There Was Something in the Air That Night, Fernando

A quick stopover in Recife to drop off our luggage and we're on our way to Fernando de Noronha, Brazil's own seldom visited fantasy island. My little purple backpack is stuffed with standard island supplies for an extended weekend, and is now slathered in a milky white sunscreen residue after having drained 4 bottles of Neutrogena 70 SPF onto my body in the space of a month. My skin shows no visible sign that I've left my country, though my perma-grin suggests that any UVA-UVB rays have bronzed my soul instead.
Joseph Campbell says that people think that what we're really seeking is the meaning of life, but that what we're really seeking is the experience of being alive. My fifteen fellow Fulbrighters and I feel alive in the here and now, and even in our sleep-deprived, overstimulated stupor, every single human sense is intensified here in Brazil. I fear "the forgetting", the inevitable psychological slippage back into spoiled complacency that will likely accompany my journey back to the suburbs.

Fernando is an enigmatic island with a mixed legacy of an Alcatraz-like prison system, 1970s funk art, and leftover US military structures that seem to crumble before your eyes. It is also beautiful. And when you tell the Brazilian seated across from you on a TAM flight that you plan to visit Fernando as part of a Department of Education grant, you are struck with both delight and guilt to discover that only a privileged percentage of Brazilians will ever see this blue-green paradise.

Fernando de Noronha accommodates visitors in pousadas, family homes converted into guest houses that are humble enough in their spartan decor to morph you into a havaiana (flip flop) wearing local during your stay. I slept in a small room with three of my Fulbrighter girlfriends, who

have fast become some of my favorite people on the planet. On 35 day journeys like this, any existing walls between people break down fast, rapido, and personal space takes on a whole new meaning. I am growing here in so many ways, and have learned how to wash and condition my hair in 3 minutes or less. Woo hoo!

The island boasts the paradoxically "oldest modern" windmill in all of South America, and I spent one morning away from the group on a quest to stand directly beneath this mammoth structure of sustainability. They are surprisingly silent. I visualized Casey by my side and remembered the time we stood like wooden statues under a windmill in the Faroes with Olavur, visions of Don Quixote dancing in our heads. Fernando is known also for its ecotourism, and features a beach that permits 20 visitors to wade within its highly regulated waters for roughly 20 minutes in order to maintain the quality of both the water and wildlife. Dolphin projects, turtle programs are everywhere, everywhere, and biologists are working hard to protect the island's crown jewels.

But what makes things weirdly unsustainable is the water, or lack thereof. Fernando is water starved, and while it relies upon household catchment systems to capture seasonal rainfall, it also produces the bulk of its potable water by sucking the salt out of the Atlantic at an energy-inefficient desalinization plant. You do see some solar power on the island, but for the most part, dirty diesel is King of Fernando.

The highlight of my trip: a sunset swim and body surf on our last night here before the journey back to Recife. I have no photos, but the image of the waves and the laughter and the gravity of so much happiness and love among new friends remains.