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Published: January 25th 2006
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Brazilian girls at hostel
Brazilian girls at hostel It took me around nineteen hours to get to Florianopolis. The ride was a bit bumpy and sitting at the back next to the toilet wasn´t a pleasant experience, in particular towards the end of the trip. I remember I was a bit paranoid about being robbed when a rough looking woman sat next to me half way through the trip, so I decided to transfer all my valuables into my money belt. I´m sure this was an overreaction, probably triggered by the memory of another woman offering her help when I was withdrawing cash in Igazu.
Florianopolis is a beautiful city, situated partly on the island of Santa Catarina and mainland Brazil. I was staying in the south of the island, at 'Abergue de Pirata' or 'Pirate´s Inn'. The place in run/owned by an Argentinian family, and open only in the summer.
The smell in the dorm, not entirely unpleasant, reminded me of the weekend house owned by my parents in Hungary when I was little. We also only used it in the summer, however we had mice and sometimes rats, instead of giant cockroaches roaming around. Despite this, the hostel was quite clean, and there was a good atmosphere,
In front of Bungalow
In front of Bungalow especially around the bar. During my stay I managed to make use of my mosquito net, as there seemed to be a lot of mosquitoes in our dorm at night. Just down the road from the hostel there was a pretty good beach, and an inexpensive restaurant serving fish, beef, or chicken with rice, beans and fries.
I arrived at the hostel very tired, as I stumbled off the bus one of the belts on my bag was caught in the door, which was received with joyful laughter from the local kids. Later I went wondering on the beach, and in the evening I managed to get to know two middle aged Brazilians and two Danish guys. After paying to visit to the centre of Florianopolis the next day I was feeling slightly bored, and decided to take surf lessons. In the following morning over breakfast I met a very friendly young Brazilian guy called Tsiago, who took me to the surf school nearby to find out about the courses.
It turned out that Tsiago was at the hostel with around ten of his friends, most of whom I quickly got to know, and although still interested in surfing, I
New Years Eve
New Years Eve was quite happy to hang out with them, and too lazy to make the effort to surf. Christmas at Igazu has passed by without me experiencing any of the Christmas spirit (it felt really weird seeing Christmas decorations in 40 degrees heat), and letting the Brazilian girls look after me made New Year´s celebrations a little more bearable 😊. Over the next few days I was kept well fed, and very much entertained.
Even though they only been at the hostel for a few days, most of the girls seemed to have already got emotionally attached to foreign guys, mainly from Germany (I wonder why?). One of the girls, Claudia ( a Barbara Streisand lookalike, according to one of the guys) got slightly hurt by someone , and I ended up spending a bit of time talking to her. This arrangement suited us both as I suppose she managed to get over whatever she thought she had to get over (although I doubt this was anything to do with me), and it involved me lying around on the grass in front of the Brazilians´ bungalow (or the beach), doing absolutely nothing, being served refreshments.
One day I had the most
New Years Eve 2
New Years Eve 2 interesting conversation with the girls. They wanted to know how I viewed Brazilian women, claiming they heard that foreign men view them as very friendly, and rather easy. After assuring them that not only Brazilian women had such reputation (and admitting that Brazilian women are indeed friendly) I quickly changed the subject and the conversation turned to what Brazilian women like about foreign men.
According to Camila (then 'in love' with a German guy), unlike Brazilian men, they are normally kind, gentle and caring. I though about trying to explain to her that this might be a means to an end, but then I figured it´s probably better (for both of us) to leave her in blissful ignorance. It´s not that I thought she was silly, in fact all the girls were really intelligent with great jobs (I remember two of them were lawyers, and one an architect), it´s just I though it was better to keep my moth shut (knowing men and women think very differently), so i don´t jeopardise my privileges.
On New Year´s eve everyone at the hostel joined the locals and other holiday makers at the beach to jump the waves (it´s a tradition for people
New Years Eve, beach party
New Years Eve, beach party in Brazil at midnight to jump seven waves and make a wish during each jump), drink champagne, and dance (there was a DJ on the beach!). All the girls were wearing white (I think the guys were also meant to, but usually don´t bother), and danced really well to Samba. In the mean time fireworks were going off, adding to the atmosphere. It was probably the best New Year´s party of my life, I wish my family and friends were there!
Towards the end of my time at the hostel I either managed to annoy some of the girls or they just decided to go through this difficult period of their lives without my help. As a consequence I found myself getting slightly bored. Fortunately Tsiago again came to my rescue by asking me to go to JOAQUINA beach (one of the best places to surf on the island), with him and a few of the others. After a bit of sunbathing and swimming (and staring at beautiful women), we came across a guy who was selling handcrafts. He also had a Capoiera instruments called the Berimbau. After showing us how it is played, he told us about the history
New Years Eve, beach party 2
New Years Eve, beach party 2 of Capoiera. Later in the evening we went to a bar called 'John Bull', although we were tired and the music was bad (they were playing old rock music), we all managed to have a good time.
I´m still surprised just how friendly and welcoming all the Brazilians were at the hostel. They were really trying (particularly Tsiago and the girls) to make every foreigner feel part of their group, and help them as much as they could. On the last day they even gave me a lift to the bus station in town.
Before I left I had a nice conversation with Jerry, a retired teacher from Canada, and 'confidant' to the Brazilian girls. I haven´t seen them for a while, so it was happy to learn they managed to sort themselves out. When they were leaving they were very emotional, particularly Claudia, who was too tired to even speak English.
One of the funniest moments at the hostel was when Lena, an eccentric fashion college lecturer started hitting a cheeky 21 year old English guy called Graham, who looked as though he enjoyed it as he kept on teasing her.
I get the impression people in Brazil really
New Years Eve, beach party 3
New Years Eve, beach party 3 know how to party, and though life may not always easy, in general they are very cheerful. Also, everyone I talked to seemed to be very hard working, some spending on average 14 hours a day at work.
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