Once upon a time, there was Fafá.

A brave lioness, wild by nature, strong and imposing, Fafá was born and raised in the Brasilia Zoo, and she was undoubtedly one of its biggest attractions.

The star’s last show, however, was a most unusual scene, inside a CAT scanner. Fafá, nearly 18 years old, had stopped eating, had bleeding nostrils, and suffered seizures, and everyone who cared for her at the zoo became concerned.

A complex plan was orchestrated by the zoo to take the lioness to a veterinary clinic. After a heavy dose of sedatives, she was moved from her cage to a litter and transported to the clinic.

There were three harrowing hours of scans in the middle of which Fafá suffered cardiac arrest. They scanned her head, thorax and abdomen, and did a rhinoscopy.

When veterinarian John Ricardo Nardotto announced the discovery of tumors in the lioness’ liver, the discouragement of the medical team became obvious. The tumors meant a high risk of death, for Fafá had cancer of the uterus in 2010 and everything led to believe that these tumors could be a metastasis of that.

Even though some tests would only be ready after a few days, the calculated cost of treatment was already at around $7,000 per month. Fafá was returned to the Zoo in the hope that she would improve.

I followed the process closely and had the opportunity to talk with Robson de Souza Almeida, Fafá’s handler for more than six years.

“I want to see her eating, running, playing and watching me when I call her name,”  said Robson.

Unfortunately Robson’s will was not the end of this story. The bleeding did not stop and a new cardiac arrest brought on biologists, keepers and veterinarians to try to save her. After some 24 hours of work, Fafá died.

I returned to the zoo and went to the area where the lioness spent most of her time. I saw her partner and blood brother, the lion named Dudu, completely desolate, sad and alone. I took some pictures and left.

On my way out I saw Robson and went to pay my condolences. His eyes were full of tears, and he was very emotional as he said, “It’s as if I had lost a brother.”

It’s always a challenge to photograph nature, and the moon is certainly a part of that. Everyone at some time has looked at that giant orb shining in the sky.

In recent months I felt the urge to try my hand at photographing it. The simplest way is to record the moon up there alone, suspended in the dark. The hardest is to capture it with something in the foreground that can cause more visual impact.

This July 3 I had already identified a place where the moon would appear, so all I needed was that interesting foreground object. My chosen place was at the Pantheon of the Fatherland monument, in the political center of Brasilia between the Planalto presidential palace, the Supreme Court and Parliament.

When the moon appeared on the horizon some people pulled out their camera phones and pocket cameras to record the beauty of the moment. I had hoped to use these people in my image as a timeworn and simple photographic cliché, a silhouette. In this case, I hoped to put someone on the moon.

To the left of where I stood, I noticed a couple admiring the scene. The man was taller and began photographing the moon with his phone. At the same time, I started looking for a way to frame him with the moon in the background.

After my first few clicks, his companion approached and stood close behind him, facing me. I’m not sure if she used her own cell phone or a pocket camera, but as I was framing the scene through my viewfinder a bright light appeared from her hand. I realized that instead of facing the moon, she had decided to take a picture of the sunset and the buildings behind me.

Upon noticing this I quickly pressed my shutter, hoping to capture that “star light” before it disappeared.  The light disappeared as quickly as it had appeared, and after a few more minutes of trying other scenes, I left.

Back inside the photographer’s room of the presidential palace where I stored my laptop, I began to edit the pictures and was pleasantly surprised at the results. I was thrilled that apart from taking a nicer photo than I had planned, a star had shined for me that night.

Deep in the Brazilian heartland, where the upper reaches of the Amazon Basin dissolve into the central plateau,  I had the opportunity last week to spend a few days in the village of joy.

What I dubbed the village of joy is the home of the Yawalapiti tribe. One day last week, a group of us were escorted into the Xingu National Park by members of the Darcy Ribeiro Foundation and the Cavaleiro de Jorge cultural center, and arrived at the circular Yawalapiti village under an enormous full moon.

The mood was one of celebration. The Yawalapiti, one of the 14 tribes living inside the Xingu National Park, were preparing a new “quarup,” a ritual held over several days to honor in death a person of great importance to them. In its original form, the quarup was a funeral ritual intended to bring the dead back to life. Today, it is a celebration of life, death and rebirth. From the very oldest to the very youngest, all the members of the Yawalapiti tribe participate in the preparations.

They wrestled, danced, fished and prepared food for the main event which will happen in August. Yawalapiti warriors held wrestling matches in a sort of qualifying round to select the best team to confront warriors from other tribes. From the inter-tribal event during the quarup will emerge the great champion.

They danced to native flutes producing sounds that were magical to me. The flutes, made of bamboo and called urua, produced strong, rhythmic music, that carried the celebration past the huts of the village and into the jungle.

Some adults initiated a ritual using seeds and natural oils to paint their bodies with vibrant, natural colors. In the center of the village a couple of tribal leaders chanted uninterrupted prayers to remember the dead.

We witnessed the preparation of food to feed the guests to the quarup in August. Men caught fish to dry and store, while others prepared a large quantity of cassava flour.

The Xingu River is the children’s main playground and source of happiness, and an excellent place for anyone to observe the natural beauty of the reservation.

This year the Quarup will pay tribute to two people – a Yawalapiti Indian who they consider a great leader, and Darcy Ribeiro, a well-known author, anthropologist and politician known for focusing on the relationship between native peoples and education in Brazil.

The Yawalapiti are living in new times. During the meetings of tribal leaders that I observed, they demonstrated a preoccupation with preserving their culture and with the devastation of the Xingu’s forests. They discussed policies that could be implemented in a new project called Xingu+50, in reference to last year’s 50^th anniversary of the creation of Xingu National Park.

Aritana, the Yawalapiti cacique, who immediately struck me as witty, serene and wise, told me that a man should be like a good, old tree; he should give fruit throughout his lifetime, and towards the end produce a huge shadow to shelter others.

Without a doubt, it was a great experience to live with the Yawalapiti for a few days. They made me ponder my own coexistence with mankind in my corner of the world in urban Brasilia, and our relationship with nature.