Tchau Brazil

       While approaching my last week in Brazil I have come to realize how connected I have become with the community around me. Since I walk the same route each morning, I have a brief conversation with the door man who gets excited when he sees me in my Brazil jersey on game days, as well as, the woman who owns the food truck at school and sets my favorite candy to the side for me when her stock is low. I also enjoy seeing new people in the park especially when they break out dancing because they think no one is watching. Now that I think about it, I just realized that Jamila, Laura, and I have become comfortable enough to do the same. Every week we venture further and further out and have some of the best experiences of my life. We have learned to value just sitting in a park for hours on end or randomly encountering interesting people who we will remember forever. We will never forget Jonah, who lets us into the apartment at night, or Tiago the uber driver who helped us explore Foz do Iguaçu and took us bowling. We will never forget Jamila buying poetry in the park that didn’t make sense in English or Portuguese and the feira that is outside our apartment every Saturday morning. In the end, its hard for me to accept that this journey is almost over, and I find myself saying more and more often “When we come back to Brazil…”