Ruby and I are in Brasil, and I don’t think that I will be able to find the words to even discribe it but ill try. We are in Trancoso a small town in the state of Bajia. We are staying with friends of ours at their huge house with 2 guest houses nestled at the end of a dirt road in the jungle. Sloths, monkeys, roosters, huge hairy spiders Oh my! The drive here was amazing, after our 24 hour trip to get here (thanks TAM airlines for forgetting to tell me at JFK that they had changed our flights causing a wild goose chace in Buenos Aires at 6:30am). When we arrived in Porto Seguro after travelling for about 20 hours, we still had to wait a couple of hours for our friends to pick us up and then another 2 hour drive to Trancoso. A hilly drive through Eucalyptus plantations (not the scrawny type you see in the US, but rows of huge trees about 7 stories high. It reminded me a bit of the backroads of texas where the side of the road you drive on here is optional. In town it is all dirt roads, and we arrived on Sunday where everything stops and the communal watching of the soccer game is an all-day event. Bars along the strip put their big screen TV’s outside and people say in chairs and on the sidewalk and stood in the street watching and yelling. Mimi and Mark’s house is amazing. It has huge open windows on all sides (no screens anywhere) and a tall roof. Their decore is antiques, Tibetan and Indian with some new-age thrown in there with all sorts of religious articles. The kitchen is big with hanging pots and everyone eats lunch (the biggest meal of the day) at a long wooden table next to big glass doors that open up to a view of the jungle. The warm air blows through the house despite it being humid. The chalet’s are cute and we feel at home right away despite a couple of Brasil usuals: a shower where the water is heated in a small water heater attached to where the water comes out, and a huge mosquito net we sleep under like we are princesses of the jungle.
Ruby and I have spent every day at the beach. Yes, that is all that you do here really which I can’t really complain about. We wake up when the sun gets a little hotter (no one has a watch here among us) and we go to the beach around what I would guess is around noon. The water is warm and the ocean is calm. The first day we park under some trees next to a guy they call Brama that sells cokes and beers and mixed vodka drinks and pineapples. Mark said it took him about 10 minutes to tell him his name, and he calls Mark Brama too. Aparently it is a name of a beer. If you aks him weather the tide is coming in or out, he will answer you later usually getting it wrong. It doesn’t seem to be important, and neither does his name or yours. The mentality here is possibly the polar oposite of New York’s uber-achiever mindset. Here you do not give times to show up specifically. You show up “later” or “tomorrow” which may mean the day after or the day after that. Its been nice to sleep in and wake up around 11 not knowing what time it is. Although the first couple of days adjusting to this whole way of thinking adds to the culture shock. Not only is everything unfamiliar, but it lacks the structure we cling to also. But it has been relaxing ultimately to let go of those little things like time and order for a week. As much as this does look like paradise here, the laid backness of it might drive me a little crazy.
The beach is amazing, lots of dark skinned Brazillian men riding on horses towing another horse giving rides to tourists. There are many tourists here, but not many Americans, its too long of a commute I guess. There is a club med here and they are building a Ritz-Carlton on the beach here soon. Most people hang out on the chairs and beds of a local restaurant drinking from coconuts from a bendy straw. The local Indians and hippies walk by trying to sell you cooked pastries and jewelry made from bone, feathers and seeds. We have learned to say “Nao Obrigarde” which means No thank you. Its been great to finally get some time with Ruby. Our lives have been so hectic and we have had a lot of great talks here.
Last night we walked to a house nearby where a band was rehearsing.. They play the local music for Bahia, lots of percussion and an amazingly seductive beat with an acordian and violin adding a Cuban flair. Mimi and Ruby went home as we had a small dinner party planned but I stayed on and watched as they all sung and swayed in this tiny dimply lit shack. The dinner was really great too, nice people a German and a Spaniard made us spanish tortillas and then played amazing Brazillian music for us on guitar and saxaphone. I went to sleep with the softest version of “the girl from impanema” going in my head.
We leave tonight and are off to the beach for one last time, and then to shop a bit in Porto Seguro before catching our 1am plane to Salvador and then to Sao Paolo. I can’t wait to get home, I miss Tom and Jack and Marlowe like crazy. But it was an amazing experience here, one I am sure we both won’t soon forget. Ill post some photos when i get home.
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