Saturday, June 4, 2011

5/15/2011 - São Sebastião, Brazil: Fucking Portuguese

Brazil is fucking huge. It's the fifth largest and most populated country on planet. Bigger then the continental United States, and the only (worthwhile) county in South America that doesn't speak Spanish.  I entered in the south from Uruguay and I'd compare it to entering the US for the first time in Minnesota and heading towards Detroit. Yeah it's America, but it's not really a highlight you'd want to see if you only had a month. Whatev, it's still Brazil either way. I've just recently found my first hostel and actual tourists. I definitely entered into in the real daily life of Brazil.

The biggest and most annoying difference is obviously fucking Portuguese. It's always fun to be in a foreign country, attempting to speak the language. Communicating with hand signals and using simple words in whatever language that might be understood by the other party.  But it's only fun when the consequences are minimal. Like getting chicken soup instead of a delicious sandwich you see some other guy munching on. Or trying to understand that the hotel wants to give me free coffee in the morning. It definitely stops becoming fun when your stuck in some downtown trying to stop traffic and pull over to diagnose another bike problem. I eventually conclude that the gas I recently bought is making the bike sputter and die. After a few exciting miles of high rpms, pushing, and nearly getting hit by a bus, I finally will the girl to a motel on the outskirts of Rio Grande. (Pronounced Hee oh Ghan gee. See what I mean, that language is fucked up.) Anyhow, Teresa and I settle down for the night. Then I start trying to figure out how with no internet and possibly no functioning bike I'm going explain my problem to somebody so I can switch out the tank of gas.

Again, leaving it up to chance and circumstance, I'm rewarded. The guy living right next door to the hotel is a mechanic and has a shop right there. And! He speaks enough English / Spanish / Portuguese that we can understand eachother well enough that he offers to syphon my old gas out and drive me to  what he calls the best gas in Brazil. Awesome. After a few hours in the morning we've rid my tank of crap, and gone to buy a few gallons of real gas. He was even able to weld some parts on the bike back together. What a guy! And all for the price of keeping the crappy gas. Sometimes things work out quite nicely. But as I soon realize, Portuguese is not Spanish, and I'm going to be driving through a foreign country scrambling to learn the language as fast as possible. I can definitely see how speaking Spanish has been incredibly helpful thoughout this journey. Bring it on, I'm always ready for something new.

Honestly, nothing really noteworthy happened after crossing the border, since the south appears to be nothing but industrial cow land with an abundance of people and big lack of things to do and see. There was some really interesting roadkill, but that´s about it. I was pleasantly surprised when I arrived late on my birthday to the popular tourist destination of Ihla Santa Catarina. It's a sweet little island with plenty of attractive beaches and water sports. I stayed at a great hostel, and despite the moldy room, had a great time. It was a perfect place to spend a few days after a week solid of motorcycling. I had a great book (I forget the name, but its that one about that chick with a dragon tattoo), and some good company. So all in all a great time, it's just too bad the weather wouldn't cooperate and make me a hot sunny day. I've had some pretty shitty weather on this trip: driving through Central America during the rainy season, or getting hailed on high up I'm the Andes. But nothing compares to the crappy weather in Brazil.

Once I finally left for Rio De Janeiro, I got hopelessly lost in Curitiba. (Yep, sounds just like it's read: Coo eeh CHEE bah. Ugh. Fucking Portuguese.) But I eventually made it out just in time to avoid the biggest city on the continent: São Paulo. My plan was to stick to the coast all the way to Rio. Turns out it was an excellent idea as the scenery and cool little cities were fucking spectacular. The beaches were the most incredible I've ever seen in my life. It's just too bad that it was rainy and cold. It was like flirting and getting along great with a gorgeous girl all night just for her to ditch you and go home with some douche bag. Bummer. You just can't imagine seeing crystal blue green salty waves crash on big long sandy beaches. All just out of reach because it's rainy and too damn cold to swim. So annoying! At least the drive was super fun on a motorcycle. Tons of twisty turns compounded with a diverse natural scenery. Only seven percent of the Atlantic rainforest remains untouched from development. And I was lucky enough to drive through the little remaining environment that's even more diverse than the Amazon. A very cool three days, but easily could have been a lazy week on the road. Oh well, got to take the bad with the good outside on a motorcycle. Until next time buddies. Boa noite!

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