New country, new life, new hopes

One of the things that most touched my heart during this week were the pictures of the Palestinian children at the Ruwaished camp, in Jordan, sent by the United Nations Refugee Angency´s communication officers in Brazil. Wearing the T-shirts with the colors of the national team (green and yellow), the kids had hope in their eyes. Hope of a new life starting very soon. They are part of a group of about 100 people who start to arrive in Brazil on this weekend, after being repeatedly displaced between Iraq and Jordan in the last years. They will be settled in the southern state of Rio Grande do Sul and, hopefully, very soon, will become "gauchos" like our locals. After the removal, the Jordanian camp will be closed down.
The Palestinians are already part of the Brazilians´ lives, especially the ones who live in the big cities, such as São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Porto Alegre, and even in my town, Florianópolis, where they own businesses in the downtown area.
Brazil´s position of receiving the refugees is humanitarian and, at the same time, political. It will contribute very much for the comprehension of Palestinian situation and will help to bring peace to the lives of these people. This will be also a good opportunity for the local communities to learn about the importance of solidarity and multiculturalism.
I wish good luck for the newcomers and I hope Brazil will always be open to people in need of a stable environment, distant from wars, hunger, political and religious persecution.

Be curious

"(...) as we go forward in the twenty-first century, feminists inside and outside academia need to be on our guard against a cynical form of knowing. We need to send the roots of our curiosity down ever deeper. We need to stand ready to be surprised -to admit surprise and build on it. It is bound to enliven our teaching, broaden our conversations, and make our strategies more savvy."

From the book "The Curious Feminist: Searching for Women in a New Age of Empire", by Cynthia Enloe (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2004)

That´s what it is all about

"I have no country
My country is the whole world" (anonymous)