Loading ...GOLDBALLOON RESPONSE TO NIGHTINGALE
From the Remote Mountains of Extreme Northern Pakistan to the Remote Valleys of Central Brazil…Goldtenters are EVERYWHERE…what a world !
Take it away Balloonman
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Hello Again!
I saw Nightingales post and heartily agree with his assessment. As noted in the email I just sent out, the one with links to the new galleries, I lived in Brazil for a year as a kid. It was nonstop unbelievable experiences, peak peak peak, or more like stratospheric cruising! Rio and Copacabana were especially amazing, as was taking a bus from Brasilia to Belem, on dirt roads, seeing firsthand the very first cuts made for the Amazonian Highway, swimming in the Amazon at Manaus, and on and on.
Brazil in 1972 and Pakistan in 2022 have many similarities. Brazil was extremely immature and undeveloped in 1972; for me as a kid, it was like time travel and being plopped into the past. I loved it! Everything was possible then, as there were no rigid rules. I’ve been back a few times since then, experiencing its changes and transitions. I still have Brazilian friends and will return again to see them. It would be cool to meet Nightingale there.
In spite of Nightengale’s accurate views, Brazil has become terribly boring in comparison to how it used to be 50 years ago, maybe like how a child usually becomes after the indoctrination of the school system gets them to conform. A major turning point was when a McDonalds was built in the early 1990s a couple blocks from one of the families I lived with in the 70s. The slide downhill continued from there. On my first day in Brazil in August of 1972, there was a live crowing rooster in the kitchen, which we ate for lunch that day. By the late 1990s, instead of having live animals in the kitchen, the majority of people were buying packaged factory foods in supermarkets, just like everywhere else in the ‘developed world’. They became proper consumers.
In rural Pakistan, there are still live animals in the houses, on their way to being eaten. I love it! Yet life is changing fast in Pakistan, too. I’ve had discussions with a number of people here, including school teachers, about the rapid progress of development. Something I always ask about is whether they are doing anything to preserve the culture and especially to maintain a solid direct connection with nature, an understanding and respect for real life, something that is still well-entrenched in the remote areas. The answers and discussions are always enlightening. My asking questions might help them to appreciate and maintain what might otherwise be lost in the mad rush to consumerism.
Here’s just-turned 17-year-old me, at Foz do Iguaçu on the border with Argentina:
Nothing has changed, eh?!
“Something I always ask about is whether they are doing anything to preserve the culture and especially to maintain a solid direct connection with nature, an understanding and respect for real life, something that is still well-entrenched in the remote areas.”
After my dad died when I was 8yo, my mom attended a Parents Without Partners meeting and asked for a dad that could mow the steep yard at our house, and take the family camping.
That second point may seem an odd one, but it turned out to be so critically important.
Later when I had young kids, I gambled and left a financially secure life in DC for San Diego, where the opportunities for the kids to experience the outdoors were vastly superior. It didn’t work out that well for me all personally, but I never regretted the move because both of my kids turned into outdoor enthusiasts … hiking climbing camping, mostly now out of Colorado. Beyond the 3 R’s its the most critical value you can impart to them, IMO. And yes, its getting harder and harder to do, as well as turning more superficial. Sadly, most Americans seldom travel abroad and when they do its to London or Cancun to english only worlds. When I traveled to SE Asia in the 90s, I very rarely met Americans in over three months. Even at the usual travelers destinations. It goes a long way toward explaining what Mark Dice illustrates in his vids about American ignorance of the world, and their place in it.
2 Thumbs Up pedro
Nice to interact like this.
Brazil has become more boring although rural (inland) one experience nature to the fullest and makes one know thyself which is good. Here rural one has to be centered and meditation helps to become one with Nature. But here I experience lost of adventures being some kind of adventurer and not boring.
About 10-15 year ago, here rural was an incredible experience. Like going back to the 1950’s (of the Western World). Incredible as it seems that life stood still. Even 15 years ago inland had no electricity where in the evening either people went to bed once the sun went under or lightened streets with candles/oil lamps – very romantic. I am talking here about the whole country Brazil minus big cities.
Getting electricity everywhere IMO has been the one and only achievements of Lula. Now these days (since 5 years or so) there is internet everywhere but such is part of the plan and towers radiate each and every little village. Since this year the cities are very calm, little people outside. Either people have less (or no) money to spent and/or became ill (!) and stay home inside. I expect the later. It is noticeable!
Indeed Brazil speeded up to become ‘modern’. They still whoreship . . . I mean worship USA as they see USA as the promised land. Some sort of indoctrination while not know/understanding how USA is today. But Brazilians are poor (in general). Before they could be happy with nothing and create an event out of nothing . . . these days they believe they are entitled as they have nothing and you/I (western) seems to have everything. Even if you explain you’re not a millionaire, they believe you are; better not to have such discussion. And frankly I can not blame them. If they have nothing and you have $10K then you are (super) rich from their point of view while everything is still cheap. They try to charge you double. So only once you understand the ‘standards’, get integrated you get honest/ fair prices.
They seems not to see the possibility Brazil has on its own. So once the BRA-turn starts in earnest with the ‘adolescence phase’ it is going through right now, with Bolsonaro leading the pack for South America for the BRIICS+, possibly BRAZIL can become more vivid (again). Nevertheless, Brazilians have vivid-DNA and such will never change. The Golden Age for Brazil will come – give it a few years for rock bottom.
To Goldballoon . . . you are welcome. Just ask FGC for my email address and let me know in due time and beforehand. Save journey!
Thanks for this site Fully. It is great to have this window into the “real world”