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Published: July 21st 2008
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A Remembrance of Things Past - In RIO!
In the interest of economizing blog space (since when?!), here’s a summary of all the stuff I did in Rio that was not related to social project. Or at least these experiences were “social projects” of a different sort! Lots of photos - get psyched.
So in Rio I stayed in this great little hostel called
Botafogo Easy Hostel right near the Botafogo Metro. Botafogo is north-ish of the chic and touristy beaches of Ipanema, Copacabana and Leblon. (Sorry Dad, it’s true). And it has easy access to public transportation. It was adorable, relatively quiet, very clean and awesome, young staff. So any of you who plan to backpack around Brazil - stay here.
Tourism Day: Wednesday
Checked out the Museum of Contemporary Art in Niterói because it was designed by Niemeyer, the golden boy of modern architecture in Brasil. There was a sweet exhibit about colors, displaying works by the list of artists in the picture with the green banner. I love art, but don’t memorize artist names, unfortunately. But this was a great exhibit. And there were school kids outside playing with big colored textiles as part of the
educational element of the exhibit.
Did I mention we took a boat to Niterói? It is on the other side of the bay from Rio. Cool views.
The Naval Museum: History of Brasil as related to invasions from other countries. Just kidding….sort of. There was an awesome timeline of all the invasions / interventions from Europe in Brasil. Seems like the Brits, the Dutch and the French tried to get into Brasil, and every time the Portuguese (or one of the above) kicked them out, they tried to get into the US. And vice versa. Oh, and when neither worked, they made some stopovers in the Caribbean. World history in a nutshell. Check out the cool maps of Brasil showing its expansion from the Treaty of Tordesillas in 1494 (which divided Spanish and Portuguese territories) until the modern day (1950s) when it got Acre from Bolivia (in the Amazon).
Confeitaria Colombo : One of the oldest tea houses in Rio, from the late 1800s, very French / Baroque style with beautiful sweets and tasty coffees. Outrageously expensive, too. Check out some glamour shots. This stop was also part of my quest to find good coffee in Brasil. Didn’t quite
make the top of the list because the “cappuccino” was topped with whipped cream, which was nasty, and cooled down the coffee way too fast. Whipped cream on cappuccino??!! (Oh, and to all the Italians or cultural devotees thereof, yes, I drank a cappuccino in the afternoon!)
Centro Cultural Banco do Brasil: An exhibit commemorating the centenary (that’s 100 years, y’all) of the arrival of the Japanese in Brasil. The first group of families came over to São Paulo and settled mostly in the interior. I know I posted about this earlier. Anyway, a cool exhibit with dragons and lanterns hanging from the cupula of the atrium!
Laura came on Friday morning, when we went to see the Projeto Morrinho. A little tourism in the afternoon, then at 4 am the next day we headed out to The Week, a sweet club in the center of Rio that has various dance floors and a back area with wooden stairs and a pool under an open roof! So we danced until around 9 am, then relaxed under the morning sun on the stairs. Yes, that’s how they do it in Brasil.
Saturday was essentially a lost day. Good
thing it rained.
Sunday was MEG DAY! Meg Young, a friend from Michigan, was here with the GIEU (Global Intercultural Experience for Undergraduates) exchange at UM. She was in Bahia for a month learning about urban and agrarian social movements and environmental justice. She came to Rio for a few days and we went to the Feira Nordestina, a huge ongoing festival of Northeastern culture, where you can buy anything northeastern and listen to great music and eat TAPIOCA! I had a flashback to Maceió with my tapioca de doce de leite. Mom, that one’s for you!
Then, we went to the Flamengo x Vasco de Gama game at Maracanã. This is one of the initial games in the Brasileirão, or the Brazilian Cup (in futebol, or soccer for the US crowd). Full stadium, mostly Flamengo (that’s who we cheered for) and a really exciting game that ended 3-1! Vasco got a sympathy goal. Vasco and Flamengo are the two oldest teams in Rio, therefore in Brasil, and also the two biggest rivals in Rio. I think Vasco was also the first team to integrate, in the 1920s. Anyway, it was madness fun.
Then I hopped the
midnight bus back to São Paulo…more to come!!
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adam
non-member comment
cooooool
we'll have to stay at that hostel during our latin america adventure, plus u saw meg in brasil?! craaaaaaaazy