It's odd to be wrapping everything up here in Brazil already and to be getting ready for my trip home. The end of my time in Altamira was lovely; I enjoyed spending time with some Brazilians who showed me around the city and took me to the best ice cream parlor and hanging out with my host family. A friend of mine was doing research in Medicilandia, a town about 3 hours away by bus, on organic cacau cooperatives, so Amy and I decided to make the trek to the cacau farm she was working on for an enjoyable weekend away from the city. She was living with the sweetest family, all of whom we were able to meet at the great grandfather's birthday party on Sunday.

Making homemade bread for breakfast

I spent most of my time there hiking around the 93 hectare farm taste testing the best chocolate I have ever had, and eating amazing food. We had the best time riding around in the back of the pick up truck while the sun was setting. I am still not totally convinced that this is real life.
My final paper is finish and ready, and all I have left to do is printing and my presentation. Then we will go to a hotel for 4 days for our evaluation period, and after I will return to the states.
As much as I am so excited to see my family and friends, I am hardly ready to leave this place. This has been the most incredible adventure and I don't want it to end.

Xingu Vivo!

"What fish?" was the typical response I have been getting from the Pescadores I have been interviewing on the Volta Grande...not quite the response I was hoping to get but very telling about the current biological state of the Xingu since preliminary construction of the Belo Monte began about a year ago.
But let's rewind...
On Tuesday morning, Amy and I began our remarkably long bus journey to Altamira. We got to the bus terminal at 8 am, convinced that we were in for a 12-15 hour bus ride, only to be informed that we would actually be spending about 19 hours of our lives on a not all too comfortable bus. After spending the first 7 hours both reading the first Harry Potter book, we attempted to waste time staring out the window and taking turns sleeping.
Around 4 am, we finally made it to our new homestay in Altamira and passed out for 4 hours before running off to our meeting with Xingu Vivo. There, we were informed that we would be leaving the next day for a boat trip to somewhere on the Xingu to meet with some people that might help us with our research, so bearing this in mind, we stocked up on rice and beans and prepared for our journey. We finally had a chance to get to know our host family in Altamira, who own a joint sticker making-dress making shop on the main street here called Lua de Mel. Mano and Alessandra are quite possibly the most friendly people and have been really helping me with my Portuguese. They cook breakfast, lunch and dinner for us every day and have provided basically a boarding house for the Americans who are doing research nearby (namely, Amy, Stephanie, and me).
The next morning, Amy and I boarded a small dingy with a man who was introduced to us as Jose Paulo, hoping that we would be able to get some sort of research completed. This 3 day trip went above and beyond my expectations; we visited 3 communities, one that has already been vacated due to water pollution from initial construction, one that only has 3 families left, and one that has not yet been vacated, but whose families are planning to leave once the fish population drops so much that they can no longer sustain themselves.

The ghost town of São Pedro

I spent much of my time on the Xingu speaking with various fishermen, visiting the headquarters of communities, fishing, tanning, swimming, and altogether enjoying life. It's awful to think that in 2-3 years, no one will be able to see this place...construction should be finished by 2015 and the entire area will be flooded. In an area with one of the highest populations and biodiversity of fish in the world, it is awful that the population has already dropped so low and that water quality is so bad here that about 100 families have already had to leave.
I am hoping to go to Medicilândia this weekend to see how the lives of the fishermen have changed since leaving their homes on the Xingu and hopefully I will be able to bring back some organic chocolate from the cacao cooperatives there.
Here are some photos of the most beautiful place in the world

Amy and I checking out the construction of the Belo Monte Dam

Catchin some fish

Helping out the family by picking oranges

My Xinguese family

Rio Xingu at sunset

Living for 5 days in and MST community definitely proved to be eye opening, but not quite in the way that I expected.
Land rights in Brazil are relatively complicated and stem from the last agrarian reform during the military government's push to develop the Amazon. Only 5% of the land here is actually owned by someone; the rest is government property that is leased out to various farmers and traditional populations. While the traditional populations have rights to the land indefinitely, farmers technically only own the land as long as they keep it productive. If the land is not productive for more than 6 months, the government technically can take over the property and redistribute it.
The idea behind the MST movement is for landless rural workers to reclaim the land that they believe to be owed to them by the government due to the PIN program. In theory, they occupy land of large farmers who claim much more land than they actually deserve/use and as a collective body "conquer" the land. In practice, many of those vying for land are not always rural workers. Every MST member I met was actually from the city and they had no interest in cultivating the land to sustain their families at all. While I am aware that all MST communities are different, the one I lived in was essentially developing very quickly but had no way to control the development and therefore was becoming a slum. I am not all too sure how I feel about the concept of MST both in theory or in practice, and I do not feel qualified to actually make any judgements, but what I will say is that this experience taught me that I can never come to a definitely conclusion about anything before experiencing what it is I feel the need to make a decision about.
My life with the MST mostly consisted of watching Barbie Disney Princess movies with my host sisters and helping to take care of the 1 year old baby. I had so much fun practicing Portuguese with them and teaching them ballet and my host family was absolutely lovely. It's funny how I find myself feeling so much more comfortable in my rural homestays than I do in Belem.
My research project is approved and I am leaving in the morning for Altamira. I will be living on a boat for another week with members of Xingu Vivo who will be taking me to various communities along the Xingu so that I can conduct interviews about the current fishing habits of these traditional populations. I cannot wait to begin my research and I hope I am able to accurately represent these people despite my sub par Portuguese...

A roadtrip, of sorts
I got in the van with absolutely no idea of what to expect during my trip to the South of Para, and I am relatively certain that it changed my perspective on development and social organization in Brazil entirely. The more I think about it, the more I realize that it might take years for this trip to sink in completely and for me to actually comprehend what I have seen here.

We began our journey by driving to the Tucurui Dam, one of the largest hydroelectric dams in the world. It is really is overwhelming to see the ways in which humans can alter and control something has huge as a tributary here in the Amazon...the Tucurui Dam is able to produce 8370 MW of energy and even that amount pales in comparison to the 11232 MW that the Belo Monte is projected to produce post construction. The major driving force behind the construction of large damming projects in Brazil is the aluminum production here. 1.5% of total energy consumed in Brazil is done so my Albras, the company that produces aluminum from bauxite. Belo Monte is basically being created for Albras, but when I visited Albras I realized that the corporation actually has the only water treatment facility in the area so that it can produce clean water for the surrounding region and it has a waste treatment facility which the government does not provide. While the energy consumption is outrageous and while there are myriad issues with these damming projects that actually have relatively viable solutions, we do need aluminum production and Albras does a great job of being energy efficient.
Post Tucurui, we visited a Colonos ranch (colonos are those who came to occupy land after PIN to receive free land for making it productive) and were able to assess the economic value of their various agricultural and ranching practices. Land rights in Brazil are really interesting because only 5% is actually owned privately. The rest is all governmental land, of which the government gives out legal rights to those who agree to make it productive. If the land is not productive for 6 months, then technically the government can take the land back and redistribute it, unless the land is marked as legal reserve and then it can remain forested. This sets up a really interesting scenario because currently Brazil is being pressured by the international community to reforest land. However, they wanted to develop the Amazon to protect it from being taken over during World War II so now rural workers who were told to deforest the area are being told to reforest it and aren't getting compensated by the government. The social problems that stem from this are astronomical, which led to the MST movement in Brazil. Since the issues with MST are so intense, I think I'll leave my description of them and my time living with them for another day, especially since this has already gotten my head spinning again...

Some friends and I visiting a Mexican restaurant in Brazil, of course

Well, I am finally going to try and finish up explaining my boat trip about 2 weeks after it ended and about 1 day before I leave again for the South of Para and will not have internet for another 11 days. The end of my trip culminated in a rural homestay with a ribeirinhos family near Juruti. Living with this family was one of the most amazing experiences of my life...I spent the days searching for fruits and brazil nuts in the forest and learning how to fish with nets in the river. I had about 6 or 7 children crawling all over me at all times and I have numerous pages in my notebook of doodles that we spent hours doing. In the late afternoons, we would spend hours playing soccer and the moms would even join in. These are the kids in my homestay family: Sauri, Alberth, Tomi Ta, and Tomi Carlon.

 On Sunday, the four communities that live near each other have a soccer tournament, so we hosted another community at our soccer field for a pretty intense game. Right before the game, I went to look for fruit in the forest and ended up by the farinha huts where the boys outside decided to throw brazil nuts at each other. I was lucky enough to be standing in the way of a particularly well thrown one that hit me just above the temple and had a great time sporting a black eye and welt on my head for about 2 weeks after. I was taken by the children down to my host mother who took care of me while the entirety of the two communities watched resulting in probably the most embarrassing experience of my life. However, the soccer game was amazing and afterwards I hung out with some locals and practiced conversational Portuguese. My host mother was very involved in the community so I was able to go to meetings and church and really understand the inner workings of it. Everyone in the community feels like one family and they do all they can to look out for one another. Education is on the rise, though they do not have access to proper materials until they reach high school age. It seems that only 5 or 6 boys are able to move to Juruti for school and they return every weekend with goods for the town. Upon leaving, my host mother began to cry and I realized why Brazilians have the word saudade....leaving someone you're relatively sure you're never going to see again that have truly touched your life.

Beyond this, life in the city has been interesting but not very noteworthy. I was able to visit Boa Vista, a community just north of Belem where we were all bathed in herbs to attract positive energy and apparently boyfriends, something that Brazilians hold in the highest esteem. I also visited the bird conservatory here, which is absolutely beautiful and a lovely paradise in the middle of the city.

I am leaving tomorrow for the South of Para and should return around May 3rd, so hopefully by then I will have plenty of stories to tell

After spending two days on the boat traveling down the river, we finally made it Trombetas, another port city in which MRN (Mineração Rio do Norte) uses strip mining methods to mine bauxite which is in turn used to create aluminum. Throughout my time here, I have been able to see the entire process from the mining of the bauxite, the distribution of the alumina, and finally to the creation of the aluminum. Brazil has about 6 billion tons of bauxite and exports the majority of the aluminum they produce, though the Brazilian consumption is expanding with their rapid economic development. After seeing the mining process, we met with the Quilombolas (escaped African slaves who created communities along the river). They basically partake in low impact activities on the land, but they are living in an area that has recently been deemed a conservation area, so they are no longer allowed to keep animals on the land and are restricted in the amount of fishing and hunting they can do. In addition, MRN has the rights to the minerals in their land, as people are able to own surface area but anything below the surface is federally owned and then leased out to large corporations. It has been interesting to see the development of this contention between federal conservation practices, corporations, and local communities that have been living on the land for quite some time. All of these interests have very opposing needs and trying to find a balance has proven to be difficult throughout the entire Amazon region, mostly, in my opinion, because the government does not do much in terms of understanding social conflicts, resource needs, and ecological concerns.
The head of the Quilombolas community took all of us around and showed us how to find Brazil nuts and open them with machetes, which they can sell for a reasonable profit in nearby towns.

In addition, sunrises over the Amazon are the most beautiful in the world

My first day in the boat, I was able to swim at the meeting of the waters (where the black water system and white water system meet). The white water is comprised of tons of sediments due to the run off of the Andes and the black water flows from the Rio Negro, and you can see a definite line between the two because of the differing flow speeds, temperatures, and densities. The black water was much warmer than the white, which is why you can see me sticking to the black water section. It also has a much higher biodiversity, so approximately 1 minute after this picture was taken i felt a large water creature brush past my leg and I decided it was about time to get out of the water.