It's not nature's fault

Here I was, studying Management of Natural Risks, when my family alerts me of a very real disaster going on not to far from where they live.

Blumenau on a sunny day, bordered by Rio Itajai. Photo from Wikicommons

My mother's family is from a cute little town called Blumenau, which means Field of Flowers in German, and is one of the German towns set up by pioneers in the late 19th century in Southern Brazil. You see, these German pioneers were practical. They knew that living near a water source would help them with their early development and getting started in a new country. So they picked a site next to a large river bend, built sturdy German houses, and named the town after flowers. It couldn't get much better than that.

But Brazilian climate tends to be a little more unpredictable. Southern Brazil is predominately Atlantic rainforest- or at least it is supposed to be. There is a large annual rainfall, electrical storms, and even some tornados off east. Once the riparian forest was gone, the river started swelling and causing enormous, catastrophic floods. The first recorded flood was September 23rd, 1880. The worst ones were in 1983 and 1984. My mom was a teen at that time. She remembers the streets becoming rivers and drinking water from the neighbor's swimming pool, because it was the only potable water left. 

Unfortunately, it wasn't the last. The last one was in 2008. It killed over a hundred people and moved thousands out of their homes. Many still don't have where to live. I've seen stories on tv of people that have no idea what to do next. They shake their fists into the air, wondering why this happened to them.

While it might not be their fault that they lived in such a precarious position, it certainly isn't nature's fault. This is Brazil. This is a climate that is used to very rainy seasons that may pop up once a century or twenty times. It's unpredictable. You cannot, and must not, do anything to change that.

What you can do is to reduce its consequences. It's the first thing I learned on my very first day of class this year : Risks are there. You can't change them. Earthquakes will happen, volcanoes will spew lava, rain might fall for 40 days and cause a flood. Earth is like that. We have to learn to live with it instead of fighting it. Luckily, most of these events are predictable. The Japonese have learned to deal with earthquakes by building seismic-proof buildings. The Dutch have built dikes to keep their country from disappearing bit by bit. 

Unfortunately for those who live in Blumenau, it's very hard to deal with this particular risk. Those who live on low lands often don't have the choice of moving elsewhere. The high lands are too far from the city and there's not enough money to move away. Sometimes the solution is asking for the government to step in and offer solutions : maybe subsidizing building companies to construct other buildings on the highlands, and connecting it with a good transport system so they won't be cut off from the city. Maybe it's making a system so that those who do construct on forbidden land are penalized. What I do know is that it's necessary to create a fool-proof risk system so that accidents like these don't happen again.

Because it will rain again. And again, and again. The trees love it, and so does the entire ecosystem. What can I say? It's a little piece of paradise down there. I just hope that people will protect it and not get mad at it.

These two guys were chilling out near São Martinho, Brazil. Lime green toucans are common in the Atlantic Rainforest.

9 tips for learning a language by yourself (and why you should do it)

Hello, all!

Part of Tracking Stories is the crossing of international borders and going where you haven't been before (virtually, I mean). If you're reading this, chances are English isn't your first language and you're practicing it right now. Good for you! Learning and practicing other languages means more than being able to communicate with more people. It keeps your brain in shape and opens your mind to new ideas.

So how exactly do you go learning a new language? Here are some tips.

#1. Pick a language. This is my first tip and the hardest for me personally, for I learning about other cultures and I'll find myself floating between languages until I finally pick one and stick to it. Tip: If your English is already at a point that you can make yourself be understood and you can understand people without a problem, you can move on to another language.

#2. If the language you want to learn isn't your second language, make sure you keep in touch with your 2nd language also. This is very important. If your first language is French, your second is English and you want to learn Spanish, go ahead for Spanish- but do not abandon English. Make sure you're still in touch with your 2nd language, even if it's ten minutes a day. Listen to the radio, watch TV, talk to a native speaker if you're lucky (write me a comment on Facebook....lol). You won't forget your second language, but it will get rusty if you don't use it from time to time.

#3. Make this a daily practice. You'll need to be in touch with your language at least once per day for it to get easier. I recommend at least half an hour per day.

#4. Listen to native speakers. If you don't live in a country with native speakers, hello Youtube! Youtube is fantastic, there are great people out there that have recorded free lessons. When you're done listening, give them a big 'like' and leave your thanks in a comment. You'll want people like them to keep up the good work.

#5. Write. Even if you never ever want to write to someone in that language, you need to write in order to exercise your brain. Keep a little notebook with new expressions and vocab. Put sticky notes all over the house (my mom did this to me in German, and odd enough, I'll recognize a word or two in GErman because of it).  If you're really into it, keep a diary. Write about your routine until writing becomes a routine.

#6. Speak. Talk to yourself. Talk to that person on youtube. Repeat the same word a hundred times until it sounds right.

#7. Read. Yes, read even if you don't know what two consecutive words mean. Make it a habit. Print out an online newspaper, buy a book in the language. Use online dictionary to translate, Google translator, or a paper dicitonary if you want.

#8. Post an ad saying you want to learn that language, and that you want them in exchange for giving lessons in your native language. So you live in Brazil and you want to learn Russian? Post an ad, offering Portuguese lessons in exchange for Russian. Maybe there are some Russians staying for the summer and they want to learn Portuguese from native speakers. Check out language centers and toursity-spots.

#9. Learn about culture. Make a list of countries that your language is spoken in.  Read about cultural traditions, customs, holidays, sayings. This goes a long way to learning a language : you might find out, for example, that the French say 'Bonjour' (Good morning) even when it's 6 PM. Learn about these little differences.

And those are my handy tips! I'll be adding more as I remember them. I just want to make two things clear: first, learning another language does not have to be expensive. With Internet, you can:

Find grammar exercises
Find easy texts to read
Find videos and tutorials

Internet is a huge, immense, tool that can be used for learning purposes. I love it.

And second, it is most definitely possible to learn a language by yourself without classes. All you need is your determination.

And most of all, have fun!! :)

September 11th- my personal experience and view of it

Today is September 11^th.

I’m not a hypocrite. There are worse massacres that happened in the world before and after, and I don’t keep track of all of the dates they happened on.  But I can somehow relate to this one personally. I didn’t lose anyone, but I got a taste of the fear. My family and I were less than two hours away when it happened. My mom pulled me out of school for fear that they would start bombing important sites, including schools. At that moment, nobody knew what was happening: we all were watching those images on TV, but we didn’t know what was coming next. We panicked. My brother and I hid in the basement. My mom stayed in the car with the car radio on. My dad left to donate blood at a hospital, because they were preparing for survivors.

This was perhaps the first thing that happened to me that showed me that maybe, the world was a darker place than I thought it to be.

The second thing it showed me was the universal hate against Americans. My brother and I have both learned later: while out of the United States, don’t speak English in the streets. Never tell people you’re American unless you’ve gained their trust. Use a Brazilian passport for identification.

And thirdly, it began to shape me into the person I am today. I wrote a letter addressing President Bush, and gave him my entire savings (a mere 17 dollars) because my mom said that he asked for kids to donate a buck or two to ‘America’s fund for Afghanistan’s children’. I wrote a letter to the French president, asking that he come to America’s aid. I started keeping up with the news. I started asking: Why?

So today’s date is burned in my memory. I pray not only for those who died on this date, but those who died on all the other massacres, too.  I want to be their voice. I want to make a tiny difference in the world, and things like this pushes me forward every day.

This was me on Halloween, 2001.