June 28, 2006
Well, my adventures abroad are about to come to a close. I'm at the airport about to head to NYC, after one final meal of what I can only assume will be a large plate of meat.
Some highlights from the final week:
We took a full day boat tour (and by boat I mean raft), on which all 12 people from my group were crammed, with this small, crazy man leading us. This guy would "offer" us Caipirinhas (a Brazilian stiff drink) ever 4 minutes or so...and by offer I mean scream "CAIPIRINHA CAIPIRINHA CAIPIRINHA!!!!" like a madman, starting at 10:00 am and continuing straight through to 4:30 pm. He would literally run to the back of the "boat" waving his arms in the air and yelling for us to take drinks every few minutes, which was odd because they were free, and as such he had no vested interest in getting us hammered. He LOVED to give us drinks, but to such a ridiculous extent I don't even know what to make of it. Even if you had two full drinks in your hand he would try to get you to take a third. It's weird how people always drink on boats, because, let's face it, it's a danger. Speaking of dangers, my group has taken to yelling "STRANGER DANGER!" whenever we encounter someone not with our group. Which is often, seeing as we are out in public.
What else. My friend Shauna reminded me that I am lucky to have received my rabies vaccine when I did, because a fear of water is one of the symptoms of rabies (and, as noted previously, I have been surrounded by water from all sides for days). The other symptom of rabies is insanity and imminent death, so besides the water thing there were other good reasons for the shots.
I just saw a dead dog floating in the ocean. You don't see that everyday.
Adrian, the giant who eats what I eat, has been having a field day with the Brazilian ladies, despite the very clear language barrier. The other night he invited a woman who works at our hotel to dinner, and she came, although I can't imagine how this was enjoyable for her. She spoke no English, the 12 of us speak no Portuguese. Our guide, Monica, speaks fluent Portuguese but for some reason wouldn't go sit near this poor girl, despite my urging. And the language of love only goes so far at a dinner table. This was the most awkward first date ever. Periodically one of the teenage girls would make a funny face and we would all laugh together, just to include this random woman, but that was about it. Oh, and everyone was blatantly talking about this girl across the table, since she couldn't understand (which, I realize, is still rude). Adrian was trying to decide if he should put his hand on her leg, or if that would get him slapped, and we were all weighing in on this decision with her just sitting there. (He went for the leg, avoided a slap, and ended up going home with her, so all's well that ends well). Actually, the night after this awkwardness the woman came to dinner with us again, but this time Adrian was armed with a Portuguese phrase book. I was sitting at a small table with Adrian and his lover. The Brazilian lover kept finding dirty phrases right in the middle of dinner and reading them to Adrian, which might have been enough to make some lose their appetite, but, let's face it, it takes a lot more than that to put me off a meal.
Last night, on the final night with my group, Monica decided to lead us 40 minutes out of the city to what can only be described as Prostitute Row, to a bar that was closed, but was luckily on a street lined with drunks and pimps. I can't imagine why this location was chosen as our final farewell spot, considering our hotel was in a nice, central location, right by Copacabana. Monica apparently wanted to put the "adventure" back into GAP Adventures.
Today I went with lots of the Brits to see that huge Christ statue on top of the mountain in Rio (I'm sure I could provide more information on this, but have not looked at a guidebook since my arrival in South America). Anyway, all trip the Brits have noted the American reputation for being, shall we say, unpleasant travellers. I was just making some headway with them (occasionally they would even chant USA! USA! as a group)....And then today we took a train to see the enormous Christ statue with a ton of high school kids from a Tennessee church group, and I think we (Americans) took a real hit. The whole church group kept throwing their hands up in the air and screaming, as if we were on a roller coaster rather than a slow, scenic train. Ahh, our countrymen, inspiring awe worldwide.
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