The Girl from Ipanema, Brazil!

I enjoyed Brazil. It was no Puerto Rico though! It was awesome to just observe all of the locals celebrating Carnaval. It is really a huge deal in Brazil. Many of the locals are off work for that entire week, banks and post offices are closed. Everyone is in the Carnaval spirit. So what we did…

Day 1(my birthday):
As soon as we got off the ship, we were greeted by Afro-Brazilian women in white dresses that tied ribbons on our wrists. According to the religion of Candomble, when these ribbons fall off, three wishes will come true. (Mine fell off the third day and my wish didn’t come true) After getting currency, we walked down the street to the Mercado Modelo! This market had everything from jewelry to paintings to statues to clothes. Ryan bought a beautiful painting of the city and guys doing capoiera in the street. Capoeira is a Brazilian form of martial arts. You see people everywhere doing it in the streets. So after our purchases, we decided to have lunch. Ryan and a few others (Sam, Wendy…) had a huge seafood platter so he was in heaven. I ordered rice and beans, surprise surprise! It was really good though. After lunch, a few of us went into the upper city. Basically, Salvador has two levels with an elevator connecting them. The price to take the elevator was equivalent to 2 and ½ US cents but we only had to pay on the last day since during Carnaval, it’s free. The upper city is beautiful. There are beautiful cobblestone streets, old, colorful buildings, and gorgeous churches. Not to mention the shopping. Since we were leaving for Rio the next morning, Ryan found it appropriate to buy a Brazilian speedo! Some of the girls we were with bought Brazilian bikinis but I just couldn’t see myself wearing one (I did get one later though and it is really cute). As we were walking down the street, we ran into a parade! There were people dressed in crazy costumes dancing down the street. I was so excited and looking forward to more parades that night. After some more exploring, we went back to the ship for dinner and to freshen up (It was so humid in Salvador we were sweating all day).

Later that night, we went to the upper city and turned right. Apparently, we weren’t supposed to do this because right = danger. Anyway, the streets were so packed with people we could barely get through. There were parades down the street called trios electricos, which were huge, open, buses filled with people wearing matching shirts that paid to be on the float. Everything was so crazy. I was a little disappointed because I was expecting to see people in elaborate costumes dancing but it was basically a huge party with drunk, sweaty people stepping all over us. Some of the men were trying to kiss the girls but no one did anything to me. I suppose it was because I was hanging onto Ryan the whole time. We left relatively early since we had to leave for the airport at 4 the next morning.

Day 2:
After just two hours of sleep, we left for the airport for our flight to Rio de Janeiro with two others that were on our flight. (The night before was a nightmare because I checked my e-mail and the hostel had sent me an e-mail saying that they were overbooked and had to deny us even though we already had confirmation! After deliberation, we decided to just go since we had already paid for the flight. If worse came to worse, we would stay up all night!) When we arrived at the hostel, it turned out to be fine. She did say that there was a problem because they had overbooked, but luckily there were beds available. So we set our stuff down and walked 3 blocks to Copacabana beach. Let me just tell you it is not what you imagine when you hear Copacabana. Although the landscape was beautiful with views of gorgeous hills, the beach itself was packed. We had to weave in and out of people to get to the shore. I’m guessing that since it was Carnaval, so many people were off work and school, they went to the beach. Not to mention all the tourists. It was still pretty though. We walked along the shore in our new bathing suits (I had on a skirt though). Seriously, EVERYONE wears speedos and tiny bikinis; from 3-year-old little girls to old white haired women. There are actually quite a few in thong bikinis as well. It is quite a sight.

After hanging out on the beach, Ryan and I ate and went to Pao de Acucar, or sugar loaf. Pao de Acucar consists of two hills connected by a cable car. The view from up there is absolutely amazing. We stayed until sunset and took some really pretty pictures. We even went down the hill a little into this little forest complete with monkeys. It was pretty cool. When we returned to our hostel, we found other SASers! We all went out together to explore Rio’s Carnaval. It definitely wasn’t as crazy as Salvador, thank the Lord. There were still people on the street dancing but it was more toned down. I was happy because there was an art fair and a little market. There were beautiful original pieces for very cheap. We looked around and decided to come back the next night to buy them since we had to take out more money. Since Ryan and I were so exhausted from lack of sleep, we separated from the group and went back to the hostel.

Day 3:
We woke up later than we wanted because we were so exhausted. The other SASers at the hostel were trying to get their flight changed to get to Salvador earlier because they enjoyed Carnaval there much more. I was thinking the opposite. I wanted to stay in Rio because the night before we had missed the Samba parade. The Samba parade is the main Carnaval event in Rio and probably all of Brazil. There are different “schools” that participate in the parade and they spend all year preparing. Thousands of participants dress in elaborate costumes and dance all night. So I was really sad that I missed it the night before and really wanted to see it. Our flight was scheduled that night at 11:40 pm. We figured we could postpone our flight until the next morning and just stay up since we had no where to stay anyway. The girl at the front desk at the hostel was helping us but in the end, the hostel ran out of the cheap tickets to the parade and only had $150 tickets. We were actually thinking of doing it but since we would have to go straight to the airport, we would be carrying all of our paintings. So in the end, after wasting a few hours, we stuck with the original plan. : (

Since we had gone to Copacabana the previous day, we decided to go to Ipanema. I really like Ipanema. The beach was still very packed but it was cleaner and very unique. The sand near the shore was flat and then there was kind of a dip so that there were a couple of inches of water that just stayed there. People set up there chairs there so it was really cool. Ryan wants to come back so he could skin board there. After eating at a cute restaurant, we took a taxi to Cristo Redentor (Christ the redeemer). On our way up, we were passing through rainforest and amazing views. Our guide was telling us all about the mountain, Cordocovo, in which the Christ is perched. Apparently a couple years ago, they had professional skateboarders from all over the world skate down the mountain. He also said that the Christ is a mosaic, and the tiles are replaced every twenty years. And the most interesting, the Christ was built 33 times the size of a man. When we finally reached the top, the view was amazing. And Jesus was huge! Rio is such a beautiful city. We were looking down on beautiful green hills, city lights, and gorgeous beaches. It was surreal. We stayed up there until the sunset gazing down at the city.

After our guide took us down the mountain, we caught a bus to Copacabana (where our hostel was) in an effort to save money. Well it cost us a whole lot of time because it was going around the whole city and was stopping first in a very popular destination for Carnaval so there was an immense amount of traffic. After about an hour and a half, we got off and took a taxi which took about 10 minutes. Ridiculous. We immediately went to the art fair to buy our art. It was 10:00 and our flight was scheduled to leave in less than two hours. Ryan went one way to buy the ones he wanted and I went another. The previous night, I had fallen in love with a painting that was only 80 reals, less than 40 USD, and I was pretty sure I could talk them down, only the stand was gone! I was so sad. Anyway, altogether, we ended up buying 6 pieces of art for around 150 USD. Which is really good. After our little shopping spree, we hurried to the hostel, picked up our stuff, and hailed a cab. It was almost 11 pm! We got to the airport in time, checked and made our flight on time and everything was fine. When we got to Salvador, we took a taxi straight to the ship and passed out.

Day 4:
We had planned with a few others to go to this little island called Itrapeca, but we woke up too late. We were on our way to the market, when a group of students asked us if we wanted to go to the beach. We stuffed 8 people into a taxi to flamenco beach! It was a cute beach with little restaurants. I even got a coconut and drank the juice out of it so that was exciting. One of the restaurants there was serving whole fish and whole crab which was pretty unappetizing. After the beach, we just went to the market and the upper city, bought some more souvenirs for all of you, and went back to the ship for dinner. When we got there, Sam and Ami (who is also a Gamma Phi) were looking for some people to go to an all you can eat barbeque restaurant. Ryan really wanted to go but I didn’t really want to pay all that money for a bunch of meat so I ate on the ship. I did end up going to have desert though. The restaurant was really interesting. Each paying person gets a little card to put by their plate with a green side and a red side. When the card is green side up, waiters come around offering various kinds of meat. When the red side I up, it means you don’t want anymore food. They had all kinds of meat from chicken hearts to veal as well as more traditional kinds. There was even a buffet with sushi, bread, cheese, and salads. After the meal, a desert cart comes around and you can pick what you want. That was the best part! We decided to do Carnaval that night and this time turned left. It was supposed to be the biggest night since it was the night before Ash Wednesday but hardly anyone was out. I was disappointed again because there were no parades. We went back pretty early.

Day 5:
Today we planned on going to Itrapeca again but one look outside changed our plans. It was raining! So we wandered around the city, visited some churches, and ate our last taste of Brazilian food. The church we visited is called Sao Francisco and it was breathtaking. It was very gaudy. There was a lot of gold, chandeliers, carvings, and at least twenty images of Jesus on the cross. It was really pretty. We then had lunch. Just a note, the restaurants are not like they are in the US. Every single one that I went to in Brazil take FOREVER to serve you. The rest of the day was pretty uneventful. We just walked around before returning to the ship.

Ending note on Brazil:
I am so glad that I got to experience what I did in Brazil. It was a different experience than our first port though. I almost wish that it wasn’t Carnaval because there were so many tourists and the locals aren’t as friendly or willing to talk. There was also more of a language barrier. In Puerto Rico, I felt very connected to the people and everyone was absolutely amazing, whereas in Brazil, I felt like a tourist. I felt different in Rio however, and if I had to do it again, I would definitely spend more time there. Although I’m glad I got to experience Carnaval in Brazil, future SAS voyages should travel to Brazil when it’s not Carnaval.

Well, I love you guys and I'll update soon!

Love,
Erika