Passing through Chicago

It's been a busy couple of weeks. I finished up my research in Salvador, came back to Chicago arriving a day late because I missed my flight in São Paulo, met up with my parents and drove up the east coast of Lake Michigan with them visiting several beautiful state parks with gorgeous dunes, came back to Chicago and graduated from MAPSS, and now I'm busy writing up a report on my fieldtrip and packing up my stuff. I move on Wednesday and then Thursday I fly to Finland. It's a bit crazy. It's been great but I am actually looking forward to when classes start again and atleast I'll be put in one place, maybe a bit too much though, considering how little time I had last year to even get out of the library.
Now that I'm home and have a proper internet connection again I can finally treat you to some of my photos.

These will be in reverse order now so the first ones are from graduation and Jimmies after the official celebrations.




















































And these are from the trip with my parents by Lake Michigan.



































































And here are some pics from Salvador. These are from the closing ceremony of my Candomblé´dance course.







































And here finally are some photos of capoeira and my friends.

Only 12 days and then I fly back to Chicago!

I cant´believe my time here is coming to an end already. I fly back to Chicago in less than two weeks, and I still have so much that I want and need to do, especially in relation to my research. I´m starting to feel that my research plans for this summer were way too ambitious, especially in relation to the number of interviews I was planning to conduct. But, then again, now on the other hand, the interviews I do have are really good, and more importantly, while I dont have anything as concrete as a tape to show for it, I have been able to get to know a lot of Candomble people and understand a little better how the religion fits into their lives. So, next summer when I come back I´m sure I´ll be starting from a completely different situation. I´ll already have accomplished, what I think is the most difficult part of doing anthropology, rapport, as we anthropologists call knowing the right people for your research.

Any way, now I´m going to start trying to pull things together. I´ve been invited to a tabuleiro de Obaluaie ceremony tonite. August is the month of Obaluiae, the orixa god of sickness as well as cemetaries among other things, so there are a lot of ceremonies organized for him happening in the Candomble temples, and you can also see adepts walking around on the streets of Salvador in their white clothes carrying trays for Obaluaiye on their heads. I´ve never been to a ceremony for him before, so I´m pretty excited to see what its like.

But I have also been busy with my Capoeira. This weekend we had our group´s international encounter here in Salvador, so it has been a really full last four days for me. Lots of capoeira, new and old capoeira friends and great parties in the evenings. I´m totally beat, but it was great fun. And I think I learned so much, once again. Now I just hope I can incorporate at least some of things I have going on in my head into the way I play the game. It´s really interesting how the more I do capoeira the more I realize I have to learn...