Home Away From Home

This weekend was Oktober Fest weekend. Unbelievable that I that do not even like beer, get to go to a party where the only point is to drink and enjoy liters of beer... But the girls said it was our first reunion so I took it as a given that I had to go :-) and made an effort to replace 1 liter beers with half liter mugs of wine and all worked out. The funny part is we start in the morning... At 11.15 we were at the door of a tent which name i can hardly spell and even less pronounce no matter how much german i learn. And if you think that once you are in you take it easy you are mistaken, you stsrt immediatelly with tbe mass of beer and many people will already be having their schweinhaxe (pork's knee, perhaps not spellt the right way). You "only" have until 4.35 pm so you better start going fast. And then you just chat drink and have fun. And you let the surroundings deepen in you, as people from all ages dressed in bavarian customes will loudly sing "ai prosti...

Friday night and i am definitely out of the office. I was told i was meant to have a cool weekend and i realize at 7 pm that i have no plans. In a way i dont feel like any plans but on another i know i will regret not making the most of my free time. So i decide to follow instructions and get myself some plans. It is hard between old friends that i am not used to see on friday night and the harvard people that are still adjusting back. And the portuguese never let me down and i guess we like to all be lazy together!! It will definitely a cool night!!

After an initial schock moment of not being able to cope with all i wanted to do i finally seem to have progressed out of it. Working my org skills to the max I managed to get a lot out of my plate and all seems to be running smoothly. Even though B is out of town this week, leaving behind quite of an empty space, in fact i know there is a lot i can do with my time. I think the fact that i have a new c. 1 kg netbook definitely helps, and i am still to discover all its features. 3 months without a computer I guess had not happened since the late 90s for me and has revealed itself a transformational experience. I transformed into moody laptop deprived Sara and tried to use someone else's laptop whenever intense iphone use was not enough! I am sure it was quite entertaining to watch my despair from the outside and, the more i felt deprived of it the more uncertain I was about which new laptop i should take. That is why it took 3 months! Life is back to normal now and i think back to ...

Sometimes I feel like I am losing it. I just can't do all the things around me that need to get done, the move and stuff for the new house, the coming back to London, the reunions with old friends, the training, the studying and most of all the NGO things accumulate and I just seem not to be able to cope. I sleep worse every day, I am more tired when I woke up, tonight I even dreamt of FSA regulation. And my to do list keeps growing and I am the bottleneck in so many things. In fact, I am almost not being able to run a to do list anymore. Some days it is hard to see the light in the end of the tunnel, or shall I say the crosses all over the to do list. I don't know where to start, I have troubles prioritizing and I don't see how it can get better. We are too few for what we are doing and I am afraid sometimes it can all fall apart. I just had to let it out, I can't always keep the spirits up...

This year, thanks to a group of friends, my birthday wish has once again come true. For my 28th birthday, I asked you to help me feed and bring to school 70 children between the ages of 3 and 6. With friends' help, I raised 1790 Euros, which net of paypal fees, allows me to give one meal a day and schooling to 30 children for an entire year! I can't tell you how lucky I feel to have friends like you. I may not have made it to 70, but I am way better than before. And I have not given up just yet. Even though the kids have their lessons under a tree, they are privileged to get a meal before going home, perhaps the only meal in their day. A Little Gesture (NGO) will not only seek to raise the remaining funds, but also complement the aid with school supplies and a construction project to give a roof to this school. With little gestures, our dreams do come true. I want to thank those who helped for your little gestures, for making my birthday wish happen, for being my friends! -----...

Dear Friends I am now in sunny Lisbon, after a race through London flat hunting and a month living my "other" love in Mozambique. I am happy to be finally back in Europe and looking forward to a new life in London in 2 weeks. Today is my 28th birthday and as tradition dictates i get to make a birthday wish. I was moved by my friends generosity last year as I raised over 3000 Euros for the Orphanage Technical School. After spending a month seeing close what money can do in Mozambique my birthday wish is clear. A 65 year old teacher fed 70 children for 3 months with 1000 Euros. I want to pay her whole year. I want to build her a school. I want to give those kids a chance Today I ask all my friends to make my birthday wish come true. You must admit, it could be harder :-) It is not a Gucci Bag, a Prada pair of shoes or an expensive dinner. I ask for your donation, whatever you can give, a little gesture, that we will make a great help! Donate Here https://www.paypal.com/pt/cgi-b...

Sometimes it's hard not to lose hope. Last week I had to tell a 10 year old I would not give him his monthly food supply until he would go back to school and would show up every morning. He is an orphan, his mum abandoned him, his stepmother tried to still from him. Sister Aparecida is now the one who feeds him, dresses him and sends him to school. But temptation is too big and the week he gets the food he does not go to school and stays home eating. Since it was exams week, we had to delay the food... Yesterday we went to look for the house of a 2nd grade kid who stopped showing up at school. Yesterday he came and said his dad did not let him come to school because he had to make some money everyday to take home. When we went to his house we knew why he came yesterday: his dad was away. Sister Isabel has promised to come back Sunday but today the kid was in the streets again. The dad was back. Today, as I left the pre-school in the morning, a policemen asked me to give a ride t...