I said goodbye to my mother in Morocco, knowing I was going to see her again soon. I just had to make a quick pit stop in South America, to round off my 6 continents in 6 months (and see some old friends).
I said goodbye to my mother and along with her I said goodbye to most of the warm clothes that I had packed for my time in the UK. Turns out that was a bad idea. It wasn't an issue for my one day back in the UK (London was so nice and sunny that day, it was almost too hot!)
Because it was such a lovely day I strolled around Covent Garden. Saw some street performers, had a lovely Korean lunch and sat in the sun. It was a much nicer way to kill my layover time than sitting in the godawful place that is Heathrow airport.
Next stop (after about 9hours on the plane) São Paulo! When I arrived, my friend Gobind was there to meet me. It's been so long, I didn't even recognize him at first. I walked straight out of the airport and almost kept going, until I heard my name and suddenly, 'wa BAM' there he was!
We hopped on a bus, which took us to the metro, which took us to his car, which took us home. Now, I don't know how many of you know this but apparently there are these people in Beijing (maybe Shanghai, as well) whose job it is to stand behind the crowds who are trying to use the subway (during rush hour) and literally push them onto the train in order to fit the maximum people on board. Well let's just say, São Paulo metro felt like that had happened...
Welcome to Brazil!
After we ditched the quasi-India-like-sardines-in-a-can-metal-tube-speeding-through-the-city, we were spit out into a little naighborhood that I would soon come to know quite well over the next few weeks, because of our frequent journeys from Gobind's house to the metro.
Years ago, when Gobind first invited me to come visit him, I remember he used to talk about his house as if it was some sort of paradise on earth. The descriptions he would give sounded so heavenly that THAT is the main reason I felt I needed to go visit Brazil. Luckily, when I got there, his story held up. The place was (is) beautiful! With passion fruit, papaya, and banana trees, a swimming pool, a lush garden, a yoga room, and a lovely lawn all tucked into a jungle mountain overlooking the Saha (jungle/forest/mountain) on the outskirts of the city.
The only problem with this paradise was about 8 out of the 14 days I was there were rainy, cloudy, and gross. Now, remember how I gave my warm clothes to my mom to take home? This is why it was a bad idea. I knew Chile would be cold so I kept a few things with me. It's a really good thing I did that or I would really have been screwed. I know it's winter and all, but, COME ON, Brazil.
The good news was that the day we were in Rio was gorgeous (we did plan it that way, but still). Because Gobind teaches yoga Tues, Thurs, and Sat we had to work around his schedule. What we ended up doing was leaving Tues after his last class (at like 11pm) and took a 6hour bus to Rio. We arrived super early, crashed for a few hours, and than went exploring.
We ended up doing all of the touristy things in Rio. We were really efficient. Started by going up to the Christ, after that we headed right to the sugar-loaf, and finally, ended up at Ipanema beach where we had dinner. This was after we saw someone almost drown. It was pretty intense. They were just lying there with a massive crowd around them with foam or something coming out of their mouth. It was like, oh, nice sunny beach day. Nope, death. Gobind doesn't think they actually died and for my peace of mind I like to agree with him, but I'm not quite sure.
Since Rio is pretty dangerous (and seeing as we got very little sleep the night before), we decided to call it an early night. I was exhausted at that point anyways, so I crashed at about 7:30pm.
The next morning we had to leave Rio around 10am so we could get Gobind back in time for his yoga classes. It ended up being a lot of bus travel, but was also really worth it. I like Rio a lot (regardless of Gobind talking smack every chance he got).
Because the weather was so crap the rest of my time there (except maybe one or two days) we had to call off our trip to the beach. We were going to take the weekend and stay at a little beach town for a few days but instead we went to some really nice (but no beach vacation status) museums in São Paulo. I even got Gobind (who "hates art") to admit that he didn't have an awful time exploring the museums with me. I think in all we went to one museum about the dictatorship in Brazil and two (or three) regular art museums.
There was one other day with nice weather so we took advantage of the sun and general clear sky and went up in the highest building in São Paulo to see the city. It was a great view, although it's not the nicest looking city. We also toured around the city center, which included going to the first building in the city that is still standing and the massive cathedral that marks the exact center of São Paulo.
Besides these few excursions we did a lot of just hanging out at home. We cooked a lot, watched a bunch of movies, played some video games, read, and had some really deep heart wrenching conversations (minus the last thing, we don't talk, what do you think we are, social human beings?).
One thing I will say that Gobind was very good at introducing me to (besides his dislike for the majority of big cities in Brazil) was the traditional foods. We had some awesomely tasty things that I will probably crave in years to come. Passion fruit mousse (Mousse de Maracuja), a dulce de leche and chocolate sweet (Brigadiero), these cheese and veggie pastries (I don't remember the name), and the tastiest (gluten free) cheese bread ever. Think a Chinese tang yuan (glutinous rice ball, look it up! Or just look up Pão de Queijo) with cheese instead of sweet filling but with an initial crusty crunch.
The two weeks I spent in Brazil went by really quickly and I feel like we didn't even do that much because of the weather. It just means I have to go back during their summer when we can go lounge on the beach and pretend like we're doing more than lounging around inside the house on the couch. Also, I made friends with their scrappy cat, so I gotta go back to visit her.
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