Graffiti, On Purpose!

I think it is every guys desire to do graffiti at some point in their life. Just to tag something so they can see it later and say, "oh yeah, I'm cool like that.." Why, I don't really know. It's like, every guy has an obsession with some sport or another. It's just built in to us. Anyways, today was the first time that I got to paint and graffiti something, on purpose, without the fear of having the police catch me or my dad kick my butt.


So the story is that we are still working with the CCJ and the plan is to paint a lot of walls in the community and at the house where the program is centered, and then tag them with our different signs, symbols, ideas, etc. In this part of Brasil they consider graffiti to be very symbolic and important in showing what/who the community is. We watched a video in class that explained really well why they do it. A man with very little and struggling from day to day loved to do graffiti to demonstrate how the community and the people felt. I found it odd but he liked to paint cows. He did an awesome job and always made these cows with attitude. I laughed at first too: try imagining a cow with attitude. But he said he did it because people in poor places and favelas of Brasil are being born to die, just like cows. Just passive and letting things go their natural way without making any impact. He said the attitude represented his refusal, and those with him, to roll over and die without making a difference. I really respect his dedication to change and his desire to show it, even though it is a different way than I would expect.


So anyways, we went to the CCJ and Carbonel got us started explaining the different ways and tools to paint with and then divided us into groups. He then said, "okay, you guys paint that wall, you guys that one, and you guys that one." You can imagine that everyone just stood there looking at him like, "are you serious?" He then told us to make up something that represented the community that we had seen. We the, quite happily, proceeded to paint the wall. haha, it was pretty fun, I won't lie. Here is what my group did:

 Yeah, we're pros, I know. Ya know it wasn't too bad considering that we just threw some paint on the wall with no idea what to do. Shortly after we painted all of this stuff we went and got spray cans and added more paint to it. It looked pretty good until we kept getting carried away with the paint. Yeah, everyone just kept spraying and spraying. I know for sure now I wasn't the only one with the desire to tag something!


While this was going on, these kids were dancing and playing games. The game they started playing was one I had never seen. They stretch a piece of something like a big rubber band or something like it between three people, and two to three people stand on the rubber. The people on the rubber have to keep on foot on top of it at all times. This means you have to be able to jump really high or somehow get your foot over the top. It was pretty fun watching them, thought the best part was watching the change between boys and girls. The boys were going around doing just fine and the girls were holding the rubber thing, and as soon as they switched I swear it wasn't 60 seconds before every girl started saying, "You moved the cord, I saw you!", "I made it, you moved it! I see you cheating!", "I get to try again, this isn't fair!", "It's too high! Bring it down!".
It made me laugh, then I realized:
"Well, at least there are some things that don't change no matter where you go in the world!" ;)