I can not begin to explain how difficult it is to take a minute to write on this blog. I am always doing something or with someone or running around or eating or gone etc etc etc! I have been here for a month and, though I certainly feel at home by now, I am not settled down. Ive still got so many touristy things to do and people to meet! Whats more is that the workload, both in my politics and my portuguese classes have begun to pick up because carnival is over. This I am glad for because i am accustomed to everything being fast paced back at UVA and I looove keeping busy.

Ive had a great introduction to the rhythm of Brazil. Brazillian history is similar to the states in some manners, massive bouts of immigration, colonization, exploitation, political unrest, displacement and finally a makeshift solution to a long engrained issue of racism and inequity. Such is life! Today we began our classes on grantwriting and I am so very excited to learn how to have this experience of formal writing. As some of you may know, I would like one day to open up a chocolate factory and, though it may seem a private enterprise and not a public service, the purpose will be to increase minority employment in NYC and expand the pool of skilled minority workers by reinvesting into the community of Harlem. I will need to know how to write a proposal for a grant to ask for startup money.

This week I most say, I feel old. All along, with every passing day in Brazil, I have indeed felt anewed, but this week, I am grown. Not old old, but old. The kind of, OMG my life is starting old. The kind of you better fudge some confidence and get out there into the real world old. The kind of, are people looking at me? I am aware not only of my eyes but that others have eyes as well. At Cadec, my volunteer internship, I have been informed that money is depleting. Everyone was crying and emotional. The volunteers that I have become accustomed to, are leaving because they can not afford to continue working there. No one is getting paid, I never knew. I keeping thinking of the kids who will have nowhere to go and no one to stay with if this place closes. Of the meals they wont eat and the attention they wont get. I cant help but feel emotional. Today I am a person with means who has not yet learned how to utilize them. Today I am asked to do something. American, can you help? I should and can, but how? Today, as my friend was straightening my hair,she passed me a white hair. MY FIRST WHITE HAIR. There was only one but I almost started crying, I couldnt hear anything, everything was a blur...I am getting older. Im 20! Im 20! When I return to college I will be legal to drink in the states. This is the first time I am afraid of my life. This is the first time I am afraid for my life.