Super long Travel Entry: Rio
I thought i should make an attempt to record my memories while they are still fresh in my mind
November 1st
Took the crazy flight on LAN Chile of Sydney, Aukland, Santiago Chile, Rio de Janiro Brazil. The service on the flight was pretty crappy, espcially at night, with some very rude flight attendents. It was pretty strange flying into Aukland having all the announcments in both Spanish and English (a sign of things to come). Watched so many crappy movies on the flight, the worst being the Devils wear Prada and My Super ex girlfriend (i refused to watch Mission Impossible 3, cause of Tom Cruise, and John Tucker Must Die, cause it looked so stupid. On the flight to Aukland i sat next to an Argentian guy, who had a guitar case with him. I asked him if he was a pop singer over there but he just said it was a gift for his child. It turned out he was flying from Beijing to Buenos Aires! (and i thought i had a long flight!).
On the flight from Santiago to Rio i sat next to a Brazilian lady who lives in Sydney who was taking her little baby over to see her relatives. The baby was so cute and slept in the seat between us the whole flight. She told me "You will love Brazil, it is crazy".
Arrived to the relative chaos of Rio airport at about 6pm (on the same day i left sydney at 7am...but not...so confused). The highlight was carefully filling in all the customs forms to just be waved through by some guy who didn't check anyones bags (and barely looked at anyones forms).
I was grateful that my hotel transfer turned up cause the taxis looked pretty insane. Rio looked like an intiminating place as we drove through the night towards Copocabana, with really heavy traffic, police with submachine guns and amazing grafiti over just about everything. Checked into the hotel and realised i had no local currency so decided to go find an ATM. Little did i know that in Brazil there are local Atms and International Atms. The first three banks i tried were all local, meaning that i got messages such as "Your card is invalid, Your card is experied ,This bank doesnt suppourt your card". This lead me to freak out so bad, thinking i would have no access to any money the whole time i was in South America (apart from about 100 US i had on me).
In desepration i went to an Internet Cafe to try and work out where i could acess some money from. After trying to talk to the people in the store (not many people speak english in Brazil, or they hate talking to tourists) and ask them how much the internet cost in US dollars, they pointed me in the direction of lanky Irish guy. "Follow me to the supermarket, those ATMS are pretty good" he said. After nervously putting my pin in i was so excited to actually hold some Brazilian Real in my hands. I think i almost kissed nasty nasty notes, just cause i was so overjoyed i wouldnt die of hunger. After all this i was pretty exhausted and went back to the hotel to sleep.
November 2nd
Woke up in the Hotel Santa Clara and had a shower. The light switch for the bathroom was actually inside the shower cubicle, so i got an electric shock twice ouchhhhhhhh. After breakfast i went and booked a city tour and a trip to the football that night, then strolled down to Copocabana beach. The day was pretty grey and cold but i still went for a swim anyway. Overall Copocabana wasn't great, it was just pretty touristy with lots of highrise hotels, people selling you stuff on the beach and lots of pasty looking tourists. Overall i would say its pretty overated and has nothing on other beaches in Brazil.
For lunch i went to one of the many resteraunts in Brazil were you pay for how much you eat in weight. Best idea ever! I ate so much steak, chicken, rice and the delicious black beans that are served with nearly everything in Brazil.
After this i took a city tour on a big bus filled with tourists from just about everywhere. I sat next to a girl from Chile who was on school hollidays with her family. There was also some really dodgy looking guy from Australia who i tried to avoid (he looked really weird). First we went to see a spot were Carnival is held, basically a big road with stadium seating on either side. Also saw some carnival clothing which you could try on for a fee and everyone went photo crazy (especially the japanese tourists). After driving along some steep mountain roads and having a look at some slum areas we reached the massive Christ the Redeemer statue. I couldnt believe how massive it was! I got some great photos of the view across Rio, an amazing site.
The bus trip back was really slow and i was worried i would miss the bus for the football. For some reason the bus dropped me off about 4 blocks from my hotel so i had to sprint back. However the bus hadnt left yet so i just sat around for a while. I met up with Gab and Dana (from London/Melbourne and Adelaide) two girls who were on my Gap tour and were also going to the soccer. On the bus we also met two guys from LA who i just annoyed with my knowledge of California music/tv shows/sport teams.
We arrived at Macarana stadium and tried not to lose our tour leader while he got us our tickets. It was raining pretty hard so Gab chased a ponco seller down the street for some lovely gold poncos (which i still have unopened and unused). This stadium is the biggest in the world and once held 200,000 people. However now everyone has to have a seat so i think it was reduced to around 138,000 so still massive. I bought some hotdogs and beer and took my seat (although it didnt really matter, as guys constantly walk around selling you anything you want). The atmosphere was fantastic as the home team Botafogo took on the favourites Internacional. Even before the game the crowd was chanting, yelling stuff and generally going nuts. It was a hard fought game with international winning a penalty kick with 2 minutes to go and converting (echos of Italy vs Australia). The fans got really angry, especially when the coach tried to attack the refs. Flares and cans were thrown on the ground and a chant went up that i can only guess was "refs a wanker nah nah nah nah nah". Our tour guide told us it was time to leave so we waited outside the stadium as riot police ran in with shield and truncons. I lost my 10 real bet as i said Internacional would win 2-0 (so close!). Went home to sleep.
November 3rd
Arrival day of our trip. I met my room mate Robert (of course they had to put us together!) from LA. He was a really cool guy who owned his own company repairing laptops and had an Ipod through of awesome music (good as i hadnt brought anything to listen to). We walked around for a bit while he changed some money until i took the Metro train to downtown Rio. Prohably the dumbest thing i had done on the trip, i walked around snapping pictures in what is ment to be one of the most dangerous places in Brazil. After taking one photo of a government building a woman ran up to me and said "No No No!". I thought mabye i wasnt allowed to take photos of this area and put my camera away. "Asaulto, Asaulto" she said, and mimed the action of someone (me) getting stabbed, shot and basically fucked up. Not the best impression of a city you want. I continued walking around looking at the historic buildings and ended up at the national musuem (which was in a totally dodgy area of town). Like most museums i visited in South America it was filled with guns, swords and massive war paintings (really impressive).
Later i wandered around Copocabana again, taking in the atmosphere of the streets. That night we met our tour leader Monica, tour leader in training Christina and all our fellow travellers. Turns out i was the youngest on the trip, but most of our group were in their mid to late 20's. Heard about all the highlights of the trip and followed it up with group dinner.
Following this me, Rob, Dana, Gab, Monica, Christina and a guy who worked at the hotel all went to Lapa, the party hot spot of Rio. I was introduced to the killer brazilian cocktail caprihina (spelling?). Its basically local vodka called firewater, crushed lime, sugar and ice. The are sweet and go down really easily and after one or two you really feel it. I can't remember how many i had that night but we all danced up a storm (to great latin music and western club/pop) and had a great time. Stumbled back home in taxi's.
To be continued
November 1st
Took the crazy flight on LAN Chile of Sydney, Aukland, Santiago Chile, Rio de Janiro Brazil. The service on the flight was pretty crappy, espcially at night, with some very rude flight attendents. It was pretty strange flying into Aukland having all the announcments in both Spanish and English (a sign of things to come). Watched so many crappy movies on the flight, the worst being the Devils wear Prada and My Super ex girlfriend (i refused to watch Mission Impossible 3, cause of Tom Cruise, and John Tucker Must Die, cause it looked so stupid. On the flight to Aukland i sat next to an Argentian guy, who had a guitar case with him. I asked him if he was a pop singer over there but he just said it was a gift for his child. It turned out he was flying from Beijing to Buenos Aires! (and i thought i had a long flight!).
On the flight from Santiago to Rio i sat next to a Brazilian lady who lives in Sydney who was taking her little baby over to see her relatives. The baby was so cute and slept in the seat between us the whole flight. She told me "You will love Brazil, it is crazy".
Arrived to the relative chaos of Rio airport at about 6pm (on the same day i left sydney at 7am...but not...so confused). The highlight was carefully filling in all the customs forms to just be waved through by some guy who didn't check anyones bags (and barely looked at anyones forms).
I was grateful that my hotel transfer turned up cause the taxis looked pretty insane. Rio looked like an intiminating place as we drove through the night towards Copocabana, with really heavy traffic, police with submachine guns and amazing grafiti over just about everything. Checked into the hotel and realised i had no local currency so decided to go find an ATM. Little did i know that in Brazil there are local Atms and International Atms. The first three banks i tried were all local, meaning that i got messages such as "Your card is invalid, Your card is experied ,This bank doesnt suppourt your card". This lead me to freak out so bad, thinking i would have no access to any money the whole time i was in South America (apart from about 100 US i had on me).
In desepration i went to an Internet Cafe to try and work out where i could acess some money from. After trying to talk to the people in the store (not many people speak english in Brazil, or they hate talking to tourists) and ask them how much the internet cost in US dollars, they pointed me in the direction of lanky Irish guy. "Follow me to the supermarket, those ATMS are pretty good" he said. After nervously putting my pin in i was so excited to actually hold some Brazilian Real in my hands. I think i almost kissed nasty nasty notes, just cause i was so overjoyed i wouldnt die of hunger. After all this i was pretty exhausted and went back to the hotel to sleep.
November 2nd
Woke up in the Hotel Santa Clara and had a shower. The light switch for the bathroom was actually inside the shower cubicle, so i got an electric shock twice ouchhhhhhhh. After breakfast i went and booked a city tour and a trip to the football that night, then strolled down to Copocabana beach. The day was pretty grey and cold but i still went for a swim anyway. Overall Copocabana wasn't great, it was just pretty touristy with lots of highrise hotels, people selling you stuff on the beach and lots of pasty looking tourists. Overall i would say its pretty overated and has nothing on other beaches in Brazil.
For lunch i went to one of the many resteraunts in Brazil were you pay for how much you eat in weight. Best idea ever! I ate so much steak, chicken, rice and the delicious black beans that are served with nearly everything in Brazil.
After this i took a city tour on a big bus filled with tourists from just about everywhere. I sat next to a girl from Chile who was on school hollidays with her family. There was also some really dodgy looking guy from Australia who i tried to avoid (he looked really weird). First we went to see a spot were Carnival is held, basically a big road with stadium seating on either side. Also saw some carnival clothing which you could try on for a fee and everyone went photo crazy (especially the japanese tourists). After driving along some steep mountain roads and having a look at some slum areas we reached the massive Christ the Redeemer statue. I couldnt believe how massive it was! I got some great photos of the view across Rio, an amazing site.
The bus trip back was really slow and i was worried i would miss the bus for the football. For some reason the bus dropped me off about 4 blocks from my hotel so i had to sprint back. However the bus hadnt left yet so i just sat around for a while. I met up with Gab and Dana (from London/Melbourne and Adelaide) two girls who were on my Gap tour and were also going to the soccer. On the bus we also met two guys from LA who i just annoyed with my knowledge of California music/tv shows/sport teams.
We arrived at Macarana stadium and tried not to lose our tour leader while he got us our tickets. It was raining pretty hard so Gab chased a ponco seller down the street for some lovely gold poncos (which i still have unopened and unused). This stadium is the biggest in the world and once held 200,000 people. However now everyone has to have a seat so i think it was reduced to around 138,000 so still massive. I bought some hotdogs and beer and took my seat (although it didnt really matter, as guys constantly walk around selling you anything you want). The atmosphere was fantastic as the home team Botafogo took on the favourites Internacional. Even before the game the crowd was chanting, yelling stuff and generally going nuts. It was a hard fought game with international winning a penalty kick with 2 minutes to go and converting (echos of Italy vs Australia). The fans got really angry, especially when the coach tried to attack the refs. Flares and cans were thrown on the ground and a chant went up that i can only guess was "refs a wanker nah nah nah nah nah". Our tour guide told us it was time to leave so we waited outside the stadium as riot police ran in with shield and truncons. I lost my 10 real bet as i said Internacional would win 2-0 (so close!). Went home to sleep.
November 3rd
Arrival day of our trip. I met my room mate Robert (of course they had to put us together!) from LA. He was a really cool guy who owned his own company repairing laptops and had an Ipod through of awesome music (good as i hadnt brought anything to listen to). We walked around for a bit while he changed some money until i took the Metro train to downtown Rio. Prohably the dumbest thing i had done on the trip, i walked around snapping pictures in what is ment to be one of the most dangerous places in Brazil. After taking one photo of a government building a woman ran up to me and said "No No No!". I thought mabye i wasnt allowed to take photos of this area and put my camera away. "Asaulto, Asaulto" she said, and mimed the action of someone (me) getting stabbed, shot and basically fucked up. Not the best impression of a city you want. I continued walking around looking at the historic buildings and ended up at the national musuem (which was in a totally dodgy area of town). Like most museums i visited in South America it was filled with guns, swords and massive war paintings (really impressive).
Later i wandered around Copocabana again, taking in the atmosphere of the streets. That night we met our tour leader Monica, tour leader in training Christina and all our fellow travellers. Turns out i was the youngest on the trip, but most of our group were in their mid to late 20's. Heard about all the highlights of the trip and followed it up with group dinner.
Following this me, Rob, Dana, Gab, Monica, Christina and a guy who worked at the hotel all went to Lapa, the party hot spot of Rio. I was introduced to the killer brazilian cocktail caprihina (spelling?). Its basically local vodka called firewater, crushed lime, sugar and ice. The are sweet and go down really easily and after one or two you really feel it. I can't remember how many i had that night but we all danced up a storm (to great latin music and western club/pop) and had a great time. Stumbled back home in taxi's.
To be continued