Sex on the Beach 2: FAVELA STYLE

He kept telling me to loosen up. Telling me that I was too closed and that I needed to relax. Well, I wasn’t sure exactly how I was supposed to relax considering he was sitting there 2 (very small) feet away from me.  Or at least he WAS because he soon found an excuse to edge his way next to me on the mats (yeah that’s right I have mats at my house and ingeniously hid my bed behind my desk so that visitors don’t take liberties on my bed like this fool was taking on my mats!).

I’m not exactly sure why the hell I even let him in my house. I can’t deny the things he was saying were making complete sense. I really did need to loosen up. My physical therapist, and masseuse tell me the same thing all the time; I'm too tense. Considering I am always trying to avoid some kind of unwanted physical contact, whether it be getting my guard passed in training, or a friendly hug that is lasting entirely too long, it just comes as second nature to treat all physical contact as a potentially hostile threat (probably indicative of some psychological damage I'm inflicting on myself but oh well I love what I do). 

Connection Rio 

my home away from home

All physical contact should be handled 

with hostility, especially at Connection Rio,

cause seriously he should just slap me!

I thought of my friends, A and J, who would be flooded with words or know exactly what to say. Better yet, they would know exactly who he was because they grew up together there in Galo.

So maybe that why I let him in, maybe it was a subconscious effort to try and be more social and integrate myself into the community. To not feel so isolated all of the time.

I often wonder what it would be like to shed my gringo skin and see the favela through the Cria perspective. Maybe then I would be more relaxed with him instead of internally slapping myself across the head for letting a drug dealer in my house. Maybe then he would just be a dumb kid from down the street and then maybe words would flow easier and I would have something to say to him.

Tudo 2 (all 2) is something I used to say all the time. Then my friend 

from Nova Uniao swore to me it was a gang phrase from my neighborhood. 

 Well if they can put it on a wall than it can stay in my vocab! 

But unfortunately that is not the case. I didn’t know him (despite seeing him everyday). So, I’m sitting about a foot away from this guy with one knee up and hands positioned to deflect any attempt to either pass or worse ENTER my guard. Just to be thorough, I made sure to keep my knee “live” or turned out and kept my hand close to my ankle to avoid it getting snatched up and me being laid out on my back (since I’m so small, people take advantage of any minor flaw in my posture to muscle me onto my back and pass my guard). Despite the attention to detail that I put into my posture, my girl Claudinha always tells me the best defense is offense, so any attempts to kiss me where going to be met swiftly and violently with an elbow.

Yes, that’s actually what I was thinking about while this guy was talking to me.

No, I’m not exaggerating not even in the slightest.

Don’t get me wrong I wasn’t actually scared of him. He was a drug dealer, true, but he had gone home and dropped off his bag of drugs before coming over and from what I could tell there was no gun under his thin, white Nike T-shirt. So, no, I wasn’t scared of him, we just had a severe conflict of interests that were eventually going to clash (titan style). In a short period of time, I was going to want to go to bed because I had wrestling in the morning and he... well he wanted to get a little wrestling done then and there. So there I sat tense AF!

I’m not sure what the hell I’m supposed to say to this guy and it wasn’t just the language barrier, we just didn’t have much in common. Tomorrow I was going to get up and go train wrestling, Jiu Jitsu, and Muay Thai. He, on the other hand, was going to sit for 12 hours and watch for police. He likes to go out and dance… and I want to be a world champion.

View from Terere's room in Galo of  neighoring favelas 

pavao/pavaozinho and Copacabana beach

Maybe I’m just as bad as he was. Maybe I was just playing with him. I knew why he was there, but I was curious to see how he was going to go about his business. I didn’t want to generalize and stick all Brazilians in a box so I gave him a chance to escape from his little box where I had neatly compartmentalized him and brushed him off as with most male suiters that come my way. 

He didn’t do much to restore my faith, instead he proceeded along the normal script, “Loosen up, lighten up, let things flow.” I’m tired of hearing that shit. Actions speak louder than words and so far I have yet to meet someone who I can let my guard down around. The fact that they never actually "let things flow doesn’t help either"! Instead they persist with one advance after another until I’m ready to grab my mouth guard and hand wraps.  

I will admit, however, that while I don't agree with the Brazilian propensity to wantonly sleep around, they are straight forward and direct. They don't beat around the bush or make promises they never intend to fulfill. They tell you straight up what they want and they don't bother to sugarcoat it with trips to movies or any other sort of romantic endeavor.

So naturally, when some non Brazilian offered to walk to the entrance of the favela (which is feared by most gringos), I was caught off guard. I've become so jaded by the animalistic sex instincts that run rampant along the beaches of Rio that if someone where to go so far as open a car door for me I might literally drop dead of a heart attack... and/or suspicion!

My bro

Terere and his badassery before class!

So here I am today. Almost a year later (with not much success since) receiving relationship advice from my bro and BJJ legend Fernando Terere:

“Oh so nothing happened? But did you grab the snake? He’ll change his game up once you go there”

Oh duh. Why didn’t I think about that? Instead of sulking around the fringes of the dreaded “friend zone” I should have just grabbed his Johnson and immediately dispelled any unnecessary doubts!

To be continued: 
Sex on the Beach 3: 'Murica

Fun from the Favela

a little look into the cut of the Cantagalo Favela. This is a house that was built by a friend of mine and parent of one of the kids at the social project. They used to live in a cement house with the rest of their family (a good 6-7 people including kids in a small room) and build this house down here to be able to have some privacy. This is more than one house. 

South Bound & Down II: Burning Bridges

Artic Chaga Tea is a new supplement sponsors... well no TEA 

sponsor that will is sending me some hand picked Alaskan mushrooms!!

Their tea has amazing amounts of antioxidants and helps speed 

recovery time by a ZIILION!

I couldn’t think of any good ways to inform Rio de Janeiro that I would be leaving the comforts of my beachside favela. After several hours of debating it, I decided I was left with only one logical solution. Facebook.

Social media has reduced human interactions to comments and likes. A definite plus for shy people like me.

So, in one quick and concise status update, I informed the world… Well, the Portuguese speaking portion of it at least, that I would be leaving Nova Uniao and moving to Curitiba at the end of the July.

I initially expected people to talk a lot of shit (people probably are talking a lot of shit they just aren’t posting it on my wall), but I was surprised by the amount of support via comments and private messages that I received. They were an unexpected, but much needed reprieve from people that generally act as if I’m slightly crazy… living in the favelas of Brazil and all.



Sunday training in Curitiba. I was supposed to be back in Rio But I missed my flight and ended up spending some extra days!!


I’m not going to lie, I’m definitely apprehensive about leaving the picturesque beaches and tropical climate of Rio. Not to mention, the safety net of friends and pseudo family that I’ve assembled here. The thought of burning bridges, whether they are useful or not,  is always unsettling to a certain degree. As a buddhist I'm well aware that attachment causes suffering, but as someone thats been living with little more than 2 suitcases for the last two years, abandoning everything that I have come to know is perplexing. 

Plus, Curitiba is one of the coldest cities in Brazil.  I’m not sure what the hell I was thinking.

Which brings me to my next point…


What the hell was I thinking?




I mean seriously... leaving Nova Uniao, one of the best MMA teams worldwide. No longer will I be training next to Jose Aldo, Renan Barao, or the umpteenth number of UFC fighters the adorn the gyms prestigious pedigree. They have everything an athlete could desire... physical therapists, and nutritionists, a pool, sauna, and a strange room that they claim is for pilattes, although to me it looks like it came straight out of 50 Shades of Gray. I'd be traded up my sports bras for sweatpants!! And then there's the beaches of Rio de Janeiro. Front row for Carnival, New Years, and Christmas events. 

But, I came to Brazil because I wanted to fight. 

Although Rio is great, I’m not getting any fights here. It’s also a very expensive city. So after thinking about it, it just makes more sense to go to Curitiba where I can save money and fight more. So I'm trading up the beaches of Rio to train at Parana Vale Tudo (PRVT). Its relatively a small team compared to Nova Uniao, but they have a pretty big girls team with fighters from UFC and InvictaFC. 


Unlike Nova Uniao where there are about a million classes offered through out the day (wrestling, boxing, conditioning, Nogi, BJJ, Muay Thai), PRVT only has 1-2 training sessions a day. The week I spent in Curitiba meeting everyone was a complete 180 in my overly hectic training schedule. The team gathers in the afternoon and the coaches divide everyone based on what they need. The amateurs may practice a little muay thai off to the side while some of the girls roll Nogi to warm up a guy that has a fight coming up. Then switch to some work against the cage, muay thai sparring, and end with judo take downs. Its seems like a completely random, haphazard way to go about training, but in actuality it is tailored to the specific needs of each person. I was able to get more 1on 1 help from the coaches in their small informal setting than when I'm training with 30 plus people on the mats of Nova Uniao. 

Its definitely different. But it reminds me of my team MiKiDo from home. So in the end I think its a better fit for me!

On another note...I also got to travel to Sao Paulo with my friend who was giving a few seminars!

Shout out to Eduardo Castro owner of Half & Half academy for letting me Crash at his place!
Per usual, met some great people on the mats in Sampa. New friends and new places to visit on my next trip! 

They said I couldn't... 

So naturally I did!

Evacking Gaza: No time for MMA training

Part 2: Evacuating the Gaza Strip

Hanging out at BJJ Hacks film shoot at Mestre Terere's house

In Cantagalo. A lot happens in one year in Brazil.

Warning: Do not try this at home.

So today it’s been a year since I’ve been living in Brazil. 365 days ago today I arrived at Connection Rio at 7-8AM. My first sight of the “Jiu Jitsu lifestyle” was the pasty white legs and tighty whities of Belgium native Brist who opened the door for me before stumbling back to bed to sleep off a long night of drinking (He is actually back now). Due to a scheduling error, there was no house manager to greet me so I tiptoed through the house, eventually stumbling across one of the common rooms that was stuffed full with damp kimonos, bunk beds, and more pasty, white gringo legs. Boy did I regret not having enough money to stay in a private room the 3 months that I stayed at Connection Rio! After 3 months I made my escape, leaving the quiet suburban neighborhood at the base of Pedra de Gavea and moved to the tumultuous Favela of Cantagalo to live with the Fernando Terere’s secretary. This is where the story gets good. 

playing cards

 I stayed there for a little while, but since I STILL didn’t have my own room, I eventually jumped ship and landed in what I now know is called the Gaza Strip or Quebra or that place, you know, when you get off the elevator and go left.

I lived there for 3 months but soon found the need to leave because… well because it was a shit hole. It was my shit hole though, so I did love it in its own way. For the first time in 8 months, I could sleep in, walk around in my underwear, and not have to worry about boys peeing on the toilet seat all the time (where we get off telling guys to put the toilet seat down is beyond me... men are impossible, if you don't want to be sitting in pee all the time it is more effective to put the toilet seat UP after finishing). 

I finally had my freedom, but I also had to deal with a suspect landlord, a wall that was always damp and most likely moldy, and a limited amount of space. SOOO limited that when I wasn’t in bed I had to throw it up against a part of the wall that wasn’t damp! Life in the favela is definitely a big change from the million dollar homes that surround the Connection Rio hostel. 

I ended up dealing with that mess for 3 months. It would have been 3 months and 2 days but my landlord outright refused to let me stay the extra days I needed before being able to move into my new place.

My New Place:

Finding a new place took two days of walking up and down numerous stairs with my previously mentioned cria and searching out people like “nido” who has a room for 300 and lives in the bakery that closed down in the GDF or “Aunty from the church” who has 3 room for cheap, wait who is it for? You? Ok! Yeah 3 rooms. She is in the salon go ask for her down that street around 9 (this is why you need a cria. In America you look up an address in the favela you ask around looking for people to point you to other people who know where there is someone). 

Hanging out and having lunch at Terere's house while 

filming BJJ Hacks. You can see Jackson Souza's house from here. 

The blue tubs supply water to houses and also act as a 

drying rack for clothes. Roof tops are also popular places

for kite flyers

So, I find a new place but nothing can ever just be easy so long story short let’s just cut to Tuesday. I was supposed to move out of my house Monday (I’m also supposed to be in MMA sparring) and I’m sitting dejectedly on my front steps with an empty house save a fridge and the blankets that I slept with last night. I’m somewhat stressed out because A.) if you hadn't noticed I mentioned it was Tuesday and I was supposed to move out Monday  and B.) there are two things that I know about my landlord for sure… neither of them meeting the censorship of this blog but most likely falling under the jurisdiciton of ATF. So yeah I woke up Tuesday determined get myself and my fridge out of there ASAP.  

Note:

My fridge is my prized possession. It is also the biggest and should be the most expensive thing I own. It’s not actually... these are.

It cost me about 80 dollars to buy these two pieces of crap!

They are the only real pieces of furniture I own...

How is that possible? Two reasons. 

A. Everything in Rio is expensive and plastic things for some reason are double expensive.

B. I acquired my fridge via the Jeito Favelado (the favela way). What’s the favela way you may ask? Well, one morning, at an ungodly early hour, someone came screaming my name outside of my window. I get up open the window and it’s my friend's boyfriend asking me if I want to buy a fridge for R50 USA $23. So, we walk up one level to this nice apartment where I am greeted by some shady guy that looks like he could be a pimp or something. IRONICALLY he used to live in Maryland and is not moving to Sao Paulo since he couldn’t afford his rent. Viola. Fridge for me, along with a huge tub a mayonnaise, and some sketchy mustard in a water bottle. I saved myself at the least R300 that I would have had to dish out to buy and transport a used fridge from somewhere else.

End note. Back to me being dejected on my front steps with no Cria.

Along the Estrada, that is not an abandoned house, people live there

Thats not a pile of trash, kids play there. 

These politicians, I'm not sure who they are, they never come here

but cheers for spending your campaign money to throw more trash 

into the communities! They should be ashamed!

Cut. Once again we are out of time. It's been a long day and I have wrestling in the morning. The third and last part will be out next week, freeing me up to get to my next topic of interest: Bomba... and not the gernades the dealers throw... I'm talking about the juice the athletes down! 

If your dying to read more about the favela check out Tales From Deep Half as my homeboy has also released a 3 part story on living here in the favela! I accidently sent him down into the Gaza Strip forgetting that he was a "straight up white boy" ... like I said you shouldn't try this at home... 

Valeu

Focus, Force, Faith, and more Black Eyes

Nova Uniao Pro Wrestling Training 

MMA SPARRING

There is like absolutely like no way to get out of MMA sparring without getting your face jacked up. When I first got to Brazil I met this guy who had an incredibly low opinion of white belts and he used to berate me all of the time. After drilling one afternoon at Connection Rio he decided to impart some impeccable wisdom to me. He told me to "be better" (with his snide English accent). Well thats how I feel after getting punched several times with small MMA gloves. I really need to be better if I want to avoid black eyes, get grounded and pounded, and getting tossed around by all the people that are bigger than me.

Note on being small: if you look up at the picture of the team you'll note that that would be virtually everyone on the team that is bigger than me with the exeception of Michelle, who is a black belt, so that doesn't count because she is a beast. In situations where I get picked up and tossed around, SHE gets picked up and then clings to the person's body, climbs to the limb that she wants, and submits them. It's actually quite funny to watch because she is so tiny, but she can hurt sooo much. She makes side control feel like a submission (and it's not, its just a position meant to keep you immoblized). 

So, in respects to sparring, just think about it. Typical boxing gloves/ heavy bag gloves weigh 16 ounces. Most people train with 14 or 12 ounce gloves, I personally use 12oz Machina gloves (although they look like they are 10oz). Muay Thai and Kickboxing fights traditionally use 10 ounce gloves, BUT, if you try to use 10 ounce gloves during sparring someone is probably going to be mad about it.

Submission grappling with Ronys Torres

Now MMA gloves, on the other hand, are a meager 4 ounces of padding. That’s virtually nothing, so we definitely don’t spar with 4oz gloves… that would be ridiculous. We spar with gloves that are between 4-7 ounces (because thats a lot better right?). I have a nice pair of Venum gloves that I really like but they are too small for me to spar in, so I was given a pair of Pretorian gloves to use instead. These gloves have a little bit more padding, but they are no where near the size of boxing gloves but that doesn't stop us from going all at it in them. 

So, like I was saying, it’s nearly impossible to go at it with those tiny little gloves and not get your face, or some other part of your body, jacked up. I mean there is always the wise decision to wear a headgear, but frankly, that rarely happens. 

The big problem for me is that if you don’t have shin guards or knee pads you’re not allowed to kick or throw knees (obviously), and my MiKiDo shin guards do not qualify (they are really just the illusion of protection, but in all actuality, provide no padding what so ever). So, that means I’m the tiniest/shortest person on the team, with a kickboxing background, and I’m not allowed to kick. That leaves me to rely on my boxing and my amazing wrestling skills (by amazing I mean almost nonexistent). I really hate wrestling, so invariably, it's what I train the most. Training with Claudinha has also really inspired me to improve my wrestling. She is exceptionally adept at throwing people to the ground, and frankly I'm not too excited about the idea of getting my ass tossed around like a doll. 

At first, ok probably still, during wrestling class or sparring I would be scared to do take downs because I don't want to look like an idiot (also, take downs gone wrong generally lead to chokes). Even worse would be when I have to go up against Lu, who fights 3 weight classes above mine in Rona Rousey's division. She is also the girl that I know the least on the team, so needless to say, I was a little worried she would use excessive force on my small frame. Well, it turns out, my fears were unfounded. She, like the rest of the people on the team, was just there to help. Inevitably, I ended up on the ground, but I managed to get a lot of tips and help with my wrestling in the process. 

On another Jiu Jitsu related  note... 

Finally got the last two strips on my white belt!

IBJJF: Rio Open

I’m finally able to compete after two months of being injured. It feels so good to be able to train full time again. Since being injured I switched the focus of my training from BJJ to MMA. As a result, I had to leave Terere's and start training BJJ at Nova Uniao. It was definitely a hard decision since Terere is such a good friend and an amazing teacher, but in the end, my goal is to fight MMA and there is no better place to do that than Nova Uniao. Since there are no MMA fights coming up that I know of, I’m going to compete Jiu Jitsu. My first competition for Nova Uniao team will also be my first IBJJF competition.

 (Note: for the non-Jiu Jitsu people, the IBJJF comps are the ones that matter. 1 IBJJF gold medal is worth the more than the other 7 gold medals I’ve won from smaller federations. I missed out on the IBJJF Brasileiros because of my shoulder).

After Rio Open I hope I’ll be able to get my blue belt because it seems like I may have gotten myself into a white belt purgatory...

An important note to aspiring white belts: When you’re trying to get your blue belt, don’t keep switching gyms! Loyalty is a big issue in the BJJ community. You train at one gym and you represent one gym in competitions.

The concept is very similar to that of a gang, when have you ever seen the Bloods and the Crips sharing the best techniques about how to pull off a drive by? Never, right? In a similar fashion, a lot of traditional BJJ gyms discourage cross training at different academies.

The girls from Nova Uniao

Places like Renzo Gracie PA outright prohibit it in their rules (with the exception of affiliate gyms). Other places like Nova Uniao just subtlety transmit the idea by ripping your patches off your gis… I get yelled at there for wearing Renzo Gracie shirts turned inside out, all they can see is black, but they know what it is. Not everyone cares though, academy’s like Terere's gym could care less. I go to Terere's with my Renzo Gracie rashguard and my Nova Uniao Kimura gi that Claudinha gave to me, and Gordo Jiu Jitsu stickers on my laptop and nobody notices… I actually got complements on the gi.

So if you want to save yourself a headache, it’s important to find the right gym for you because it’s like a family, and they expect a certain degree of loyalty and respect. I, however like to do things the hard way, in an attempt to find the right training combination with BJJ and MMA, have switched gyms twice. As a result, I’ve screwed myself into a white belt purgatory and I now have no idea who the hell is going to give me a blue belt. 

~Get Hip~

Women's MMA

UFC books first women's strawweight bout in history

Women's Pro MMA Events- June

MEET THE STRAWWEIGHTS
TUF 20