robandjanel

Today was the day of the big Final in Rio. I had nothing planned for the day other than the game. The closing ceremonies were to start at 2:20pm with the kick-off at 4pm. For Germany, was it going to be the day star #4 was added to their jersey? For Argentina, was it going to be Messi’s day, the day he’s finally considered alongside Pele and Maradona as the 3 greatest of all-time? I was completely divided. I am a huge Messi fan, likely the best player I have seen play in my time following the game. Maradona was where the bar was at as far as I was concerned until Messi came along a few years ago. Both from Argentina, both small in stature, both huge in game and talent. What separates Messi from ... read more

When I woke up this morning, I remembered that the Brazilian soccer federation (CBF) inaugurated their new headquarters a month ago and in their new building, a museum dedicated to the national team. The main attraction: replicas of the 5 World Cups. I say replicas because the trophy for first 3 World Cups Brazil won was different than the one used nowadays. It was called the Jules Rimet Trophy and Brazil got to keep the lone version of this trophy when Brazil won it for the 3rd time in 1970. The only problem is that the lone version was eventually stolen and melted. Yes, Brazilian robbers destroyed the World Cup trophy. Brilliant!!!! Read more about it here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FIFA_World_Cup_Trophy So I grabbed a bus to Barra da Tijuca, which is a town/beach just beyond Ipanema and Leblon. ... read more

I didn’t have much planned for today other than to watch the second semi-final between Argentina and Holland. I had considered visiting an outdoor museum but that required me to get up early, take a bus to a nearby city and come back during tonight’s game. I decided instead to visit Belo Horizonte a bit and tagged along with Claudio, who works at the hostel I’m staying at. He had offered to give me a tour of Belo Horizonte as he did not have much to do today. I had assumed it was going to be by car, but it was all by bus. Haha We first visited the other hostel location that is closer to the city center. Then, we took another bus to the city center and walked around a bit, visiting squares, government ... read more

Today was a travel day for me as I made my was from Rio to Belo Horizonte, which is where Brazil will Germany in the first semi-final of the World Cup. I grabbed a bus from Leme to downtown Rio, then walked the rest of the way to Santos Dumont airport. This airport is right by the water right across from the Sugar Loaf. Once again, the plane left on time and landed 20 minutes early. From above, as we approached Belo Horizonte, I was surprised at how big Belo Horizonte is. Residential buildings everywhere. On the ground, I grabbed a bus from the airport to the city center. The International Airport I landed at is about 40km from the city, so it took us about an hour to arrive at the bus depot. There, I ... read more

Our plan for today was to climb up the Leme rock, but not really climb it, more like walk up a nice trail. Bruno, Nina and I started our walk and in no time we ran into little monkeys. We saw about 6 or so right away, 5 of them hanging onto a single branch. The walk was nice and peaceful and the sun was out in full force; it must have been 32C or so. Bruno and I took turns carrying Nina up the hill, but Bruno endured the steepest part. Once we reached the top, we had a nice view of all that Rio is famous for: the Christ, Sugar Loaf and Copacabana Beach. You also get a nice view of the FIFA Fan Fest that was already full in anticipation for the Argentina ... read more