| Brasil (Part
2) by Little Wonder
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Dear readers, you must forgive my egocentric approach to
Brazil and my on going rambling! I never gave you a proper introduction to
my heartwarming little Brazilian family, so without further ado I give you a
short intro to all my friends there before I continue my journey through the
heart of Brazil. J - my soul mate who carries her heart on her sleeve C - my soul searching, over analyzing, over exercising, over (healthy) eating wonder M - amazingly strong individual with a great charisma P - the world revolves around him, love his brutal honesty and dedication. There is no real world to describe him - his name should be a term in the dictionary! T- my little sister who is capable of anything she sets her mind to, love her life philosophies she lives by - we could all learn so much from her! V - she is my little aloof flower who's still trying to find the best climate for her survival; I hope she finds her path soon D - we never talked much as language was a huge barrier but we found ways of communicating through her immense kindness and inner warmth. And all the others I met and got to know (whom I didn't mention here, that have been part of this amazingly remarkable experience I will never forget. Ok ok, I sound like Gwyneth Paltrow at the Oscars, tears rolling down my cheeks so I won't go on, but I will go on with the story if you don't mind! I opened my eyes already feeling the heat . It was time to get moving. M. got us into this Member's Only sports club with a fantastic pool. I pretended to be a member, flashed the card and then couldn't go through the bloody gate! Sheer embarrassment. In the afternoon C - my new nanny and ex roommate from our Disney days, took over because J. had to work the next day. Felt a little sad, wished we could all be under one roof like one big happy family. C took me to the Tomie Ohtake Institute to check out some exhibits. Instead of going straight to the exhibit hall, we made a detour and headed to their store. Such a girl thing to do I know, but museums/galleries always have the coolest stuff in their little stores. After half an hour of rampaging through the store we proudly walked out without a single shopping bag! Well what else could we do, it was just a tad out of our price range! Oh well. We remembered shopping was not the reason we came here, so we headed to see Amelia Toledo's installations exhibit. It had just opened and we and a pro photographer were the only ones there. I shyly tried to take advantage of our solitude and take some photos but was warned not to. Hey, maybe he thought I was some big time competition and my shots would make it to the magazines sooner then his...Yeah, right! Get real girl! Oh well, to get back to Amelia's work. It was all set in an extremely spacious room with black painted walls. We wandered in darkness until we reached the installations and then earth, water, stones and shells danced their dance with light before our eyes. I almost felt like I could dive into their depths. Just as I was attempting to jump in, the guard started screaming and dragged us out! We then darted over to the FNAC store for some consolation. Reminded me so much of the Virgin mega store in Downtown Disney - Orlando, our little hideaway from the omnipresent Disney mania. You could sit down for hours with just a book and some coffee and not have Mickey's ghost flash by you. From there we went to have lunch at the Gardenia Café in a Manhattan-style restaurant. I started panicking over the fact that I still hadn't found my little Brazilian-style bikini, and then I remembered the large quantities of delicacies I ate that day and sadly realized there would be no bikini for the likes of the super-sized me! However, that didn't stop me from trying. We ended up in this ultra exclusive mall, and after trying on zillion bikinis I finally found the one where my behind wasn't completely hanging out. Well, I had to compromise a little in the end! C was moaning so much over the fact that she spent so much time in a mall and kept saying, "It's up to you..." I could see that she had had enough. She needed to vacate the premises ASAP. But before leaving we had to try the best coffee & cake in the mall since leaving without tasting anything would have been a crime. According to C, anyway.
It didn't bother me that my behind was growing by the minute,
I just continued packing more and more calories every chance I got!
We got back to C's place and she introduced me to her
parents. Her Mum made an extra effort of speaking Portuguese very slowly
but, of course, that didn't help me much. Her Dad, however, spoke a little
Italian, so we tried our best to communicate. After one of us would utter a
complete sentence in so called Italian we'd both feel proud and nod back at
each other in approval. It was a funny exchange of both Italian and
Portuguese words, but it worked.
We had mingled with the family enough, we felt, and it was
time to go out again. C. started her sentence in her usual manner, "Well
it's really up to you but... how about going to see some holes?" Holes?!
What was she going on about? I said, "Sure why not," in my usual
go-with-the-flow manner.
And off we went to meet up with her friend R. and
have a drink in Praça Vila Boim (hopefully I spelled it right). It was a very European spot, reminded me of London's
Hampstead where the young and hip used to hang out (don't know if they still
do, that was back in the 90's). The owner of the place was a guy from Bosnia but his girlfriend stabbed him a few months ago and the present owner was unknown to us (maybe she wanted the place just to herself?!).
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