Celebrating a Year

And I wake feeling more or less recovered. Thankfully, as I’d promised myself that I’d seek medical intervention if this didn’t subside in 48 hours. I work at home until the afternoon and then take myself downtown to go to 2 art shows. The first is a small documentary photography exhibit of the work of Jean Solari from the 60s and 70s– he of the famous Os Mutantes photo. His pictures show 60s news journalism focusing on issues of national interest, giving a look at a slice of Brazilian life from half a century ago. I then head over to the blockbuster show called “India! Lado a Lado,” (India! Side by Side), just ending its run, that contrasts the old with the modern in India’s art, culture, and politics. Interesting in and of itself, I’m also fascinated at how it shows the Brazilian perspective, as another country rising to economic prominence in the world while still struggling to reconcile a 3rd-world infrastructure with a new globally-aware sophistication. As I sit in the bus going home, my landlady Miriam boards, and we travel together. When we arrive she suggests we climb the stairs above the floor where I live, and the floor where she lives, to a rooftop tiny grassy lawn 5 stories about the street that she has created since my last stay. She pulls out folding canvas chairs and we sit chatting, surveying the vastness of Guanabara Bay as evening falls.