Mais Um Mes (One More Month)

April 13th has arrived, meaning that I now have exactly one month remaining in Brazil. It seems weird to be thinking about my time left now in terms of weeks, rather than months, and its hard to believe that my time in Brazil is down to 30 days. Work is rather busy right now, although I've hit yet another snag in trying to start my vision study, one day after scheduling it to begin next Wednesday. Now it looks as though things may be delayed a bit more, and so I'll continue focusing on lab work for the next week.

As I think about leaving Brazil on May 13, I will be happy to get back to the US, but won't necessarily be happy to leave Brazil. While I'm really looking forward to getting back to the US to see family and friends, there are many things that I will miss about Brazil, including the friends who I have made here. I'll probably write a bit about some of the things I'll miss about Brazil later, but for now, I thought the opposite might be more interesting (and timely giving some of the frustrations of the last week). And so without further ado, the top 5 things I won't miss about Brazil...

1. Higher crime... never feeling 100% relaxed given the higher crime in Brazilian cities
2. Long, hot bus rides through narrow, crowded, polluted streets... arriving at work soaked in sweat and exhausted
3. Lack of pedestrian safety... cars speeding up rather than slowing down for pedestrians (or people knocking you into the path of an oncoming car while you're running...)
4. Meetings in Portuguese... feeling exhausted after sitting through a marathon two hour meeting in a foreign language
5. Bureaucracy... The simplest things seem nearly impossible to get done thanks to layer after layer of bureaucracy (see account of my attempts to register with the Federal Police earlier in the blog...)

But despite some frustrations, there will be many things that I will miss greatly about this incredible country that I have called home for the last 9 months. Many great friends, incredible sights, and enjoyable activities will be greatly missed. Living in another culture for a year has been both a challenge and a joy, and I know that I will look back on my time in Brazil fondly in spite of many of the challenges.

There are quite a few people who I'm looking forward to seeing when I get back to the US, and so amidst attending a couple weddings of friends and family, moving back to Charlottesville, and getting started with clinical electives on May 28, I hope to have a chance to catch up with many of the people who I haven't seen in quite a while soon after my return, and there's also a much anticipated soccer game to be played with some friends. Until then, I do hope all of you in the US are doing well, and look forward to seeing many of you in May!