WEEK FIFTY ONE, PARTIES, PARADISE, POP IDOL!
Trip Start
Jan 17, 2008
1
8
44
Trip End
Dec 31, 2008
Praia do Forte,
State of Bahia,
Brazil
Thursday, March 6, 2008
Myself and Bruno went in to Sao Paulo city today to do some sight seeing! Bruno pretended he was a gringo all day and wouldn´t speak any Portuguese, he wanted to see how I would cope! He was amazed at my survival skills! and miming ability!
We went down Rua 25 Marco, a huge Brazilian version of Henry Street at Christmas time, with people of all races and accents selling you crap from ramshackle tables and carts! We saw the Cathedral, Praça, Business District and went to a really cool Gallery de Rock, I shopping center just full of rock and punk clothes and stores and tattoo parlors and music stores, I was in heaven, but lack of funds meant I could only window shop! Gutted! But having no money didn´t stop us from having a beer in a really fancy bar, the most fancy place Bruno has been in in Brazil! The liter of beer came in an ice bucket maybe it was ´Moet Beer´and the waiter poured it into our glasses and returned to refill our glass before they got empty. Now that is what I call service!
That night we went to a birthday party in a friend of Bruno's house. It was just like an Irish party, adults in one room watching t.v, the rest gathered in the kitchen sitting on the counter tops drinking beers, eating cake, talking crap and the boys slagging each other off, just like home!
That weekend we continued the birthday celebrations of the same friend in a local pub outside on the deck in the sunshine, whist a samba band played. Samba is a really fast dance with fancy footwork, which I didn´t attempt until I was well and truly drunk. Once I hit the floor all the local girls tried to teach me samba, I picked it up quite easy and they said I had samba and Brazilian in my blood! (Mam, something you are not telling me?)
After that we went for pizza to sober up and then hit another party on the street outside Bruno's house, these guys love to party and do it anywhere! From there it was on to the best nightclub I had ever been too. It was huge! In the middle of nowhere built into the hill. It was open plan and had no outside walls and it was built around the palm trees and waterfalls, so these where actually in the club! It was all made out of wooden decking and had a huge dance floor, raised DJ terrace and massive green laser light show! Check it out http://www.estanciaaltodaserra.com.br/
The people were gorgeous all chocolate colored skin, shiny glossy hair, tiny designer clothes and wearing sunglasses inside, in Dublin they would have looked like twats but here, as always, the Brazilians pull the look off with ease. I looked like a tramp in my cut off jeans and navy singlet! What a way to make an impression! But I didn´t need to look like one of those stunning Brazilian models in waiting, I was 'gringo', 'Eskimo', 'white skinned' 'light eyes' I was center of attention and when I spoke I had boys under some sort of spell and they all wanted to kiss me! It would have been rude of me not too! I love this country! The music was amazing, the DJ´s knew exactly how to get the crowd going and we all had an amazing night dancing till our bodies ached! The club finished at 10am but we left about 4ish as Bruno was having no luck with the ladies! Ha! He should have spoke English to them! I, on the other hand, had a very interesting car ride home with Philip, Bruno's very drunk and horny amigo! The rest is classified!
Monday morning came and I left Bruno's and hit the road again. My credit cards had been lost in the post so I had to reorder them again. I still hadn´t got them by the time I left Bruno's but his girlfriend was arriving from Australia today and I didn't want to impose any longer. Plus, I was starting to fall for Bruno, as I had done first time I met him in New Zealand, and being there with his girlfriend would have been to much to take! So I headed into Sao Paulo, and boarded a bus to Parati, a preserved Portuguese colonial and Brasilian Imperial (1822 - 1889) town. http://www.paraty.tur.br/indexen.php
The 5 1/2 hour drive along the Costa Verde (green coast) was stunning, giant mountains of dense dark green trees filled my eyes as far as I could see to my left and sweeping deserted white sand palm tree lined beaches of aquamarine water stretched to my right. Each beach dotted with little paradise islands just off shore. It was picture postcard perfection!
I reached Parati just after dark and it was like an old wild west town, all dusty and wooden with undesirables lurking in the shop doorways and horses roaming free. I expected a duel to happen any minute! "Draw!!" The town was beautiful and colonial. All narrow cobbled car free streets lined with beautiful restaurants and craft shops and lit from above with stings of bare bulbs from one street to the next, like low lying stars guiding the way to the next pretty pastel colored protected building. I could have stayed a few days here but I had a bus to catch to Rio.
I boarded the bus in the dead of night and watch yet another horse roam past the window before the bus pulled away. I looked around the coach. I was the only one on here, was there something I should know? Where was everybody? But I didn't mind, I welcomed the quite as it is so hard to find in Brazil! I looked out at the navy night sky and watched the white foam of the waves that were running along side the bus interrupt the darkness. The only time I saw light on the 4 hour journey was when we arrived at Rio and the lights from the ships on the sea bobbed on the waves like floating candles and the lone bulbs of the huts in the favelas lit up the surrounding hills like the national grid! This whole scene of Rio at night is just magical and fairytale like even though it couldn't be further from the truth!
When I got to Rio bus station I was informed that I had just missed the last bus to the airport and would have to wait until the morning, nearly 6 hours away! I didn't know what to do! I didn't like the bus station and there was nothing to do here to pass the time. So I wrapped my bags around me and had a quick nap before deciding to bite the bullet and get in another taxi, which I hadn't done since I nearly died in one in Salvador! Once again, it was another Death Cab ride through the foul smelling late night slums of Rio, another sleep in an airport and a flight back to the scene of the crime in Salvador! All in the space of nine hours! Nothing of significance happened on but I have to tell you about the most glorious thing I have seen so far in Brazil.
The flight from Rio to Salvador took off at sunrise, 6am, perfect time to be soaring above one of the greatest cities in the world, so they, whoever they are, say! The sky was light blue and creamy from the breaking morning sun. The ocean below changing from cold deep blue surrounding the large freighters to warm baby blue as it met the golden sands of the most famous beaches in the world and covered them in white waves that gently lapped the shore. Then, as if growing from the ocean floor itself emerged the biggest, barest, bluest mountain range I had ever seen! For miles and miles giant peaks of slate blue jutted up and out of nowhere and pierced the morning sky, ripping through the low lying clouds and completed the picture of the best nature has to offer, ocean, sky and mountains in every shade of blue imaginable and some that I had never ever seen before. The waves breaking, the shimmering sand, the boats of all shapes and sizes, the mist completely enveloping the scene, the sun slowing rising in the sky, the only thing that was missing to make this truly the greatest sight I had even scene would have been Christ the Redeemer looking down over the whole symphony of nature, I searched for Christ, but he was nowhere to be seen, maybe he isn't and early riser! But it still didn't take from that view, that memory, that scene I will always remember happening below me! Then I passed out from exhaustion!
I awoke in Salvador and got the first bus out of there to Praia De Forte, a glorious little town with sand for streets, wooden buildings, a quite chilled atmosphere and circled by a beautiful clean sandy beach lapped by green waters, dotted with palm trees and colorful old wooden fishing boats, local children doing back flips in the warm water and a giant sea turtle nature reserve! It was just perfect and to top it off two lemur moneys ran down the tree beside me and crossed my path to climb up to the roof of the shop and play! How cool is that?
My day was made even better when I spied an English magazine with pages and pages of trashy articles and gossip inside! I took myself straight down to the beach, spread out my towel and brought myself up to date on Jordan's latest boob job, Ashley Cole cheating on what's her face from Girls Aloud, Jeremy Beadle dying, the Heath Ledger scandal, gosh that really upset me, I loved Heath! and various other bullshit about Z list people from BB or Pop Idol or whatever else is the latest reality TV show! Surprisingly I am sure I was reading the same stuff about the same people over a year ago before I left Dublin. Does nothing ever change or happen has the world stood still for so long? Where is the news and world events?
