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Published: November 16th 2006
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The various stages of posing
Me: Preparing
El: Preoccupied
Mike: Primed! The next few days after our hectic weekend were spent fairly lazily, so much so that I will endeavour to squeeze them into one blog entry. On Monday, I walked across town with Daniel to Mike's gaff and spent a bit of time over there, having a good first cousin to first cousin chat. We discussed birds, cameras and more birds. Mike showed me some pictures of Carnaval 2006 in Rêcife - they go wild over here around then, I don't think there's a comparable event in Ireland, it's nuts. Mike got hoisted up in a Height-for-Hire thing on one of the main bridges in the city, with a bird's-eye view of all the happenings. He's a shrewd fella, our Mike; his work paid for the whole thing! He did it first in 2005 and they liked his work so much that he got to do it again the next year. I think he's planning something even more spectacular for Mardi Gras 2007.
We headed into the city again for a bit of shopping, Antigo-style. We were meeting up with the rest of them for some retail therapy, although how therapeutic it is stepping through hordes of wares-peddling vendors -
Flying off the shelves
Told you we'd been talking about birds who never let you go if you take even a glance at their stuff - is debateable. Good fun though. I acquired a very enjoyable DVD here too which has provided endless entertainment back home! We spent time wandering around the various squares of the city, each usually fronted by a church or sometimes another prominent building, and the various vistas can be seen in the photos.
We moseyed into the synagogue proper this time, and had a look around - it was a fascinating place. It has been restored on the original site where the first temple stood. The Dutch had been much more permissive of different religious beliefs and the Jews flourished in Rêcife up until the Portuguese stormed in and drove the Dutch out of Pernambuco and eventually out of Brazil altogether. You can imagine that the staunchly Catholic Portuguese didn't take too kindly to a bunch of Red Sea pedestrians living on the best street in town, and the Jews had to beat a hasty retreat to other pastures or go into hiding. This was unfortunate for the economy of Rêcife as the Jews had been introducing many modern monetary practices (for the time), such
The Brothers Grim
Looking lively in Rêcife as paying by instalments, that were very beneficial to the standard of life for the residents of Rêcife. Time passed along and after the horrors of the Second World War, everyone everywhere was more sympathetic towards the Jewish people, and when some excavations on Rêcife Island yielded what seemed to be the remains of a synagogue, efforts were made to save and preserve the special site.
After this, Aidan and I took an opportunity to run up to a shop that specialised in cheap fragrances whose quality he swore by. It may sound a bit gay, but when I smelled the colognes they had in there and marvelled at the prices, I had no difficulty in giving the old reverse victory sign to Hugo Boss, Giorgio Armani and the boys as this stuff was just as good for 1/20th the dosh. I picked out two 100ml bottles and a couple of spray bottles for R$17 (about €7). You can't beat that! Just as I was getting ready to pay, though, the electricity died - turns out the same had happened for the entire block! The chick ahead of me was totally screwed as she'd been planning to pay with
You don't know where this finger's been!
Aidan is pointing at nothing in particular and we are busy calling each other gobshites - Dad just wanted a pose plastic, however I had no such problems and readily skipped ahead of her to hand over a crisp R$20 note. Score - geddit?
That night we went to Mirza and Mike's gaff for some solid Brazilian nosh. It was a royal get-together; everyone was there except Paula's Daniel. Paula had to go early, though, as the water in her house only turns on for an hour in the evenings and in the mornings - not just the hot water, any water - and she had to shower and wash some clothes. It seems unbelievable that people so close to my blood have to live in conditions like this. Paula is a qualified lawyer yet can only earn R$900/month in a call-centre job - her rent is R$400 out of that already. To give you an idea of the value of money over here, a Big Mac meal costs about R$10 (which is €4 - the going rate for the same food is €5.70 in Ireland). Tough stuff. Anyway, back to the Johnstonian get-together. We had potato salad, some yum chicken, sausages, and all sorts of Brazilian concoctions, some of which were tasty and others not so much (to my
Ag haggle-a for agua
In a rare moment of generosity, I splashed out the reals on some uisce fuair. palate anyway). The Skol beer was flowing and everyone was having a good time.
It was a very enjoyable night, with everyone involved in something, the kids playing with us younger ones, Alannah doing her own little comedy impressions again and the adults having some serious conversations about times past and discussing photographs that Dad had brought along. Mirza brought the girls into her workshop where she makes her own paper (all the way from the pulp stage) and other arts and crafts. Aoife is very much into that kind of thing and it was great for her to see another the setup of another artist as talented as herself in Mirza. We met Michael's girlfriend Patricia for the first time and she proved to be a warm, intelligent woman, very suited to Mike's personality.
Time moved along and people got tired and we had to skidaddle. Michael took a few photos of the whole lot with his big pro camera and hopefully I'll have them up soon.
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RTW2006
Rachel
...somethings missing..
..all in all.. great reading in your journal.. but none of your much vaunted "wall to wall TNA"... disappointing :P