Blogs from Salvador, Bahia, Brazil, South America - page 13

Hey All, So I Have Landed in Brazil! Flying into Sao Paulo Was Amazing!!! The Color is so truly beautiful!! The buildings are oranges reds greens blues yellows nestled in lush green rain forest, with fields of Red Red earth breaking up the intense green. Sao Paulo is Mountainous, very much like vancouver's rolling mountains. I was to take a plane to Salvador from there. I went to the gate I was supposed to go to, they scanned my ticket and the announcement came over the intercom to board the plane. i jumped up and got to the front of the line, we waited for a long time for the plane. they scanned my ticket and on the plane I went. it was a blessing that I asked the staff what seat I was in, he ... read more

We stayed in the historic center of Salvador known as the Pelourinho (Pel). In English, "Pelourinho" means whipping-post. It was named as such because it is where Africans were sold into slavery upon arriving in Salvador. Most of the buildings in the Pel were built while Brazil was a Portuguese colony. Brazil was the seat of the Portuguese Monarch during the period that Napoleon's Army possessed Portugal. The King of Portugal moved to Brazil until Europe was able to push the French back into France. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Portugal_(1777%E2%80%931834). Salvador lived up to its reputation of colorful food, people, and music. It is very photogenic. Wolfgang and Miranda (of Amsterdam), who we met in the Amazon jungle, typically stay in hostels when they travel, so we thought we would give it a try. We stayed in a Hostel in ... read more

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/13/world/americas/13brazil.html?_r=1 I was looking through the new and saw a pic I recognized, yup, that's Salvador, my temporary home. This community has been autonomous for the last 15 years, taking care of their problems without police involvement, etc. But yeah, Carlinhos Brown went and got the/his community to work together to get infrastructure and build a music school and promote exchanges between the kids of the middle class neighborhood just beside it and the kids of Candeal. There are a lot of slums around the city. Big communities of poor people. Not ghetto or anything, just poor folks without many means of climbing up the social ladder. ... read more

The majority of the pictures will be taken during the boat tour of All Saints Bay going to Itaparica Island and Frades Island. We rented a boat to take 55 students around the bay with music and drinks. (Along the way, I saw a school of fish jumping out of the water, in and out and in and out, a few times. I didn't take any pics of that though.) There are nice beaches. We ate a good Bahian meal. Some local kids caught an iguana and it had a photo-op with me. Nice day out... I know, you want some pics of me in class 'cause no one will believe I'm here to study...(I'm studying the beaches of Brazil!! haha) My family wants to go to the beach tomorrow. I saw 2 Chinese people getting ... read more

We rolled into Recife and headed straight to the lovely neighbouring city of Olinda. Olinda has a small but superb historic centre (at times small is just what you need). It’s one of South Americas most charming and well restored gems. We enjoyed the beautiful centre full of churches, cobble stone colonial architectured streets and plazas, all magnificently restored. Olinda also boasts a vibrant artesian culture, is chilled out and full of nice little cafes and posadas. It’s a great place to come and relax for a couple of days and isn’t overrun with tourists either. We left Olinda for Recife to catch an overnight bus to a city that we had heard so much about, for good and for bad. We arrived in Salvador da Bahia, found our hostel and had another great breakfast. Salvador ... read more