Treacherous footing, narrow street

The rounded bricks that made up the ancient street were so treacherous that I had to pick my way extra carefully, with my head down. I didn’t even see the building until it was right in front of me.

Suddenly, there it was — sky-blue stucco, navy-blue shutters, and black decorative ironwork over the doors and windows. It was so familiar, a building I’d seen hundreds of times, but only in photographs and videos.

When I craned my neck to take in all five stories, I got goosebumps.

Almost ten years ago, Barry and I loaned the money to buy this property to a tiny non-profit. At the time, it was a derelict, and we didn’t know what it would take to renovate it. We had no idea when, or if, we would be paid back. We had no idea when we’d even see the building, located in Salvador da Bahia, Brazil.

Now we had come to do something more than just see it. We had come to use the building for its intended purpose: To exchange knowledge and build community.

We were part of a group who had come from all over the USA at the invitation of Rita Conceição to help launch a new endeavor: Sou Digna. The phrase is translated as, “I Am Worthy,” which pretty much sums it up. Sou Digna’s programs give impoverished women the confidence and skills they need to achieve equality.

The crew worked tirelessly in the heat

So, when we stepped through the door and into the building, we did so as participants, not visitors. For two weeks, we threw ourselves into a whirlwind of activity that included fixing broken furniture, painting, cleaning, and making the classrooms fresh and inviting. We sat together, creating budgets and planning documents and promotional materials. We participated in discussions every day about living with the violence created by endemic poverty.

For one week, my friend and colleague Nancy Bacon taught a class in organizational development and grantwriting, and I served as a class assistant, documenting the class and learning along with the other students. Then it was my turn to teach them how to use technology to build their international community.

At that point, I really wished I was on the painting and refurbishing crew. As I wrote to a friend at home, “Frankly, I am terrified, even though I know all my students.” As a corporate trainer, I had presented to much larger groups — 200 people, not 10. But I never had to present this much critical material, working with an interpreter. Would I have too much material? Would I have too little? Would I be able to meet their expectations?

Sharing what we know

In the end, the class went great. The students were excited to realize that they could develop their own messages, using tools that are not intimidating. They did class projects that provided them with useful materials they’ll be able to use, not just abstract assignments. They had several days of hands-on work with computers, and it was fascinating to see the range of computer skills in the room and the joy they experienced when they succeeded in doing something new.

At the end, the biggest complaint in the class evaluations is that they wanted a longer class. Whew!

It has been a few months since the class, and now that I see the work my students are doing, I am awed. They came to class and learned a lot more than new computer skills. They learned that they have things to share with the world that the world wants to hear. They learned that they have a right to speak and be heard by the world. They learned that they are worthy.

In the months since I’ve returned from Brazil, members from this dedicated group of women have launched several initiatives. One is a course in cooking and food preparation that will help women find jobs and start small businesses. Another is a technology class that incorporates basic computer skills with some of the material I shared. And every student in the Sou Digna program learns about human and legal rights, those basic rights that each of us needs to understand to know that yes, I Am Worthy.

Every time I see a photo of the activities, I recognize where it was taken, in that building. I am proud of myself for being part of the genesis of that building, for having a little plaque on the wall with my name on it. But in the end, it’s just a structure. The real pride is in the students who study and learn and grow in that building. The real pride is knowing that I have contributed to the well-being and happiness of my Sou Digna community. There are no plaques for that, but I don’t need one. I carry it around with me all the time.
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For more information about Sou Digna, visit our website or “like” our Facebook page. As a friend of mine, you are already part of our community, but please consider making it official by signing up for updates! If you’d like to help us financially, mark your calendar for May 2nd, 2012, when the Give Big campaign gives you a chance to donate with up to 15% matching. It’s like finding free money to give away.

Nancy Bacon has also written an excellent blog post about our students.

Part of our group in front of the building

Meps, Rita, and Barry with the plaque

We learn from each other. Rita and Jaqueline, who make Sou Digna possible.

All photos are copyrighted, but feel free to send me an email if you’d like to reuse one.

Topes with elotes

A black-and-white road sign with a symbol on it, looking like a snake that ate two donuts. Tope!

“WATCH OUT!” I cried in alarm, from the passenger seat. My driver and companion, Philip, slammed on the brakes and eased the tiny rental car (he called it “the pregnant rollerskate”) slowly over the nearly-invisible, transmission-eating bump.

“Whew. Thanks,” he said, as he shifted back up to speed.

The sudden stop was re-enacted over and over during our recent trip to see the Mayan ruins of Mexico. “Topes,” or speed bumps, are a fascinating part of the Mexican driving experience. Completely disruptive to comfortable car travel, we found them all over the highways of Quintana Roo. According to expat writer Stan Gotlieb, Mexican slang for them is “policia durmiendo,” or sleeping policemen.

There’s no consistency to the character of the topes. Some are wide plateaus, some are rounded bumps, some are big pieces of rope that jar your teeth. The signage, too, is inconsistent. Some are marked 300 meters in advance. Some are painted yellow. Some are not marked at all, just waiting for you to fly over at full speed and land in the arms of the local mechanic. We saw almost no stoplights in Mexico, but hundreds of topes.

Clever entrepreneurs use their village topes to offer fruits, vegetables, and baked goods to the drivers who are forced to nearly stop to make it safely over the deadly bumps. Some have even erected permanent shops and stands next to the topes, including one where we bought a pineapple. Is it possible that the shopkeepers erect the bumps, or at least lobby for them, as a way to get business?

After we’d made it over the “Elotes” speed bump and into the village, I asked Philip to make a u-turn. He cruised back and parked in front of the bump. I had finally remembered what “elotes” meant: Corn.

Topes with pineapple stand

The young woman at the stand took my money and pulled two ears of corn out of a large pot, steaming over a wood fire. She squeezed lime juice over each ear, then spread it with a thin layer of mayonnaise. This was followed by chili powder and fresh-grated hard cheese, and delivered with a handful of napkins. Many years ago, I had read about this way to serve corn in a Molly Katzen cookbook, but I never thought I’d get to try the real thing, on the Tulum-Coba road.

As she quietly prepared the corn, I found myself wondering if she and her family had erected the speed bump, and what she thought about working every day, selling corn and vegetables next to a speed bump. I wished my Spanish was good enough to have a conversation with her.

The corn was delicious, and I used my clumsy Spanish to thank the young woman. “Gracias,” I said. To which she replied, in completely unaccented English, “You’re very welcome.” I was too surprised to reply.

—

Meps with the pregnant roller skate

He came back down, shaking his head. “A nice lady on the dock invited us over for a glass of wine,” he said.

“Wow. It looks so close, but it’s a million miles away, isn’t it?” I replied.

We were barely 100 feet from a private dock in front of a condo building, but it would have been impossible to launch the dinghy in those winds without damaging it, Flutterby, or a member of the crew.

The next day, the winds calmed a little, and we were able to row ashore for a new GPS. We used the dinghy dock at the marina, further up the creek, which meant a more difficult row against a 2-knot current. It was a grumpy day, because we spent way too much money (for you landlubbers, a “boat buck”=$1K) at West Marine.

When we got back to Flutterby that evening, we wearily hauled the dinghy up on deck and tied it down. My mind was set on an early bedtime and a pre-dawn departure.

On the dock, a man called to get my attention. “Would you like to come over for a glass of wine?” he shouted.

If only he’d called out 10 minutes earlier, before we got the dinghy out of the water, I might have said yes. But I shook my head. “No thank you,” I answered.

He persisted, having noticed our home port. “Our daughter lives in Seattle.”
“Where?”
“On Capitol Hill.”
We conducted a surprising but difficult conversation over the wind. His daughter lives very close to the house we owned for 10 years.

“I’m not originally from Seattle!” I shouted. I told him that my parents had built a house on an island just up the road from here, Harbor Island.

“What’s your Dad’s name?” he asked.
“Schulte!”
He threw his head back, laughing. “I WAS AT YOUR WEDDING!”

I peered closely at the white-haired gentleman on the dock, who I hadn’t seen in 20 years. Then I stuck my head down the companionway. “Barry! We have to launch the dinghy again! That’s Tom Mikell on the dock!”

We launched the dinghy and rowed the short distance. Tom was waiting for us with a glass of wine in a condo on the ground floor, Flutterby perfectly framed in the french doors of the living room.

The three of us sat down and started getting caught up. “Wait ’til my wife comes back from yoga. She’s going to be amazed. She was disappointed when you wouldn’t come over yesterday.”

Old friend, new friend. Tom and Mary Ann.

Mary Ann came back a little while later, and Tom met her at the door. “We have guests, honey. Remember those folks on the sailboat?”

“Great! You got them to come over!” She greeted us with a big smile and a hug, and Tom teased her about his ability to lure us over when she could not. Then he burst out, “Guess who was at their wedding!” She shook her head, “Who?”

Tom pointed to himself.

All three of us grinned at her. She stared at us in disbelief, then checked the wine bottle. “What have you been drinking?”

“It was twenty years ago,” I chimed in.

With all three of us talking at once, we explained the strange coincidence, the fact that Tom had known my parents very well, that we had gotten married at my parents’ house in a memorable and unusual ceremony. “Do you remember that there was a sailboat on top of the cake?” I said to Tom. Back then, we owned a 14-foot daysailer and dreamed of someday cruising on a “big” boat.

Tom and Mary Ann have been married for just about a year, and they are a wonderfully-matched couple, excellent story-tellers who share a lively sense of humor.

“I met your Mom and Dad at a party on Harbor Island,” said Tom. He’s an attorney who represented the Harbor Island Owners’ Association, an organization my Dad practically ran for a while. “When I got there, everybody was drinking and carrying on, and your Mom had this party game, where she was studying peoples’ handwriting.”

I cracked up laughing. Mom’s ability and belief in handwriting analysis were legendary in my family. Any time my siblings or I brought home a new boy- or girlfriend, Mom demanded a sample of their handwriting to analyze and make sure they were a good person. Barry evaded her scrutiny only because handwriting analysis requires cursive writing, and he prints everything.

“So your Mom studies this sample of my handwriting,” continued Tom, “and with everybody at the party watching, she looks at me and says, ‘Hmm, dishonest…’ and everyone at the party starts laughing their heads off! ‘See these loops here, and the way the i’s are dotted…dishonest, very dishonest. Must be a lawyer.’ I must admit, I was not pleased,” said Tom. He scowled playfully.

Luckily, Tom laughs about it now. He forgave my mother and enjoyed many good times with both my parents. He described a time when Harbor Island was a tight-knit community of young, vibrant retirees who hung out together on the beach, went boating, and had a lot of parties.

“Remember the whale?” he said.

That’s another legendary story — in 1987, a 65-foot whale beached herself on Harbor Island, which folks in Beaufort call “an overgrown sandbar.” My family was walking on the beach that afternoon and was the first to come across the giant creature, who was euthanized after a couple of days. Then there was the problem of what to do with a rotting 65-foot whale — one of Tom’s more interesting legal cases.

A group of experts cut the whale up into pieces with chainsaws, and the island owners hired a man with a bulldozer to bury them. But Mother Nature had other ideas, and a couple of weeks later, the rotting pieces started popping up out of the sand.

“I guess they just buried it deeper,” said Tom. “No, I heard they put concrete on top,” I said. Neither of us had heard of rotting whale pieces on Harbor Island after that.

We spent the entire evening with Tom and Mary Ann, talking about everything under the sun. We even walked over the Upper Crust for some dinner — my Mom’s favorite pizza place when she was alive. Once in a while, one of the four of us would shake our heads and marvel at the coincidence and history that brought us together. “You look like your Dad,” said Tom, a very high compliment indeed.

One reason our wedding was memorable was because it was all about magic and sailing. It was magic and sailing that brought us together with Tom and Mary Ann for the evening — but I can’t believe it took 20 years. Now that we know where to find them, we’ll be back a lot sooner to anchor in Factory Creek and row ashore for a visit.

“Yes — there’s a laundry room, right over there,” said the woman behind the cash register, Lynn. She pointed out the door of a clean but nondescript room with a row of washers and dryers and a small table. At least, it was nondescript at the time. Later that night, you might say it was pretty “descript.”

We’d stopped at Osprey marina because after four days on the water, anchoring out, it was time for hot showers, diesel, and laundry. A couple of years earlier, in one of the email dispatches known as “Malla and Ted’s Excellent Adventure,” our friend Ted had gone into uncharacteristic rapture over the place, once named the best marina in the country by Marina Dock Age Magazine.

As Ted led us to expect, the place was small, reasonably priced, and very friendly, with excellent facilities for doing a memorable load of laundry.

4 days old and cute as a kitten

What made it memorable was that at 5 o’clock, when the office closed, Lynn moved a baby goat into the laundry room.

The morning we arrived, the goat was the only topic of conversation. There was a small herd of them on the 180-acre property, and this one had been born four days earlier, on February 23. At first, everything looked fine, but after three days, his mother died.

Just a few hours before Barry and I arrived, the little orphan was tucked among warm towels in a small cooler and moved into the marina office with the heat cranked up. Everyone who came into the store stopped into the office to coo over the tiny brown-and-white floppy-eared creature who spent his time sleeping, eating, and occasionally bleating in a way that sounded like a human baby.

At the end of the day, there were plenty of volunteers from the various boats to help care for him overnight, which is why he ended up in the laundry room with all his paraphernalia — milk, bottle, printouts from the internet on how to care for an orphaned goat, a feeding schedule, and notes about his care and condition. Plus a sign with his name: Lucky.

While I was cooking dinner, Barry offered to carry our load of laundry ashore and put it into the washer. He didn’t come back, and dinner and I were waiting for him when he finally returned. He admitted that he had gotten into a conversation in the laundry room with a boater named Sharon, who was goat-watching. I couldn’t blame him, because I was dying to go up and play with the goat myself.

Sharon and Barry in Lucky's nursery

Later that evening, as Barry was getting ready for bed, I announced that I needed to use the shoreside facilities. It was a ruse — we have a perfectly good head. I went straight to the laundry room, where a couple was just leaving after feeding the goat. We had a nice chat about — what else? — boats and goats, and then they left me alone to enjoy Lucky’s company. I got him out of the cooler and set him on the floor, where he wobbled on his toothpick legs and promptly piddled on the floor. Lucky was innately “cooler-trained” and would not mess up his bed.

For a four-day old creature, he was very rambunctious and curious. He wanted to explore the laundry room and when I turned him away from hidey-holes where he might get into trouble, he complained. He was an adorable playmate, about the size of a small cat.

We were enjoying each other’s company when Sharon returned and caught me trying to capture the fast-moving little guy with my camera. “Oh, good! I was afraid he’d be alone,” she said. “Here, let me take a picture of both of you.”

I was supposed to be in bed a half hour earlier, but I couldn’t help hanging out and talking with Sharon. It had been over 20 years since I played with a baby goat, and who knew when I’d get my next chance? I happen to really like goats.

The next morning, our alarm went off at 5:20 in order to catch some early favorable current in the Waccamah River. I’d promised Sharon that I would check on Lucky, because that would be between his 3 am and 6 am feedings. But when I entered the laundry room, there was Sharon, sitting in a plastic chair.

Sharon snoozing with Lucky

“Don’t tell me you stayed here all night,” I said.

“OK, I won’t tell you,” she replied.

“But you did.”

“Yeah, I did. I got some sleep when other people came in to feed him. His bottle’s over there in the sink — go ahead.”

I picked up the bottle and crouched down to the cooler, where Lucky was nosing his head around the towels as if looking for something. I gave him what he was looking for, and he sucked contentedly for a while. I hadn’t fed a goat since we lived on Hill Farm in Portland, Oregon, and it brought back fond memories.

Eventually, Barry came looking for me, intent on getting Flutterby underway, but he, too was captivated by early morning goat-feeding. We finally said our goodbyes and slipped our lines at 7 o’clock, 45 minutes later than planned.

Lucky seems strong and healthy enough to survive, but his future is unknown. Will he be adopted out to a family or local farmer, or just nursed long enough to return to the Osprey herd? Is Lucky even a he, or a little she?

Meps and Lucky the Goat

There are a lot of boaters with dogs and cats aboard, and even a few birds. One thing is certain, though, which is that none of the boaters so eager to take their turns with Lucky in the laundry room want to adopt him. He may look adorable and be fun to play with, but already the laundry room is taking on a certain “goaty” odor. He is not a close-quarters pet, and I doubt that Osprey Marina, with its reputation for being one of the top marinas in the USA, wants to jeopardize their highly-prized standings with such an odiferous, albeit adorable, mascot.

Our experience definitely confirms one thing about Osprey: Their reputation for being the friendliest marina around is well-earned. They’ll be good to you, providing excellent facilities and plenty of free snacks. Even if — especially if — you are an orphaned goat.

Karen's mast quilt

The compass roses on our charts are very practical, necessary, and boring. They include true and magnetic north and a circle of numbers and tick marks to help us plot courses.

Flutterby recently acquired a much more beautiful compass rose, with blue cardinal points, green ordinal points, and gorgeous purple for the secondary intercardinal points. It is reminiscent of the ones used on historical seafaring charts going back to the 16th century, and it is a stunning piece of art.

It started with a picture that we posted on Facebook of Barry standing in Flutterby’s galley, next to the mizzen mast. In the comments about the photo, our friend Karen wrote, “Crazy question, but what’s the circumference of that mast?” Barry promptly replied (he has some interesting specifications stored on his computer), “The circumference is 27 inches where it goes through the galley.”

It was an odd exchange, since although Karen is a curious soul and a voracious reader, she isn’t a friend I think of as interested in the minutiae of sailboat refits. We met over 15 years ago on a computer BBS and shared a love of cats, dancing, and hilarious late-night conversations. Karen once distinguished herself as the best house-sitter on the planet when we returned from a trip to find a fresh-baked, homemade apple pie in our oven.

So after the initial question about the mast circumference, Karen dropped the subject. At least, that’s what I thought. And since she lives in Port Orchard, Washington, and she wasn’t likely to visit us on the boat very soon, we dropped it, too.

Nine months later, the next time we were in Seattle, Karen said she had a special something to give us. We had no idea how special!

Nautical side of the quilt

The surprise was a double-sided quilt, 27 inches square, with the dramatic compass rose and a blue-and-white fabric with boat plans on one side. Such a perfect thing to wrap around the mast in the center of our main cabin! It makes the boat look like an art gallery — the quilting itself was taken from a stained-glass window with butterflies in it.

But it is the other side that truly takes my breath away, because it illustrates how perceptive Karen is about the Adventures of Meps ‘n’ Barry. It’s a convergence quilt, with successively smaller pieces starting in the four corners and working together in the middle. It’s very colorful, but the predominant colors are restful browns and beiges. What the colors and the fabric represent are the four corners of the USA — the corners that we have explored and blogged about from the Squid Wagon.

As we set out on our latest voyage, heading south down the ICW, I am delighted to be boating again and to share my stories of life on the water. Our beautiful quilt is hanging on the mast with the compass rose facing out. But that is only a portion of my life. I’ve just gotten back from a trip overseas, to Brazil, that was taken on an airplane. And as Karen has beautifully illustrated, I am very proud of the voyages and the writing inspired by our travels on land, here in the USA. And I am very, very proud to call Karen Jake — fabric artist, crazy cat lady, librarian, and dedicated caregiver for her Mom — my friend.

Barry and Karen with the landlubber side of the quilt

So why again am I moving South for warmer weather? I suppose it could stay decently warm up here. But nope, I’m heading South now.

Err, well, not really. Going “South” on the ICW from Beaufort, I follow the coast and go due West. I am trying to head South, but the compass won’t be pointing that direction for another week or two, given the shape of the coastline.

Today I’m noticing how many smaller things in my life have shifted already. Before, Flutterby and I were in the boatyard, with projects and chaos sprawled out in too many directions. The feral cats we’ve been feeding seemed to be getting more attached to us, and even tame–Nancy has head-butted Meps’ hand, and Kenny rubbed against my legs a few times. He will eat cat treats from either of our hands, and they would both jump onto the deck of our boat to ask for their dinner. Or sometimes they just came over to say hello, even after they had eaten their fill.

Last night I said goodbye to them. I didn’t use words–I just fed them dinner and treats like I usually do, and talked to them. I can say the stupidest things to them, and all I think they notice is the tone of voice. Sometimes I just meow back at them. Either way, they don’t understand goodbyes, and I don’t like goodbyes much anyway, so I didn’t waste words on that.

Today, we saw dolphins in the water crossing our wake. I don’t know when I’ll see those cats again, but I’m sure I’ll be seeing more dolphins in the next few days.

We are unplugged from shore power again. So I took two electric space heaters that had been running every night at the dock, and wound up the cords and put them away. I got out a small propane powered space heater and tested it. It is now dark, and cooling off. I’ll probably be using this heater for real in another hour. I’ve put away the AC power supplies for the computers and the phone chargers, digging out the 12V versions. Most people wouldn’t even notice, but I feel better knowing that I can run on my own power.

More important is being at anchor, swinging in the wind again. And next time I leave the boat there will be a dingy or a kayak to launch instead of just pulling the dock line in a bit tighter and stepping ashore. This motion is what a boat is supposed to do, and feels much better.

Yesterday, I spent an hour shuffling stuff in and out of the space under the V-berth, the deepest, largest, and (nearly) hardest to access storage aboard Flutterby. There are still things to stow, but she looks more cleaned up than she has in months. We had a short day (not even 15 miles) and are having a lazy afternoon, but I already sewed some clasps onto the mast quilt our friend Karen gave us this summer.

I have trouble figuring out which direction I’m going these days, but it sure feels good to be in motion again.

Farol da Barra, the view from my balcony

A half-block from my balcony was a lighthouse, a 75-foot tall structure that dominated my view. I photographed it at all times of the day — at sunrise, highlighted in gold, and sunset, in pink. I spent a lot of time standing on my 4th-floor balcony, gazing at it and the ocean beyond.

The lighthouse was a classic one, broad black and white stripes and a rounded top. It was built on top of a fort that dates back to the 1600s, and the fort was on a grassy park that juts out into the bay.

Just over a week ago, on a Friday night at 10 pm, the grounds were quiet. A couple of people were walking across the lawn under garish green spotlights that made them look bilious. Occasionally, a car or bus drove by.

If this was a park in Vero Beach, or Seattle, the lack of people would be normal. But it was not. I was in Salvador da Bahia, Brazil.

The lack of people last Friday evening was terribly, eerily wrong.

So why was the lighthouse deserted? And why were the streets of the city deserted, as well?

To understand the answer, you have to understand this city with its vast disparity between rich and poor. The police receive salaries that put them closer to poor. Fifteen years ago, they went on strike, and they demanded hazardous duty bonuses. The government agreed, but then broke the promise and never paid them.

So on Thursday, the police went on strike.

When I first heard about it, on a sunny Friday morning, I didn’t understand the implications. I wondered what the striking police officers were doing – were they picketing, or just staying home that day?

With my limited Portuguese, it took me several days to figure out what the striking police officers were doing.

The most visible group of them, together with their families, occupied a legislative building, refusing to leave until their demands were met. Others did random acts of mayhem, like deliberately causing traffic jams.

Overnight, the murder rate doubled. Why? Because there were no police to stop the bad guys? Or – here is the shocking thought — because frustrated policemen become bad guys? In an interview reported by the Associated Press, a representative of the Homicide Department said that at least one third of the murders that occurred during the strike had characteristics of death squads, which include the participation of police and former police officers.

I watched a video on YouTube about an “arrastão,” a word that my dictionary translates as “trawling” or “dragnet.”

A group of rowdy people had just broken into a big store. First, they took the cameras and computers, valuable and small. When those were gone, they took expensive appliances, helping each other carry things like washing machines. Then small pieces of furniture. Eventually, they brought out entire beds, carrying mattresses on their heads.

What kind of people would be desperate enough to steal beds? No self-respecting looter (is that an oxymoron?) in the US would carry a mattress on his head down the street.

Newspaper headline reads, Two thousand armed soldiers arrive today in Bahia

The first night after the strike started was the worst. Thirty reported murders, but that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Out in the poor neighborhoods, our friends from Salvador say, most murders go unreported. The next day, the Army sent troops, and camouflage-colored trucks full of soldiers drove up and down the main streets. It made people feel a little more secure, but not enough. Ten thousand striking police could not be replaced by only 2000 soldiers.

One was stationed across from my balcony, by the lighthouse. I could see him from my balcony in the wee hours of the morning, a forlorn silhouette with an automatic weapon.

No sleep for the soldier, and no sleep for the people of Salvador. The city was like a tinderbox, ready to go up in flames any minute.

In the poor neighborhoods, people didn’t dare sleep, because there were not enough soldiers to go around. Residents had to stay inside their homes with their doors and windows locked. It was not safe for them to ride the buses, so many didn’t show up for work. In the center of town, businesses were closed and streets normally clogged with traffic had one or two cars on them. Schools postponed opening that week. We went out for ice cream, but the entire shopping mall was closed.

Over all this hung the fear that Carnival, a week away, would be canceled. Millions of dollars would be lost. It was unthinkable.

The lone soldier watches the lighthouse from across the street

For a visitor like me, staying in an upscale neighborhood, the peaceful and quiet streets made the strike seem surreal. The only indication of the danger was the US State Department’s warning that Americans should not go to Salvador. But we were already there.

The strike lasted for about ten days, and then, suddenly, it was over. They arrested the leaders and promised the policemen a pay raise later in the year. The police, back on the job, marched in formation down the street, and people cheered for them. The soldiers slouched, relaxed, in the back of their trucks, and made up the other half of the parade. People cheered for them, too. “Propaganda,” said our local friends.

When we got back to our room on Friday night at 9 pm, people were starting to gather at the lighthouse. By 10 pm, the street along the waterfront was completely full, with thousands and thousands of people dancing. The traffic jam on our street stretched for blocks. At 11 pm, a samba band started playing and continued for a couple of hours. At midnight there were fireworks. When the samba band stopped, the noise level continued, with at least four DJs playing amplified pop music.

Were they celebrating the start of Carnival? Or the end of the police strike?

As the party started, I saw dozens of people carrying 30-pound bags of ice on their heads: Beer vendors stocking up their carts. The going rate for beer was 3 for 5 reis, or about a dollar a can. Most people had a beer in hand as they walked down the street. I lost count of the people – men and women – I saw going to the bathroom between the parked cars.

But to my surprise, no one was staggering, or fighting, and I never heard the sound of a bottle breaking. Even the drivers stuck in the traffic jam blew their horns happily, not out of frustration. It was just a big, noisy party. Very noisy. One of the noisiest I’ve ever experienced in my life!

That last night in Brazil, I stood on my balcony, listening to the throbbing sound and people-watching all night long. Sleep was impossible. No sleep for the partying people of Salvador, either. But I think the soldier finally got to sleep. That is, if he was not out partying, too.

These soldiers are looking across from the lighthouse at our building

During the day, soldiers were all over the lighthouse and the fort

A few days after the strike begins, the report on the negotiations is merely "no"

Meps at the entrance to the Farol da Barra (the lighthouse)

“Seating is first-come, first-served. In case of insufficient seating capacity, passengers will be placed on succeeding schedules that have available seats.”

Such a nice, polite, legalistic way to explain the hell I went through in the Greyhound bus terminal in Raleigh, North Carolina.

I’d gotten on the bus in New Bern, at a scary convenience store and gas station situated on the edge of town. There’s something odd about where they situate these Greyhound stops — so far out of town that you have to have a car to reach them. But people who have cars don’t need Greyhound.

After an hour of waiting at the gas station, the bus itself was pleasant. It was a new one, clean, with fake leather seats, power outlets for charging electronics, and — Hallelujah! — wi-fi. Fewer than half the seats were occupied, so we each had two seats to ourselves. I thought to myself, I can handle 20 hours of this.

About an hour down the road, a man got on at Goldsboro and sat just across from me. He was a slender black man with very short and graying hair, and he was dressed in a curious outfit of all white — white pants, white button-down shirt, white sneakers. His luggage consisted of only a small white trash bag.

For the next hour, I occupied myself with my computer and phone or watched out the window. Across the aisle, my neighbor pulled a small booklet out of his pocket and read some pages, then put it aside and watched out the window, too.

When the bus arrived in Raleigh, I got off with my carry-on luggage — a heavy backpack and a canvas tote full of snacks and water. I retrieved my giant purple suitcase from under the bus and went inside to wait about 30 minutes for my next bus.

I took my time, went to the bathroom, sat and drank some orange juice. When I heard an announcement about my bus, I made my way to Door A in a leisurely fashion, about 15 minutes before its departure. There were four people who had formed a line ahead of me.

What happened next was such a surprise that I experienced it with a sort of shocked detachment. This couldn’t really be happening to me, could it?

A man came to the door, checked the tickets of the first three people, and let them through. He said something I didn’t hear to the fourth person and then turned around.

The man he had spoken to suddenly went beserk, screaming expletives, grabbing the man’s shoulder, and threatening him. The gist of his outburst was, “You can’t keep me off this $@#%!! bus! I have to muster in at oh-seven-thirty in the morning! I serve my $@#%!! country for twenty-three $@#%!! years and this is what I get? You can’t do this, you $@#%!! $@#%!!!”

A woman came out, a station employee. She tried to make peace between the two men, which is when I realized that the one who was checking the tickets was the driver of my bus. He knew that he had three seats, so he let those people on. He was going to step aboard and check for two more seats before he let us on.

Instead, he shrugged. “I don’t have to take you,” he said, walking away. He got on the bus, started the engine, and then drove out of the bus terminal.

Leaving me, an innocent bystander, standing in silence behind an angry veteran who continued screaming and threatening violence. Everyone in the terminal was staring at us.

The woman looked at me sympathetically. “You’ll have to take the next bus at six am.” I stared at her, uncomprehending. It was eleven pm. Then I looked out the door, as if the bus driver was going to come back and say, “Sorry, I forgot that other lady.” He did not.

The station employee said, consolingly, “Don’t worry, I’ll make sure you get on the next one.” I walked slowly away, back to the seating area, in a daze. I was devastated and desperately wanted to cry, but I would have been embarrassed to do so.

It was 11:15 pm, and I was going to have to sit in this terminal for seven more hours. To make matters worse, while the bus had wi-fi and comfortable seating, the terminal had dreadful wire benches and no internet, except for the 10 minutes when a bus with wi-fi happened to be parked outside! To top it off, the room was ruled by a giant, rude television that blared crime shows at top volume.

Adding to the indignity were the two men who came in, propped open all the doors, and blocked them with large trash cans. Then they started asking people to move from their seats. It became apparent that they were going to shove all the benches — and passengers — into a small area, close off the rest, and clean the floors.

That’s when I ended up sitting next to the man in white. I asked if he had just come from work, and he looked confused and said no. “But I thought — your outfit –” I stammered, afraid that I had embarrassed him and was now embarrassing myself. He said something I didn’t quite catch, and when I asked him to repeat it, he shook his head sadly and pantomimed taking a drink. I guessed he meant he’d just gotten out of rehab, so I didn’t probe further.

Over the course of the long night, our conversation grew organically. We compared notes about where we were heading, and how long our trips would take. He was going to “a town so small, you’ve probably never heard of it.” He went on to explain that the closest town was Gastonia, but he had another long layover in Charlotte and wouldn’t arrive until 6 pm. Given that I had seen him board the bus at about 8 pm, that meant over 22 hours to get from one tiny town in North Carolina to another.

I told him I lived on a boat, and he admitted he’d never set foot on a boat. “I only been fishin’ once.” When he asked where I was going, I told him to Florida, and from there to Brazil. He’d never been out of the country in his life.

There was a long, comfortable silence, during which we watched the floor cleaners and a trio of 20-somethings across from us who were behaving erratically.

I asked him how long he’d be staying where he was going. “Oh, I’m going home,” he said. Another silence, then I asked how long he’d been away.

His answer spoke volumes: “90 days.”

Most people would say three months, or maybe “since October.” A few days later, I confirmed my suspicion about his answer by running a search on the internet. There is a state mental hospital in Goldsboro. People who are involuntarily admitted cannot be kept longer than 90 days.

It got very cold in the station with all the doors open, and people around us were grumbling about the cold. I got out a fleece jacket and draped it over my lap. My companion didn’t complain, but I could tell he was cold and had no jacket. I handed him a fleece quillow — a small blanket that converts to a pillow — and suggested that he could use it to keep warm. He accepted it gratefully.

When we finally introduced ourselves, it was after we’d been talking for a couple of hours. “By the way, I’m Thomas,” he said, holding out his hand and chuckling. “I’m Margaret,” I answered, shaking it like we’d just met. With the purple blanket around his shoulders, he looked like an Indian mystic.

After a while, we talked more than we were silent. He wanted to know about the boat and how it operated. Did it have a kitchen and a bathroom? Did I help steer it? Where had we gone in the boat? I asked questions about his family, what places he’d been to, what places he wanted to see. I even got out my laptop to show him photos of Alaska and Yukon, so he could see the beautiful light at midnight on the summer solstice.

Meanwhile, the mood in the bus terminal had gotten ugly. The veteran whose outburst had caused my bus driver to leave was — obviously — waiting for the same bus as me. He erupted every hour or so, yelling belligerently about how unfair this was, then settling down until something set him off again. The 20-somethings also got into repeated altercations with each other and with the employees. The good part was, it got quiet when they went outside to smoke. The bad part was, whatever they were smoking made them more volatile and more hostile when they came back.

It would have been terrifying, except that Thomas was very calm. His influence kept me calm, too.

Sometime after three am, the floor cleaners began moving the benches back, and we had to move again. Thomas picked up my suitcase, all 55 pounds of it, and we found a new spot that was agreeable to both of us. A while after that, they announced his bus. We said a reluctant farewell and exchanged a little hug, both hoping that our paths might cross again someday.

Across the terminal, I could see him waiting patiently in line, the blanket around his shoulders and the plastic bag in his hand. He was standing directly behind the group of obnoxious 20-somethings when things hit the fan.

For the first time all night, the 20-somethings wound up beside the volatile veteran. Like a match to tinder, they set each other off and then banded together against the employees. Suddenly, they were all shouting. The veteran began threatening to beat up the floor cleaners, shoving benches around, and lunging at them. The female employees were trying to placate them, to calm them down, but several of the male employees had reached their limits and were ready to get into fisticuffs with the passengers.

Thomas melted back against the wall, making himself invisible. That’s when the police arrived. They took the difficult passengers outside, and everyone breathed a sigh of relief at the sudden quiet. Then Thomas and about 20 other people boarded the bus to Charlotte, and the room was half-empty.

I missed my ally. Even with the violent people gone, the terminal was still a scary place, and I had a couple more hours to wait. I moved my luggage to a remote corner where I tucked myself under a table on the floor. I could never sleep in the terminal, but at least I could make a fort out of my luggage and hide behind it.

I read my book and waited. When they finally called my bus, I got up and rolled my suitcase over to join the line. To my surprise, there were already six people in line. There was no sign of the station employee who had promised me a seat. Suddenly, I realized that I might not get on the next bus, either. I found myself trembling with fear that I would spend another day in the bus terminal, waiting for the 11 pm bus.

When we boarded the bus, the driver looked twice at my ticket. “You were supposed to be on the 11 pm bus,” he told me. I just stared at him, afraid he was telling me I wasn’t eligible for this bus, either. Then he waved me on. I climbed up the steps and looked down the aisle at a completely full bus. There was only one seat open, beside a Greyhound employee in the front row. She reluctantly moved her bags from my seat.

I had come so close to missing this bus that as we pulled out of the station, I burst into tears. The woman next to me turned to the window and ignored my quiet sobs. For the first time in over 24 hours, I slept.

I didn’t even miss my blanket. I knew that Thomas, my angel in white, was using it to stay warm.  He’ll probably never know how valuable his calm companionship was during that long, tough night.

(click to enlarge each photo)