Johannalo
Johanna Löfvenius Joined: January 5th 2006
Logged in: November 10th 2007
Logged in: November 10th 2007
Travel Blog Posts
Rainclouds over Ipanema beach
Around 5.30 am on the 13th of June I woke up, after quite an uncomfortable night on the 20 hours long bus ride between Ilheus in Bahia and Rio de Janeiro, just in time to see the sun going up as we were driving over the bridge between Rio de Janeiro and Niterói. It was one of these magic moments when everything around you is quiet, apart from the humming sound from the engine of the bus, and you have the feeling of being the only person experiencing the city taking it’s first few breaths of the new day. Watching the silhouettes of Rio, the mountain peaks, the sea, the buildings, the beaches, and the forests I think I fell in love at once. For an active person like myself I had of course ended up ... read more
Daniela and I practising chilling at Prayinha
The contrast between foggy Valparaiso and tropical Bahia here in Brazil was expected, but did still come like a minor shock. It does take some days of adaptation after having changed climate, culture, language, friends and lifestyle. But now, when three weeks have passed which, except for a few days to start with in Salvador, all have been spent in the tropical little paradise of Itacaré, I feel pretty integrated into the Bahian way of life. Of course some things are easier than others to pick up... To start with, not really doing anything is a hobby that quite a few people seem to be enjoying here. It's actually quite amazing how another day passes by and you once again realize that you didn't have time to wash your clothes, study Portuguese, buy mosquito repellent, get ... read more
Hitchcock - Cajun del Maipo, after 90 meters and 5 hrs of climbing
Even though I’m no longer in Valparaiso, but in the tropical Bahia in Brazil, I have devoted this entry to some final reflexions upon life in Chile and Valparaiso. There's one highly relevant theme that I still havn’t really written that much about. The machismo- a phenomenon highly integrated in the Latinamerican society, or? I remember conversating with some friends before leaving Sweden, discussing ways to meet the machisto attitudes that I was sure to meet in all sorts of contexts, for example regarding men insisting on paying for drinks or dinner or throwing comments in the streets. Recently one of those friends asked me how I had coped with these and similar situations, which made me realize that not once, during my time in Chile, had anyone tried to pay for drinks or food that ... read more
The summit of Cerro (=hill) Unión 3658 meters (Nicolas, me, Carlos and Karen)
The autumn is about to arrive in Valparaíso, even though it doesn’t seem to mean such a great change in the lives of the people of Valparaíso. Some of the people that are contracted might have a week or two of winter holidays to look forward to in July, but the majority keep on working or whatever it is that they are doing as usual. In the organisation where I’m working we are about to start with a new concept. It’s very exiting and very new, but so far it’s just an idea and we have still to find out how we’ll go on the implementation stage. The concept is called planning ahead. It was at this weeks staff meeting that the co-ordinator presented the revolutionary idea of making a plan of the activities of the ... read more
Valparaiso
Below you’ll find some fresh reflexions upon life in Valparaiso, although I'm not really sure if anyone actually is reading these entries… I'm getting a lot of mails saying: "oh, and your blog looks great, but I haven't quite had time to read it yet.." But anyway, I’m glad people seem to like looking at it at least. This site is for you, so feel free to come with requests (you can post comments down at the end of each entry) on what you want me to write about, if it should be longer, shorter, wittier. more provoking etc. As predicted my life here is now a bit more stable, but I wouldn’t exactly call it everyday life.. I have been working for almost a month now, without really feeling that my life has gotten that ... read more
Valle de la luna
My three and a half weeks of holidays will soon come to an end, and I guess this means that I will soon be into the everyday life of working in Valparaíso... Spendning just over two weeks of travelling and holidaying with Chileans has however been quite a good way of getting into the culture, comparable to an intensive course 24 hours a day. During this time I have experienced a few diferent aspects of the chilean way of life, which I intend to share with you in this entry. My new friends from Valparaiso live a life that's not to far away from my own in Sweden. Most of them live in shared houses with friends, some of them live alone, and some are still living with their parents. They are working (for some reason ... read more
In case you wondered - this is not Cologne
As usual I wasn’t very lucky with my flight across the ocean. This time it was the weather in Frankfurt that put an end to my dreams of the Chilean sun. As we were about to go down in Frankfurt we were informed that that they had closed the airport due to snow that had to be cleared away from the landing ground. After a while of circling around the plane was redirected to Cologne - less than half an hour away. Landing in Cologne I couldn’t even see the slightest snow flake, and did all of a sudden feel very cheated. As we were waiting for the plane to reful and take us back to Frankfurt, hopefully just in time for the connecting flights, we were informed that the plane was needed somewhere else. So ... read more
The Kärsö house
Just got back from having a coffee with a friend. He recommended my to open up a journal on the Web for my trip. I was not convinced. I don't exactly consider myself as a member of the "IT generation".. But look at me. Here I am just about to post my very first blog ever. Let's see if I can keep it up during my time in Chile and Southamerica.... read more
