Stairway to Heaven

So as you may probably know I’m building an Eco Park, Organic Garden and a Social Center in one of Rio’s Favela with local friends that grew up i the Favela. The garden’s location is amazing !!! on a mountain, at the beginning of the forest, at the end of the Favela with a view of the entire city. In order for us to build the garden, we need to straiten the area and build huge terraces (4 meters). The least expensive and ecologically way we’ve found is to use old tires of vehicles. To build the terraces we use will use 300 tires! From the close road in the Favela to the garden has over 200 stairs! I can do the math for you how many times each of us has to go up and down, but i will save our time and just say its a nightmare !!!

But what can we do , we know it’s not going to be an easy job, we had a beer at a bar near the road, we looked up and we didn’t saw the end of the staircase, we looked at each other, a deep breath and started to take up a huge pile of tires to the garden on the mountain.

But then something really amazing happened ! Along the stairs on the way to the garden live thousands of people, everyone who came up the stairs just grabbed a tire (or more) and put him on the stairs, children, men and even an old women old help us! We did not ask for help from any of them, but they understand one simple thing, there are a pile of tires, they went up the stairs, the tires have to get up – so they take a tire and help us.

See the people that help us gave me a lot of forces and made me very happy, they reminded me that maybe it is possible to live differently …