Real World: Paraguay: Brazil!

Brazil. Roll that "r" and get real excited on the "i".

Brazil is a green land of wonder. They speak Portuguese, which is almost like Spanish until every other third word, which is nothing like Spanish. It was almost a little too much fun to watch Oscar struggling to speak with people. Ha ha! Now you know how I've been feeling for the last year and a half.

Brazil is also noted for its ladies. A place where I plummet to a 2. Here are some little-know facts about Brazilian Women.

Brazilian girls are born with a thong tan.
At womanhood, Brazilian women sprout coral-colored nail polish and three-tiered dangling earrings.
Brazilian women sleep hanging upside-down by their stiletto heels in a sub-zero anti-gravity chamber.

Our trip was with a college friend of Oscar's. Forty-five Paraguayans and one Americana, coolers packed with meat and beers, sheets and pillows. In Brazil the land became green. It became huge hills and houses stacked nearly one on top of the other. We all saw the beach at the same time, on our left and glistening.

We rented a house near the beach for 50 or so people and got out on the sand as soon as possible. We were in Camboriu, which is more crowded with buildings right up to the beach. There are vendors that come around with portable stores of beach cover-ups, necklaces and hats piled high on their own head. There are also churros filled with dulce de leche, chocolate or sweetened, condensed milk. Yum!

Then we headed to Florianopolis...

Me with my new Brazilian regulation-size sunglasses, purchased from my
trusted Prada dealer on the beach for 10 Reales.

At a Brazilian phone booth, tracking down our CouchSurfing host.

Florianopolis is a more natural part of Brazil. While the group went back after just one day, Oscar and I stayed for CouchSurfing! CouchSurfing is a web site where people from all over the world open their homes to host travelers. There is a reference and verfication system to make sure the people you are staying with are not ax murderers. We were not ax murdered but instead had a great time with a guy named Marcos. He spoke English and Portuguese and just a little Spanish. I speak English and Spanish and two words of Portuguese. Oscar speaks Guaraní and Spanish, a little Portuguese and English curse words. Between us all, we managed to have a conversation into the night. At one point, I was making Paraguayan rice salad and the guys were in the kitchen and we started talking about the differences in all of our cultures and it felt like what CouchSurfing should be.

Marcos told us about this awesome beach that is almost empty, because it takes an hour hike over a mountain or a boat to get there. I made Oscar try the hike.

At the entrance.

The scene going up and looking back.

Up Higher...

Arriving...to the left

To the right

Here's Oscar with a celebratory beer after the hike where he almost fell on me and killed us all. Notice the change in facial expression from the entrance to here.

On this beach there was hardly anyone, just some people enjoying the waves and some campers.

On the beach, we found the biggest bug ever, dead piranhas and crabs.

We rode the waves a bit, then opted to take the boat back.

I started to get a little sea sick going backwards.

They told us to look up at the rocks.

Please don't puke, please don't puke.

At least we didn't end up like this chick, who puked and then fainted. Oscar asked me to take the flash off so he could take this picture escondido, but I didn't understand and put it on instead, so everyone knew he was insensitive.

It rained on us on the way back. We were freezing and not sure if we would vomit or not. We got to shore really dazed feeling and I went into the first restaurant I saw to change into dry clothes. The restaurant owners took pity on us and warmed up a shot of liquor to warm us up.