Blogs from Brazil, South America - page 590

About a million things happened since I last posted to this blog, so I’m just going to race through everything. Though a bout of shingles (otherwise known as adult chicken pox) threatened to ruin my Carnival celebrations, I recovered just enough to be able to enjoy myself, and not to have to worry about scaring people away with my open sores. Sounds grosser than it was, but believe me, it was far from a comfortable experience. Anyway, Carnival was everything I thought it would be, although up in Olinda it is a much different Carnival than in Rio de Janeiro. In Rio, there are samba schools, and people wear those elaborate costumes you’ve probably seen on TV (or maybe in person!). But in Olinda, the celebrations are characterized by groups of Maracatu (a type of Brazilian ... read more

So we flew into Recife from Manaus even though it was quite a detour considering we had about 4 stopovers before we finally came to our destination. Recife seemed to be very modern with a lot of condos built around the beach area called Boa Viagem. The beach was not bad but one thing that seemed to be missing in there was the action. There was no bars or restaurants like one would usually picture. I got checked into a hotel and well me and Wayne, the australian pretty much just lazed around the beach trying to get burned by the sun everyday. We visited the old part of town in Recife. Walked around a bit but did not see anything that would totally amaze me. After a couple of days of being useless, we decided ... read more

I've made it to BRAZIL!!!..... After a sad departure from London I made it into Rio de Janeiro and to a hostel by the name of Stone of a Beach, located a couple streets back from Copacabana. I had a few days to settle into the land of sunshine and skimpy bottomed bathing suits before being joined by a fellow seasoned traveller by the name of Owen. I met Owen about 7 months ago at the Okay guesthouse in Phnom Penh and then again for the celebrations that the Full Moon Party (where he initally made an appearance on the blogsite) had to offer with myself and Kym. Having Brazil on my ''2005/2006 world tour'' and the same interests of travelling a good portion of the Brazilian coastline and a little of what the Amazon offers ... read more

Sometimes, when I'm learning Portuguese, I sing to myself "Learning Portuguese I think I'm learning Portuguese I really think so..." If you think that's dorky, sometimes when I'm adjusting my Start Menu settings I sing "Lock the Taskbar" to the tune of "Rock the Casbah." Things are good. More later. kyle t.... read more

i think it's about time to talk about teresa. see...kyle and i signed up at this website called global freeloaders. basically, this webiste has a database of people willing to offer a couch or a bed for travelers, and in exchange, you sign up to do the same. it's a pretty awesome way to meet people of that country. this is how we found teresa. in our first email exchange, teresa informed me that she was hesitant to host us because she had hosted some smelly rude americans in the past. i assured her we smelled good. then she said (upon asking for our birthdates) that kyle and i are nearing the end of our first saturn cycles and that perhaps we could have a nice chat about this? uh-oh. ;) well, i'll be honest, at ... read more