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Published: February 26th 2007
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bullfish!
one of the crazy amazonian animals in a zoo in belem Once again i have defied the odds and managed to navagate from my last blog destination in Forteleza to Belem...
running low on funds as everything was shut during carnival i jumped on a bus to belem a 24hour bus ride from fortaleza hoping when i got there the banks would still be open. Yes the race against time was on once again...
firstly the likelyhood of a brazilian bus being on time was extremely unlikely and it was set to arrive at 1pm (banks in brazil genrally close around 3pm).
secondly... banks are also closed on saturday and sunday today was friday.
so the bus pulled in to the rodoviario at 1:15pm amazing there just might be a possibility of getting to the bank whilst it was still open. i finally figured out my map and jumped on the el cheapo bus system i have been catching since rio since my confidence in cabs has been destroyed. amazingly i only jumped off the bus 3 blocks from where i was supposed to so i was able to circle the city a couple of times in a relatively fast fashion before getting it right and finding the
Drago Do Mar
the cultural centre of forteleza hotel. (not the flashest hotel but more about that later.)
so 2:30 i leave the hotel... it begins to rain... i try 3 banks on the main drag before finally the last one directs me to a bank do brasil the bank i have made my other transactions from in the past so this sounded promising. 2:55 bank do brazil. no problems tho the bank is open till 4pm but i of course still have to wait in line... but which line... randomly asking security and the information staff i got a serise of it´s too late go home answers before i found some one who spoke english... gold! yes i got my cash 3:45pm... you would think i would be getting good at this.
anyways the hotel... lonley planet what are you doing to me! "a backpackers meeting place although a little shabby"... a little? this place is definately on the budget side not that i care but i am just suprised lonely planet gives it such a good review... the walls and matresses are so thin i think my materess is actually transperent and the pressure out of the taps in some places is so low
my mate in forteleza
the streets of drago do mar you must unwind the taps from their fastenings to get a mere few drops... on top of this they are painting the celing in my room so it smells like paint and the lock on the door is useless... this place is paradise! well the aim was to meet people and i met up with the owner on the first night and she seems to know about all the information i need so this place could be ok.
the next day i headed out looking for my hammock and a few supplies to prepare myself for my trip... i met up with a girl Rachael who was really cool and spoke awesome portugese so we went to the zoo to see all the native amazonian animals for the ones i might miss on my jungle trek... a really cool place for 2 reals it is definately worth seeing one of the wierdest animals was the bull fish it was literally a bull in the water i hope i don´t swim with one of those in manaus. and another thing racheal told me that the ´sloth´in portugese translates to lazy-real or real lazy....i thought that was classic.
we then
hotel
my hotel room! no it is not that clean the flash takes away the grimmy grey walls... cosy though and the staff can be really cool. went down to the markets by the docks and ate some more seafood awesome! really fresh food for 5 reals yes everything is dirt cheap here. i decided to go shopping and pick up a hammock at the market next door and only paid 35 reals.. it was only till i got back to the hotel that gilda told me there is a shop litteraly out the frount which sells them for 15... yes i should have asked the locals... but stuff it i still think 35 reals is cheap.
more suco... and it is getting weirder and weirder... today i had two juices i had never heard of or tasted before...i´m hooked it´s like tasting flavours you have never tasted before, like if i said to you what does purple taste like that is about as close as i could get to describing these juices, and generally most of them are really good! i can never remember the names though cause they are ridiculus like macaba or caja or caju.
I then had a bit of a random evening since rachael left to catch her plane i was hanging around the hotel a bit speaking to gilda
belem zoo
amazon zoo park area from the hotel... basically she said she was going to grab dinner in an hour and i should join her for some traditional braziliano fish. yeah sure i said not to through down an offer. so an hour later i followed her to what i thought was going to be some local resturant but turned out to be her house! yeah i was a bit uncomforatable but she refused to let me think otherwise. so i went to her SMALL apartment which was basically 1 room with an attached kitchen and bathroom and gilda spare room on the side. anyways more people arrived i bought drinks because i felt bad not paying for anything and dinner went along nicely.
it was a classic scene 2 french 2 brasilians gilda and me sitting on the beds in the spare room watching portugese soap operas hunched over a small milkcrate sized table.
the french couple and one of the brazilains left and it was just me and another girl from brazil who only spoke portugese but was really nice. being 11pm gilda wouldn´t let me walk the three blocks back to the hotel so me and andrêa (the CRAZY! but nice brazilian girl) crashed at her house in the 2 spare beds. i think one of the best nights i have had in along time - very random but it was good to see how people live and how they have a good time in brazil.
the next day it has been picking up supplies and the remaining things for my 5 day boat trip down the amazon which leaves tomorrow.
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naz
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sleazy eyes
hey matty! i put a deposit on my south america trip coupla weeks ago so your blog is making me drool!! hope you haven't peed on any bags haha catch you soon. naz =)