juxtapósition

sidenote: these keyboards are a little different. so, my spelling and such is not totally wack.

somethings in life are much bigger than you think they are while other things are much, much smaller. two examples: the "favelas" and my hotel (which i will call the dollhouse). my plane to salvador left a good 45 minutes late. quite a mess.

sidenote 2: i just tried to cry right now, but no real tears came out. am i fronting about being overwhelmed?

anyway, i missed my scheduled taxi and had to make arrangements for transportation to the hotel. thank the Lord for flate rate taxi service. hol-la!!! my trip into Barra (my new neighborhood) gave me the opportunity to scope out my new home for the next three months. i am completely overwhelmed by the sheer amount of poverty. yet, i feel really bad, guilty even, for placing my american/western values on this place. there are literally valleys of buildings that would not even pass code in the US yet they serve as h.o.m.e for many many salvadorans. i knew to expect this, but i was not even ready!!!

then we arrived at the dollhouse. uh. yeah. not the place i was expecting from the book and especially from their webstie. their website features great, crisp photos of a place that seemingly evokes feelings of warmth, joy, and, well, home. that´s why i chose the place. well, lets just say that the paint is faded. and the rooms are teeny tiny. i am a big girl. curvy and 5´11. i literally dwarf the whole staff. i remember as a young girl playing with my barbie mansion that i wished that i too could play inside the doll house. well, this is my chance.

my room is at the top of a very narrow and high circular stair case. talk about incentive to limit my intake of beer and caiparhinas!!!

ya´ll my ceiling is made of terra cotta. it also is the only thing that seperates me from the rain that is steadily falling as i write this.

elizabth medgyesy wrote the following in this month´s yoga journal magazine: (how does a pilgramage differ from a vactaion?) "the difference is intention. a pilgramage is a vessel for growth, and travel is the most potent form of spiritual growth that is available to us. when we´re at home in a regular day in-day out routine, our feelings, thoughts, and actions are just that. routine. however, when we travel, we get out of our seat of normalcy and that´s when growth occurs. it comes down to releasing control and trying something new."

based on this belief, i am experiencing a shock to my senses (sight, smells, sounds, tastest) and to fully experience the new i must "[let] go of existing patterns".

i will have to let go. have. to. the first step is to accept that i have a super-sparse room in a dollhouse. i accept this room. and i will also honor it. a good thing about sparsity is that i have lots of space. (read: greater than 5 feet 11 inches to practice yoga.)