Onde é isso?

Estávamos hoje fazendo uma caminhadinha que fazia tempo que precisávamos!

 

Andando e batendo papo, no meio do caminho uma mulher parou o carro pra pedir informações. Na maneira de perguntar dela, deu pra notar um tom meio impaciente. Nós pensamos um pouco antes de responder até que ela deu mais uma informação que facilitou pra nós tentarmos ajudá-la. Insatisfeita com a nossa incerteza, ela soltou: "Nossa, o povo que mora aqui nem sabe onde são as coisas né? Eu perguntei pro outro homem e ele disse que era por aqui".
Um pouco surpresa com sua reação respondi: "Olha, estou tentando te ajudar. Estou te dizendo que é pra lá" (apontei pra direção que achava ser a certa) e continuei:  "com esse ponto de referência não tem dúvida que é mais à frente, do outro lado. Se quiser ouvir o que o outro homem lhe disse ouça, estamos tentando te ajudar."
Achamos engraçado que pela falta de paciência, ela não soube nem perguntar e não queria aceitar nosso sábio conselho...(Rsrsrs)

 

Foi engraçado meditar sobre aquilo. Uma pessoa impaciente, interrompendo a  nossa caminhada, e nós com toda a boa intenção de ajudá-la, e ela não quis aceitar e ficou insatisfeita. No final, ela agradeceu, mas mesmo que talvez da boca pra fora, fizemos a nossa parte. Ela quis reclamar da nossa falta de informação e não aceitou a nossa ajuda, mesmo que fosse pouca.
Apesar disso, sabemos que tentamos ajudar da maneira que pudemos.

Nos fizemos a nossa boa ação do dia. Haha :-) agora, fiquei até curiosa onde e o endereço mencionado por ela. Seria uma loja? A casa de alguém? Talvez um SPA? Um local pra relaxar um pouco? Talvez... ;-)

As primeiras segundas impressões

Como é bom voltar à sua terra natal!
É difícil explicar exatamente a sensação de estar aqui de volta e também poder rever pessoas amigas e entes queridos. Logo nos primeiros dias, pude fazer as primeiras observações deste lindo cenário.

Confesso que senti e ainda estou sentindo um quasi choque cultural de retorno em alguns pontos que havia me esquecido... rsrsrs. Mas isso faz parte mesmo em qualquer lugar do mundo. Não existe país perfeito, tem muita coisa aqui que é maravilhosa e tem muita coisa que é ruim. Na Holanda é assim também, para quem não acredita, e é muito interessante observar alguns desses pontos no Brasil...

Por exemplo, a maneira que as pessoas são bem-humoradas no Brasil. Ainda dentro do aeroporto de Brasília, na fila da alfândega, estava ouvindo a conversa de dois homens na minha frente. Um dos senhores estava com uma maleta o outro começou a fazer comentários sobre ele dizendo: "O que você tem aí nessa maleta secreta?", "Olha, que essa maleta você está carregando o tempo inteiro do seu lado, tem algo muito precioso aí e você tá escondendo alguma coisa", e os dois riam daquela brincadeira entre amigos. Eles olhavam ao redor e riam também, pois sabiam que as pessoas estavam achando aquela situação engraçada pelo fato de passarmos pela polícia federal.

Um outro exemplo é a nossa língua portuguesa. Como é bom poder falar português e são tantos os termos que são engraçados; é notável a presença do bom humor até nas coisas mais simples. Alguém já ouviu falar no polvilho "MATUTO"? Rsrs. A palavra diz tudo e garante que esse polvilho deve ser da melhor qualidade, não é mesmo?! E quanto ao lava-jato "ESPONJA DE OURO" ? Será que alguém duvida que seu carro não sairá brilhando de lá?

Até mesmo no linguajar do dia a dia, claro que não estou nem levando em consideração o tamanho do nosso país, e nem todas as possíveis expressões e regionalismos que existem aí pelo nosso Brasil afora. Eu estou longe de saber e poder conhecer todas elas, então fico aqui na minha região influenciada por várias outras, mas que esse humor e jeito de falar me toca, ah isso sim. Estava eu com minha mãe na hora do lanche em casa, e lembrei de uma frase que saiu: "não vou tomar esse chá tão quente não, tomar essas coisas queimando guela, ninguém merece."

Até comentamos se um estrangeiro estivesse estudado o português ele não entenderia realmente muita coisa, mas pode ter certeza que ele iria sorrir quando ouvisse e entendesse o sentido daquela palavra naquele momento. Por isso digo que, as minhas primeiras segundas impressões aqui foram cômicas, e claro, apesar da situação atual estar meio crítica em relação a problemas econômicos e sociais, e quando ligamos a televisão só se ouve falar de bandidos, acidentes, mortes, tem muitas outras coisas muito bonitas e às vezes até despercebidas entre as linhas do dia a dia, no sorriso de um estranho, ouvindo a conversa de pessoas amigas, e por aí vai.

Back to the future...

After almost 8 years living in the Netherlands I am back to Brasília!!
Wow... yes, wow!!! What a big change, what a big move!! Is this good? Is this bad? Why it's nice and why it's sad?

Many thoughts cross my mind right now and there are also many mixed feelings of being happy and sad at the same time. I didn't know it could be possible, but yes, it is. Happy for encountering again all the loved ones I was so far away from for such a long time... Sad because I left behind an incredible bunch of people whom I learned to love and respect...

In the middle of the rush of all the practical stuff that needs to be arranged when you move, telephones, contracts to be cancelled, my belongings and personal things to be given away or taken with me, still the most important thing was there right me with me: my inner peace. Still, some of the questions tried to challenge this very peace like:  And now? What if..?

They say "home is where your heart is".. Where is my heart now? This is a question I suppose will always be there around us no matter where we go.. I realized that sometimes there is no explanation for certain things. In fact, I can only feel much grateful and completly dependent on who is above me, God, who is above any human knowlegde and explanation. Apologies if you don't share the same vision, but He is the one single constant who kept me moving.

Living abroad has brought me valuable lessons.. How can you rely on yourself sometimes and how dependent you can be? We meet so many different people from all different cultures and everybody has something to offer.

This amazing experience I won't forget and I would do it again, all over again. It brought me here, it helped me until here, it made me see and realize many things about myself, it gave me an opportunity to spend time with myself and with many people whom I believe were selected to be around me for many purposes... Wow... I even now can't have so many words to say about this experience and still, until now, I am under the impression as where I am now, it doesn't feel the same, because no, it's not the same. It changed... I changed.. And It feels really good. But, it also feels bad... I miss being there, I miss the there part, and the people... I am sure I will miss it even more later, as this is only the beginning... but wow... I am still under the impression that this is just the beginning.
This is the beginning of the future, and then? What then? And now?... Once He told me, it's better the end of things than the beginning... WOW! I am very curious now... I missed my town and I will miss my second home... Can we have both? This is back.. to the future, I suppose
;-)

Stuck in a moment..

Have you ever been in a place or situation in which you felt powerless or incapable of changing it?
How frustrating was it? For how long did you have to go on.. What did you do? What was your reaction?
It's funny to think of ourselves at such moment when we feel stuck...

I was recently in the train station in Rotterdam central station and because of the storm alert, the trains were incredibly delayed. We had to wait for long before the train arrived and there were many people waiting. And when the train opened the doors, it was like this wave of people trying to get in before anybody else, pushing and squeezing each other fearing they not being able to get in as well. It's like life in a jungle, fighting for some basic human need...

Well, when we were all finally all inside the train, I noticed that people were very restless and in a bad mood. For a moment, someone started laughing because of the situation, another woman was taking pictures, others looking at each other faces finding a comic situation.

At the moment you are angry and frustrated, but some people could find it amusing. What else can we do there? We can't move, we can't do what we want to do, we can't change the fact we will not go home at the exact planned time.

Somehow there was a change there... At that moment when your natural reaction would be to be angry and mad and frustrated and start complaining, we could change that. We can laugh, and accept the fact we can't get what we want at the moment we want to get it. At that moment there was a change... Isn't that interesting to think about? We could change our perspective and the way nature will lead us, we can change the way we see things...

If the train is delayed, if you are in a traffic jam, it started raining the moment you stepped out of the bus.. Think not about the things you can't get or can't influence, think about the things you can change... Change that moment... ;-)

Time flies...

Well.. time flies.. and another year has passed.
It's funny to notice that we are the whole year preoccupied with our daily lives and are always too busy to do certain things. In fact we may always have time. We actually make time for the things which are more important to us.

I am not sure about you, but sometimes I feel I am missing out on things.. I feel like, it's not that I don't have time for them, it's because I just didn't think it was important; I was just "too busy"doing something else. But, was that something else that irrelevant? Hmmmmm maybe not? Maybe yes? How can we know?...

Perhaps, it's necessary to press the "Pause" button once a while and reevaluate our life for just a few minutes a day.. They say, "Stop to smell a rose", but it's true. Thinking only about tomorrow or standing still in the past, may get us nowhere. Sometimes living that moment to the fullest may be exactly what you need for that particular day.

Sometimes I like to detach and pay attention to things around. This week, I was observing people in the train and suddenly I saw these teenagers together. A boy and a girl, sitting next to each other, laughing and enjoying themselves. It was so funny to watch them. They looked so innocent, pure, full of hopes and dreams and they seemed to feel so comfortable around each other, like they belonged together. That was a nice thing to see..

Time flies... "Stop to smell a rose".. If life is going by too quickly, sometimes is nice to just take a moment and pay attention to what really matters, usually the simplest things are the ones who really add so much value.. what is today that is so important... Hmmmm....

Frank 010

Another Frank 010 experience... The music was much more lounge than dancing...
What I couldn't resist once again it was the delicious Absolute passion drink they serve there. Wow, it's absolutely delicious! :D
So, basically it's a mix of passion fruit, passoa, vodka and some other secret ingredient which I didn't hear when the bartender said (the music was loud)... But it was worth it!

For those who aren't familiar to this event, it's a kind of happy hour, a "borrel" (in Dutch), or  "The Frank borrel" which takes place on every last Friday of the month at the Cruise Terminal in Rotterdam from 17:00 to 23:00. Just a tip: arrive as early as possible to avoid a very long queue outside... It's very popular. And if you are living in Rotterdam long enough, you will see many familiar faces there.. (Once a saw a famous Dutch presenter there, don't ask me his name.. I don't know, hehehe!)

Feliz 2012!! Happy 2012! Gelukkig 2012!

Feliz Ano Novo pra todos! Happy 2012!! Gelukkig nieuwjaar!

Many many blessings!
Muitas bênçãos!
Veel zegen!