Saturday January 23, 2010
Babylon
This is what we call the program and the system that’s been all we’ve ever known. More and more we are ridding ourselves of the Babylon that’s still left in us. This place is cleansing us of those concerns. There’s very little to comply with, but this week we attempted to be compliant with the system, stay legal in the eyes of the government, here in Brazil. Brazil has more than its fair share of bureaucratic nonsense. In fact I think it would be fair to say that here it is excessive. The difference seems to be that the people here don’t get ruffled by it too much; they just go through the motions of compliance without the emotional impact of frustration, anger and disgust. So I’ll tell you about our experience just for the purpose of the example.
On Tuesday morning we drove to Brazil where we needed to visit the Federal Police, which is located at the airport. Last week we spent two days also in this pursuit of obtaining a Brazilian drivers license. After the first stop at the Detran (the drivers license bureau) we were sent to a different location where they process licenses for foreigners. There we were handed a printout listing all the documents we’d need. At this time we’d been told that the US Embassy could translate our American drivers licenses, because the international ones we came with were not acceptable for this purpose even though they are written in Portuguese. We also learned that after 6 months, the international license was no longer valid and that we would then need a Brazilian license. We were then sent back to the Federal police at the airport for a necessary form. Leaving the Detran we headed back to the airport, only to find that the federal police end their workday at 4pm, just minutes before we arrived (for the second time that day.) Deciding we’d return there on our way back home to Alto Paraiso the next day before returning again the following week, we missed any signs leading to the airport in the midst of a torrential downpour, driving through the city. This brings us up to Tuesday morning. After a longer time than expected getting a car wash, we left an hour later than we’d intended, found no signs to the airport, driving circles past unmarked roads which we thought might get us there by following an inadequate map, we finally got close enough to find it without enough time to arrive once again before closing. So again we opted to put it off till the following day and instead visit the embassy to check off another item on our list. At the Embassy gates we were turned away by phone, told that the embassy does not offer any translation services contrary to the information supplied from the Detran. At this late point in the afternoon, we thought we’d at least try to reach one of the official translators from the list provided by the Detran, only to find that our telephone would not work. So we continued the drive through the city, out the other side to Ecletica where we would spend the night and pick up our friend Ganeesh to help us complete the process the following morning. Exhausted yet? Well, Wednesday morning the three of us returned to Brasilia. At the airport, the federal police told us that they do not provide the form that Detran sent us to retrieve. From there we visited a translator to drop off our American licenses, before returning to the Detran where we were told we would need to provide our birth certificates. From there we returned to pick up the documents from the translator. Leaving there we drove the hour back to Ecletica to return Ganeesh and then headed back home 3 ½ hours away to get the birth certificates. Little did we know that the highway home was closed in our direction to accommodate rush hour traffic leaving the city and the traffic was diverted but without any signs to alternate routes. We then attempted to wind our way back to the highway, thinking it was simply closed for an exit or two because of an accident. It was only later that we realized the rush hour closure. Meanwhile what would have taken 20 minutes to travel took over 1 ½ hours, which made our return home a 5 hour drive. The next morning we got back in the car to return to complete the process, however our birth certificates lacked the necessary documentation of our parent’s names. Seems that in the 10 year period when we were born they didn’t find it necessary to put the parents names on birth certificates! But in lieu of this I had discovered two forms in Portuguese with this information, which I hoped would take the place and eliminate the need to again pay the official translator to rewrite the birth certificates. I’m actually exhausted in simply the retelling of this ridiculous process, so I’ll skip ahead to the end to save us both the time in the recapitulation. When we returned to the Detran with all the photos, copies and documents they requested, we met with the manager who explained that in the end we still couldn’t have drivers licenses because on our passports was a date allowing us to remain legally in Brazil until February 8th, so there was no way he could issue us a license to drive beyond that date. Now several hundreds of dollars later after covering the cost of gas, hotel rooms, translators fees, some assistance to our friend for his time, copies, photos, etc we were told the process would have to wait until our permanent visas were issued, driving with our international licenses until they expire in May or leave the country for a day and re-enter again so that we could legally drive for another 6 months. Problem is and the very reason we attempted this nonsense to begin with is that Paul’s US license expired on his birthday, last week. What an utter waste of time, money and energy! And I even left out some of the details of the process to spare us both the recounting….
So now it is several days later and we have recovered from our unfulfilled efforts. It reinforces our opinion of the futility of complying with the ridiculous laws, rules and regulations that are here for what? To mentally enslave us in a dew loop of utter nonsense.
I’m ready to give up on so many of my old ways. All my technology has been stolen or broken or simply ceased to operate any longer. I’m having to recreate who I am and what I do. That’s okay; I don’t think my old ways of being were really working anyway.
Tuesday January 26, 2010
So one last thing about all that before moving on, the good news is we now have a piece of paper from the Federal police which allows us to stay indefinitely in Brazil until a decision has been reached on our permanent visas.
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We spent a little time this week talking with an analyst of human design, a system that combines astrology, the I Ching, the chakra system and the kabala. With this system you can see a genetic map, coding the aspects of your self in this incarnation. It appears to cover more than your personality and automatic behaviors and we both found the analysis very insightful. At this time I really can’t say more because I am just beginning to assimilate what I learned.
January 29, 2010
Greetings my dear friends and loved ones. I am writing to you from my new lap top computer, which arrived on Monday. Happily, now that the mercury retrograde is over, my tools for communication are coming back into my life. Perhaps I will be more prolific in my writing again?
I had a strange and unsettling experience, which completes the cycle of the old computer leaving and the new one returning. It coincides with an astral event, which had Pluto squaring my moon. During this transit I read that I would have to deal with issues from my childhood that were never resolved adequately. When I learned that my new computer was waiting at the post office to be picked up, I went immediately after the opening, only to be told that I would have to pay an import tax of 60% of the declared value. This amounted to over R$500. I was very distraught and angry at a world that would steal my computer and then charge me so much money to receive my new one, which I had paid to replace. I began to cry while standing in line at the post office and then to complain about the government and country of Brazil, venting my frustration into the post office and the clerks behind the counter. This is a behavior more suitable to an emotional child, which I was famous for being in my youth. It was inappropriate for a woman of my advanced years. And typical of my childish emotions, they included embarrassment as well as anger, disappointment and frustration. I must admit that as well as never resolving my issues around being overly emotional, I retain unresolved childish issues around money. Not surprising that I would have an inappropriate emotional outburst during this transit. Meanwhile a woman approached the clerk and inquired why I was so upset. Funny thing is, before I began to cry at the news that I would have to pay taxes to pick up my package, the clerk spoke with me only in Portuguese, even though it must have been obvious that I was struggling to converse, but after my outburst he switched to English, which was actually quite good, so he was able to understand my story of the stolen computer and my outrage that I had to pay taxes so high to receive what was in fact mine- paid in full. He explained my saga to the woman who inquired. A few minutes later the clerk turned to me and said, “You have two guardian angels.” He was smiling as he told me that the two people who waited behind me in line had offered to pay the tariff for me. They quickly left as I stood in a state of complete shock, my heart flooding with love and gratitude and a million more emotions simultaneously. They were gone before I could even react to thank them or decline the offer. He informed me that they would return later after which I should come back to retrieve the computer. He was very kind and explained that the policies of the government were beyond his control and was apologetic for the need to comply with them.
I left, not having that much money with me anyway to take the package. I was so distraught, I couldn’t function well enough to go to the bank to withdrawal money, so I went home to have breakfast with Paul, Uta and Olivia and make an attempt to pull myself together. All thoughts of money and anger gone, I could only feel the love of these two complete strangers who offered their help. I knew immediately that I would decline their offer, but I wanted to find them and offer my gratitude for their offer of assistance.
Saturday January 30, 2010
Only days before, as I previously mentioned I spent some time with an analyst of the Human Design system. I was amazed to learn that I am not, what is called in the system, an emotional person. My emotional center is completely open. This means that I amplify the emotions of everyone around me, so it appears as if I am much more emotional than anyone else. I always knew that I absorbed other people’s emotions but I thought it was in addition to the emotion I was already overly experiencing. Now I find out that all this time none of the emotions were actually mine. It’s a bit of a mind blower for me to learn this. Paul, it seems, is an emotional person, so for the nine years we have been together, I have been magnifying his emotions! I think hearing this piece of information took some processing for me and on Monday morning I woke up feeling overwhelmed with emotion. I recall that I was really missing my family- especially my children and parents, but put those thoughts aside when I learned that my computer had at last arrived, thinking it likely never would. When I arrived at the post office all the feelings surrounding the disappearance of the computer, the actions I had taken to replace it, the long wait and frustration over it’s not arriving for more than 6 weeks after it was promised to be delivered, all flooded within me and the last piece of news that I needed to come up with another R$520 was the last straw that broke the camels back, to use an old worn out expression.
So that was Monday. When I returned home that morning, I stopped the car in the yard and burst into a full out crying spree. Flooded with an array of every emotion I could imagine: anger, frustration, relief, joy, love, gratitude, embarrassment, disgust, confusion, and probably a few more that I can’t recall at the moment, I could do nothing but have a really good cry and try to flush it all away so I could resume some normal sense of functioning. Paul was angry with me for my behavior and lack of control. I think he was embarrassed because I am so much a part of him that it was as if he had stood in the post office making a big scene crying like a baby. Uta was simply offering love and understanding and hugs, what I actually needed – not anger and disappointment, that and insightful words of wisdom. Paul scolds me when I cry and fret over money. Uta reminded me that nothing in this material world, like money, is worth crying over. But what remained in my heart was so much love that the people of Brazil who more often than not, do not have an extra R$500 to give away, would offer it to a complete stranger.
It took me a whole day to recover from that flood of emotions and another day to come up with the plan to bake some brownies as a gift of thanks, but Wednesday I went to find my two guardian angels and offer my gratitude. Uta and Olivia went with me to help me with translation. They invited us into their home, served us tea and we spoke for a couple hours, finding that we had very much in common and were traveling the same path. Though they moved here 8 years ago from Sao Paulo, they followed the wisdom of many of the same teachers we admire. They said one thing that I’d like to share with you. “We are not separate, we are all one. When one suffers we all suffer. When you give, you receive threefold. Money has no significance, it is not worth trifling over.” They were grateful to God for bringing them new friends in the three of us who came into their life and into their home. The next day, Jato rode his bicycle over to our house and brought us a gift of 18 CD recordings filled with teachings and messages from mutual teachers that we admire. How could one doubt the perfection of this life when things like this happen?
Since I write so infrequently now, I’ll end here and send this along to the blog to share with you. Know that each of you are always in our heart; we carry you with us. All love…