldn't cry, I couldn't suppress the tears as we said goodbye. These students amazed me with their determination, optimism, and love. In just two weeks, we started strong foundations for LTI and also made friendships that will last a lifetime.

The bus ride started strangely - my water broke. Well, more like I dropped my bottle of water and the bottom fell off, spilling water everywhere! Thankfully I was able to drink out of the bottom as not to be dehydrated on the 8 hour journey through the hills. That night, we arrived in Rio where Susan's amazing family greeted us and took us into their home. We ate some delicious pizza prepared by her mother and then snuggled up for bed. I cannot thank Susan's family enough for welcoming us into their home!

Now begins the Rio de Janeiro segment of our journey. We have important meetings coming up this week to establish more connections in Brazil and hopefully will get to check out the beach at some point!

Thank you students of Belo Horizonte for everything. I will never forget all of you and am grateful for all you have taught me.

Make sure to keep in touch - we won't be able to rid of each other anytime soon.

Beijos!!

Tina

LTI Brazil, Day 9 - Dave

Hey everyone! Wow, what a big day for the program. LTI Brazil made a lot of big decisions today, but first let's talk about how the session activities went.

Our second mentoring team, composed of Arnobio, Mateus, Alice, Gabriel, Ricardo, and Enrique started the session off with an energizer called “Evolution” and then led the “Bridge Building” activity. In “Bridge Building,” each team has three sheets of newspaper and six inches of masking tape and must create the strongest bridge using only these materials. Students then test each bridge by placing weights onto their bridge.

The Pessoa mentors added an extra twist to the activity. During testing instead of placing weights until bridges broke, a cup of water was placed on each bridge and each team had to elect a team leader to stay under the bridge during the weight placement. If a team placed too many weights and broke their bridge, they would not only be disqualified but they would have a wet and unhappy team leader. Luckily, every team had a bridge that was strong enough and no one needed a change of clothes.

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Bridge Building

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Marcia, taking one for the team

After break we had our first batch of presentations for the activity “Teach a Passion.” Last week we told everyone to prepare a short five minute presentation on a topic of their choice—either something they know a lot about or are passionate about. Presentations ranged from baking instructions to dance lessons to Diablo sticking and there was even a presentation about yours truly complete with my date of birth, hobbies, and a whole slew of pictures (I’m guessing there was a whole lot of Facebook stalking).

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Yuri showing off a Diablo trick.

Finally, during the Exec-Planning portion of the day, the Programming, PR, Finance, and IR committees created action plans and timelines for everything that needed to be done before their first session. The managing directors (Arnobio and Paolo) met with the committee directors (Ricardo, Sacola, Carol, and Mariana) to decide on a starting date. I was very excited to hear their decision: feeling that they should take the momentum that’s been create with these two weeks of training, the directors wanted to start their program before the year was through and so they decided to start in the beginning of the second semester of this Brazilian school year (August 2010). This start date may be tentative, but it’s a huge milestone to have this date to work towards.

Although we ended session on such a good note, our fun together didn’t end there. Today was both Tina and Amanda’s 20^th birthdays, and we had a surprise party waiting at Julia’s house. The PESSOA students all quick ran off to Julia’s to set up while Michaela, Susan, and I stalled the two birthday girls. When we arrived at Julia’s, Amanda and Tina were completely taken by surprise when they saw everyone there. There was much merriment and celebration as we ate cake and Pao de Queijo. Amanda and Tina each got a stuffed animal-- a panda for Amanda and a turtle for Tina (their respective favorite animals)-- decorated with all of our signatures so they could forever remember their experience here in Brazil.

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The birthday girls

LTI Brazil, Day 8 - Tina

Oi! It's Tina back again to fill you in on Day 8! It's hard to believe we are already 8 days in and thinking about leaving all our new friends in Belo Horizonte is quite sad. I have so much faith in these students and can't wait to see all they accomplish.
Today, we switched control over to our newly trained Brazilian mentors. I had a blast being a student as they led the way through the morning activities. I must say these guys are working at 110% and have impressed me beyone expectation. The three groups divided on Monday and Tuesday planned an engerizer and an activity for the morning period before snack.

We began the day with a quickly paced game of Electricty. Mariana led the group and set everyone up in a circle with their hands intertwined. Various forms of tapping signalled different ways to pass the tap around the group. If you didn't pay attention, your hand was quickly removed from the circle.

Students play an intense game of Electricity

Next, the remaining mentors taught us about four forms of leaders. Transactional, Service, Inspirational, and Transformation leaders are present in our communities. Groups then made short skits showcasing the various styles. Dave took on a Yoda persona as he Transformed his group of ordinary students stranded in the forest into superheros in order to survive!! Alice hunted animals to feed the group, Paulo creatively arranged a shelter, and Ricardo improvised a way to create fire! Ina my group, Carolina was an amazing service leader in our skit after she provided food for Michaela, taught me how to speak Português, and gave Amanda a job.

Back to Back

We all made it up!!

Back to Back proved to be especailly challenging for our group. We had a difficult time standing up with our backs touching but eventually all made it up as a group. The new LTI record is now 23 people!! Way to go LTI Brazil.
Our final two directors were elected today as well. Congratulations to Carolina, Director of Finance and Mariana, Director of Internal Relations. We split up into committees after elections and developed action plans and timelines for the develolpment of LTI Brazil.
Finally, we introduced Jigalo to the group and theywent crazy for it! The activity requires you to share a dance move with the group which the group then repeats all at once! I must say there are some pretty talented dancers in this LTI!! Homario even joined in the last game before the end of the day.
I moved hosts this weekend and am having an amazing time living with Deborah and her family. We just finished more pao de queijo and watched some American TV with Português subtitles. I heard that Cruziero (a famous Brazilian soccer team) is playing so I'm off to try to catch the end of the game.

Ps. There is a ton of lightening going on right now! Brazilian thunderstorms totally beat Bostonian lightening!
Boa noite!!

LTI Brazil, Day 6 - Amanda

After a lovely relaxing weekend, it was back to work at LTI-Brazil-land. We started off with a recap of ASA, this time with two calls going at the same time; it was actually pretty interesting seeing how people responded to this extra challenge - especially since a couple of people hadn't gotten the rules quite down yet. Next, the 20 students broke up into 3 groups that would later lead an energizer and activity that none of the students had experienced yet - mentors helped students plan and organize their activities so that the curriculum would stay within the time frame alloted to them. Meanwhile, Tina and I set up for the Maze Activity by winding white yarn around trees and lampposts in the lower courtyard - quite the death trap when you think about it, but at least the students were blindfolded before entering the maze. As there was no actual beginning and end of the maze, the only way to exit was to raise your hand and ask for help - which all of the students came to understand. A very long discussion afterwards brought out some useful conclusions before breaking off for snacks.

After our snack break, Tina gave a thorough presentation on how to Make the Experience - including some very interesting pictures of Disneyland v. KiddieLand and other ways to make LTI look like a legitimate organization. Next, Dave separated the students into groups of guys and girls for the Masculine v. Feminine activity where students arrange adjectives into a "masculine" and "feminine" category to highlight the stereotypes that society places on gender roles. This very swiftly led into a discussion regarding the validity of such stereotypes, and a very heated debate and interesting conclusions made by some students that, let's just say, weren't quite politically correct.

Even though today was full of many discussions with very heavy topics, nothing was to compare with the elections process for the future directors of LTI-Brasil. The mentors from MIT decided to structure the exec board into 2 Managing Directors and 4 Committee Directors who would be ultimately responsible for all of the things that LTI-Brasil was going to accomplish. Congratulations to Arnobio and Paulo (the 2 Managing Directors), Ricardo (Programming Director), and Mateus (Public Relations Director) - we'll definitely be keeping in touch with you, don't you worry.

That's all for now!

Love from Brasil =]

LTI Brazil, Weekend 1 - Dave

With the first week of session successfully completed, it´s time to finally relax. On Saturday, Tasia hosted a get together with everyone in the program. We usually have dinner after sessions with a few of the Pessoa students, but it was great to see and hang out with everyone out of session. We had some delicious Brazilian barbeque and passed that time playing card games, chatting, and we even had a friendly game of soccer.

Turns out, people in Brazil are indeed generally a lot better at soccer than people in the US, but I´m happy to report that I got to play with them and did not get completely trounced. It was mostly the guys who were playing soccer, but Tina, Susan, and Anna all gave a good showing for the gals in our programs. Romario, the director of Pessoa, showed that he was a force to be reckoned with. When he got really intense, it was actually a little scary. Pretty sure if I got hit by one of the balls he kicked, I probably be in a hospital right now. But seriously, he was really good.

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Soccer in Swim Trunks and Speedos...

Oh yeah, we also got to swim…in a pool… outside…in January. For the Brazilians reading this blog, that´s probably not a big deal, but for you guys back in the US who are enduring winter, you can probably understand how exciting that is for me. The water was great. Also, it´s summer here. Did I mention how much I love Brazil?

Arnobio brought his guitar and I got treated to a serenade in Portuguese courtesy of him and Marcia. We even got to join in with a sing-a-long to Jason Mraz’s “I´m Yours.” All and all, a fun and relaxing day to end a successful and busy first week.

Until next time!

~Dave