CARNIVAL!!!!

okay so we haven't exactly got a posting on here for a week, but we haven't really done much of any other errands here, we have just been too busy. I am currently very sick, with a whisper of a voice left and a cough that sounds very similar to TB. As well, I have started my malaria medication, which seems to make everything "float", i am starting to feel like a bit of a skitzo. Regardless, i now have time to update you on the best week i have ever had.

we arrived in Rio De Janeiro last Thursday (3rd) after an exhausting 20 hour bus ride with no air conditioning. The bus was pretty fun though, all full of backpackers. One guy actually asked me if i was going to Rio for carnival, so i pretended i had no idea what he was talking about. We arrived to meet Cecilia and Daniel around 3pm, i don't think we have EVER stunk that bad, so it was kind of embarrasing.

Cecilia, thanks for kick ass accomodations, we couldnt of asked for anything more, a great apartement, with everything, including a pool, and a great host. Cheers to you.

To sum things up, we have been out 6 nights in a row till about 9 or 10 in the morning, and have been sleeping in until 3-4, going for a supper and doing it all over again. We are getting very familiar with the sunrise over Copacabana beach, especially from the window of a 5 star hotel restaurant. See, this guy we met taught us how to sneak into the hotel, pretend we were staying there, and enjoy the best breakfast buffet while enjoying the beautiful view of the sunrise.

We spent a few of our evenings at this crazy party called Scala. It is this huge banquet hall looking place, which hosts a different theme every night throughout carnival. We can't decide if it was worse to be a foreign guy or girl in that place. The guys had to be very careful who they talked to. You see, every girl in the place was either a tourist, a hooker, or a man. I think Jolene and I were the only actual "women" in the bathroom everytime we went. We were worried about what to wear, but bascially everything was acceptable, from halloween costumes, to fake breasts on men, to no clothes at all. We felt quite safe in our jeans and tshirts, if not slightly overdressed.


Sambodromo is the huge parade that you have probably seen on TV. On sunday night, all of the best samba school compete for 1st prize. The stadium is huge, its not even a stadium, it is like a kilometer long with grandstands on either side. The costumes were amazing, Jolene loved it because it was color corrdinated. We actually met, amoungst a crowd of over a million people, 7 people from Edmonton, and Ayaaz, the crazy guy, was one of them. We stayed at the sambodromo till 6 am, buying cheaper beers from the guys behind the fences, peeing in the bathrooms worse than stage 13, and eating BOB burgers. At the end of the last parade, the 10 of us split into smaller groups and went costume scavaging...Jolene, me, and a guy named Sasha went running behind the scenes, plowing through backalleys, and pushing street people just for a chance to get a costume. After asking so many people in the parade for their costume and getting denied, Jolene spots a pile of costumes lying in the garbage..we go running over and take like 13 costumes, steal them from the street people sleeping there, and put them all in a cab. We though we were so cool wearing the costumes to breakfast buffet, until the sun came up....suddendly the smell of the costumes was getting worse and the pretty sparkly costumes were looking more like a kindergarten project. We stunk pretty bad again when we rode the bus home the next morning.

We are staying in Rio a couple extra days to detox, recover, and get healthy..because tomorrow we are off to the Iguacu Falls, and then Bolivia, where it is only 10 degrees. Good bye suntans!

We will put pictures on as soon as Sasha sends them, he had the camera that night. Send lots of emails to us, we are really starting to miss everyone!
Ten and JO

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