Bugs, Samba and Pizza... Lots of Pizza!

Can't quite remember what I wrote last time, but anyway!

Last night we were thinking of going out but were so ridiculously tired (I blame the heat!) that most people went off to have a 'power nap' and no-one got up! However, Danni and I and the girl who has just joined us in our room called Chloe had a rather interesting experience with a massive bug! You probably had to be there, but there was a flipping huuuuuuuuge chicada like thing flying around our room, chucking itself and the light and generally being scary that we got rid of in an absolutely pathetically girly way which involved me wrapped up in my sheets and Danni running away and falling up the stairs because it flew at her! Very amusing afterwards, but pretty scary at the time! Who needs to go out to have an exciting night?!?

So after our lame early night, we decided to get up early and head to the 'hippy fair' near Ipanema beach. It's quite a treck to get to on the Metro and a Bus (we felt rather proud of our efforts there :-) ) but was definitely worht it! So much amazing stuff to buy - probably going to go back there in our last week in April to get souveniers without having to carry them through Peru etc.

Most of us just ended up buying clothes because later on in the afternoon we had been invited to join a nearby Samba school's practice for the main Carnival Parade. Problem was, we had to wear all green and white (they were very strict about that!) and so we had to do some shopping. I bought a tye-died dress which ended up looking like a tent, but never mind!!

The Samba practise was AMAZING once it started! We spent about 2 hours standing around being arranged into lines and then re-arranged into lines and moved backwards so more people could join! But eventually we got to dance through the main Sambodrome, which surprisingly was full of spectators! It was such a great afternoon. The main point was to learn the Samba song because the schools all get judged on all of their participants: how well we know the song, how much we smile and stay in lines etc. And the point of all this is:
WE ARE GOING TO BE IN AN OFFICIAL CARNIVAL PARADE IN COSTUMES!!!!!!!
Cannot wait for that! If today's rehearsal was so good then the real thing is going to be mind blowing!!

After all that dancing, and because it was Jo's birthday, we all went to the local restaurant just down the hill from our house. It's an incredibly place. Downstairs is a buffet where you take everything you want and weigh your plate and then pay by the kilo, and upstairs is a pizza buffet where you pay a set price (worked out at about 5 pounds) and get unlimited pizzas of every type you can imagine! Particular favourites were chips-on-pizza, banana-pizza, chocolate-and-strawberry-pizza, crab-and-chicken-pancakes, and the King of all pizzas: ice-cream-pizza!!!

Absolutely stuffed now and exhausted from all the Samba, so another early night I think so that we can get to Copacabana tomorrow morning and walk around the beach front to Ipanema.....

Chow xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx