Brazil in Pictures (Recife)

 

*The pictures can be clicked to see them at full size*

I will be posting Salvador and Rio soon. (Hopefully…this post took more work than I thought)

Recife

 Olinda

 The view from Olinda. Olinda is a beautiful historic area of Recife. As a matter of fact Olinda means “Oh how beautiful.” We also learned that the phrase applied to describing a person as well. For example: You could say Olinda to someone or cut off the “o” and saying something like Ciao linda meaning “Goodbye beautiful. This view is from one of its highest points behind a church.

 

I took the above picture not too far behind this statue of Jesus (pretty much where there people in the background are). You can see the detail on this statue of Jesus depicting blood where nails were driven through his hands. Also, what looks to be his heart is shown as well. I’ve found an aerial view of the whole church on Google. 

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Around the back of the church. I cannot find the picture but to the right here is actually a stone wall with strategic holes for snipers to sit and take out invaders coming up the hill. 

Reminder From A Millionaire

A couple of weeks ago I had the pleasure of sitting down with an individual who has been kind enough to act as a mentor of sorts. I do not see him much but he has always been an email away. This particular day I wanted to meet with him to hash out some questions in regards to my book (and catch up as well). He released a book of his own last year to much success so I knew he’d have good advice, but those minute details are not exactly what I want to talk about right now. 

Over the course of our discussion, I found out something I had never known about him; his wife is a news anchor. Moreover, she has been living hours away for her job and will be for some time AND they have a a two-year-old son (currently staying with him), because “new anchors have crazy schedules and children need routine.”

My first question to all of this was “How do you do it?!” His response was pretty simple. “We’re used to solving problems. Plus, when we got together not too long after college we had an understanding, I’m an entrepreneur and she’s a new anchor. If we remained important to each other, we’d make it work.”

Milestone Update: First Meeting With Editor

Last Friday I finally got to meet with my editor about my first draft. It was an amazing experience for me. I chose to completely remove myself from the content of the book until the editor was able to speak with me. That turned out to be a great decision. I was able to look at everything with a fresh perspective. Being immersed in the creative period makes it extremely difficult to objectively judge your own work. Her primary critique was that book seemed to be many books inside of one book.

“I can tell that you kind of noticed that at some point and tried to tie them together, but it didn’t exactly work. You obviously have a lot of ideas. Always remember, you can always put some of this stuff in another book.”

She was right. Although I am not necessarily looking forward to writing several books, it was nice to be reminded that if I really have something I need to tell the world I can always write another book. I have to admit I had this pressure on myself where I was writing as if this was the only book I’d ever be able to write. It genuinely felt like this book was the only chance to share my thoughts with the world. It was like if I died ‘tomorrow’, I would at least have those words to live on.

Because of this issue most of the meeting was about direction and forming a more concise message. She had so much constructive criticism and I am excited to meet her challenges. The greatest part of it all was to see how much I actually wrote. It assured me of the importance of working hard on building something today; because once it is built your accomplishment cannot be taken away from you. “Wow, I wrote all of that…wow…I can’t believe I did that.” When I looked at the papers I could see early mornings, long hours, missed TV shows and outings with friends. Those papers were a culmination of at least 8 months of my life, just as a college degree represents a person’s years spent in classrooms and libraries. I still have a long way to go, but being told what I did wrong has never been so encouraging. Written by Sean