Week 4

Believe it or not (because I know I can't), as of Tuesday, I will have been here for four full weeks! They seriously just fly by; I don't think I've ever lived through a faster month in my entire life. I keep telling myself that this month just went by super quickly because it's the first month–but in reality, I'm pretty sure most of the next five months (not six anymore?!) are going to go just as quickly. February is going to be a month of solid activities: This Friday (or maybe Saturday), I'm planning to take a bus to Minas Gerais. One of the girls in the program with me has a friend there near (or in? not sure) Belo Horizonte, which is the capital of Minas. I'll be going with four or five other friends, and the friend in Minas is letting us stay in his apartment for free, which is awesome. We'll probably explore some cities over there, and I'm looking forward to seeing some of the national parks. After that, I return to Rio for the week or so of Carnaval on the 12th. I don't really have my plans solidified yet (but I don't really need to, as something will be going on somewhere 24 hours a day for that week). THEN (yep, there's more), after Carnaval I think I am going to be taking my bigger trip, which is going to be down to the Foz do Iguaçu. We will probably bus down there too, since it's cheaper, and we have a little more time (about a week and a half in between Carnaval and school starting up again). After Iguaçu, we're thinking about trying to get to the Pantanal, but that may be overly ambitious. And actually, all of these things are overly ambitious for me right now, seeing as my financial aid check has still not arrived, so I can't buy tickets (bus or airplane or otherwise). But that should happen soon, I hope.

March will probably go by pretty quick, being the first month of real classes at PUC. And April will probably go by quick, having my birthday, having Erica visit, and going to Minas again with the University of California students (they pay for us to have a weekend trip there, in Ouro Preto). So I guess if there's going to be a slow month, it will be May…but to be honest, I think that every month is just gonna slip through my fingers.

I should probably have already blogged this week, because I am having a hard time remembering everything I did! I wanted to devote a whole post to the awesome (read: terrible) day I had on Thursday, registering with the Federal Police. But I also wanted to devote a whole post to what I did yesterday! And I still have homework to do for tomorrow! What a dilemma! Not really, but I swear that these things are worth writing about…I guess I'll just do my best and then round out the post with some pictures, which I know are always crowd-pleasers.

So Thursday was the day I had to go to the international airport to register with the Federal Police. Brazilians are definitely all about bureaucracy. The Federal Police registration is mandatory for anyone visiting Brazil for over a month; if you don't register within thirty days of arrival, you end up paying a fee for every day you were illegally in Brazil. But they don't make it easy for you to register! Each day, the police only accept 60 people to register with them. Maybe this wouldn't be such a hassle at another time of year, but right now, lots of foreigners are arriving with the intention of staying through February for Carnaval, etc. and so 60 people a day is not very much. One group of international students in my program went on Monday and actually got there too late, and had to return on Tuesday. This might not seem so bad, but keep in mind that they left the university at 7 AM on Monday, and since that wasn't early enough, every subsequent group had to leave at 6 AM. For me, that meant getting up at 5 AM on Thursday. It was remarkably easy to get up, and I got to see another one of those giant hummingbirds (Swallow-Tailed Hummingbird) perched on the fence outside my building. The rest of the day was a lot less satisfying. We got to the airport before 7 and had to wait around for them to open the doors to the office; then we we got in, we had to wait to get in line to take numbers. Then, we finally had our numbers, and we had to wait for them to be called. The actual process of granting the registration is REALLY SIMPLE. They look at your visa, your passport, and this other form you have to fill out, and then they stamp some stuff and you're done. But for some reason, it isn't that easy for some people. So we ended up being there until about 4 PM. It was basically like being at the DMV. I haven't decided which one I hate more.

Yesterday, I got to go on a "boat tour" of the Guanabara Bay (which is the bay that Rio is next to). It was essentially just a party boat cruise all afternoon, though: open bar (sponsored by the University of California?), a DJ, barbecue, and swimming. We were meant to go meet at PUC in order to take a tour bus from there to the Marina da Gloria, where we were getting on the boat. I had a sneaking suspicion that I was going to have to be going in circles, because so far, most of the times I've had to meet at PUC, the bus or whatever that takes us to our end destination passes Laranjeiras. But I got up and waited for the bus to go to PUC anyway, instead of asking about where the Marina was. This proved to be a mistake. First of all, I really don't understand the buses here. You have to flag them down, first of all, which seems easy, except that they don't always stop for you. This happened yesterday. Then, they seem to have no set schedule. For example, the bus I take to school will sometimes come like, three in 15 minutes, and sometimes have gaps of about 40 minutes. This is just like the 51 in Berkeley, so it isn't like it's something unheard of, but it's still really annoying and it makes it hard for me to ever be on time or predict when I'll get somewhere. So this basically happened yesterday, and even though I got up around 10 in the morning, and even though Laranjeiras is at most about 30 minutes away from school on the bus, I still didn't get to PUC until about 12:20. Thomas called me and told me that they were going to leave without me, so when I jumped off the bus I ran the rest of the way. Which sucked. Please imagine running in dumb rubber flip flops up hill in 90 degree heat. Yep. So then, we finally get going. And lo and behold, we are taking the route my bus takes for me to get home; however, I figured we would just pass the exit to my road. I figured wrong. We didn't just go back in the direction I had just come from, we actually went RIGHT BY THE BUS STOP THAT I HAD WAITED AT FOR 40 MINUTES. I was remarkably un-upset, because it had sort of been a stressful time getting there. But I definitely whined and complained about it to everyone who'd listen, including the directors of the program and the UC study center director. Haha. Oh well. I deserved to get to complain a little.

It was definitely worth the annoying driving around in circles, in the end. The boat trip was awesome. I saw dolphins, crazy fish jumping out of the water, a lot of cool sea birds, I think I saw a sea turtle, and we got to go swimming in the ocean. Major downside though? Major seasickness. I have never gotten seasick (or motion sick at all!) in my whole life, but yesterday I guess all my complaining about the bus gave me some bad karma or something. After going swimming for a little bit, I climbed back in the boat, and just felt like I wanted to die. I tried to just wait for the feeling to pass for about 30 minutes, but in the end, there was really only one solution: Chamar Raoul. "Chamar Raoul" is the phrase Brazilians use to say vomit. It literally means "to call out Raoul." The thinking behind this is that when you vomit, the noise you make sounds like the name Raoul, roughly pronounced in Portuguese "Khaa-ooow." So I threw up (in a trashcan, though, because I'm a considerate person and didn't want to ruin the swimming for everyone). The CCCI director got to witness my awesome display, and then she teased me a little bit because, just as whenever I vomit otherwise, this outburst was LOUD. But karma got her too, because a while later she threw up off the side of the boat. So ha. After throwing up I felt much better, albeit embarrassed, but other people ended up getting seasick too, so I don't feel too bad. The rest of the boat ride was great; everyone else was drinking a lot, so they were all really fun to be around, dancing and whatnot. We went under the bridge that goes between Niteroi and Rio, and I got to see awesome views of both cities, including of the MAC (the Contemporary Art Museum in Niteroi that looks like a flying saucer). I was planning on visiting Niteroi today, actually, but didn't end up going. Soon enough!

One last thing before I post a few pictures: I got a haircut here! It was 17 reais for a haircut and a shampoo (which is about nine USD right now, thanks to the ever improving exchange rate), and it also came with a little cup of coffee. It's not my favorite haircut I've ever had, but I also survived the barrier of not really being able to tell the barber how I wanted my hair to look. I ended up telling him (in Portuguese) that I wanted it to be medium length, and more Brazilian looking; to be real, anything is more Brazilian looking than the hairstyle I had before, so whatever. Anyway, I will probably go back to that place, it was full of friendly people and I came out satisfied! Good job, Brazil.

I still have to read a story and write a mini essay about it, and I wanted to get to bed within the next hour and a half, so I am going to close the post with some pictures now! Até mais!

The one on the right is the boat we took!

This is...some fort or something. Haha.

This is a view of Niteroi, with the MAC on the left.

This is a view of Rio. The point thing just right of center is the Corcovado, and if you squint you might be able to see Cristo Redentor. The kind of flat rectangular mountain in the middle is the Pedro da Gávea.

I don't know what this is, but it looks so Brazilian.

Niteroi

Niteroi and the MAC again.