João: Honestly, it wasn’t one single moment, it was more like a slow build-up of noticing things. I grew up watching my neighborhood deal with the same problems year after year, and nobody in power seemed to be doing anything about it. At some point in school, around fifteen or sixteen, I started going to a few community meetings just to see what they were about, and I remember sitting in the back, not saying anything, just absorbing how people talked about change like it was actually possible.

It clicked for me that staying quiet wasn’t neutral, it was its own kind of decision. Once I understood that, I couldn’t really go back to not caring. I started small, helping organize a school walkout, handing out flyers, that kind of thing. It built from there.

João: Honestly, it wasn’t one single moment, it was more like a slow build-up of noticing things. I grew up watching my neighborhood deal with the same problems year after year, and nobody in power seemed to be doing anything about it. At some point in school, around fifteen or sixteen, I started going to a few community meetings just to see what they were about, and I remember sitting in the back, not saying anything, just absorbing how people talked about change like it was actually possible.

It clicked for me that staying quiet wasn’t neutral, it was its own kind of decision. Once I understood that, I couldn’t really go back to not caring. I started small, helping organize a school walkout, handing out flyers, that kind of thing. It built from there.

João: Honestly, it wasn’t one single moment, it was more like a slow build-up of noticing things. I grew up watching my neighborhood deal with the same problems year after year, and nobody in power seemed to be doing anything about it. At some point in school, around fifteen or sixteen, I started going to a few community meetings just to see what they were about, and I remember sitting in the back, not saying anything, just absorbing how people talked about change like it was actually possible.

It clicked for me that staying quiet wasn’t neutral, it was its own kind of decision. Once I understood that, I couldn’t really go back to not caring. I started small, helping organize a school walkout, handing out flyers, that kind of thing. It built from there.