The sound from the bush

I’m walking home after work. Going up the hill, on the road that runs through the bush that takes me from the office. I am aware it sounds strange but I actually work in some offices that are far enough from the centre of the city to make me feel as if I am going on vacations every day. It is still close enough, about 35 minutes driving, to make it viable.

From the bush, comes a sound of music, I think there are voices coming from the trees. I imagine a choir, or a cult, people gathered among the trees singing. As I come closer, I can hear some pop song, no choir. I imagine where the party is, there is nothing but trees, a cliff and the water… Then I come to the clearing and I see a cruise ship, the source of the music.

I am received by the couple of turkeys that live somewhere around the place as I’ve seen the female before. I was given prime view of the male today, though…

Female Turkey Grazing

Chickenated Bicycle

This morning I was walking on a walkway near the road talking on the phone; I noticed that a bike was approaching, the movement behind me or the sound alerted me to the fact. I stepped to the side to give the person space to pass me by. As they moved, I saw this thing emerging in my peripheral vision. It was a bicycle but on top of the handlebars there was a stuffed chicken. Not just a normal chicken too, it looked like an African sort of chicken, appearing to be a bit special. The guy passed me by thanking me for having given way. I responded.

This is the first really hot day after the winter in Sydney and he was topless, his body was thin and un-muscled, I could see his bones poking out of the skin and he had a hairy back. His bicycle had two saddle-bags that looked full. I have the impression it was his home… his and the chicken’s.

Simply Gerva, an Australian-Brazilian Romance

Simplesmente Gerva is my second self-published book at Amazon in Portuguese from Brasil. It is a fictional romance which was created in a very interesting way. I met another Brazilian writer and we decided, almost as a joke, to write a book in collaboration. The idea was that I would write a part and send to my co-author, then he would continue the story as he saw fit and send it back to me.

Capa Simplesmente Gerva

It took us months, I spent time in Brazil, then he moved to Perth, then he went to Brazil, I came back, and we kept writing.

We never knew what was going to happen, we had no plan for the story, what moved us forward was the character, Gerva. The end result was quite difficult to polish because of this structure but the writing was a great pleasure.

Unfortunately, it is not translatable, there are so many cultural references that it would become very strange if attempted in another Language.

Gerva is a typical Brazilian guy, with his forró dancing, his sensuality and flexibility in life. He meets a Brazilian muse and an Australian girl and with them lives many adventures.

I am in the process of writing the second book of the series, a continuation of this first story. Although my co-author lost interest in the project I am committed to the same process as observed in the first book: writing without knowing where the character will take me.

If you read Portuguese, note that you have to buy the book from the market where your Amazon account is registered:

You can read Kindle books in any device.

The Failed Minute Meditation

This was a failure. My friend and I created a Minute Meditation app, except it never worked Recently I started working at an app creating company and one of the super-smart-expert-in-creating-apps-guys told me: it is not possible to make it work. Because I have tried so hard at the time and exchanged a lot of communications with the contracted app developers, I actually understood why. Cannot explain though, it has to do with the way notifications and alarms work on iPhones.

It was the simplest of apps, basically not much fancier than an alarm. We spent months with back and forwards emails, screen-shots, and broken communication with people who clearly, like us, were not first-language English speakers. Except that they had a lot of difficulty in understanding and communicating the issues.

They failed to alert us that technically there was a limitation to the project.

At the time it seemed like the most brilliant idea ever, especially because I have ideas for other exciting apps and this one seemed like a good starting point.

‘I’m going on a meditation retreat’ my friend said to me.

‘Seriously?’

‘Yeah, I’ll send you the details in case I go missing!’

She didn’t go missing. In fact it was great. As I have this habit of learning from other’s experiences, I ended up partnering up with her and attempting to create this app. The idea was to create the chance to stop for a minute per hour to breathe and meditate, something designed for busy people.

Accepting failures is a big challenge for me, and being able to laugh at this maybe means I have learnt and moved on.

This is my record of the attempt, a record of the creation even if it didn’t work. Because risks are taken with the possibility of failure and forgetting the failures might make you forget the teachings from it.

With the experience, I have learnt that hiring cheap, overseas, freelancer developers is not worth it.I understand much better now the need to think deeply about the requirements of projects. Extrapolating to everything: unless you have the resources to create a proper product, paying high quality contractors, you better not do it. It is a waste of effort, energy and money. 

Minute Meditation ScreenMinute Meditation OptionsMinute Meditation Texts

This is what I wrote for the app:

What is One Minute Meditation?

It is the opportunity to stop, for one minute per hour, to meditate. Meditating may seem hard, but doing it for one minute at a time makes it easy. By doing so, you will tap into a new resource to change your quality of life. Get connected with yourself as a soul, as an infinite being of light. 

One Minute Meditation is taking responsibility for your well-being. 

See the settings to choose how many times you would like to do it per day.

How to Meditate?

Make your world hush for a minute. Breathe, just breathe. Inhale the energy, exhale what doesn’t serve you.

Look at the meditation screen and feel all your senses: see, smell, listen, taste and touch.

Be present, in the present, for the present alone. The next minute doesn’t exist yet. The previous minute is an illusion, as it is gone. There is only NOW and YOU. For one minute.

By practicing the Minute Meditation one or more times a day, you will train your brain to feel the present. You will expand your tranquillity and awareness – bringing new magic to your life. Problems and limits may disappear.

You will see new possibilities, feel energised and be opened to new levels of achievement. Our intuition loves meditation. Enjoy!

A Multicultural Ghost, Fio da Meada

Fio da Meada is the first book I have published. It was the first time I got over the fear of putting my writing out there and self-published at Amazon in Portuguese from Brasil, my mother language.

Fio da Meada, Cover

The stories are about a ghost who finds himself following a woman in the Manly Ferry, in Sydney. This fiction is based on the stories I have collected from my grandfather’s real-life. He was unique, with many funny tales, he was someone who enriched his life — before mobile phones and even telephones — with pranks and imagination.

The strongest image I have of him is this handsome older man, poorly dressed, with shorts my grandmother had been begging to be thrown out for years; with the softest shirt with a couple of wholes. We are seated in the small fishing pier in front of our ranch, for hours in silence. I can smell fish scales and worms. He is like a statue looking at the tip of the fishing rod. When he gets tired he gets up, find a large rock and throw it in the water creating a large splash. He ruins the fishing for me and the others, father, sister, cousins; then he walks away laughing out loud while we scream at him.

vovo01  avos_0002.jpg

If you read Portuguese, note that you have to buy the book from the market where your Amazon account is registered:

You can read Kindle books in any device.

Improvising & Dancing With the Stars Appearances at SSC 2009

The Sydney Salsa Congress is a place so special the guests feel free and inspired to do great things on stage.

Kim, Alex, Jaime, Zoe & Dave backstage at the Sydney Salsa Congress 2009

Alex & Kim, Dave & Zoe felt inspired to improvise a show together. I thought the seriousness of performing was suddenly lifted from stage and we were seeing things that were not quite possible.

It was a game, with each couple showing off to the other, exchanging partners midair, each of the guys carrying both ladies over their shoulders as if they weighted nothing. You could see the show was more an improvisation than something rehearsed over and over and even though the tricks were ridiculously incredible, I got the feeling as if I was dreaming. 

After the shows I heard Alex saying to Jaime that it was so good, that it was great that the congress gave them the chance to have that much fun on stage, for them to meet as they would never get to meet anywhere else.

You see Dave and Zoe are not Salsa dancers and Alex and Kim are, normally they wouldn’t know about each others’ existence and here they were, showing us what “amazing” really is. 

Johnny Vasquez is always a party just by himself.

It’s a bit of a hazard to give him the Microphone, he looooves to talk. But he does well and from his hello to his singing and dancing you smile and laugh the whole time. He sang and danced on Saturday and Sunday and on the closing of the congress he made us sing my favourite salsa song, Baila Rumbero, it was the first time I saw the artists applauding the crowd.

Then he and Ramon Morales danced for a few bars with each other, and those moments are branded in my memory.

The words that came to my mind seeing them dancing were: “Puro Sangue” as in “Pure Blood” not trying to offend anyone that is not a born Latino, it’s just that those two were probably dancing in the womb.

Their genes must have been turning around each other in spins not spirals!

The sperm that made each of them was swimming and singing:

‘baila, baila, one, two, three; five, six, seven… Now on2!’ As they were swimming up towards the egg.

We have even drawn some famous TV figures to the crowd; that is because we have them on stage…

Luda Kroitor was performing with Oliver Pineda, five times Salsa World Champions so her TV partner and winner, Luke Jacobz, from Dancing With the Stars, (reality TV Show) came to watch her shine at The Sydney Salsa Congress. 

Charlie Delaney was also watching her Dancing with the Stars partner, Csaba Szirmai who was performing with Vali Damaskou. They were very graceful and smiling guests.

19 Orble Votes

Dance of Life

The other day my friend saved my life when she compared my job with a partnered dance.

‘Imagine your boss is your dance partner, and for the time being he is the leader. While the music is playing your best chance of enjoyment is relaxing into that leadership and following.’

It is very easy to follow a great leader.

But if the guy is a bad dancer, you may be in for a challenge.

You may have to step with him rather than with the rhythm of the music, endure his silly pa‐pa‐pa singing completely out of tune with the song; stop when you should move, turn to the other side, be kind to yourself when you make many mistakes and step on other peoples’ feet and, most of all, understand you will have your limits and sometimes you will say ‘NO, I won’t dip as you want because I feel that I am going to fall’.

Sometimes working is exactly like that. The best thing to do is relax as much as you can, follow the leader while the music is on, or until you reach your limit, find something to enjoy about that moment, and try not to get stuck in the sense that you should be doing something else (like sticking to the rhythm of the music).

Thinking about this, I have come to the realisation that this advice is valid for life in general.

You won’t have amazing dance partners every day, actually most of the time you will be thrown into the strange dances of the day to day life, with the girl who is preparing your coffee, the life partner, the children, the employers and the employees, and if you relax into the leadership of fate or reality, you will have a better time than resisting the movements of life.

When you resist the bad dancer, you end up in a war… it’s not worth it.

18 Orble Votes

Directly from the Bachata-Me Dancefloor

It has been a while, since I danced and even longer since I posted a Dancing Bug piece.

I’m excited about both. I’m here at City Tattersals waiting for the Bachata Month to start.

With the first party to mark the official countdown to the Sydney International Bachata Festival

The deliciously tacky bachata music is one-two-three-fouring louder and louder.

“Te aaaamooo” sings the song.

The first couples are venturing onto the dance floor and I’m on the sideline typing as quickly as I too, can be free to Bachata the night away.

There is some excitement, the feeling that reminds me of a time when I was starting to venture into the Latin dancing world. Finding my dancing feet, my heels’ balance, recovering my life’s passion for dancing. And for the first time learning that dance can encompass sensuality too. Discovering the perfection of moving in unison with a partner…

I hope this is a special night. I’ll will pray to the Goddess of Dance & Fun that a lot of guys ask me to dance, and at least one dance tonight is one of those that go into my own personal hall of fame, those that fill your mind and you keep dancing for years hoping for another one like that.

27 Orble Votes