My project for the Kellogg Foundation Fellowship in International Community Development has been one of Organizational Development for the Connecticut Chapter and the Partnership with Paraiba. This has been an exciting and dynamic process resulting in significant growth for the chapter and the partnership at large. In addition to visiting Peru and Grenada over the course of the fellowship, we went to Brasil.

I had the great pleasure of visiting four different cities in Brasil and then Paraguay during the third Fellows IX seminar in Bahia. Fellows colleague Celina Ellery invited me to speak at an International Seminar on Human Rights in Fortaleza, Ceara From there I went to work with Marcos Honorato Torres et al at our sister chapter in Paraiba, and then on to the seminar in Bahia, where we enjoyed the vibrant cultural life and marvelled at the music. Lastly, coming from Paraguay with Gloria Aquino, I viewed the magnificent Iguazu Falls.

The three email letters below describe my experiences during that trip, and the international collaboration we instituted from my then-employer The Connecticut Prison Association.

Three letters from Notheastern Brasil - Sept. 16 - 28, 1997

By 7 am the tropical sun is already high in the sky. Middle class sun lovers are slathering sunblock on their sweating bodies on the beach a stone's throw away, municipal workers in red jumps suits are sweeping sand and rubbish from the nights revelries off the streets as barefoot beggars pick through the garbage, and Professor Flavio Colaco's phone is ringing off the hook downstairs. "Diga" he demands of the caller,once the phone has been passed on by Eleita, the housemaid, who now takes care of the place and cooks. Until fairly recently, there was a staff of five who worked the house, cars, etc., before his daughters married and sadly, his wife passed away last year.

Invariably one of Flavio's many contacts wants to arrange a meeting, seek his advice, or deal with a legal matter. He's a founding member of a highly respected private university here in the capital city of Paraiba, Joao Pessoa. Unexpectedly, I have spent most of my professional, and increasingly, personal time with him and his community. In my capacity as a worker for prison reform, treatment, etc., Flavio arranged meetings with the Secretary of Justice for the State, and also the Head Judge for Paraiba: the former had a burning curiosity towards many of the specific details of the administration of our prisons, rates of recidivism, types of crimes, security policies, volonteerism, and the like. Three hours passed rapidly, interrupted sporadically by his cell phone ringing. I spoke French, my mutual language with his secretary, who translated to Portugese and back, facilitatating our wide-ranging discussion capped by a philosophical examination of the merits of the Death Penalty. Brasil does not have the Death Penalty, and in fact, the maximum sentence a prisoner can serve is thirty years, by law, even when the most heinous of crimes are punished with symbolic 300-year sentences.

Prison rebellions are the subject on everyone's lips. The Secretary of Justice (his name is so long, and his card is elsewhere) was particularly interested in how we deal with rebellions in the U.S., with brute force in most cases, as opposed to how it's done here, where the church, private citizens - anyone with influence who wants to try - goes inside to reason and negotiate with the prisoners. Well, it's not surprising the rebellions occur in certain cases where, I learned, a prison built for 150 people holds 700 or more.

The following day I had the great privilige to tour a medium security prison, which in itself sounds perhaps strange to the ears, yet it was fascinating for me. I was very inpressed to learn of a collaboration at this prison of educators and employers who guarantee the basic wage by law ($120/month) to prisoners on work release, and I attended a classroom where car mechanics were being taught. This particular prison, Magdabeira, was built near the ocean far (at that time) from town, as a working farm, such as is possible in this semi-arid climate. Coconut groves and rows of bushes that produce a bitter, red fruit that supposedly contains the mythical sum of 100 times the vitamin C of an orange, cover the spacious grounds of the prison.

Less appealing are the blocks of cells, galleys with three or four men per cell, no bunks, just thin mattresses, though is some cases their families have brought them televisions, and in one cell - a large fridgerator!

This group of prisoners participated in the rebellion at the maximum security prison last month, and have been locked down for 15 days without a look at the sun. This was their principal complaint to the Head Judge Hitler Cantalice who accompanied us, as did several gun-toting guards.

I've had my fill of prison work here for now. The emotional exhaustion of it and my pathetic struggles with Portugese, spoken very sensually and softly here, leave me wanting a day at the beach!

It began, of course, during my first stop in Brasil, the end result of 4 planes starting in Hartford, and almost 24 hours of travel. I loved my 4 full days in Fortaleza, a vibrant city of 2 million people to the north of here, also on the coast. As I was a main presenter I had access to a car, driver, hotel on the beach, and unbounded hospitality. Celina Ellery coordinated a superb conference on International Cooperation for Human Rights. I was very touched they included me in the program to present on the third day with Simone, the wife of a prisoner in Rio de Janiero, and the founder of her own NGO called PIMM, that works with the families of prisoners. Celina is a colleague from the Kellogg Fellows Program that has invited forty of us (for the third of five international seminars) to the seminar in Salvador, Bahia, next week. I'll be leaving for Bahia Friday afternoon, to attend a one-day seminar on the differences between the political systems in Latin America, before our intense, 8-day conference on the theme of "Youth" begins.

As for Brasil, I can certainly highly recommend the northeast as a place where the people are exceptionally warm, not to mention absolute knockouts in the physical sense thanks to the centuries of mixed marriages between african descent, portugese, and native indian populations. Recently I met an amazon beauty who was bigger than me! In general, people love to touch each other when they make a point, kiss each cheek in greetings, and spend time together as much as possible, talking and drinking Antartica beer in outdoor cafes. It's not cheap, though, at least not this upper middle class lifestyle that has me in the deceptive caress. Edgar Sauder Neto, Flavio Colaco's son-in-law, iterated the greatest problem of Brasil today is the vast difference between those with money and those without. When that number is close to 50 million - almost a third of the population of the country, anyone looking at the reality has to be concerned.

Salvador, my next stop, is the reputed heart of African culture in Brasil, Bahia is known for Candomble, Orisha worshipping, its' 365 churches, and the vivacity of the inhabitants.

Southerners from Soa Paolo and Rio look down on the northeast, at least that's the stereotype, and similarly the people from Salvador have one of their many statues of Jesus where his raised hand points south. The easy-going Salvadorans say that Jesus is telling people "if they want to work hard, go south".

Tonight I will facilitate the second of two organizational development meetings with the sister state committee of Partners of the Americas in Joao Pessoa. Evidently it's going well, as the group of doctors, lawyers, community development professionals and university professors wants to continue to develop these ideas which foment harmonious relations built on common purpose and elaborated in our joint document. I appreciate replies, comments, and will try to fulfill requests for information, if anyone has specifics they want to know.

Update: Now in Bahia, at this email address until saturday. Everybody gets to read it, so save the racy stuff for later. If I have time I'll try to send an update from here. Lots to do, and so much competition for the computer!

Letter # 2, from Bahia

San Salvador, Bahia, is the capital of black Brasil - the northeast. The people are famous for their vibrant, somewhat explosive, culture. I've experienced this directly twice so far in the form of an astonishingly active weekend nightlife. Dancing men and women that at times, as the drums of 15 -20 players beat out particular patterns to excite the crowd, people seemed to go outside of themselves, lost in a wild, frenzied abandon.

Friday evening I was exhausted from the trip from Paraiba, but Saturday night I went out with some local people from the Bahia chapter of Partners of the Americas.

Our evening had begun with a fairly staid reception here at the Salvador Praia Hotel, an opulent 4 star facility chosen in part for its capacity to host a major international conference with a simultaneous translation team, so that whether the presenters or participants are speaking Portugese, Spanish, or English we have our native language in our ears via radio transmitters.

This high-tech side of Brasil is quite disconcerting relative to the disturbing poverty and attendant complications for poor people.

Yesterday, for example, we visted a neighborhood here in San Salvador called Alagados, which effectively means 'garbage'. Just on the waterfront in the poorest section of the lower city - there is a higher city on the ridge above - sits a community built on a tidal march. Their houses are on stilts, indeed, all the bridges and walkways netween them are rickety walkways in need of constant repair. In some cases they charge each other a few centavo to cross certain areas in order to maintan the structures. As it was Sunday we observed a protestant church service, itself uncommon in a hugely Catholic country, being held in the living room of one of these huts built above the tidal marsh. Rubbish floated in the pools below, as the tide was out, and the stench was at times overwhelming.

Well, time to sign off, as a pal awaits the machine. I a few minutes our tour leaves for another event, this time a folklore show and dinner of native Bahian food. The ignames, manioc, papaya and other tropical fruits remind me of Africa.

Regards, and feel free to respond.

Sam

Letter # 3, from Bahia

As I sit in this temporary office for the seminar, I have excused myself from the lecture in order to jot off a letter, and was admonished to bring my simultaneous translation equipment with me. So, in my ears is the english version of the "çulture, identity, and education" in Bahia. Next to Lagos in Nigeria, Salvador, Bahia has the largest black population in any city in the world. Yet discrimination still exists here, and education levels are much lower for the majority of people than for the minority whites. One speaker has dealt with the issue of black feminism here in Bahia, and placed it in a historical context of the three cycles of   slave trade. The reality that only 1 in 3 slaves brought here were women, and they were objectified for the procreation of more slaves, and for the use of the portugese male landowners.

The dominant religion, Condomble, is evidently a result of the Yoruba and Fon tribal beliefs that survived and changed slightly. She pointed out that in the Carribbean , for example, the Santeria religion is the local manifestation of a similiar, forced migration of beliefs. I was quite touched while visiting a book store (in a mall that could have been anywhere in the states) to examine the photos of Pierre Verger, who had been recommended to me, that it was prefaced with an old map of the west coast of Africa, clearly marking Lama-Kara, Togo, where I lived for almost 4 years. I realized why I feel so comfortable here!

Women dominate the condomble religious pratices, and direct about 60 percent of the 'houses' as they are called. Unlike Catholicism, which is huge all over Latin America, not just Brasil, Condomble is not male-based, and as gives a place for the black women here to rule a significant aspect of their culture. After the morning break we'll debate the issues.

Yesterday and Wednesday I was part of a small field team tht visted a project that works exclusively with street kids. There are 1,500 kids living on the streets in Salvador, and another 10,000 who work the streets for money then return home at night. Project AXE as designed and started by a former UNICEF employee, an italian by the name of Cesare something-or-other, who is completing 30 years in Brasil. It is base on the philosophical premise espoused by Paolo Friere and others, built on a "pedagogy of desire''.

Taking desire as the route cause of all human action, his idea - now shared by several spin-off groups and internal projects in Salvador, is to offer to the children only that hich they want, and thereby opening the door for education, change, and possibly a better life for them eventually. We met with some educators and street kids at a roadsie recycling project where the young people, once emerged from their cardboard boxes around the corner, participate in transforming thrown out paper in to beautiful, aesthetically pleasing objects. The intended metaphor is to demonstrate that everything can be transformed into something better, and even that which is considered garabage can be made lovely by applying the right intention. Pretty cool.

AXE is a condomble word meaning ''Peace, or the positive life force from which all things wil flow". Our group spent an hour or two at their circus for kids, Circo Picollino, which reminded me slightly of Oddfellows Playhouse in Middletown, and with an actual big top, high trapeze wires, and seriously trained youth on tightropes, gymnastic bars and the like.

Fafa, a young guy of about 15 I guess devoted himself patiently to me for 30 minutes or so for a juggling lesson with clubs. Alas, maybe I'll get it some other time - not as easy as it looks!

Last night I viewed a Capoeira class in the San Antonio Fort, in the old city of Pelourinho, where the cobblestones rise from the earth in a most irregular manner, worn and displaced from a couple of hundred years use.

I was there last Saturday, where I went dancing to the music of ILE, one of the several cultural groups reclaiming black culture through their specific blend of reggae, samba, and more direct african rhythms. Capoiera Angola, the brand they practice here, is apparently the non-violent kind, and is truly beautiful to see in it's element. One team performed the music while the other trained, then they switched. It does look exhausting.

My time in Brasil draws to a close, and we are at that point in the seminar where everyone just wants it to be over, despite the fascinating information and debates therein. Later this afternoon, myself and two colleagues, Ed Gonzalez from Haverstraw, NY, and Marilene Machado, from Colombia, will be leading a workshop called "Right From the Beginning: How to Involve Young People in Decision Making or Projects". Should be fun, though I admit I am nervous, as usual.

Tomorrow our last day will be spent partially on one of the several beaches - finally - outside of town, where we will bask, swim, and possibly evaluate the seminar. As you may have gathered, we're all delighted to be here in Bahia, and this exuberance has spilled over into most of the seminar, too. In truth, most of the presentations have been excellent.

For example, the speaker is talking right now about racism here, and how the dominant class is still white, as exemplified by the hotel staff here, managed by whites, with customers served by blacks.

From here, I'll go to Paraguay, then to Iguazo Falls, hopefully, before returning home next wednesday.

Regards,

Sam