Abroad Once More- Brazil!

Ola, bom dia!

I´m back in the blog seat again. I spent the past year living blog-lessly, mainly because my life felt complete without a running commentary. No longer. A brief run down of 2008: I was in PT for most of it, having potlucks, going dancing and making friends. In the spring I returned to Maui and Kauai- seductive and beautiful but I´m glad I moved back. In the summer months I worked up in SE Alaska on a tender buying salmon which was a great opportunity to hang out with my Dad and brother and revisit my roots. Then in September, I had a chance to go watch Flamenco and eat paella in Barcelona. Wow! These days you´ll find me pluggin´ along at YES! magazine on Bainbridge as a crazy intern.

But now we´re in Brazil! It´s hot like Thailand, colorful like Ghana, jungly like Hawaii and nothing like Alaska, yet. It´s our goal to surf, dance, learn Portuguese (tudo bem!), meet wonderful people and attend the World Social Forum. Quite a lot to do in just one little month! Especially when the country is the size of a small planet.

We landed New Year´s Eve in time for one heck of a party. The entire city of Rio descended upon the beach of Copacabana, dressed entirely in white and carrying bottles of champagne and flowers to toss into the sea. (Most of the bottles found there way into the sea as well. Boo.) Music was pumping and people were dancing and at midnight a giant fireworks display illuminated the sky as well as the thousands of upturned faces. It was quite a night.

Now we are exploring the coast between Rio and Salvador to the North. Looking for quiet towns with nice beaches. Of course, that´s usually an oxymoron. But we´re optimists. Arraial d´Ajuda is nice, we like our poasada (guest house) Alto Mar a lot, especially our hosts. We took some pictures of monkey visitors and they posted them on their site! Pretty cool.

Time to go get a bus ticket at the rodoviaria for our next leap north. Then some horas at the praia, I hope. The water is just fine.

Mais tarde,
Kai-poeira