Restaurant in Parati

As I said before, the resturaunt we ate at was not very good. But, they did have some neat wall decorations. I think that's why we chose the restaurant.

Brazil Trip w/ the Boys: Sunday 2-15-09

Sunday we woke up a little bit later. Then we went sea kayaking in the Bay of Parati. We hopped from island to island in the bay. We saw wild flamingos. Adam got cut up on some barnacles while he was docking on some rocks to take a pee.

After kayaking, we got washed up and went out for dinner. The restaurant we chose wasn’t that great. I was disappointed. We went shopping before and after dinner. Parati has a lot of cool shops in the historical district. The most interesting was an artist’s shop. She makes all kinds of things from polyester resin: chairs, doorknobs, vases, toilet seats, tourist memorabilia.

When we got back to the hostel I taught the guys how to play trouco, a brazilian card game. It’s a little bit like euchre, but with challenges & bluffing.

Video from El Ateneo

El Ateneo

I went to a bookstore last night to find a book for learning Spanish. The bookstore is named "El Ateneo". It is supposedly the largest bookstore in South America. It was pretty big, but not overwhelmingly huge. It was very cool though. The bookstore was converted from an old movie theatre.

Despite being the largest bookstore in South America, I didn't find what I was looking for. All they had were Spanish / English dictionaries. Oh well, I think I have everything I need to learn Spanish here with me anyway. A coursebook would make things easier to structure though.

Day One: Travelling to Parati

I picked up Paul, Adam, and Ben at the airport on Saturday (Feb 14th). We took a shuttle to the bus station and bought bus tickets to our first destination: Parati.

Parati is a colonial beach town. In preping for their adventure, Ben and Adam read that it is customary for Brazilians to stand closer during conversations, and touch on the shoulder. They practiced this custom at one of the stops on the way to Parati.

We got to Parati at about 9-10pm on Saturday night, but the night was far from over. The receptionist told us about a jazz festival happening in the Town Square of the historical district. They flew in a New Orleans jazz group for the event. We drank Caipirinhas and had a lot of fun at the concert.

Good Job Boys!

Adam, Ben, Paul, and myself all went on a captivating adventure in Brazil last week. There's a lot to say, so I'll catch everyone up to speed in daily installments. Sorry for the almost two-week pause in postings. I now have the time and the internet to start posting again.

I'm in Buenos Aires

I arrived in Buenos Aires this afternoon, and I'm safety at a hostel here. The HSBC bank looks like it's close by. All is good for now. I'm missing my EasyShare USB cable, so new pictures are nixed until I can find a replacement... hopefully just a day or two.

Thank You

Thank you Everybody.

Mineiro, Angela, Bruno, Tiago, you have all been very good to me, very hospitable. You've gone out of your way to accommodate me. I'm very greatful. All of my new friends in Jau... you've made my life very pleasant here in Jau. May the good times roll. Capoeira folks, keep up the great academy. I hope we meet again some day.



Kevin

Things are about to get Interesting

Tomorrow I will be leaving Jau. Bright and early. I'm saying my good-byes today. I'll be meeting a few of my american friends in Sao Paulo: Adam, Ben, and Paul. From there, I will lead us on an excellent adventure including Rio de Janeiro, Paraty, Sao Paulo, and Itatiaia. This will be a true test of how well I can actually speak Portuguese. After out journey, I will make my way down to Buenos Aires... meandering through the Brazilian and Argentenan countrysides. My posts are about to bocome more sporadic, I don't know how often I'll have internet access. But, stay tuned in, because I'm sure when I have the opportunity, I'll be posting a lot of interesting points.

What's more interesting is that I don't speak spanish really. I'll be studying on the bus. Buenos Aires is gonna kick my ass.

Funeral

I went to Ezekiel's office this morning to participate in an english class that he has for his office every tuesday and thursday. It turn out, the class was canceled because Ezekiel's mother passed on yesterday. Instead, we ended up going to her memorial service and burial. Rest in Peace.

The cemetery was quite different from what I'm used to. There was no grass at all. The whole place was paved with concrete.

That's a Nice View

College Hazings

On the first day of college, there is a party for all of the Bixos, or freshmen. It's voluntary... you don't have to come to the event if you don't want. So subjecting yourself to the humiliation isn't mandatory like when joining a fraternity. The bixos are painted, they have to wear their underwear outside of therest of their clothes, and they've got to dance. My neighbor Adauto invited me to the bixo party at his school last week.

Museum of Jau

Jau has a quaint little museum. It was one of the first places I went to when I arrived in Brazil. The museum has a lot of taxidermy exibits featuring indigenous species. It also has some history about the city.

A Change in Plans

My plans have changed recently. Until two weeks ago, I was planning on venturing to Santiago, Chile to teach English in the INACAP university system there. I got the unexpected and bad news a week and a half ago… The legal department at the university couldn’t agree/understand some contract terms in time to hire me for the semester starting in March. I guess international hiring is a little more complex. What a disappointment!

I was only about 75-80% certain that I would get this job. The department chair and president both expressed a lot of interest in having me join the English department. But, I know very well that things don’t always work out… so I also had a plan B in the back of my head.

Now, I plan to go to Buenos Aires in about 2 weeks. My two main objectives in coming to South America were to learn Spanish and Portuguese. I can speak Portuguese well enough now, although I should continue to study the language if I want to retain and expand on what I’ve already learned. I still need to learn Spanish.

I will go to Buenos Aires, and I hope to stay there for about two months. I’ll start a job search there: locally, but I’ll mostly be looking for jobs in the US. It would be great to get a job or internship at a brewery! At the same time, I’ll be waiting to hear back from graduate schools which I applied to back in November before I left for SA. With the current job market and my so-so undergraduate marks, I’m not sure how I will fare. I haven’t thought of a plan C. Hopefully I won’t have to make one.

Even if things don’t go smoothly for me, this escapade has been absolutely priceless. I believe Portuguese and Spanish will turn out to be valuable skills. I don’t have any regrets. Wish me luck.

Can you spot the Coca-Cola bottle in this picture?

Coca-Cola is more popular in brazil than juice, milk, water, and even beer. Bruno lives on the stuff. People think I'm weird because I'm american and I don't drink a lot of coca-cola. My dad used to be a coke addict... he understands. He switched to Mountain Dew a couple years ago. I don't know if that's any better. Mountain Dew is also my favorite soft drink. They don't have it down here though. I wonder how popular it would be. Maybe we'll never know.

When I first arrived in Jau, I was quite the celebrity... especially with the capoeira kids. In a smaller city like Jau, I am the first american that younger people have met. I've even given away my autograph! haha! Tiago has a picture of me somewhere, with all of the capoeira kids huddled around me. Here's some pics of the tikes.

Resuraunt Bar Code Tags

At some gas stations, docerias, and many resuraunts, Brazilians use a pretty innovative system for paying for things. When you enter the resuraunt or shop, you are given a bar-code tag. When you order food, drinks, deserts, the item or items are scanned onto your tag. When you're done and you're ready to check out, you bring the tag to the cashier and pay. This is system is most commonly used in places where you order from behind the counter, when you might come back several times for different things.

Fruit Juice

One thing that I really like about Brazil is the selection of fruit juice that you can get here. There are lots of juice shops, and just about every resuraunt offers a bunch of juicy fruits to choose from. You have some fruits that you can get in the US: orange, strawberry, lemonade, banana, pineapple, apple. But there's also a lot of fruits that I haven't seen before coming to Brazil: goiaba, cashew (it's not just a nut I found out), mamao, acai. My favaorite is Suco de Acai com Leite (Acai Juice with Milk). I usually stop by a doceria on my way home from capoeira each night and order this drink. It's great to replenishment. Here are pictures of Suco de Acai com Leite and Suco de Cashew.

Pictures from this Weekend

I'm posting some pictures from this weekend. Nothing super-noteworthy happened, but friends usually invite me out on the town, or to parties, lunch, BBQs, etc.

Lunch at Bruno's Sogro's house

Bruno invited me for lunch yesterday at his girlfriend's house. Here in Brazil, mother-in-law = sogra, father-in-law = sogro... but these terms are used pre-maritally as well.

I hope you all had a good superbowl sunday. I didn't watch. I saw part of a soccer game. How were the commercials this year? Half time show? Superbowl Sunday isn't observed in Brazil.