Hurray for me!

So I want you all to cheer for me and to be incredibly excited for what I did today. I rode a bike! Okay so everyone should be rejoicing with me. For those of you who do not know I had a bad bike accident a year ago and have not been back on a bike since then. But this afternoon a bunch of us wanted to go for a bike ride to better see the city of Curitiba and to see the condition of their bike and pedestrain path that runs throughout the city. It was a lot of fun and the bike path is in wonderful condition.

We have spent the past two days getting aquainted with this city and seeing the ways the governmental leaders are addressing problems and issues of urbanization. Curitiba is world reknown for its environmental sustainability and friendliness. It has over 55 square meters of parks per resident. Consequently, the city is beautiful and is covered in parks and greenery. I will admit the parks and green spaces were very refreshing to see after living for a month in Buenos Aires. The city is also very wealthy. The government claims there are no poor people in the city and that there are no beggars or homeless people. In one sense this is true. You do not see beggars or even many people attempting to sell things on the streets. You also do not see stray dogs. However, when you talk with nongovernmental people, you quickly realize that the story the governmental leaders tell is not exactly true. They end up giving huge incentives to the poor within the city so that they leave the city and go to the rural areas. They are told they will receive land and a house. They do receive both of these, but it is in a squatter settlement or shanty town. A further problem with this solution is that once people live in shanty towns they cannot get out. No one will want to give them credit or to hire them in high paying jobs even if they possess the needed skills. In some ways the city feels like it is too good to be true. It kind of reminds me of the Truman Show. It is a beautiful place and all of the residents love to live here, but I am wondering if they have really addressed issues of urbanization. I am also beginning to wonder if you can address all of the issues, or if you begin to address one do the others fall behind.

The other cool thing for me over the past two days relates to some discussions that Michael and I have had with two of our professors about the HNGR program. These two professors have been previous or current HNGR advisors so they know more then I do about how the internship plays out. We have to design a project for the internship. But they said in many ways you only have a vague idea of the project and you dont really begin to design your project and make it more concrete until about half way through your six month stay in a developing nation. Your project comes out of your interests and most importantly from listening to the organization to see what their interests are and what their needs are. For example, one of the ministries we saw yesterday did not know how their work was changing the feelings and impressions between the poor and rich. So a HNGR intern could use their skills in anthropology or sociology to research the effects of the program and to see if they are having the results they want. Also we met a girl from Germany who has been here for about 5 months. She came here not knowing any Portuguese and she now can speak profficient Portuguese and even translate from it into English. It was very encouraging.

I hope you are all well. Happy forth of July. Please set off some fireworks for me!