The Weekend and More...

I've done it again, left it far too long between blog entries... sigh!

Danni and I didn't go out on Friday night in the end. The bites on her leg were really playing up: about 6 of them swelled up and filled with puss to the point where it hurt to walk, so she had an excuse to stay in bed. Myself, I was just tired!!

On Saturday we went to Ipanema beach again. It was just myself and Danni, but we managed to bump into Becky there (she used to be living in our house but her project finished so she's been out in a hostel for the past week. Although we still see her nearly every day, she even comes up to the house - maybe just to use our internet...! - which is ace). It was a lovely day, I had the nicest swim in the sea I've ever had - that is, until I realised I'd gone in with my new watch and broken it :( such a fool! But it hasn't been so bad. I'm determined to go for a while without a watch cos I'm usually so anal about knowing the time: it should be good for me! I've gone 4 days so far and I'm not going totally insane so that's ok!!

Whilst on the beach we met some really cool guys. Unfortunately they were only in Rio for a couple of days each, but they were staying at the Mellow Yellow hostel in Copacabana and they invited us there for a few drinks before we took them to Lapa (so weird how we are now the ones in the know and they relied on us to show them where was good.. pressure much!). Their hostel was pretty cool, except the bar was up about 6 flights of stairs and it had a bit of an 18-25s Mediterranean holiday feel about it - there were some girls there doing a 'sexy dance'class which was a bit cringey! Anyway, we didn't join in with that. We played a fun drinking game instead. Very smilar to the one where you count up to 10 in a group and can't speak over someone else, but you had to stand up as you counted and drink (obviously!) if you lost or if you were the last to go. Much amusement! The 'hostel drink'there was lush as well. It was called a Mellow Yellow and was actually a nice cocktail involving cashaca, unlike Caparinhas!!

From there we went to Lapa where we met up with lots of people from our house (including some of the newbies having their first night out in Rio!) and the beautiful boys as mentioned before! We just hung around chatting for ages near the Arcos and eventually decided to go into a club. At first, I thought it was really lame. The music was all Portuguese classics from the 70s and 80s, but it was all sort of laid back Samba. By the end of the night everyone was partner dancing and it was a really great atmosphere. When I got tired I just ended up sitting on a bench at the side smiling at everyone else having such a good time.

We left at about 6.30am by which point Danni had had a rather hilarious rant at some poor unsuspecting Brazilian man. Well, he wasn't 'poor' actually, he was really annoying and wouldn't leave us alone and it seemed like he enjoyed Danni's explosions as he kept clapping along and sort of chanting with her... interesting stuff!!

Ipanema beach again on Sunday. This time we avoided the Hippy Market as we do the same thing every week - wonder around wanting everything but never having quite enough money and always being aware of the budget (or slight lack of!). It was rather interesting on the beach as I bumped into a couple of guys I'd met in various clubs over the last few weeks... Got told I was very cute because of my English accent whilst speaking Portuguese, the fact that I'm 19, and the fact that I live with my parents. Well hundreds of people here live with their parents for years and years, so I don't know what they were talking about dammit!

On Sunday evening we attempted going to Santa Theresa AGAIN!! This time we got as far as going down the hill to the square and waiting for a Kombi. Unfortunately, when the Kombi came we decided it was too late as the live music finishes quite early so we vowed to go next week and Danni, Becky and I ended up at a little bar in town which was quite nice anyway!!

We did manage to make it to Santa Theresa on Monday though! *cheers* we started off by meeting Becky in the morning and going with her to her project. She works up in the favela near Santa Theresa. It is a whole lot nicer than our one out in the country. It's difficult to identify exactly why it was nicer - the road was concreted so that was an obvious difference, but it had a lot narrower streets than ours. Still, it most definitely has more money and probably the volunteer work going on there helps create a cheerful atmosphere - it was like i-to-i central! There were hundreds of volunteers and ex-volunteers there painting. It's quite funny because the drug lords who rule there have allowed them to paint, so long as they only do big blocks of colour: not one house red, one blue etc. This is so that if there is a police raid it will be more difficult for the policemen to identify which house the drug traders are hidden in because the whole street is blue or salmon or whatever. That's just the way it is!!

From the favela we walked up the hill and eventually hopped on a tram. They are funny little things! Very narrow but very tall so they look pretty precarious on the roads! We had a great time just hanging off the sides (free that way, never mind paying 60 cents to sit down!). It was actually like being an excited little kid again, and Danni got even more excited when one of the beautiful bohemian types got on!! We had forgotten to take a Lonely Planet book, so we ended up just hopping on and off the trams wherever we saw a nice spot. We had a beer overlooking a favela on the opposite hill - we go past it on the train every morning, it has an incrediblely high road winding up the hill on huge stilts. We also found quite a few gift shops which were very nice.

The tram from Santa Theresa goes back into the main town via the Arcos de Lapa - the old aqueduct, with great views of the new city blocks surrounding the weird concrete cone of the cathedral. From there we walked into Uruguaiana, and (alas!) ended up at the Columbo Cafe again! Third time in three weeks, woopsy! But once we realised where we were there was no way we could resist it and walk past! After that little indulgence we also indulged in a bit of shopping around the area (just window shopping though due to lack of money!). However, once we got back to our neighbourhood, we stumbled across 2 amazing vintage shops!! One of them was just like a mahoosive jumble sale. I picked up a really cute smock-style dress for $3 and a pair of shiney gold heels in almost perfect condition for only $10. Very impractical, but never mind!! They'll look great on the Inca Trail...

We've just been at project for the last few days. We've had far fewer kids because of the schools going back and it being so close to Carnaval so we've stopped doing the afternoon sessions (a very welcome decision as no kids ever turned up and we just wasted time getting hot and tired there!). However, we have decided to hang around every day and have lunch there. Not sure if I've written about it before, but there's a fantastic 'restaurant' (just a jolly old man who loves having gringos in his house and his wife!). For just $5 you get as much rice and beans as you can eat, plus salad, plus a different choice of meat everyday. It is absolutely lush! Danni and I have taken to eating as much as possible at lunch times because we have so little food here at the house and there's not much point in buying more because we are leaving here on Friday. Good stuff - it's almost worth the bus and tram fare to get there just to have such a fantastic meal!

Last night we made our 2nd (or possibly 3rd) attempt at finding the Clan Cafe. It's in the Lonely Planet and it sounds like it would be great: live jazz and various other types of music every night. This time, we took a taxi but the driver swore he had never heard of it and that there were no bars in the area. We took his word because he lives there, and so set out to find somewhere else to wile away the evening. We started off in a bar, but ended up retiring to the juice bar next door (until 10.30pm, wild or what!) But that was also lush (need to enhance adjective vocabulary!). I had Açai - apparently a super fruit, but very very Very tasty!! Danni also had a Frappucino which was heavenly. We are already planning our next trip there...!!

That's just about all to write for now. Project is going well at the moment. We just found out that it is going to get sponsored hugely starting very soon. Some guys turned up (we thought they were just going to do one theatre class), but they've said they'll fund a teacher a day for the kids to learn Ballet, Capoeira, Theatre, Modern Dance, and Circus. It's going to be great! When we get back to Rio in April we will definitely go back to visit to see the classes in full swing! Also found out that Olivia's managed to find some of her friends to sponsor 3 of the older guys through university which is absolutely fantastic as otherwise they wouldn't have stood a chance of going! They want to do Medicine, Law and Architecture and have apparently planned that when they graduate they will move into an appartment with Olivia in Copacabana and be god-fathers to all her children and they'll eat out every night and go to clubs.... It's just incredible what this project can do for them all and it feels great to be a part of it, no matter how small! We are doing the Carnaval party on Friday so have spent the last 2 days making lanterns out of yoghurt pots and masks covered in sequins and feathers! Should be good...

Off to bed now. We've just done our first round of packing tonight - very sad! It really does feel like home here, especially in this house. However, we are meeting Michel and Gabi (long convoluted 'friend of a friend' type story) tomorrow before we move in on Friday. Pretty weird seeing as they won't actually be in the house the whole time we're there! They're happy to leave us in the capable hands of their friend Miguel... should be excellent! Especially as the house is in Copacabana. Not looking forward to the Metro with our luggage though... our first taste of proper back packing!!

Boa noite xxxxxxx