Time has passed. I dance every week. I seat listening to a real Diva: Dona Inah. Before I dance and listen to her, I seat and talk about her life. Every week Dona Inah tells me something new…. like about when she played with Cesaria Evora, or about when she had a concert in Morocco. We both love Morocco. Sometimes she tells me about her last trip to Cuba where she recorded a CD which is about to come out. She  who had played with many of the musicians of Buena Vista in other times.  She who had sang with Omara Portuondo and so many other amazing artist and yet she is so kind. Dona Inah is 78, and every week she sings till 3,5 am in Sao Paulo.

I am literally flabbergasted by her. Her joy, her voice, her strength and her stories. Her life and music just flow through her.  She who had started singing professionally when she was only 12 in Araras, a country side town of the state of Sao Paulo, and who had only become famous when she was  in her 70’s. Dona Inah, like me, goes to listen to Choro in a small place where some musicians go every week. I go to listen to Isaias and Israel and so many other brilliant musicians  who just pop there every single Friday, bringing their instruments and their brilliancy… It is free,  and somehow hidden in a little studio. I feel I am very privileged to be invited to go there, so I never invite almost anyone else, who might make noise there, in respect to the musicians I go alone, or with someone who plays or deeply respect music.  And so we all seat to listen to Choro.

This Friday there was a storm in Sao Paulo. It had been days that it had been incredibly hot, and strangely without rain. But this Friday there was a storm, so when we got there under the rain there was no light.

It was then that the mystery and the sacredness of music could be really felt. We could not see anyone, and yet music flew, and was played perfectly. As I stood up and walked carefully to go the toilet I heard my name. Two of my very dear friends were there. They were amazed to see me there. I had not seen them in ages. They held me and told me that all would now be alright. Just like before… and somehow I knew they were right. And so we stood there listening to music.

The following morning I woke up with my body all in place. Simply all in place. I still had to go see Dr. Getulio today.  I knew I was finally ok.  Even before Carnival was about to start, my soul felt it could dance again. My tears became more scarce and it feels that soon, it will be nothing but joy.

The passing of time is just soo mysterious. Sometimes it feels wonderful, while other’s it is very painful. The greatest mystery of it is the ability to desire to go to its future but never to go to its past. Actually that is probably its hardest quality, the inability to go back. Especially since we can see the past but not the future.

Years ago, I once wrote I was coming home to Brazil because Cidao, the owner of my favourite bar in Sao Paulo was dead. At the time I received tens of messages in my Iphone while I was on my way back to Israel and Palestine. I put the thought aside then in the airport of some eastern european country, till  one day I could no longer do it. I avoided the though a lot of times.. feeling a bit sick both in Israel and in Palestine. Being taken care enormously in both places.

One day I realised I was afraid of loosing my feeling of home, which was strangely connected to the bar of Cidao. I came back to Brasil soon later, and yet once again I fell severely sick again.

I never truly understood what my nomadic soul wanted so as I was recovering I wrote my book. And then I left once again back to all places I had been before. I was confronted from the feeling of many I had left. I was puzzled, never had I thought my own feeling of abandonment could be shared by the ones who had stayed.

I left once again and it was this time that I was almost dead. The near experience of death did not make me more afraid of living not of or dying. It actually it made me  remember the words of many friends of mine who had celebrated the life and the  suicide of one of my colleague of the Phd.  At the time I did not understand that.

And life took its course. And then a few things led me to sit here to write.

Foe once  I had a conversation with Chi. My friend from Taiwan. Chi who I hosted in England in 2011, and then here 2012. Chi who was in the road for all these years. Who had travelled fundamentally different than me. Chi who though distant is together with Francesco the people who most cared about my mind. Chi crossed about 50  countries making connections never profound, always with distance.

Francesco is a doctor who wanted to be a philosopher and who accompanied lots of my situation over watsapp. Francesco went all the way to Asia to look  for salvation, mysteries. At the time, having already been to Asia several times I advised him to go to Africa or South America to volunteer as a doctor. There he would find profound connections and some kind of salvation in his mind. and body, in the relationships of others..

In Asia the continent I deeply adore I found good paths to loneliness. After a long path I did learn you could mediate to separate yourself to the world, but you should rather meditate to connect to all.

For those who are escaping their lives, Asia is an easier place to be. It is rather more dangerous exactly for that. Encounter the deep knowledge you must escape your fear of the other.

I eventually went back to Asia, to the border of Thailand and Laos. I once again could have the pleasure to see daily beauty of each sunset in the Mekong. My soul  had always craved to go to Burma, before going there I was at Mut Mee, seing the Mekong. There is my  home in Asia. And from there I heard my grandmother was in hospital. So as I took the train to go to Bangkok to go to Burma, then I collapsed and in my following days I almost died.

For the period that I was in a Coma I had a complete sense that I could choose to never wake up. Yet, I decided I wanted to come back.  Why was it so? It was clear I wanted to go back to people, and especially to see my grandmother who was at that time in hospital.

As some of you might know it has been since september that I fell sick. I am back home in Sao Paulo. And now I find time is even more mysterious. The melancholy that I feel for all these people  I have met over the world bring me tears in my eyes as I write.

I was just told by the widow of Cidao that the bar will close this sunday. For those of you who read me for a while you might know, how  much that place is important to me. And how it is related to me constructing a life here in Sao Paulo. I will definitely be there that sunday to celebrate it. Time is mysterious but in our symbolic existence we must make celebrations.

As I wrote to a friend these days, I no longer believe committing suicide is  necessarily bad.That it is not to mean that I plan to commit suicide. It is simply to overflow my feelings over time.

Time flows forward, while lots of our existence flows back. Buddhist are right in insisting we should be present. The greatest mystery of life, the greatest act of courage is to fully encounter the other. I have lived a life of full encounters so as I recover I can nothing but thank, and hope to have some reencounters again… not all… that would be asking too much.

The greatest mystery of life is to encounter the other, and for that I guess we have to get that the greatest mystery of time is to be present.

Happy New Year, and I wish you all a happy, truthful life.

Dear friends,

I have finally been able to recover a large part of my old email list. I believe most of you might know I was gone for so long because I was severely sick the past few months.

For those who did not know that… in brief..while in Asia I was forced into a coma after having a non stop epileptic crisis.

I was about to go to Burma but then I  had a major fit just in front of the Burmese Embassy, where  there was luckily a Hospital.

I was accompanied by Edu and was kept in an Hospital in Thailand for a while till my parents came to rescue me.

Since my fits never stopped it was decided I should be induced into a coma since the non continuation of seizers could harm my brain. I naturally do not remember not of that.

I was in a total different world while this was taking place. I lived real battles, where death was  strangely not a disaster, nor a sweet thing but a simple option. It still took a while for us to return to Brazil my parents and Edu and I.  It took that long because we needed the permission of the hospital to be allowed in an airplane

I was truly in another planet. And it is taking a lot of me  to fully recover. Luckily now I recognise all the people, and able to write full sentences and not need anymore someone to take care of me.

I have been working really hard on recovering. Now it is becoming more natural again. I have been maintaining my two blogs. In english

https://translatingthoughts.wordpress.com/

And in Portuguese

http://descolonizandoamente.wordpress.com/

I do not write exactly the same things in both.. As it would be incredibly boring to do that… even when I was healthy that was the case.

But I started writing as anexercise to observe my own brain. It was Getulio Dare Rabello who had suggested.

Thank god, the scientists and the enormous amount of love I have received my brain is doing much much much much better.

Soon I will be free of most of my medications. Soon I hope I will eat less and go back to my usual life.

Thank you to all of you  who wrote me, who came here, and if I have not replied… believe me… it is only now that I actually am being able to see how much love for so many places in the world I have received… and how much I should write back! Happy New Year!

Lots of love and a Happy New Yearfrom Brazil,

Julieta

ps: if you want to be added in my english list let me know..just as if you  s know to receive emails as well

I sat with my grandmother yesterday to write in English, now I am trapped between these worlds. The world where I come from where some people do not speak English, and  the millions worlds I can only access in English because I do not know their own languages. I  never feel like writing the same texts in both languages, nor do I feel like talking about how sick we  my grandmother and I have been in the past months.

I wrote last night a whole post in English while I waited for the skype call of someone. My post was cute, informing of all little intricacies I perceive here. Then I finished my text, my conversations with the my grandmother and somehow mysteriously my whole post was lost…It was like the whole world felt like all was closing down and that I should just walk in another rode. Suddenly I decided it was not the day to write…I should just do something else something that would remind me of who I am…and to let write later.

I live with my grandmother in an old neighbour, I ask her about old neighborhoods here in our CIty Sao Paulo. She told me there were many that were old: Such as Bras , Campus Elisius and not surprisingly  the central part of Sao Paulo. Many times she even showed me places where there used to be a river and no longer has anymore.

She loves this city, and is always saying she prefers the pollution to the air of the country side. I praise the old,  she prays for scientists and admires inventions that according to her make the world better. As I  said I am interested in  the old and want to hear shamans and traditional  Chinese medicine and my grandma though she believes anything is theoretically possible she prefers the new. As I am asking all these questions she puts her book down  and says very seriously. Since you are not a specialist on these you should google it. They know better than me.

My grandmother is 89, she has just had an heart operation. As she came home she went to bed and in the following morning when she was asked whether she wanted coffee or tea she replied she wanted a cold beer.  My grandmother follows all recommendations of doctors but also her own ideas, she also learned languages and as a child she had classes of gym in her own house and piano which she hated it.  Her father was also an admirer of the future. My grandmother has always been very popular with her friends… so now having  finally the permission of the doctors for it all she planned a trip for New year’s eve with her friends. Like the following years  there are 6 friends in their eighties on the road to celebrate.

It was my grandmother who insisted I should go out for new year s eve somewhere. In Brazil, New years eve is in Summer. Many of us dress in white ( for peace according to popular knowledge) and then we try to go to the coast, and by midnight we should jump 7 waves for good luck. Many people make offerings to Iemanjá. One  the of “Mae de Santo’s” of Candonblé.

In these syncretist religions brought from  Africa, and mixed to Christianity such as Candomblé there are many figures which are like goddesses and gods who are not ever good nor bad. Very much like greek gods these “mae de santos”, and “pais de santos” carry power and human personalities. Good and Bad is a consequence of your relation with that figure.   So when you go to the beach to sea fireworks, we  sea offerings in the beach and in the  sea. We all avoid stepping in anything. Atheist or not most Brazilians are afraid to step in these offerings.

My parents did not want me to go anywhere, but they do not enjoy new years eve as much of all of us do. But luckily  Doutor Getulio told me I should go. So we prepare ourselves, we are going to our beach house house by the coast of the state of Sao Paulo. Initially, in another life time, when I had planned being in these house with 8 people. Now the world collapsed and like my message I never heard nor these new years eve is what I wanted.

So we decided to invite people we love to celebrate life. There is apparently a saying in Brazil that when all goes wrong what one should do  a party. So that is what we prepare for: we prepare now  for a party not sure whether we are hosting 5 people or 17 in the house…..  we do not care, my cousin and me, Like in Colombia I hope we will be able to celebrate “In shallah”

Love from Sao Paulo