Day 8: Journal Excerpts

THOUGHTS:

LAPA!

Lapa was sooooo much fun. I was so glad I went. The crowd was intense, and exciting, and so different from what we see everyday when we arrive at the center. The streets were packed with people dancing, drinking, eating, meeting... The first place I went in had a full band of drums. Bass, djembe, timpani(?). I was really impressed and glad to have found a really unique place that was worth telling people about.
The rest of the evening was spent talking and dancing in the Boal center.

The boys were still out then too. Different environment, same intensity.
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On our way to Buzios. Looking forward to this bus ride and getting some sleep.
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We went to a rest stop on out was to Buzios that had food and souveniers, but they were also giving out vaccines. Wild.
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Buzios is beautiful, our hotel reminds me of a bed and breakfast. The town is so small, but very trendy, and makes sense as a nearby getaway for those who can afford to come. We went to a beautiful restaurant and got to know some more about our hosts who seem very nice. I want to come here again with DJ, and really be able to enjoy what Buzios has to offer.
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WORKSHOP:

The drama therapy workshop seemed to start awkwardly because we were late, and it seemed so few people had come, but by the time we began, we seemed to have 50 or 60 people in the room. The warmup was fun to watch, and I was so glad to see how quickly people took to the game. At the same time, I think the rules had been glazed over and changed by the group to some degree. I think we were supposed ot be observing the differences and similarities, not making them up, but it seemed to work out anyway.

Storytelling was the next technique, and 5 men raised their hand to go up. The story was of Mr. Black and Ms. White and how they ruin the enviornment together for money's sake. I was anxious about where the story was going at first, but it highlighted the different ways that people think about the interactions between black and white and what can save all of us from self-destructing from the pressure of it. A rainbow! It was funny that a rainbow was chosen as the guide, since we seem to be struggling with Boal's rainbow back in Rio.

After the story, three solutions were chosen from the story and enacted on the floor/stage. My group's solution was for the guide to transform the "trash" into "jewels" and everyone live happily ever after. Fairy tale accomplished. I got the sense though, that people needed to say more about this issue, and we tried during the next chapter, but all that came out were songs and a monolougue.

I was not expecting an evening of song to emerge from the "coffee chat", but that is indeed what happened. Personlly, I am glad it did. I felt that singing to each other might have been the best we can do right now, and that's great. When the young lady began to sing her song, I teared up, not just becasue it was pretty, but becasue I knew what she was singing about before they even translated it. I could hear it. I was listening. The translation turned out to be "take the hand of God and go".
I wanted to sing more, I felt things welling up in me that I often only feel in church at home. I could remember the release I felt on Sunadys when the chior sang, and I hoped other people were feeling that too.

I sugessed we sing the Negro National Anthem, but I couldn't because I was to upset. But as other people sang, I recalled the words:


Lift every voice and sing
Till earth and heaven ring,
Ring with the harmonies of Liberty;
Let our rejoicing rise
High as the listening skies,
Let it resound loud as the rolling sea.
Sing a song full of the faith that the dark past has taught us,
Sing a song full of the hope that the present has brought us,
Facing the rising sun of our new day begun
Let us march on till victory is won.

Stony the road we trod,
Bitter the chastening rod,
Felt in the days when hope unborn had died;
Yet with a steady beat,
Have not our weary feet
Come to the place for which our fathers sighed?
We have come over a way that with tears have been watered,
We have come, treading our path through the blood of the slaughtered,
Out from the gloomy past,
Till now we stand at last
Where the white gleam of our bright star is cast.

God of our weary years,
God of our silent tears,
Thou who has brought us thus far on the way;
Thou who has by Thy might
Led us into the light,
Keep us forever in the path, we pray.
Lest our feet stray from the places, Our God, where we met Thee;
Lest, our hearts drunk with the wine of the world, we forget Thee;
Shadowed beneath Thy hand,
May we forever stand.
True to our GOD,
True to our native land

by James Weldon Johnson (1871-1938)