Friday, November 28, 2008

Floods

Well it certainly puts things into perspective when you complain about a little bad weather on your holidays only to later see that part of the country wrecked by floods. Santa Catarina is suffering at the moment, people killed and displaced by the flood water.

Which all seems a little impossible to imagine in the glorious sunshine of Porto Alegre. I am on the verge of my last weekend in Brazil- heading to Buenos Aires on Monday, all going according to plan. And it is an ex-student filled week- staying with Jeferson in Porto Alegre then nipping out of the city to spend a couple of days with Max, and sharing a pint or two with other ex-Malvern types- I guess that would explain why I keep dreaming about work!!!

It is hot here, around 33, so nice for me but it seems that the rest of Rio Grande de Sul hate it! Max didnt like to leave the house until the sun had gone down and various students´mothers look worn out by the heat. And think that I am mental for heading into the sun each day in search of a tan.

Right, I think that it is finally time to wash some clothes, people have beengiving me funny looks all day but at least the smell has scared the pickpockets away!

Monday, November 24, 2008

Peas Louise!

I just had the biggest burger known to mankind and it included the usual corn, crisps, tomato etc but I noticed that pea fell out and it was loaded with peasy goodness too- now that is service for you!

I am in my final week in Brazil now and have hit Porto Alegre- after just 115 hours on various buses! I went from rainy Florianopolis to rainy Sao Paulo and onto rainy Curitiba and finally to gloriously sunny Porto Alegre, way down south.

People kept advising me not to go to Sao Paulo, stating that it was just another big city. And so I avoided it at first but the rain in Floripa just seemed like a sign and a quick MSN conversation with Marina, another ex-student, and I was on my way.

And with a population of over 17 million, it could quite rightly be stated that SP is a big city but I have come to the realisation that I really do like cities. I do. I know I am a bit of a hippy and should therefore prefer nature (and nature certainly has its place, let´s face it, the highlights on my trip have oft included it) but I am happy in a city, I understand them more than nature. You don´t often get dragged out on eight hour hikes in the city, you never run out of water and if you get lost you can just jump in a cab. Perfect.

So the first day I arrived in SP, Marina was working so I just left my stuff in the Guarda Volumes in the bus terminal and went out for the day. I retrieved everything in time to meet her at the metro and we went back to her house. She lives just off Avenida Paulista which is pretty central- central to the good stuff and away from the actual centre where I was advised not to even attempt to take a photo for fear of having my camera nicked. Certainly when I was walking around there there did seem to be a lot of people who lived on various benches around the centre.

Mari was my student in the winter of 2006, leading up to my trip to Colombia and I have to say that she is one of the happiest and most adorable people I have ever taught. Despite the shocking winter weather she never lost her enthusiasm for London and life. Wonderful. And for our two nights out she carefully selected people who could speak English to accompany us- bless!

The next day was a holiday for everyone in the city, bar Mari. Of course it was a holiday at her company too but they were told that all the bosses would be there and so..... hum. Fortunately for those of us on holiday, the sun came out the next day- which made all the overly large Santa melting in its heat seem even more surreal to me. And the next day I was off again, this time to Curitiba.

I was going to stay in Curitiba for a couple of days- there are some nice things to do and see around there but I spent the night alone in the hostel and thought better of it. Instead of taking the panoramic railway to a fishing town, I overslept and took my stuff to the Guarda Volumes (yes, my most useful bit of Portuguese vocab to date!) and went off to SHOP! The rain gave me a perfect excuse not to have to go on the open top sightseeing bus or anything like that.

I was rather pleased with myself when I managed to buy a new top (yes! I am sick to death of everything in my backpack already, not least of all because it all stinks!), new batteries for my reading lamp (by bringing the old ones along and delighting a group of Brazilian shop assistants with my feigned shock at the price) and new contact lenses! Yes indeed an achievement. This was done by photographing the packaging of an old lens and just going into an opticians and asking if they had the same. I was relieved to find that not only can you buy contacts without a test or prescription in Brazil, they also have no qualms (?) about selling you one which is the wrong strength- albeit only 0.5 out.

So now I can see, read at night and I don´t stink- today anyway!

My last task in Curitiba was to call the student that I was due to be staying with in Porto Alegre. Easier said than done. Calling interstate is hard here- there seems to be a whole load of secret numbers which only Brazilians know, each passerby giving me a different secret number but alas to no avail. I sent him an email, hoped for the best and got on a bus.

Eleven and a half hours later I got off and he was not to be seen. I went to Brazil´s most expensive internet cafe in the bus terminal to check for messages but nothing. A very helpful man at the tourist information told me that I had too many numbers on the number which I had written down.

Hum again and back to the internet but the number I had written down was the one in the email. By now the guy in the tourist info office was looking at me like I really should have caught on that the boy didnt want to see me by now. But he had called me in London a couple of weeks before so he seemed pretty keen. It was a sunny day and after so long on the bus I decided that I needed to get out- another trip to the Guarda Volumes in the bus terminal later and clutching a map with Jeferson´s street hightlighted on it I emerged to have a look at one of my last destinations in Brazil.

You see, I had arrived at 9.30 on a Sunday morning, not a healthy time to turn up on someone´s doorstep. After all the fussing trying to phone and getting freshened up in the toilets (the room not the actual receptacle), it was still only 10.30. So I thought that walking would be better. And it was.

And I finally got there, managed to communicate my intent to the doorman who phoned upstairs, then guided me into the lift, pressed the button for the 8th floor and told me that I was pretty and finally I was there.

Poor Jeferson, looking as bleary-eyed as you can imagine a poor 23 year old is before lunch on a Sundy, opened the door and welcomed me in.

I think that it is worth saying at this point that I think Jeferson is possibly one of the sweetest guys I have ever met for oh so many reasons. We went to watch a football game last night (Inter vs the team that won) and he lent me a shirt to wear. There was even samba dancing at half time. But óur´team still lost.

And I think that brings you pretty much up to date with everything. I am heading out of the city for a couple of days tomorrow to visit another ex-student then back here for the weekend- my last weekend- I am flying to Buenos Aires on Monday!

Goodness me, how seven weeks flies!

Tuesday, November 18, 2008

Floripa

So I arrived in Florianopolis on Saturday morning- the city is the gateway to Ilha Santa Catarina. I had been talking to a couple of Canadian girls on the bus from Foz and so we decided to look for a hostel together. We consulted the interweb and realised that we were all swooning at the same hostel photos so jumped in a cab to go there.

The cab left the city and then drove us through some dreamy landscapes- all beaches, lakes, picturesque rivers winding through gorgeous villages. In fact, every time we turned another corner we all sighed with the satisfaction of the place.

The taxi pulled up next to a small bridge leading over a river which led away from the 16km of sandy beach. As I got out of the taxi a familiar face was getting off a bus- Niall who I had met standing by the road in the Pantanal. We all went over the bridge and found the hostel easily.

However, it was the wrong one. I decided to stay and the girls went off to the other one. Me and Niall hit the beach pretty quickly. Ah sigh, perfection.

That night in the hostel there was quite a gathering in the bar, a host of caipirinhanas were consumed and then we went to a nightclub. Things are a bit vague after that. There was a band singing, they werent very good. I bumped into the Canadian girls, they pulled me out of the club, I grabbed Niall and suddenly we were walking along a steep, muddy and very dark footpath- I know not why. At the end we realised that the Brazilian guy were were following didnt seem to have much of a clue where he was going so we grabbed a cab and went home.

It was about that time that I posted the last entry here.

Awoke the next morning to the sound of rain. It continued for most of the day. But the hostel barbecue in the evening made up for it in some small way. As did the nightly arrival of the chocolate man- a lively old fella who sells homemade chocolates- lovely.

The next morning there was more rain. Half of the hostel signed up to leave the next day. I had to think of a plan quickly, yes I was going to leave but where was I going to go?? I am flying out of Porto Alegre to Buenos Aires and have some old students to visit there in my last week but I didnt want to make it a week and a half there. After much thinking about it and waiting to use the free internet in the hostel (and quick nipping out to the ever popular ice cream buffet) I decided to go the wrong way and head north to Sao Paulo for a couple of days and then head south again.

Yes, it is the wrong way but the bus is pretty cheap. And no one, guide book included, could think of other places for me to go in the south before Porto Alegre so that was that. Decision made. Spent the evening chatting to a guy from Nicaragua and one from Chile.

Awoke on the morning of my final day to glorious sunshine once more.

Huff.

Undaunted I am continuing with my Sao Paulo plan- I am meeting another old student there tomorrow when she finishes work. I am travelling overnight again so will have to dump my stuff in the Guarda Volumes in the bus terminal for the day and then pick them up to meet her later.

Now I am just killing time waiting for the bus- I have about an hour and fifty minutes to go......

Saturday, November 15, 2008

Cop Out

.. I know it is but I put the photos on facebook today! Sorry! You can see them there! Went to a nightclub in Florianopolis tonight- later followed a bunch of people down a dark alley, this policy has never yielded anything good. Arrived on another beach and got a taxi home with a guy from the hostel. At the hostel now and there is no queue for the internet! If I told you what I had spent the last hour listening to you would never believe me!

Friday, November 14, 2008

Alone Again

so I cant remember if I told you that I have had company for the last week or so- first in the form of Moti, an Israeli guy that I met in Campo Grande, we picked up Melissa in the Pantanal and the three of us found Natasha from Switzerland on the bus going to Foz do Iguacu. It is nice to have a bit of company while travelling- I dont mean in the hostels as there is no end of people to talk to then (unless you are in Cuiaba where I was the only one in the room) but actually on the bus journeys.

This is not because I need to endlessly chat to folk while speeding along the highway (or unsealed road aka dirt track) but rather because it is lovely not to be the only one having to watch out for where to get off or worrying because you get a sudden attack of paranoia about having missed your stop. Also, it is a sheer joy to have someone to watch your bags for you while yoú pop to the loo or to get a snack os anything which would usually mean getting all backpacked up and walking around like a deranged upright turtle.

The company is nice too of course.

When we went to the Brazilian side of the falls on the first day here I went with the girls. It was amazing, there is something really special about being soaked by an enormous waterfall. The following day I went to the Argentinian side with Moti where we learnt that you dont know the meaning of the word soaked until you have been there.

The first day was so amazing but we had heard that the Argentinian side was even more impressive, we just couldnt see how this could be so given that the Brazilian side was so fantastic. Then we turned a corner and got a different view of the falls and turned to each other and said that now we understood.

There are two places where you can get thoroughly wetted on the Argentinian side and the second is a sheer wall of water with a walkway coming up to it. It is an almost spiritual experience when you stand at the end of the metal walkway (having fought off all the other tourists so that you can get a photo of you standing alone at the end) water penetrating to the very heart of you, the water crashing down behind you in thunderous applause and you laughing through sheer joy and excitment.. only later to realise that the dye in your jeans is not fast and so you will have wet jeans and a blue bum until you get home and shower. At least it got the ketchup from the day before out of my t-shirt! I am a class act and no mistake.

Of course the other bonus to being on the Argentinian side is that they speak Spanish! Joy! I could understand nearly everything- even when they told me a price for a sandwich and a drink which would have had Starbucks in London hanging its head in shame.

Today I went into the town to get some money to pay my bill here at the hostel, I am always secretly impressed with myself when I get a bus in town. It is easy to get intercity buses (provided you dont have to change too many times and it doesnt drive off and leave you at a rest stop somewhere) but it is far more difficult to get a bus from one place that you dont know to another that you dont know and it all happens so quickly. Usually.

Now I am just killing time until I have to go to the bus terminal to get my next bus.

Thursday, November 13, 2008

Toucans, Hummingbirds and quite a lot of water

I am in Foz do Iguacu, right near the borders with Argentina and indeed Paraguay. I went to the world famous waterfalls yesterday and again today- yesterday in Brazil and today I went to Argentina for the day to see the falls from the other side. I have just one word to say about both experiences.....

AWESOME!!!!!!

And I went to the Bird Park yesterday and have decided that if the world were filled only with toucans and hummingbirds I would be happy.

I am heading to the beach again tomorrow- ah it has been too long! After a couple of weeks of swimming with piranhas, being rained on and being soaked by waterfalls on both sides of the border it is time for some honest to goodness sun and sand again.

And another bus journey. I have racked up over 70 hours on buses in the six weeks and one day that I have been here so far. I have two more weeks in Brazil so I am sure that I have time for more before I head to Argentina. I know that you are all on the edge of your seats in anticipation.

Photos to follow when I find internet that is fast enough and someone to burn photos onto a CD for me...... we shall see!

Monday, November 10, 2008

Map

I just realised that I used to put maps here to help you know where I am- so here is Brazil

brazil

Still having problems getting photos off my camera- I have been plugging it into the PCs but they give me an error message. Am a little concerned

Sunday, November 09, 2008

Caiman Fatigue

If I see another caiman I am going to punch him on the nose! Well, actually that might be a bit too ungrateful. I spent an amazing four days in the Southern Pantanal and you could hardly move for the little buggers there. I stayed in a campsite which was basically a room full of hammocks surrounded by a mozzie net and that was all. The first night there was no electricity but there was caipirinhas so that was OK.

Up early the next morning- the Pantanal turkeys make sure of that- and off horseriding for a couple of hours. Another couple of hours of serious lounging in a hammock doing nothing followed that and then out on a little walking safari.

Which was awesome! We saw capybara, caiman, howler monkeys, armadillos, deer etc etc and emerged from the forest just as the clouds had really begun to darken. We clambered aboard the truck and the first spots of rain hit the ground. We drove for a bit and it got worse. The guides stopped and put on the rain cover and then it was as if we had just driven into a shower- a shower with more thunder and lightning than you would expect to see. It was dark now and we were driving along a caiman lined dirt track only catching glimpses of the world as it was lit up by the lightning. The truck was all over the road, sliding in and out of the various potholes. Bits fell off it and had to be reclaimed by the poor guides legging it through the downpour.

It had all the ingredients of a bad B-movie- a group of international travellers, some staying at the guesthouse and then us favela kids from the camp, dangerous unknown beasties making loud and threatening noises in the darkness, the storm etc. We kept thinking that any minute we were going to break down and have to send one of the guides for help, only for him to disappear forever into the dark tropical night. I couldnt work out who would be the survivors in this B-movie scenario but decided that I would probably be one of the first to go- the London girl complaining that the wilderness wasnt co-operating with her endless demands, being attacked by bugs shortly before the truck ride home.

Of course, nothing bad happened and everyone back at the camp had moved all of the stuff into the middle of the room to avoid the rain which was pouring in on all sides. And rain really cooled things down from the temperatures of over 40 that we had been suffering- I even slept rolled inside two blankets that night.

But my English stomach got the better of me and I missed the hike the next morning but made it for the piranha fishing- this time I caught two that I managed to keep from jumping back and one that I didnt. They were cooked in a stew that night. And we played the international backpacker card game of Shithead for a glorious couple of hours.

The last morning we went on a boat ride, one of the English guys was bitten by a piranha when swimming in the river and I was hit in the back of the head by a suicidal sardine- they all started to jump into the boat at one ponint but this one was guided back into the water by my bonce. Unfortunately this was also the first point in the last four and a half weeks that I got sunburnt. Huff.

Then I left the camp yesterday with an Israeli guy that I had met in Campo Grande and then gone to the Pantanal with. We met an Irish guy standing by the road waiting for the bus to Bonito and we all came here together last night. Today we have been snorkelling. Moti, the Israeli, said that it was one of the best experiences of his trip. But I will be honest with you, I get freaked out by water on my face, not great for snorkelling, so I got in the river but in the end opted out of the hour long float and took a boat to the end- after half an hour or so of playing with the little fishes. Even my limited experience was enough to prove to me that Bonito is a very special place indeed. Gorgeous out of the water and in it.

On the way to Rio do Prata we stopped off at a canyon which I forget the name of, but it is filled with large screeching colourful macaws swooping carelessly through the air below as you stand at the top and look down. This was also a very special place which I would recommend to anyone.

I have just booked all my tours through the hostels, whether in the northern or southern pantanal, I have been told that all prices are fixed so there seems little point shopping around plus the chanecs of being with an international group seem higher if you are booking in the international hostel. I have yet to be disappointed.

I think that I am leaving Bonito either tomorrow or the day after and continuing my journey south. Photos to follow of course!

Tuesday, November 04, 2008

Pantanal Take Two

I suddenly realised that I might want to take some photos on this four day safari I am going on in the Southern Pantanal- and I haven´t downloaded my photos from either of my memory cards. So I came up with the cunning plan of putting some of them onto my MP3 player for storage. Just one problem- no PC I tried (and I have tried about 8 here now in Campo Grande this afternoon) will play with my little camera. And finally I got one to recognise my big camera but while it would show me the photos, it would not save them onto the PC.

Grrrrrrrr.............

So I have gone for the other option of buying a new memory card- let´s hope that it is a little more co-operative than the PCs have been. And I hope that this does not mean more problems later.

Anyway, I arrived in Campo Grande this morning after an 11 hour bus journey from Cuiaba- totalling 50 hours on buses in the last four weeks- the only problem is that I had slept with my lenses in again so my eyes were somewhat glued shut when we arrived. Ah well, the hostel was easy enoughj to find, given that it is the first thing that you see when you get off the bus.

Everyone in this hostel speaks English and the guy that organises the tours was on a Channel 4 programme back in the U of K recently- ´Dangerous Jobs for Girls´- which he proudly showed me. There are some very bad reviews on the internet about this hostel but I am hoping that they are wrong! They mainly seem to centre around the tours on offer, which is the reason that people come here after all. We shall see- after the hassles with the tour last week I (hope) I have learnt that even if things don´t go exactly to plan the tour can still be amazing. I´ll let you know at the weekend.

The tour that I am going on heads off tomorrow, though the first day is just travelling, then three days of full on Pantanal activities (seemed to be a lot of walking involved for somewhere that is over 40 degrees at the moment) before transferring to Bonito for what is promising to be a highlight. If you are not sure what I am talking about, and let´s face it neither did I until two weeks agó, look at Bonito Brazil on Google images and prepare to be jealous!

So I will be away from the internet for a few days and assuming that I don´t get eaten by caimen or anacondas, I hope to catch up with you again in Bonito on Sunday or Monday. And maybe even find somewhere that will help me with my photos!

Monday, November 03, 2008

OK, OK, you win....

... residents of Cuiaba, I admit it- your city is possibly the hottest place that I have ever been to! After a week of the temperature hovering just over the 30 degree mark in daytime and dropping as low as 24 at night, it really out-did itself yesterday by topping the 37 degree mark. And if I wasn~t so cheap, I would have sat it all out in a nicely air-conditioned room. Unfortunately I am that cheap so just paid for a room with a fan- which just seemed to waft the hot air towards me.

For most of the week I have been alone in my dorm so had sole control over.. well pretty anything that there is to control in a dorm.. but then a new girl came in. One who is oblivious to the heat and so likes to sleep without the fan on. We haven~t spoken yet but have communicated through the medium of the fan controls.

But I am leaving today (though this internet cafe is nice and chilled and at R$1.50 an hour (or around 30p) I am tempted to sit the day out here). It has been a pretty mad week. The problem with arriving on a Monday is that you have to wait until the weekend before your friends have any real time to spend with you- which in this case meant that we went out every night during the week so were too tired to do much at the weekend.

I have been here with Daniela who is one of my original friends from when I moved back to London three years ago. When I first started teaching in London I was way more interested in spending time with the students than the teachers. After all, the teachers were just English and the students were all fun and exotic. Plus the teachers very rarely get drunk and tell me how fantastic I am! Since coming back from Colombia I have spent more time with the teachers (and worked out that it is possible to get a compliment out of them if you fish enough).

So Daniela was one of my first drinking buddies in London but she came back to Brazil two years ago- can~t believe that it has been that long! We have really had a lot to talk about. I have spent most of the week then either in the pub or sleeping off another hangover and avoiding the sun as much as possible. On Monday we went to a pub and only left when it closed, Wednesday we went to a night club, Thursday was another pub, Friday was a barbecue at a friend´s (massive) house, Saturday was necessarily quieter so we went to a pub and last night.. well pub again.

Yesterday we went to a big shopping centre near Daniela´s house with her mum and teenage brother. The shopping centre (or simply shopping as it is in Portuguese) had AC but seemed a bit shy about using it. They were getting ready for the arrival of Papai Noel next weekend- the grotto was nearly ready and even included some fake snow- though for many of the residents here snow is an alien concept. I am tempted to stay so I can tell Santa what I want for Christmas but figure that he will probably be appearing in other shoppings too.

Dani´s friends have been awesome at trying to communicate with me. There was a girl at the barbecue who can speak fluent Spanish after leaving in Spain for two years so we had quite a long chat- though, don´t tell her this, I didn´t always understand much! And everyone else has tried to talk to me which is enormously sweet- even Dani´s mum tried out a couple of words!

What I like about visiting my Brazilian students here in Brazil is the amount of time that I spend hanging out with goodlooking young doctors, pilots, lawyer, pharmacists etc- in London most of my English friends are English teachers and my foreign friends, well they take what work they can get really. It is a whole different world for me... and the houses!!! Oh my god, my flat in London would nearly fit in the barbecue area of the house that I was in on Friday night. Not everyone here lives in such splendour of course but it is really interesting to see.

And Cuiaba is quite different from Salvador- well the people are different from those that I spent time with in Salvador. For starters, most people here pay in cash and in Salvador it was a constant merry-go-round of passing out the chip and pin machines for everyone to pay, once they had all got out their phones and used the calculators to work out their share of course. People here don´t spend as much time in beachwear- we are a long way inland here- or seem to spend as much time in the gym or getting tattoos as the people that I saw in Salvador. And they kept asking me why on earth I was in Cuiaba, not a reaction that you usually get near a beach. But I loved both places and met some really cool people in both.

But it is time to move on. I am catching a bus to Campo Grande later- having not quite made it to Chapada during my time here- we wanted to go but things conspired against us and the last person to offer to take me there (a rather goodlooking young surgeon who had just had a fight with his girlfriend) quite rightly realised that taking an English girl who he met last night in a bar out to the countryside for the day probably wasn´t going to do his relationship any good. So Campo Grande it is and the Southern Pantanal. Then Bonito- which I am really excited about- you will understand why when you see the photos.

And as for a photo update here, I brought all the relevant equipment with me only to find that the PCs are locked tightly in cages under the desks so I guess that they are not keen on letting you near the USB ports.... another time, dear friends, another time!

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