Brazil!

Oh, Brazil. Home of the hotties with the bodies. That’s what I was expecting when I got there...tons of scantily clad models roaming the streets. Now after docking in Manaus, Brazil, reality set in. I had many expectations of Brazil, and many of them were broken, good and bad. But my time in Brazil was a unique experience, first of all because it was my first time on a different continent. Secondly, Brazil was the first country I’ve ever been to where I don’t know the language. And lastly, Brazil was our first big port on our voyage...

Sunday, January 23, 2011

I awoke that Sunday morning that we arrived in Brazil just in time to shower, get dressed, and grab a quick breakfast before heading to an SAS service visit with my friend Kelli. The trip was to the Monte Salem Orphanage, a facility that accommodates about 25 kids (ages 1 to 16) that were extracted from their homes by the government for various reasons. On our way out to the orphanage, we got our first look at the city of Manaus. As we passed bus stops, schools, and the local jail, our tour guide gave us a thorough history on the city of Manaus. He pointed out a newly renovated section of town along the river where people had once built their houses on stilts. To get people to relocate from the river, the government built and offered free housing for those living in the stilt houses, with some restrictions included of course.

Also, the tour guide was talking about some of the expectations and trends for woman in Brazil, and something he told us really stood out to me. He told us that the girls in Brazil begin having children at a very young age, even as young as 12 years old. Having a child (to them) is a right of passage of sorts. The girls have children to prove that they’re woman. The implications of this occurrence are too numerous to list.

But soon, we arrived at the Monte Salem Orphanage, and unloaded our group of 45 students and faculty to meet the kids and learn a little more about the facility. Admittedly, I guess I was expecting to be a little more affected by the conditions that the children were living in, but I was relieved that this wasn’t the case. The girls and the boys were separated in different rooms with bunk beds, and there was also a nursery for the smaller children. With a sitting area, kitchen, and community style bathrooms, the orphanage seemed very adequate, but of course they still have some needs to be met.

Following the tour, we got to play with the kids. It was tougher situation than I had anticipated because of the huge language barrier. All the kids spoke Portuguese, the primary language in Brazil. For those who knew a little Spanish it was still difficult, yet a little easier to communicate with Brazilians, but for a French speaker like me, I had to improvise. Things like a smile or a high five are pretty universal. Another thing that I learned is that little kids love to play with your camera. I don’t worry too much when they do...my camera is pretty durable, and the pictures they take are priceless. So that kept me pretty popular with the little ones. We didn’t stay for long, and soon we were heading back to the ship.

When Kelli and I got back from our trip, we decided to go explore the town a little bit. Soon it was clear to us that we didn’t have a single clue where to start, so we took a seat in an outdoor bar and shop area right on the waterfront and chatted with some other SASers as we tried some the local beers Brahma and Sko. Then we decided to brave the busy, crowded, and colorful streets of Manaus in search of food. Immediately I felt a little uneasy. It was just the atmosphere...I began to become hypersensitive to my surrounds. Maybe this reaction was just a result of all the talk of crime and theft in our pre-port meetings, but I held my purse tighter than usual in Manaus...payed more attention to the people around me. After all, it was just us two girls and it was apparent that we weren’t from Brazil. We managed to find a cozy little pizza place called Splash next to the Opera House. Ordering proved to be a little difficult, again because of the language barrier, but we successfully ordered a medium pepperoni pizza to share between the two of us. The pizza was very similar to the pizza we have in the states, except that it didn’t have any pizza sauce. It was still comforting though to taste a bit of home. We tried to order a slice of the dessert pizza but once again, the language barrier came into play. Instead of interpreting holding up two fingers and pointing to the dessert pizza we wanted as one slice for each of us, the waiter thought that we each wanted two slices...and these slices were not small. All we could do was say obrigado (the only Portuguese we knew that means ‘thank you’) and laugh it off. Luckily, our friend Mark Anthony had just come in with a local mother and son that he had been hanging out with all day, and we got to share our dessert with them.

As we were making our way back to the ship, we were met with a crowd of SAS people heading to Samba, what I later found out was some sort of street block party. So  I showered, changed, and joined part of the crowd heading to Samba. As soon as I stepped out of the cab I heard the rhythmic percussion of the huge Samba band and made my way up to see the Samba dancers in front of the band, who were all putting on this special performance just for us SASers. It was pretty cool to say the least. You couldn’t help but want to dance along with the rhythms the band was playing. After a little while they invited us to come and dance with them. I was dancing alongside some people that I had never met or really talked to before but it felt so natural. That moment was incredible...it was the kind of moment that is so unique to Semester at Sea  and one that I’ll never forget.

Monday, January 24, 2011

The next morning I had a trip into the Amazon Rainforest for a hike and then to the town of Presidente Figueiredo. It was about a 3 hour drive out to the rainforest, which meant nap time on the bus for me the whole way there. When we finally got there and off the bus, the heat immediately hit me. I had decided to suit up in long pants, long shirt, hiking boots, and a little too much bug spray and sunscreen because that’s what the medical team told us to do to make sure we didn’t get malaria. Apparently no one else got the message. Everyone else was wearing shorts and bathing suits and definitely not taking the safe route like I was. It’s like I was the Carlton in a big bunch of Fresh Princes’...awesome. I had to quickly get over my nerdiness and focus on the hike ahead of me.

The rainforest is unlike anything I’ve ever seen before. Everything is so lush and green. The trees are so tall that you can’t imagine where some of them end. The smell of the forest emanates from the plants, from the ground. The roots from the trees coil and twist on the forest floor like snakes. You can taste the humidity. It hangs in the air like an invisible fog. You can sense the wildlife that is present, yet keeping camouflaged from potential predators. It was beautiful.

The hike was not the easiest. It had probably rained recently because the ground was slick and it was tedious work trying to remain upright as we worked our way downhill towards a cave. When we got to the cave our tour guide told us that the Indigenous Indians used to hide in the cave when they needed to. After looking around for a little while we headed back to the bus. By that time I was pouring sweat and had conveniently left my water bottle on the bus. You can imagine how grateful I was to retrieve it, and also that I had conveniently brought a change of clothes with me. By the time we reached the Waterfall Reserve I was a new, refreshed woman.

The Waterfall Reserve was also cool to see. We didn’t spend a lot of time there but we did get to jump into the river at the bottom the Waterfall and swim around a bit. The water was a strange reddish-brown color and warm, but I high-tailed it out of there as soon as I thought I felt a fish brush up against my foot (I don’t do fish, especially if I can’t see them).

Next we stopped at a little restaurant in the town of Presidente Figueredo for lunch. The food was excellent, an array of different fish, chicken, rice and beans, and other traditional Brazilian dishes like fried plantains (yum!). Drink wise, they had Coke, Fanta (which tastes a lot different in Brazil), and this smoothie type drink that they made for us. For dessert we had candied figs and cream. The meal was delicious but as we were getting ready to leave, things got a little confusing. The waiters came around and started handing us bills for way more than we were expecting. Since we were on an SAS trip, we were only expecting to pay a few Reals for our drinks, but we were all getting charged extra for the dessert and the smoothie drink. I’d like to think that this error was solely caused by the language barrier, but this kind of thing happened a lot during my time in Brazil. Vendors and taxi drivers would try to take advantage of you if you didn’t speak their language. Eventually we got everything all sorted out and we finished out the day by doing a quick zip line.
When I got back to the ship I ate dinner with my friend Kayla, and then we played Monopoly Deal with some of our other friends before they had to leave for their Rio trip.

Side note: for those of you who play Monopoly Deal with me back at school, just know that I got my friends here all addicted to it too! :)

Tuesday, January 25, 2011

I had a pretty chill day that Tuesday. With Kayla in Rio and Kelli at her home stay, I made plans with Allie and Katie to walk around and explore Manaus a little more. Not really knowing where we wanted to go, we just headed in a random direction and hoped for the best. On our quest for adventure, a couple of police officers decided that it was best to escort us to wherever we were going. Apparently, the part of town that we were in wasn’t the safest. They ended up walking us to the Palacio Rio Branco, a museum of sorts that used to be where the president worked (judging from the broken English of our tour guide). The building was beautiful and I even got to sit in the President’s chair!

Next we walked around by the Opera House and walked into a local Catholic church. After that we stopped into some gifts shops before heading to the grocery store to stock up on snacks for the ship. Now I brought a sizable amount of snacks for the voyage, but by the time I hit Brazil my snack drawer had already depleted considerably. They had a some things that you find in America, like Pringles and Doritos, but besides that everything was pretty new. I settled on getting some chocolate and soft drinks. I didn’t buy a whole lot because everything seemed surprisingly overpriced. Later I found out that most people in Brazil buy everything on credit and pay it back later, they’ll put even the smallest items on their credit cards. All the prices were more expensive because you weren’t expected to pay the full price.

Before getting back on the ship, we stopped on the sidewalk to buy some bracelets from these two guys, Seidu and Robert. I was shocked that they spoke English so well. It turned out that the bracelet guys were from Ghana originally. They were really nice, and gave us some tips and stories about what to expect in Ghana. We thanked them and got back on the ship.

That night I had a moment of weakness. I was homesick, friendsick, and feeling like I hadn’t made very many friends on the voyage so far. I called my friend Beth Peak for encouragement and she was great to talk to, but it just made me want to go home even more. I was overwhelmed...and I had no plans for the night.

Things began to turn around though. A big group of people that stuck around in Manaus decided to rent a river boat to take us up and down the river that night. It didn’t sound like the best plans, but they were still plans. It actually ended up being pretty fun. I met a lot of people that I didn’t know before and we all just talked and danced the whole time. I realized a few things after my night on the river boat. First, I realized how much of a family Semester at Sea people are. We pick each other up, help each other out, and look out for each other, even though we might not know each other that well. I also realized that my insecurities about making friends were fallacious. I kept expecting people to not be friendly and welcoming towards me but of course that wasn’t the case at all. Time and time again that night I was able to connect with people that I hadn’t ever spoken to before. I love that.

I went to bed that night not feeling at all lonely.

Wednesday, January 26, 2011

The next day I made plans to go shopping again with Nicole and some other girls that I had met the night before on the river boat. I tried on my first Brazilian bikini and decided that I just don’t have the body for it. My booty is liscious and there was WAY to much showing in that bikini. But the Brazilian women I saw wearing them looked fantastic...naturally.

When I got back on the ship for lunch I met up with Kelli, who was on a quest to find a laundry mat. I joined in on her quest and we asked the reception desk where we could find the nearest one. Armed with a map and a general sense of where the laundry mat was, we got off the ship as confident as ever. Our confidence was only strengthened when we ran into a couple of guys who had just gotten back from the laundry mat that we were looking for. They even gave us a business card with the address of the place on it. But once we merged onto the street from the ship, reality set in again. We kept looking at the map for a reference but the thing about maps is that they are basically useless in Brazil. Brazilians, especially the ones in Manaus, do not use street signs. Most of them weren’t even labeled. We got lost. Like, really lost. And I kept trying to ask people directions by showing them the business card and then the map, but with someone who has zero Portuguese and even Spanish skills, my efforts were almost exclusively in vain. I must have asked at least 10 people for directions with no luck. At one point Kelli and I just stopped at the intersection, looked to the left and then the right, looked at the map, looked at each other...and we had to laugh. Just when we were about to give up and try to levitating to either the laundry mat or back to the ship, the voice of an angel made its way to our ears. It was a woman. Speaking English. In the middle of Manaus, Brazil where everyone speaks Portuguese. “Do you girls need some help?” she said. You should have seen the relief that swept over our faces. We wiped around and she was standing right behind us in some sort of nail salon. She had moved to Brazil at a young age from the States and has lived there ever since, which explains
how she know English and Portuguese. The woman was able to show us exactly where the laundry mat was (we were literally a block away from it), and we finally make it there to turn in Kelli’s laundry just minutes before it closed.

We noticed a cyber cafe a couple doors down from the laundry mat and decided that we wanted, no, NEEDED to get on Facebook. We spent at least an hour and a half surfing the web at the cafe and it only cost us one Real. We went up to pay at the counter and the guys working there wanted to talk to us. Not so easy when you don’t speak each others language. Not even Kelli’s intermediate Spanish was getting the job done. But one of the guys had this brilliant idea to pull up Google Translate and talk to us that way. They would type something in Portuguese and then hit the translate button to make it into English, and vice versa. It wasn’t perfect, but we were all so excited to have found a way to communicate with each other. We talked to them using Google Translate for over and hour. It wasn’t until we stepped outside that we noticed it was already dark outside. Crap. Then Kelli and I literally started heading in different directions from each other to where we thought the ship was. Double crap. So we were lost again in a sketchy part of Brazil. We needed another miracle to get us back. Well, God came through again. From across the street I head another angelic voice. “Miss, do you need help? Remember me from yesterday?” It was Seidu, the guy that had sold me a bracelet the day before. He knew exactly where to go to get back to the ship. Perfect! He was super nice and escorted us all the way back to the ship, and he said he would take us out again that night to experience some nightlife.

We actually had a really fun night. Seidu brought his friend Robert along, and Kelli and I had heard that there was another Samba performance so we decided to check it out. It turns out that walking to Samba took WAY longer than driving to Samba. It felt like we walked around for hours, but we had some really good conversation along the way. Seidu told me more about Ghana and how things were in Brazil. I learned so much about things that you wouldn’t from a tour guide, like expectations of women and observations about the gay community in Brazil. Finally we get to the place where Samba was held and their performance was over, but there were still SASers, locals, and street venders still hanging around. After a while I acquired a suitor for my affections. I didn’t catch his name but he was very interested in me. He kept calling me Beyonce (I could get used to that), and he played me Justin Beiber to impress me. Side note: Brazilians LOVE Justin Beiber. He’s everywhere. Printed on t-shirts, notebooks, underwear...Weird. Anywho, he knew very few words in English but he had the phrases “you’re so beautiful” and “I love you” down. After a while he asked for my hand in marriage and all of his friends came up to me to try to convince me that I should do it. It was very flattering but all good things must come to an end. We left the block party and headed to a local nightclub where a lot of the SAS kids went. Kelli and I danced and danced. After that we headed back to the ship and had a sleepover in my room. It was the perfect last night in port.

Thursday, January 27, 2011

The last day in Brazil was mostly spent running errands. Kelli and I returned to the laundry mat to pick up her clothes, and then we also returned to the cyber cafe to check Facebook again. While at the cyber cafe I happened to check my bank account balance and I noticed that someone must have stolen my debit card number and had stolen hundreds of dollars from my account. If you’re out of the country, this situation SUCKS! Not only do you have to cancel your debit card, but you have to make some pretty expensive international phone calls to do so. I ended up getting back on the ship and handling the situation and calming down because it was out of my hands. I wasn’t going to let some bad circumstances ruin my the rest of my voyage. I almost forgot all about it when I started seeing the friends that had come back from Rio on the ship again. I was so glad to see them and to continue our voyage on to the next country!