January 30, 2011

The school owners took me out to lunch yesterday at a nice place on the beach front. My whole street is filled with hotels and restaurants catering to the people brought here by the beach. Talked over what I will be doing. The school day is long 8 -5:30, for teachers, but students have split shifts. Some come in the morning, others in afternoon. We visited the school, very nice, clean and well organized. I can tell they are very committed and treat this venture as a way of doing their part to improve education standards. Profit does not seem to be their main concern.

They took me to a market, bought some fruit and staples. The fruit tastes so good, the bananas are the short stubby kind, very good. Saw cashew fruit, bought some cashew juice, will see how it tastes. My apartment (not hotel), has most of the furnishings and utensils I need. It has 2 TVs, balcony facing the ocean, microwave, good size fridge, towels and bedding. The 7^th floor has a pool, exercise room and sauna, with a beautiful view of the area.

Weather here is sunshine with a breeze, 30 C. The ocean is calm looking with no white caps but the big breakers keep crashing in. So nice to have warm limbs, at home, my feet are ice cold with 2 pair of wool socks and my arms are cold to the elbow. Bare feet and sleeping with 1 cotton sheet. No mosquitos (spelling??), spotted, thinking they can’t take the wind.

This morning went to have a swim in the pool on the roof, beautiful view there. In the afternoon the ocean looked very nice with lots of people in the big waves, not drowning or being carried out to sea so I went to give it another try. The waves were big and breaking on the beach but it was lovely swimming about 10 meters out. Water like Port Hood in August, I stayed in about a half hour till I ran into a jelly fish. Didn’t hurt much but made me think bigger ones may be waiting out there as well so time to come in. Beach wear is doesn’t use much fabric. They all wear two piece suits, the young, old, fat and skinny. Speedos, tiny thongs, it’s the style and naked is just a few cm of fabric away!

Brazil, day 1

Friday January 28, 2011

Woke up Thursday to a cold house, time to call Bill Danburger, electronic wizard. Between he, Neil and Hughie they diagnosed the furnace problem. Neil drove me to Halifax in snow and slush, thank you so much. Nora and I were at the airport waiting on our delayed flights, she in the US departures and me in domestic. Made my Toronto connection and it was 10 hours to Sao Paulo (with some sleep). Missed that connection but got one for 3. Great flight but waited about 2 hours for driver who I’m guess was at international arrivals while I was at domestic. No internet connection, my phone wouldn’t work so I asked a fellow who called the school owner and the driver showed up. Then we were in rush hour traffic and huge traffic jam. Didn’t get to Macae till 10:30. Interesting driving habits. Every time my taxi driver cut someone off, they honked loudly, they had a hand signal exchange , stared at each other as were met again and again in traffic, and he would go right up behind them and leave on his brights. Did it on several different occasions and drivers. All through the traffic jam there are vendors selling drinks and snack to the people stuck there.

As we drove out of Rio we saw Sugarloaf and the huge statue of Christ.

The hotel/ apartment is awesome. Clean, bright , with internet access, spacious, large and with kitchen and balcony overlooking the beach. Beach is beautiful sand, can’t wait to get in the water. My employers dropped off some groceries to tide me over and are taking me out to lunch today.