Opening Ceremonies
My friend and I were lucky enough to be invited to the inauguration (opening day!) of his garden. It was an elaborate affair! We arrived just before 10am, the appointed time. In Brazil, it’s pretty normal to start things later than the appointed time, so, of course, the festivities began about 10:30. To ring in the ceremony, first they raised the flag, and all but 2 people (Leti and I) out of the 50 who attended sang the national anthem with great emotion. Then the local Minister of the Environment spoke encouragingly of this project — a garden created without chemicals — citing it as a beacon for the city to follow and praised Marcelo for his quest to create more green space.

The artist, Gabriel: Showing his work of art.

A mass followed in which the priest spoke fondly of the relationship between man and nature. He said how people in the past tended to abuse nature, and that we need to accept more responsibility to care for the earth.

At lunchtime, we were treated to a rousing performance by a brass quartet (four people playing brass instruments). I personally sampled pieces of at least four different cakes prepared by the local church — each one for just one "real" (about 40 cents in US money).

The Kids Arrive
In the afternoon the kids arrived, most of them with parents and other family members. Leti and I were able to provide an entertaining diversion to them: They got to practice English and Spanish with a real native speaker of each language. (I speak English, of course, and Leti’s native language is Spanish). "What do you know in Spanish?" Leti asked the kids. "How to count," one girl answered and began, "One, twelve…" We all had a lot of fun practicing languages! But I became more impressed with how much they knew about something other than language: ecology!

The dozen kids began to draw pictures to explain ecological messages. They scribbled, wrote, drew, and colored casually until Marcelo announced the time was nearly up. Then they rushed to finish during the extra "minutinhos" (minutes) he gave them. Together with Marcelo, Leti and I served as guest judges for the art competition. It was difficult but we finally picked first, second, and third places. The Clube Dendrobatis sent along these works of art as a gift to Kidsregen.org.

Garden samples: Plants grown in the garden in Brazil.

Now it was time for a skit. The children aptly portrayed poor city-dwellers who had no place in which to play...until they met up with some kids who lived in the country — and it was all fun and games from then on! Thus the inauguration ended. Marcelo told me he would like to keep in touch with Kidsregen.org and The Rodale Institute, and welcomes any volunteers we might send down to visit and help out with the project.