This will be a weekly travel column “Globe-Trotting” of cool places around the world. In the beginning of this year, I had the opportunity to travel to Brazil for a couple of months to volunteer at a conservation center for sea turtles called Projeto Tamar, crazy right? Well many people asked me why I wanted to work there if I’m not a biologist or vet. But I think the real question here is WHY NOT? So I went to Ubatuba, which is a city with many beaches, located between Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo.

Projeto Tamar also ran a recycling center so kids in the community would come to recycle paper and make paper bags that Tamar would later buy to use at its stores. It was a great way for kids to learn new skills and also to earn income for themselves. The cool thing about this center is that we don’t only learn how to recycle paper, but it’s an exchange of knowledge. They would teach me how to recycle paper and in return, I would teach them how to make cookies – yeah, I’m not sure how that’s really comparable but hey, it worked.

Every place that you go has these little things that sort of define it. These are all handmade pieces that I found.

Photos by Pretty Talk

These are a couple of things you should bring back if you go to Ubatuba.

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