Downtime

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Have any of you had the pleasure of watching Robocop? Aside from being one of the stellar sci fi actioners of the 1980’s it has aged remarkably well. There is a scene towards the end that has specific meaning to me at the present time.

In the penultimate battle Robocop is battling a heavily armed criminal gang around a steel mill and during the course of this fight one unfortunate baddie crashes his car into a tank full of toxic waste(what this was doing at a steelworks is anyone’s guess) baddie emerges, his skin now grapefruit pink and hanging in stripes, smoke rising from his exposed flesh unable to talk coherently and making pained guttural noises.

Here is the scene in question.

After my day in the sun I feel like that baddie. Aftersun no matter how much I liberally apply it is no match for the red terror that spans up and down my back. My back now resembles a map of Europe during the cold war.

Aloe Vera might work but it appears none of the pharmacies or Drugarias as they are known here stock it. The only option is to stick with the bog standard after sun and cover up until I get better, Niamh whos also burnt is coping a bit better but for skincare reasons we are going cultural for the next few days and going to explore the city centre. Hitting the beach in our condition would be exceedingly dangerous, Brazilian police from our observations have access to a wide Varity of firearms, batons, helicopters and armoured cars but they don’t seem to carry human sizes spatulas , such a tool would be invaluable should your truly get foolhardy and decide to hit the sand again.

Ate in a Brazil lion buffet last night, you have a myriad of dishes available and you simply load up your plate and are charged accordingly. I deliberately went for what seemed like the local dishes as much as possible and while I didn’t know what half of it was I can gladly say it was all delicious.
We combine breakfast and lunch into one Meal and this is normally bought in the supermarket. The supermarkets here are a riot, aisles have dimensions similar to attic crawlspaces and the express checkouts sign of 10 items or less is treated as an advisory at best!

We’ve been a week in Rio and its high time we moved on, the plan, which changes on a nearly hourly basis currently dictates we take a 22 hour bus to the Iguassu Falls
, spend a few days there gazing at the magnificent waterfalls and shrieking comically at the giant arachnid and insect life that’s indigenous to the area.

On a more serious note we got a few “worried text messages from friends and family in recent days, according to BBC news the heavy rain has caused mudslides in the northern area of the city and upwards of 400 people have tragically lost their lives and thousands more displaced from their homes. The area we are staying is completely unaffected and we honestly didn’t know anything was amiss until we logged into skype and were informed of the disaster by worried parents. Most of those who died are living in the slums, the slums themselves are largely located at the base of the mountains and these housing estates expand they creep up the side of the mountain. The foundations used are unstable and once a mudslide hits nearly all the houses and their unfortunate occupants are swept down the mountain. This type of thing is a regular occurrence in Rio with similar floods, abet less deadly, occurring in March last year. Let us all hope the best is being done to help the hundreds of people affected by this disaster.

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