I think the real question here is did pattycakes end up doing ayahuasca with the mother and daughter?
not yet, but seeing as we're getting confessional, here's the rest of the day:
the first 3/4 hours it was pretty much just me with the occasional jogger or couple. one of my big things in the past was the over self awareness thing where i was worried that people around me either
knew (thus exposing myself to the feeling of vulnerability when i had my first really bad acid trip on 4 tabs with a bunch of people i didn't really know who decided i was gonna be their toy at 16 or so. probably never fully recovered from that one nearly 20 years later, but that's another story) or i was drawing attention to myself because i was acting weird or whatever. and there it was, subtly nagging at me this time again, but i managed to tell myself to be cool, and did. was really just a choice in the end. this in a foreign land with potential who knows what lurking around.. it really was just a choice. then i started to laugh at myself for even caring or thinking that any of it mattered and buzzed on that for a while.
after sitting next to a stream for half an hour watching the water lines glimmer and shift in the sunlight poking through the trees i decided to move on to the next spot. i'd hiked this forest once before but never in the area i was at yesterday, but all of a sudden the woodland path looked familiar and i knew i was headed toward the famous Pedra Grande (Big Stone) viewpoint. walking down a steepish hill, some milton bradley terminator-esque dystopian epic pad laden acid decided to kick in as Big Stone began to roll out in front of me. for most of the hike i'd been enclosed in dense forest but all of a sudden the sky opens out above the stone, the pad in the tune hits full intensity, the sunlight hits my skin in force and i begin to walk up the craggy face of the rock. the entirety of sao paulo reveals itself in it's relentless concrete whiteness.
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do yourself a favour and click
this one to really grasp the feeling
mesmerising to see a city of that size all in one, from such a distance. a true forest itself. it's late afternoon and there's noone around. 'strange for this time of day at a place like this' i thought to myself. but just then over one of the folds of the rock i see what i though was a human knee waving around. aha, i thought. guess it's not just me after all and braced myself for a possible face to face interaction. a few steps closer and i realise it's no knee. but in fact a rather large bird, which was busying itself with something it had found on the rock. i managed to get within a good few meters before it noticed me and we both checked each other out before it turned and flew toward the city over the top of the thick canopy separating the rock and the city. 'fuck me' I thought. 'couldn't have scripted that better.' As I watched what in my head was a glorious eagle soar toward that great concrete expanse I hear a motor and a stern voice behind me shout "ta fechar!" a surly looking guard on a dirt bike was gesturing for me to come down. 'couldn't have harshed my buzz better if you'd tried.' "fala ingles?" i asked. "não, fecha às 4" the grumpy sod barked. apprently the mountain closes at 4pm on saturdays. no beautiful sunsets for me I thought. asked for 5 minutes because I'd just got there. he shook his head. so I turn and glumly start to walk the long way back to the entrance, knowing I had a good 45min-1hr to go to get back down to base. this was peak tripping and yet i wasn't allowing this guy, who to be fair was just doing his job, in. it became funny because there i was having my personal epic moment to myself, (you know how big everything is in your head when tripping and yet you're really just some guy walking past people who haven't the slightest clue) all loving nature and being at one with the city with this incredible soundtrack and out of nowhere then rules of the house come crashing in and i'm being sent down the mountain. in the past, i'm pretty sure this would have twisted me right out and who knows what would have happened. but i shrugged it off pretty calmly. not trying to brag here but more make a point about how there's a choice involved sometimes.
on the way down the guy on the bike followed me the whole way. slowly because there was no way i was hurrying in my state. every now and then i'd look over my shoulder and see him and chuckle. he probably deals with this every day i thought. me pretending to be all wtf about it to send to a mate on whatsapp:
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https://i.ibb.co/rtbpMVk/WhatsApp.jpg" alt="WhatsApp" border="0"></a>
whatever.. kept moving. getting closer to base more and more clumps of people were also leaving and i find myself totaly embracing it all and realising they're just families out enjoying their saturday, picking up pinecones and showing their kids little details in trees. and why shouldn't they be? this sounds like nothing as i'm writing it but at the time it was fairly profound. mostly because in the past they would have had me walking like trebor's mr soft trying to act normal. giving way to much of a shit about what people were thinking. guess the point has been made by now though.
anyway, out of the forest exit and onto the road. suddenly hits me that now i'm going to have to face the city. still pretty much peaking although on the downslope. luckily there's a regular city park right there which i duck into but it's rammed full of families with their kids running around all boisterous. saturday afternoon in full swing. i try to find myself a quiet corner for 10min or so, still keeping it together. protective eyewear on. but all the good spots are taken. a wooded path which seems to either lead out of the park or to somewhere much quieter catches my eye and i give it a shot. no benches or bits of grass to park on but much less intense than the playgrounds and carp lakes in the main bit. a leafy pathway. this'll do. oh wait, is that a police car? or a whole row of them?! big sign behind them saying 'police militar'... german shepherds? how about 12 big burly navy seal looking fuckers staring right at me? a single one of their biceps bigger than my neck? i feel the beads of sweat on my forehead. i clench my toes and turn to look straight ahead. pretty sure the mr soft walk kicked in. i hear them chuckle and from the corner of my eye am pretty sure i can see em flexing their arms. 'just keep walking for fucks sake'. had a bit of hash in my backpack. the moment passes. i pretend to try to get something from my backpack so i can look behind me to see if anyone is coming. of course they fucking weren't. it's all in the head. lolled at myself but with a little quivver this time. and kept on going. end of the road led into a favela, which i definitely wasn't ready to tackle, so i turn back to face the police, the families and all the rest. i buy a cup of fresh coconut juice and sit on a quieter part of the lake to take it all in and realise once again that all the shit going on inside is literally nothing to everyone else passing me. and then i notice certain other people who i guess were just naturally more self aware, awkwardly walking past other people all stiff and bodies clenched, eyes darting around. all to familiar tbh. inverted souls trying to just be out there amongst it all. a small part of me wanted to reassure them but then i realised it was none of my business and would probably only make things worse anyway. not to mention the language barrier. i try to at least smile in their direction. some smiled back. it felt great. people were just doing their thing.
this kind of meandered and maybe promised a better ending but that's pretty much it. i got an uber home, ate some mcdonalds, had a friend over for a little bit and went to bed around 11.
overall a pretty nice day. 4.5/5.