Ok, so I've actually been focusing on school for once and haven't used this at all. I just re-read some entries and I'm really glad I wrote all this as I was living the journey. There are so many things I feel like, I'm forgetting or scared of forgetting.

Studying just makes me reminise like CRAZY. Except, I was remembering all the bad experiences the other day. Especially the horrible time I had at the airports. Man, I never hated airports as much as the ones in Brazil. The staff were not friendly and I felt like they just hired anyone. I'm pretty sure we have a lot higher standards for anyone who works at our airports. I had totally forgotten about this memory about how, I was late for my flight and got yelled at 3 times by the airport people and I don't even know for what. I never wanted to shoot someone the finger and scream out loud so badly. But I kept my poise and dignity and just sucked it in. I remember having a conversation with the 2 guys in line with me. Both not speaking one word of English but we understood each other. I think that was the best, when I found people who were willing to talk to me, despite a bit of a language barrier and I was not afraid to practise the language. I'm slowing losing the language and it frustrates me. Why don't we offer Portuguese at the U? Grrr...I'll have to take it later.

It's been 6 months and I still think about it everyday. Is this normal? Que saudades!!!

I made this background for my laptop to remember the good times:

Time flies

I'm losing count of how many days and weeks its been since I've left but I almost feel like I never left home. I feel like I've been here forever and Brazil was a long time ago. It's sad because already I haven't talked to a lot of my AIESEC friends over there. Only a handful of them still message me now and then. But I was warned that Brazilians don't really like to keep in touch. I even had a full out conversation about it with one of them hehe. I think he mentioned that he didn't want to force a friendship on the other person because he wasn't sure if they wanted to still be friends with him. I was just like "wtheck?!" Just try contacting them and find out. Don't just want for the other person to message you. The problem is I'm always the one messaging them so I think I understand what he means. Friendship should be a two way street. Sometimes they should be the one initiating the contact.

Anyways, enough of that. On the weekend we all went out and they actually played some latino music and I was so happy! Except that I had no one to dance with. I'm so used to having a really good partner dancing with me and having so much fun. It kinda sucked. It made me really miss the samba-ing and salsa dancing. So many little things can just trigger a memory or emotion. Like randomly while sitting at the computer I think of the annoying morning calls we got at the conference and was actually missing it. Everytime I think of something similar to Brazil, I just want to talk about it, but then I feel like I'm getting annoying talking about it all the time. I just can't help it though. I need to let it out and explain because my friends weren't there with me to experience it, to know how I felt. I'm glad everyone's been pretty good about it and are willing to listen to the million stories I have. I guess I'm usually like this but not specifically about Brazil so they have gotten used to me. (I hope.)

I'm just happy that my favorite gringos are all back in americano de norte now. But now its actually harder to get together and keep in touch because of our everyday busy lives. I really miss Funk Brasilieros too!!

Like Prison

You must be wondering what is this entry about...well basically that fact that my city is so hot and humid that I can't stand to be outside. I feel SOO trapped. I'm so used to be being able to go outside and run in the morning or just take a walk. I can't do that here without the possibility of getting heat stroke. It's just a little frustrating. People have also commented that I'm not really dark coming back, well, whatever tan I did have coming back has surely faded with the lack of sun exposure. I miss being outside! I know I can just suck it up and go outside but I guess its more then just being outside, its the fresh air, the populated parks full of trees and trails. I think I'm just still missing Brasil a lot. I hate to be annoying but I can't help but compare everything to what I once knew. Surprisingly, even food tastes differently here. I mean, you would think after eatting this stuff for 20 or so years that 2.5 months of being away, I would be used to it again. Sweets are TOO sweet for me and I'm just still not used to the food here. Miss it so much. I need to focus more and get busy and not think about all the things I miss so much or else I won't get anything done here.

1 week since Brasil...

AIESEC Brasilia after my last dinner with them!

Today last week was my last day in Brasil. Its been a week back home and OMGOSH, has it been a long week. I remember on Monday just feeling lifeless and bored. I hate being bored and usually rare get bored. It was nice, on Sunday the first full dayback, my friends got a birthday cake for all my friends who weren't here in the summer to celebrate together. I was included since I was in Toronto when it was my birthday. It was so nice, just the feeling of warmth I miss about my Brasilian friends.

I guess I've been doing something everyday since I've been back so that hasn't changed from my normal schedule in Brasil. I saw Ratatouille on Tuesday, which was cute because I saw the commercials for it in the theatres in Brasil and its almost like closure to be able to get to finally see the movie after so much anticipation.

I have a TON of work to do because I got selected to be Organizing Committee President of a Regional Conference (OCP) so I'm kinda freaking out because this conference usually gets a year to plan and I have about 1.5 months. I just have to DO it and not let my fear take over. I think it'll be a good learning experience, especially learning to trust the team you work with that they will get things done like expected. I don't even know what will be happening for sure in Sept. Of course the easiest thing would be to be admitted into nursing right away and I won't feel like I'm wasting a year. I'm starting to see beyond the bad of staying home for another year, but that's just because I'm trying to be optimisitc. I hope this weekends fun, I miss having friends just call me up everydaywith plans. I still don't know what I'm doing this weekend. It sucks! I hate wasting weekends. I really wanna go to the beach since I miss it so much. I'll have to call some people up.

Worst 30 hours of travelling!

(Written at the airport when it happened July 27th 11:30pm)

The WORST 16 hours of my life!

Surprisingly, leaving Brasil was really smooth. Everything was on time and Jonas was super nice and drove me to the airport at 3:30am. We met an old AIESEC member who actually finished her internship in March on my flight. So the flight from Brasilia to Sao Paulo was fine even though it was TAM and it was Sao Paulo. Then from Sao Paulo to Atlanta, Georgia was really smooth. When I arrived in Atlanta airport, I knew something bad was going to happen. The place was craziness, just people running around everywhere, lines for the passport check-out that didn’t even go anywhere. I wore my Brasil shirt proudly and a Brasilian thought I was Brasilian and started asking me for help. Yay, another chance to speak Portuguese! So after that I went through security which took forever because there were so many people. I know there was one Brasilian guy I definitely should have followed and I would have gotten to Toronto on time. But no, I got confused because my luggage was being shipped by Delta and my flight was with “United” but apparently it was Air Canada. (Stupid itinerary!!! All the wrong info.) I also realized I still didn’t have a boarding pass to go to Toronto!? WTHeck? How did this happen? So I went back to where I started and waited 30 mins for the Delta people just to tell me that I was in the wrong place and that my luggage was being sent off without a destination tag!! I had to wait and go through security AGAIN!!! My flight was for 8:05pm and now it was 8:15 pm!!! Omgosh, I was stressed. I took the tram to Concourse T where they told me I should go and walked through all 20 something gates and I still didn’t see AIR Canada. “Air Canada” is in Concourse D. By the way, your flight already left!! The next flight is at 6:25am the next day!” Nossa (omgosh), as if I hadn’t already done enough walking in this stupid airport and now I had to wait another 9 hours to go to Toronto!!!! I just want to go home! (I guess I got what I wished for when I kept thinking how much I didn’t want to go home.)

At this point a good idea was probably to go and call my parents. BUT… PROBLEM: my cell phone wouldn’t turn on and I couldn’t remember anyone’s phone number after not calling anyone in almost 3 months!!! OMGOSH, everything was a dead end. I searched through my purse, maybe I wrote some numbers somewhere? I couldn’t even remember my grandparent’s number and ended up calling another Chinese person in Windsor (lol). Oh man, life sucks right now. So I find a place to plug in my laptop and maybe somewhere in there, I will find a number. I have no internet connection so I couldn’t search online. Maybe on Skype I’ll find it, but couldn’t log on without internet. L So now what? Somehow I found an old letter I wrote for my dad that I saved and I found his cell phone number in it!! Thank God!!! So called that and no one picked up! So hopefully that was his number I called because the letter was back in November of 2006.

Ok, now onto trying to figure out how to get a boarding pass with AIR CANADA for the next morning. More walking around the airport with useless airport workers directing me all over the airport. I finally found it and OF COURSE there’s not one there anymore because its CLOSED!!! I should have known. Now what to do?! I called AIR Canada and they said all I could do was wait till tomorrow morning. Boy, do I hate airports right now. So I’m sitting at a restaurant right now waiting for the next day to come. I’m super worried about the family because now they have to either find a place to stay or sleep in the airport all night. I hate burdening other people. They already had to take time out of work to get me and now this. I’m so frustrated with the whole day. How is it that nothing like this happened in Brasil but in the US, I go through all this crap!?

(Written July 28, 2007 at 11pm)

So I barely slept all night in the freezing cold airport on the worst bench ever made. I got up at 4:30am to get checked-in. That went smoothly and I got my ticket. I still had no idea what happened with my luggage but the attendant told me to ask the person at the gate and they would be able to help me. Luckily, as I was boarding the plane, the attendant informs me they found my bag!! Yay, so now just to get to Toronto! I get to Toronto and didn’t see my family, tried calling again by using my credit card to pay and again it wouldn’t work. Went to go buy a phone card and when I turned around, I saw my family wandering around looking for meJ Then we drove off and I had my first real Chinese meal in 2.5 months!:) Dim sum!! (Please google if you’re not sure what Dim sum is.) How I missed those egg tarts! Then some shopping at Pacific Mall and a 3.5 hour drive to my city (Windsor).

What I will miss about Brasil

Two days left till I leave for Canada. I can't believe how fast time has gone by. I totally can see myself living here again in the future. Next time with better Portuguese and more money in my pockets hehe. I am going to miss it here SOO SOOO MUCH. I can't even pinpoint what, but here are a list of somethings I will miss. I think I'll be continually updating this as time goes along because there are going to be so many things from big to little that I will miss.

-Having a maid
-Trying to speak Portuguese
-Churrasco and any street food that's super good and CHEAP. IE. Tapica!!!
-Fairs with lots of nice handcrafts for reasonable prices
-Dancing parties on the bridge at the wee hours of the morning
-Laughing at Beeps and Patricia's randomness
-Singing in the car with Beeps, Patty, and Dan
-Skating at the mall in the worst skates ever but with great company
-Travelling with and meeting all the interns in different parts of Brazil
-Travelling
-Tasting new and different things
-Caprivokcsas com morangos
-Agua de coco (fresh coco water)


-The beautiful sunsets
-BEACHES, BEACHES, AND BEACHES!!


-Rio!!
-Acai


-Cheap salgados (pastels, coxinhos..)
-Inexpensive manicures and pedicures
-AIESECers in Brasil
-Old European inspired buildings
-Modern Oscar Niemeyer buildings (Esplanada)
-Running in the parks (Parque do Cidade e Parque Olhos D'Aguas)
-Festa Juninas
-Capoeira
-Dancing Samba, Forro, Salsa

What I miss about Canada

I think this will be 2 parts, one about Canada and one about Brazil.

-My parent's cooking and basically CHINESE FOOD!!!
-Pooky (my car), not just the object but the freedom of being about to drive around everywhere and go when I want
-My bed, I think my back actually touches the frame:(
-My family
-My friends- meeting up to go to Starbucks, going out to eat together, movie nights, talks on the phone
-Good shopping!!! I did go to some good fairs here and found some awesome stuff but everything is way too expensive in my city and it was sad not being able to afford a single thing.
-Grey's Anatomy, American's Next top Model and whatever reality crap that's out there, that I just can't get enough of.
-Making cookies (I definitely wouldn't have spent R$20 on ingredients when I could have bought them for R$2.)
-People being somewhat on time. (Brazilian time is WORSE then Chinese time).
-Grocery shopping and finding everything I need.
-Being able to use the pay phone just with a quarter, instead of having to buy a phone card.

Surprisingly, I can't think of more things I miss about Canada. I really do love it here and I think it will be apparent when I write the things I will miss about Brasil, which will most likely be longer.

Recife: The city that rains too much!

It's my 4th night in Recife and I still haven't gone out yet! I've hardly seen the city. I've been to some places but I'm the type of person that loads up every hour with an activity when I travel. That's what makes things fun, being able to fit a lot into a day and making your trip worthwhile. I'm kinda upset right now with this. My hostess friend tried so hard to convince me to come here because its so nice and so much to do! Well, why the heck have I not done much? I did get to go to the place I wanted to go to the most which was the Porto de Galinhas yesterday which was a lot of fun. BUT I definitely didn't pay $400 CDN to fly here to live at her house and go on the computer all day and night. Frick, thank God we live near the beach! I had to escape this place. I was happy to just lie on the beach and get a tan.

So I arrived at about 3pm on Friday and that was an alright day, I spent 3 hours at this mall that used to be a prison and there was a museum at the top floor that explains the history about Recife. This city is about 400 something years old, started in 1637 or something like that and supposedly this is where Brazil first started! So a lot of the place is really old looking. I really love the historical buildings. It's nice to see the contrast in this country, where I lived in the newest city in Brazil (Brasilia) that's about 50 years old and then now to this almost 500 years old city. I really was in awe with the history behind all the buildings. Then I walked through the whole super expensive mall and then went to the liveria cultura (bookstore) to listen to a ton of CDs while waiting for Carol to return from work. The Linkin Park CD I was listening to was really good. I think its their most recent one.

So on Sunday we went to Porto de Galinhas. We took 1 hour to drive there. It was nice, I got to hear my theme song from my trip in BH. I have no idea of the song's name but I'll figure it out one day soon. "Boys don't cry" by Fergie was the theme song for going there. It wasn't a sunny day afterall so I was kinda sad about that. Its been raining everyday since the day I got here! I don't know why no one warned me, I would have gone to Fortaleza instead! (Fortaleza is a city that EVERYONE has told me is beautiful and so much fun but no, I thought knowing someone in a city and having a place to stay was just as important.) I'm kinda regretting that choice right now. Anyways, we paid R$8 to go on this tiny boat or raft to go to the rocks close to the shore. Then they had pools of water in the rocks so we could swim in them. Every little pool of water had fish in it and we swam in the biggest one with a bunch of fish. We also jumped into the ocean in another area where the raft took us and swam with the fishies there. That was one of the coolest parts of the day. We walked around the place for a while looking at their different shops and finding presents for my grandparents and cousins. My friend was also determined to find a Brazilian style bathing suit. I was kinda annoyed that my host friend is always introducing me as the friend that Canada that doesn't speak Portuguese. Frick, I've been here for 2 months and I've been trying really hard to learn so give me so credit! I like that my friends understand that, and tell people that I can speak a little and I understand more or less what's going on.
Some of the pools of water.



The pool of water that is the map of Brasil!




Swimming with the fishes! There were SO MANY, we all got kinda freaked out.

We ended the day at about 4:30pm and drove with the sunsetting along the road. It was super pretty and I saw the coolest clouds. I was exhausted the sun drains all my energy. While in the car ride home we listened to the radio on how the Brasil game against Argentina was going for the American Cup. Yea, that's how crazy they are about soccer. We were supposed to go out to a pub to watch the game with a group of AIESECers but that didn't work out. Too bad because it would have been cool to see the game with other Brasilians who were going crazy when they scored the goals and won the game.


Road going back home.

Belo Horizonte, the city built on hills.

(Written July 9th)

I'm currently in Belo Horizonte with my friend from AIESEC. His family lives here so he's on vacation for 2 weeks and I decided I wanted to see the city where our Windsor intern is from. It was already off to a rough start. But I finally got the ticket to get here and arrived after a 12 hour busride. Some people should take a shower before they get on a bus! Seriously! I think I couldn't sleep partially because that buss smelled so badly! Partially also because it was so cold! Anyways, I arrive at like 9am, got back to their flat and had breakfast. We watched Babel, which I have to say is a really good movie. It was interesting how his brother decribed the parallels in the movie. I was starving! We didn't have lunch till 4:30pm! Yes LUNCH! Well, at least I saved money by having 2 meals in one because I was surely too full to have lunch at the regular time of 7pm. We went to the mountains to get a nice view of the city but we missed most of the sunset and the park was closing because we ate so late. It was a really nice view of the city which like my friend said "was build on the mountain". Some of the streets here are so steep I dont even know how someone can parallel park without hitting the cars in front and behind them. We had a hard time finding friends to go out with us. My friends did find a group that was watching the soccer game between Chile and Brazil at a pub. So we went. Man, people are so disorganized here. We didn't end up going away where else because it was getting late and it wasn't worth paying R$15 to go somewhere for only 2 hours. So we went home at 2am. Relatively early for the Brazilians.

We had to wake up early to go to Feira Hippe where they have tons of booths with vendors for everything you want, from furniture to clothes and shoes. I'm happy to say I finally found a pair of nice ones I like:). I didn't want to leave because finally I found a place to shop that I could afford. We returned to the house and left for Ouro Preto, a town that was a gold mining city, in the 1800's. It was gorgeous! Really European like with very narrow streets and cute little shops. It was definitely a tourist city because they actually had English in their museums. We went there are a concert they were having at 10pm but all the museums closed at 6pm so we had 4 hours to spare. What is a person to do?! Why not go to a Catholic mass? So we go for the 7pm mass and it was incredible. The church had gold everywhere! The service was special becaues it was Saint Maria's birthday (Jesus's mom). So they had the regular mass and then all of a sudden 10 angels come walking down the aisle and they all climb onto the huge structure in the front and crown the Mary statue. It was really interesting to see. I was in awe, I couldn't believe I was in Brazil at that moment for some reason. Afterwards there was an orchestra outside of the church playing.

The sun over the hilly lansdscape of Ouro Preto

Darn, the church closed 15 mins ago so we didn't get to go inside.

The really narrow streets.

The angels in the "Gold" church for the crowning of Saint Mary.

We went to the concert that was beginning to start but first we went to get our extra jackets we brought. This was the coldest place, I've been to in Brazil. It felt like a cold fall day, which shouldn't be surprising to me since it is winter here. We ate some churrasco, (Brazilian BBQ) and drank some Capri-fruta to warm up. Boy, that drink was strong! We lost the parents so we walked around the place for about an hour before seeing them. Then we went to the concert of Jorge something (he is well known for singing Samba and Pogode music (Brazilian). It was fun, we sat along the edge of a building moving to the music outside just absorbing the atmosphere.

We went home at about 1am. The drive was 1.5 hours long so I was sleeping the whole way back.

Samira, Max and Manry

On Monday (Written July 11th):
-I went to AIESEC Belo Horizonte's office and got to see my trainee friend, Fleur from Holland. It was so nice to see her since Rio, which was a month ago. We went to lunch then I went to work with her (Casazul). A non-profit organization that is located in a favela. I got to see first hand how they are and this was a simple one that was just one street and also located on the steepest street I've EVER walked on.
-We went on the bus back to the office where we listened to some AIESEC songs that we have dances to and sang and dances along in our seats:) Oh I love those simple moments.
(Everything- Michael Buble, Reach for the Stars, Superfreak....)

@BH with Fleur:)

On Tuesday:
-Very fun yet random day
-Went to the university of Max's brother. He goes to the best public administration school in all of Brazil. He gets to work for the government right after he graduates for 2 years. (Guaranteed)
-Drove by their old house, old grade school, and then went to the big lake.
-Took pictures by the famous church that Oscar Niemeyer built beside the lack but was closed:(
-Went to a small amusement park, where we played bumper cars and took pictures on rides like the carrousel and floating ducks that was about to sink since it was holding double the weight it usually does.
-Went to this self-service ice cream place that allowed me to have 12 flavours of goodness in my bowl for R$4.29 which is about $2.25 CDN!!! Oh man, flvours from acai, banana carmelho, pineapple, romeo and juliet, ferreo rocher, graviola, condensed milk and a bunch of other's I can't remember.
- Went to Central Mercado (Central market) and had a mini-heart attack becuase of the number of birds they sell there. The puppies were really cute though. They were selling a Chow Chow for R$500 that's $250 US! I wish I could bring it home!!!!
-Ate dinner with the family, the mom made Canjica and Maracuja (passion fruit) mousse for me, because she heard that I liked it. Then we said our sad farewells and I took a 12.5 hour bus home sitting beside these hippies that probably didn't shower since 2003.

All in all, the trip was better then I expected. Definitely worth the horrible bus rides to get here.

Canada Day Weekend in Goiania

Happy Canada Day!! (note: This was written on the actual day). So after sleeping for 4 hours, I left to go to a town just outside of Goiania (a city 3 hours from Brasilia). I went to visit a small school where a group of 20 kids were awaiting to learn more about me and Canada. I couldn’t think of a better way to represent Canada but to 20 young minds that were willing to absorb and learn about this different culture that they never heard about. The kids all came from very poor families and never really got a chance to go anywhere besides maybe Goiania and some surrounding towns. They had never met an Asian before and said I looked like an actress from the TV hehe. They had a list of 20 questions prepared for me and I explained everything from the food, weather, school systems, clothing, sports and my family to them. Some of the questions were really hard like “Who is someone Canadians admire who’s Canadian and a Canadian that our country doesn’t like?” I thought of Pierre Trudeau, whom I just made up a reason why and I couldn’t think of anyone we don’t like. (Sugguestions?)
It felt really nice to be able to spend time with these kids who were so grateful for my visit and I got to share about my beloved country. They all wanted to take a picture with me individually, I felt like a celebrity hehe. It was so cute. I took a few with smaller groups to make them happy. One little boy, Wulliam, was eating by himself for some reason and we asked him why he was all by himself and he said he’s not alone, God was sitting with him. It was just so adorable. They all lived pretty simple lives with not much but they were all so happy and the kids with siblings took care of their little sisters so well. Its seeing things like these that make you hope that they’ll get a chance to have what you have and how lucky we are to come from good backgrounds. Its hard in Brasil to go from poor to having some money because only the rich get a good education because you have to pay for private schools all the way up to University since only private schools provide the best education so you can pass the test to enter university. So without an education you can’t get a good job and you’re stuck making bare minimum.

The kids

The kids, their teachers and I.

Other things I did this weekend:

-Took a 2 hour Salsa, Samba, Forro, and Zouk class. Wow, so much fun!! I was smiling the whole time!!

-Went to Parque Aeriao and saw about 5 monkeys just running around and climbing the trees. This is a public park!? So cool!!!

-Went to the best store in the world. This place was called "Frutas do Cerrado". It had about 50 different kinds of popsicles made from REAL fruit. I was eatting the mango one and you seriously get all the stuff stuck in your teeth like eatting a real mango! They also had the most amazing ice creams too. Unfortunately I couldn't bring any home so I just bought 6 popsicles and left.

The endline line of freezers filled with delicious goodness!!

7 flavours, from Caju (the plant of a Cashew), Caja-Manga, Murici, Jaga(Jackfruit),Manga (Mango), Coco Queimo...(Burnt coconut), condensed milk and another caju. (Burnt Coconut and mango were my favorite).

-Went to the Feira do Sol, its like a flee market outdoors with tons of stuff. I got to have Churrasco (Brazilian BBQ), including frango com bacon (chicken with bacon) and steak. It was amazing for street food and only R$7!!

-Tried more yummy food at a roadside market

-Met a guy who does make-up for drag queens.

-Saw a gorgeous sunset from my friend's apartment.

I think I went through culture shock today. I think its also when I lose patience with people. It started yesterday. I went out to lunch with the AIESECers and again, they go off laughing and talking about a million things that I have no idea what they're saying and I'm just sitting there, bored and feeling ignored. I really don't like going out to eat with them. Hanging out and actually having an activity is fine but when I have nothing else to do its horrible. I realized that it didn't have to be like this. When I hang out with my other group, I have a lots of fun even though most of them speak Portuguese and that's because someone is always willing to summarize and explain what's going on to me so I don't feel so lost. That's all that's needed is that extra effort from people. Its annoying too because no one speak Portuguese with me when I ask them to but then they expect me to know what they are talking about when they're only speaking Portuguese with each other?! That's the thing that frustrates me the most! I don't feel like I've improved in the past month. My learning curve for Portuguese totally died off. I really want to learn more but its hard when you have to be motivated to teach yourself. Well, I'm going away this weekend, so it'll be a nice break from the frustration, I hope.

HAPPY CANADA DAY EVERYONE!!! I will be representing Canada as I sport my Roots Canada hat on Sunday to visit a village of poor kids. (According to what my friend told me).

Celebrating good friends.

NOTE: UPDATED JULY 3RD with skating pictures!!

On Wednesday Patricia left:( So sad! I got to spend the 5 days with her before leaving because she and her friends had finished school. The last day she was here we went all out. We started off skating indoors at a mall (Park Shopping). I was super excited! I love skating! My Canadian friend, Dan treated us because he felt like he owned us for making his stay in Brasilia so much more fun! I felt bad but if he was willing then why not! It was REALLY expensive though, R$20 for 30 mins. I usually go skating for 1-1.5 hours but I have to say 30 was PLENTY. This rink was tiny and there obviously was no zamboni that was going to drive out from anywhere so the ice wasn't the best. What do you expect, its Brazil. I was already a little worried because everyone on the rink was wearing helmets and I'm thinking heck no, I'm not looking like an idiot. Obviously I wasn't close enough because they were also wearing elbow pads and knee pads to complete the look! LOL, I couldnt' believe it, it was mandatory and I couldn't get out of it! We even had to sign a waiver, I have no idea what it said but probably something along the lines of if I die I can't sue that mall. I couldn't skate for 10 mins because I was laughing so hard at my embarrassing ensemble. The skates were also plastic! The most uncomfortable things I've ever worn! Ever. After I while I kinda forgot about what felt like a bodysuit and started skated gracefully. I even tried poses forgetting about the outfit. My friend had a really good fall, so she was super thankful for the helmet. After discovering the worst blister of my life we went to McD's and then headed over to our friend, Juliana's to watch the soccer game of Brasil vs Mexico. We were 15 mins late and Mexico had already scored 2 points!! There was no hope for Brasil anymore. It was 0 to 2 at the end. We took lots of fun pictures and played "never have I ever". Afterwards, Patricia had a time of sharing on the flaws of everyone in the room and she was really honest and open because these were all her closest friends together. It was nice to see the raw honesty someone can put forth. I think its also a good learning experience for yourself to hear. Sometimes someone really does have to have the guts to say something or else those annoying people will always stay that way. I was nervous for my turn but thank God she's only knew me for 1 month so she didn't have anything to say. hehe. We were too loud for the neighbours so we drove to the 3rd bridge and danced to my friend's Ipod till 4am!! My favorite funky song and a bunch of others including Ivete (a Brasilian artist). It was a lot of fun and a really memorable night. I'm sad to say bye to a friend that was always here for me in Brasilia.

My camera was still broken, but I got some pictures from my friend's camera.

Six years of figure skating and I get forced to wear THIS!

I didn't suffer alone. My favorite group in Brazil was there to laugh with me.

I tried to be graceful and then I remembered what I was wearing:(

This is what we had to skate in! No wonder I got a huge blister!!


At Ju's, Monique, Fernanda, Manry, Dan, Patricia, and Juliana.



At Lago Sul (South Lake) Monique was cold lol, Dan, Patricia, Abelado, Manry, Gabe, Ju and Fe.
(Lucas taking the picture).

A summary of the past few days

Wow, I'm definitely due for another post.

So I have been going out like everynight since last Friday!!! I've never done this in my life! At least not that I recall. It's partially because my closest friend(Patricia) in the city is leaving to go on vacation this Thursday and I wanted to be able to spend as much time with her before she leaves. She has been amazing since the first day I met her. She picks me up to go out and drives me home everytime, she invites me to her house to eat lunch all the time with her family and brings me to fun events. She's one of those people who actually listens when you talk and I think that's probably one of the most important things here.

Sunday I went to church for the 2nd time and I wish I could bring this church home with me. The sermon was really good and the pastor is able to say everything in about 30-45 mins. No one ever falls asleep here. Then I went to lunch at Patricia's house and then at night went to the concert of Gotan Project that was sponsored by the French Embassy. It was free when most people pay about R$60-$300!! Before the concert my friend's car tire got stuck in a hole and that was memorable. All 8 of us trying to use the tire lever to lift the car off the ground then pushing it. What teamwork! Definitely moments like these that bring people together.

Tire in the random hole in the parking area. It was really deep.

Pushing the car...I know I should have been helping, but someone had to capture this on camera!

We decided to put a tree in the hole to warn people, how considerate are WE!?

So finally got the car out and I was really excited for the group. I wasn't sure if they were good or not but after seeing them, I have to say they are one of my favorite groups. Its like everything I love about music put together. They played tango, salsa, classical, mixed with some electronic beats. It was fun, we stood on the bleachers as we listened and danced to the music. Unfortunately this girl dropped my camera and now the lens won't go back in and won't take pictures. I hate when things happen, not just because it costs money but the hassle of getting things done here. I have to ask people where to take it, if anyone will take me to that place, if not, how can I take the bus there? What are the directions to get there? The city is nice but horrible for travelling in. People from other cities make fun of us because they think everyone in Brasilia drives in circles. Its true actually we don't really have corners. You just drive in one of those circles until you get to the street that branches off of it. The city is also divided into coordinates. South to North: 1-9 West are odd #'s, East are even #'s. Confused? Yea I feel ya. I still don't really get it. There are no such things as street names. I think you guys realized when you got my address for my city.

Gotan Project! Muito bom!!

Anyways, Monday we went Bowling and I have never played so horribly in my life but it was fun to get a game in and feel at home.

Taisa, Patricia, Dan, Manry, Claudius, Luciana

Tuesday we went to our friend's family restaurant that had really yummy steak and then I went to meet some other friends. One of whom I just met last night and does translating in China. He's Brazilian but knows a little Cantonese and Manderin. He has a pretty sweet job and he's NOT EVEN GRADUATED! His major is Translating. Weird, yet cool. I still don't really know what he does but I think he was explaining that he manages the team that does the translating and doesn't really do translating himself. I'm not sure, but I want his job! Why did I study Bio and now I have no jobs to go into to make a decent living!? Grr...

Tacky Festival and Kareoke

Last night was so much fun, I just had to make a note of it. After the AIESEC meeting everyone was going to this salsa, samba place I went to last friday called "Caribeno". My friend who's not in AIESEC called and said he was dancing at this festival he was having with his English school that he taught at. I decided I would support my friend at his performance and I'm glad I did. We had so much fun even though I got a broken toenail that was bleeding the whole night from it. We ate and drank a lot of Gummy. My Canadian friend said it would make my toe hurt less hehe. I guess it kinda worked. The party was like a Festa Junina party, where people dress up in patterned dresses and kinda country-style dances. (Please refer to the pictures.)

They performed a really fun long dance. Then we talked arond a bit and played Bingo to try to win a huge fruit basket. I was happy I understood the numbers being shouted out! :) Then we all went to a Kareoke place. What FUN!! We were the only ones picking the English songs but they knew most of the them. We sang, Bon Jovi that was Dan's favorite (the other Canadian), Madonna, Barbie Girl (Mi, I was thinking of you during this hehe), Spice Girls (Wanna Be), Summer nights (my voice was so gone, I could hardly sing this one), Shania Twain, Man I feel like a Women, totally rocked the whole place up and a U2 song. It was so much fun. I always have a blast with these guys. Maybe I should be hanging out with my AIESEC friends more out of AIESEC but I see most of them like everyday at the office so its nice to be able to hang out with other people. Plus, there's still a big of that language barrier thing. We spend more time explaining things to me then really having good conversations. But I've had some good moments during the week.

I love these guys!:)

Another adventure

I've been planning a trip to Northern Brazil for the past 2 weeks. My friend and I finally decide to get the tickets together but the stupid airline websites won't let us buy them. Apparently, you need a CPF # that only Brazilians that live here have! So after wasting 2 whole days searching online and trying and re-trying I decided I couldn't wait any longer. My friend said she would come at 10am on Friday morning to come and help. She never showed up. Its the typical Brazilian thing, they can't say no. So I wanted till after lunch and decided I was tired of relying on other people. I think I'm independent in that way that I don't like to depend on other people for things I need to have done. I rather do things myself then to delegate tasks to other people. So I asked my friend how to take the bus and wrote it all down and went my way. I had this excited, yet nervous feeling. I was starting to really enjoy these moments of true independence. I found the right bus with the word AEROPORTO labelled on it like my friend said and it was a Heaven sent that a guy that worked for GOL (a big airline here) was sitting in the first seat (a good sign). Even with everything, I still felt a little doubtful, because the bus was taking so long to get to the airport and all these people kept getting one! Surely they aren't ALL going to the airport too with all those shopping bags. At that point I realized, the similarity between taking the bus and life. Sometimes you are given all the right signs of where you should be going but you still doubt yourself. You don't fully believe in yourself. I go through that a lot. That uncertain feeling that always holds me back a little but I realized that you just have to learn to listen to your gut and my gut was saying this was right. So I arrived after 45 mins and after walking around the airport 3 times, I found the place to get my tickets. The guy took forever because he kept wanting to practise his English with me. I was just happy I made it there was able to save R$130 by taking a R$2 bus to get there. Unfortunately, waiting for the bus to go back was annoying. There was this really annoying old guy that wouldn't leave me alone and trying to get a little too friendly. What's with me and old/weirdo people!? Go away!! I was about an hour late for my AIESEC meeting but I was so happy after 4 phone calls to my friend that I arrived to the other University for the meeting. I felt really good that I was able to accomplish one of my challenges.

The morning I was supposed to run with my roommates and they didn't wake up on time so I decided, I'll just go by myself and try to figure out where the nearest park was so I could run. Again, I wasn't really sure of where I would be lead to but I let myself explore and I found it:) It was like walking through the jungle with dense trees everywhere, a lot better then the city park. Another lesson I realized with this was that sometimes you just have to step out of your comfort zone to discover new treasures and not to be afraid because even though you don't know where you're going, there is already a path ready for you. You just have to let yourself discover it.

I saw Shrek last night! It was really good. I always loved that movie because it was so hilarious! I wanted to treat my flatmates but they wouldn't take credit cards!? It was so stupid, what movie theatre doesn't take credit cards?! So then it ended up that he paid for all of us. Totally backfired and looked bad.

And they cooked me this for lunch yesterday:) It was super yummy!

Here are my flatmates:

Saulo and Virginia.

Ok, so now that I figured out how to put pictures on this thing. I'm going to update some past posts with pictures. I know everyone is waiting for more eye candy!

Biking event

Max, Jonas, and I
















Max and I on the 3rd Bridge riding through Lago Sul (South Lake).

I don't seem to like posting right away for some reason but because I have some dedicated readers, I will try my best to do this more often. Let me know you are still reading this though. I really feel like I'm writing to the wall sometimes hehe.

So Sunday I woke up thinking I was just going to bike for 2 hours or so and then eat lunch. WRONG. I woke up at 7:30am to leave for 8am and somehow end up participating in the 5th annual biking event that celebrates the sharing of the road with cyclists and drivers. There were thousands of people! The Governor of either Brasilia or Brazil was there, journalist, media everywhere. I think I might have been in some pictures because I was in the front. Anyways, they closed off a bunch of streets to so that we could bike through. We even got to bike on the 3rd bridge, which is one of my favorite bridges. It was really fun. It was a beautiful day, super sunny but windy too. I seriously hadn't biked in maybe 5 or more years?! 'Cause I seriously don't remember biking being so uncomfortable. I was using my friend's mountain bike and it ended up having a hole in one of the tires. If it was me, I would have had to just walk my way home or something but being the well-prepared and experienced guy he was, he took out his kit and went to work. It was great. I wasn't really paying attention but I don't understand my luck here. I've never seen a tire get changed for a car or bike at home but here, I've seen 2 tire changes for cars and now a bike. My other friend, Max showed up and during the draw won a helmet just as he told us he didn't have one. What luck. It would have been cool if I could have won a bike but I probably won't be able to bring it back to Canada.

So I ended the day at 1:30pm feeling much pain but very healthy and tired. I definitely got a farmer's tan accompanied with really bad burns on my arms and legs. I had no sunscreen and didn't know my flatmates had some until I went to look for aloe vera or something to help me out. In Rio de Janiero, their sun doesn't really burn but Brasilia is more North (closer to the equator) and can do some serious damage. A well spent morning/afternoon with some of the guys. I guess the girls aren't very active in my committee (where I work) because I never do much with them.

On Monday night, I made Brigaderos (a Brazilian chocolate dessert) with my flatmate, Virginia. It was a lot of fun. I'll try to make some for you guys when I get back. We ate so much food because they had just came back from their home city and everything is half the price there. So we had like 10 kinds of fruits in the house and the fridge and freezer were both packed full. I enjoy living at the new place because it is super convenient and my flatmates are really awesome, caring, nice people. They have been cooking the lunches and including me in them everyday. I have to learn to cook soon though but I have some tips from my mom and also my friend. It seems everyone can cook except moi. That day my flatmate's mother called and since she doesn't know English she spoke French. Oh man! I was getting my Portuguese all mixed in with it and getting the poor lady all confused. I don't get it, when I want to speak Portuguese I speak French and then when I'm given the opportunity to speak French, I mess it up with Portuguese, the language of which I hardly know!? Hopefully my brain gets out of this mix up and I can improve my Portuguese much more! My goal is to speak 10 sentences of Portuguese a day. I haven't really been able to do that yet but I've made it up to at least 5. I need to practise writing out my verbs and conjugating them.

The Journey from success to significance

“We should think about the difference between success and significance. Success is about being and significance is about becoming.”
These were some of the many touching words that the main speaker of my graduation said. We don’t remember the successful people but we all remember the ones that touched our lives and had significance to who we are today. As boring as graduations are I always love the speeches that I heard because they give me a bit of inspiration that I need to hear to make me rethink my life. To re-evaluate my present being and what I’m doing to contribute to being a better person, a better friend, student or member of society. It sucks that 4 years I got to go to everyone else’s graduation but I couldn’t be there for my own. It’s just one day right? I guess I’ll get over it. I’ll have more chances to graduate.
He did say something though is that we should spend more time on making significance and so with that I want to work harder to make my time here to make a strong impact. Right now I’m working with bringing more interns into Brazil to work on social entrepreneurship projects. What happens is the interns come to Brasilia to work with some craftsmen and help to export their goods to other countries so they can try to make a living. The intern would help to monitor that the process the products were made were environmentally and social sustainable. For example, didn’t use child labour to make or didn’t harm the environment to produce. This is the product of AIESEC, being able to put forth real actions of making a chance in people’s lives. It isn’t about just saying we develop leadership and whatever else our brand promised but that through our work, you develop those skills and characteristics and that’s how you make an impact on society. In Brazil I see the bigger picture more easily. I really hope that I can see the change these interns make before I leave Brazil.

First night alone in my new place

It’s been a month a 3 days since I’ve been in Brazil and time has really flown by. I apologize in advance if my English is also very poor. Some days I feel like I can’t speak anything. I feel like I’ve lived here for longer then just a month. I’m really getting used to the life here and how things work. Except for the whole tardiness of everyone, I don’t think I’ll ever get over that. I moved to a new place with a couple and I have my own room which is located 2 minutes from the AIESEC office. Life is quite different here. I went from an apartment in the nice area with 5 bathrooms and 4 bedrooms and 1.5 maids (one of them only comes 2 times a week) and a dog and served meals to a small apartment and a couple with one bathroom and making my own food.
What started out as a normal day ended up being quite unexpected. So the couple I’m staying with left for the weekend to their home city and left me to take care of myself. No problem right? I kinda know how to cook and I’ve lived away in a dorm independently before. Well, firstly I start off the night by burning the leftover pasta my friends left me. Then I realized the internet wasn’t working and there were a million wires and I had no idea what to do with them. I was frantically trying to get on msn to contact my friend about going to see a band play because my cell phone ran out of money so I had no way of calling people. But my laptop battery was going wacko on me and in 10 mins I had only 33% of my power left and couldn’t find a plug in anywhere! Thank goodness my LCP was still at the office and saved the day by coming to fix the plugs and I was able to contact my friends at the office! I realized I really need to figure out technology and not be so dependent on people. But it was a rude awaken to make me realize I have a lot of independence to learn beyond traveling alone.

My day of Independence

All my trainee friends had left to go back to their cities because they all needed to work. My LC was flexible and so I was able to stay a day longer to see the city. The problem was, my host was very busy at school and I had to travel the city by myself. So I wake up at around 8:45am due to sheer nervousness I was about to embark. I took an hour to get ready just to stall the start of my independent journey. I had my little map of Rio I got the day I arrived in Brazil and a manually drawn map and stops of where I should get off. My plan was to go to Rio Sul Shopping Centre, then to Uruguiana, then the cultural centre and finally the ballet at the Theatro Municipal. My host was able to describe the path the bus would take very well. The way it would go up a ramp and go straight then do and slight turn to the left. I was able to also ask the bus people to indicate where I should get off just in case. The people were a lot friendlier then I had imagined, thank God. I finish shopping and had to take the bus again to go back to where I was staying to go to the metro station and take that to go to the “centro”, their downtown. This is probably the most dangerous part of the city because it is so crowded and full of vendors and things everywhere that someone could just easily rob you. I was super careful and constantly was conscious if anyone was following me or if I looked too touristy. Mind you, I think the whole being a tall Asian girl gave it away without me speaking, that I wasn’t from there. Uruguiana is equivalent to the markets in China were there are a million little booths cluttered with tons of things on sale for a lot cheaper then any stores would charge and a lot of fake designer items. The food there was dirt cheap. Unfortunately after spending all my cash on my 2 pairs of Havaianas, I only had about R$10 to get back home and also have dinner. Smart, real smart. Sadly, I didn’t end up getting much there. The great thing was I felt guided that day, like I knew where I should be going without really knowing the area. I made it to the city centre and was able to get more cash randomly at the bank, buy stamps to mail my postcard home and see one of the famous churches. Unfortunately, the city centre was closed but everything worked out. The only problem was that the ballet didn’t start until 8pm and it was 5pm right now and I had to figure out a way to waste 3 hours safely. So shopping it is. I went into whatever boutiques were still available and probably spent about 2 hours at this one bookstore. I left after the manager kinda gave me the look of “you’re STILL here?” Whatever, I learned more about Rio from a tourist book and read almost every cover of the fiction section in Portuguese. The words written are so similar to French and Spanish that I got most of what they were trying to say.

The ballet was amazing! It was only R$5 for 5 performances. The best R$5 I’ve ever spent. I think I was supposed to sit in the cheap seats section at the very top of the hall but I was the only one who bought that one (I’m trying to save money). So I ended up getting to sit on the first floor with eye level viewing of the show! It was awesome. They had everything from modern music, to classical and piano pieces that were similar to what you would hear on soundtracks for movies. I safely got back to the apartment I was staying in after my 12 hours of asking in Portuguese for directions, prices, trying to bargain (unsuccessfully) and ordering food. It was so nice to feel like I overcame a real challenge and that I wasn’t robbed and survived being alone in one of the most dangerous cities in Brazil.

Rio de Janiero for 5 days

All my friends here advised me not to take the 22 hour bus to Rio because its one of the most dangerous cities in the world so I paid R$80 more to take the plane. I guess I got a good deal since its the holidays. I arrived and it was late and dark out so I thought it would be safer to get a taxi that's associated with the airport. Of course with that relationship, I had to pay more. Apparently R$30 more! I paid a R$62 taxi ride that usually costs $30? Oh well, at least I was safe right?

The first night everyone met up at a restaurant, almost all the trainees (people doing their internships in Brazil from different parts of the world) were there. Just the Dutch girls were missing. I was SOO happy to see everyone, mostly Eric (from Canada) and Lyn (from Austrailia) because I knew them best out of the people there. Then all 8 of us decided to go to Lapa (an old area of Rio known for their bars and dance clubs). We went to Democraticos, a famous club for dancing Samba. We had a lot of fun and I learned to kinda Samba so for those that are expecting me to be pro when I get back, be warned.

The next day we wake up not sure if our host was still asleep or had gone to school but my friend, Lyn and I knew one thing, that we wanted to go to the Beach today! We had no idea where to get the bus or which one we should take but with her Portuguese we managed to get ourselves there to meet up with the Estonia girls. I was so excited I was probably doing somersaults inside. I hadn't been to a real beach since I was 16 in New Brunswick? I can't remember which ocean I was in that time but this time I got to play in the Atlantic Ocean!!! It was just a gorgeous site. I wanted a tan so badly but the sun wasn't very strong that day and so the tan wasn't very evident. It was hilarious because it seemed like every vendor on the beach had approached our little group. Me and my pale legs probably told them we weren't from around there. After the beach, we decided to go to the Jardin Botanico (Botanico Gardens) after the beach since it was only R$4 and we heard it was pretty.

At night we went to Bukowski, a place that was a nicer version of the kildare house and The Loopo put together. It was basically a house turned into a bar with 80's music and some alternative music playing. I of course didn't know most of the songs but my attitude was to have fun so I just danced along. When we were leaving they started playing all my songs that I love to listen to on 89x (an alternative station in Windsor/Canada). Darn it! Anyways, it was late.

On Saturday we went to Corcovado, the huge Jesus Statue. It was like being in Heaven. There were clouds everywhere and it was just beautiful. As the day went on we were able to see more of the city and got a good view of some of the landscape. I never got to see Maracana (the world's largest soccer stadium) but I did see the top view of it. I wish I got to see a game being played there!!! Anyways, because the Corcovado is on a mountain, we drove by a lot of favelas( hillside neighbourhoods where all the poor people live). They are VERY dangerous because a lot of them have gun fights and a lot of violence there. Then we went to Santa Teresa to have lunch. We ate in this cute restaurant that had live music playing and I had shrimp with rice and real mango juice. This was the life. hehe The atmosphere was awesome, I felt like I was in Europe or something. Afterwards we realized we were really late to go to Pao de Acucar (Sugar loaf) to see the sunset. My friend, Patricia ended up driving 110 km/h in in the 80 km/h zone to race the sun so we could get a good view. We get there and there are about 150 people in line!!! But thanks to her connections (her dad's a tour guide and was randomly there) and jumped in front of the line and bought us tickets:) We were super lucky! We caught the last glimpse of the sun as we were riding up the tram to get to the first peak of the mountain. Then raced to the 2nd tram to get to the higher mountain with a better view. This sight was even better then the one we saw at the corcovado. Especially with the changing colour of the sky. It was just gorgeous. We stayed up there for an hour and then not waiting to make our host wait so long, we went back down to go home. After our daily nap at 6pm, we went out again to Lapa and who do we see but 2 of the guys from the Samba club! We asked them for recommendations and found a place that was cheap where we met up with the Dutch girls and Eric and his friend. It was AWESOME. They played everything from Samba, to Forro, to Funky (Brazilian funk), to American music and stuff like "Do the Twist"! hehe It was so much fun.

Sunday was the last day for the trainees to be together. We got to see the Estonia girls during the day at Ipanema beach and as Lyn left to go home Eric and his friends came and we stayed till the sunset.

Monday was my last day in Rio but that will be a separate entry because it was the day I was in Rio all by myself since everyone left to go home and my host was busy at school. Stay tuned...

Nipo: Japanese Country Club

Saturday night there was a party at the Japanese Country Club (Nipo) where there's usually a lot of Japanese food on sale. Unfortunately, I was also invited to go to a sushi night at my friend's friend's place. I was caught in a big dilemma! Sushi is one of my favorite foods but I ended up going to Nipo because everyone said it was cool and only that one night. I might get a chance to go to someone's place and have sushi again.

The day started off where my friend Patricia drive me to her house. She's living with her uncle's family and they have a huge house and pool and everything. The house is in "Lago Sul" which is on the other side of the bridge where all the rich people live. They ONLY have houses over there. The first thing I see is fire in a land full of tall grass and trees. This fire ended up spreading crazily! Its a 5 min drive from the house but there were ashes flying all over us and the pool. It was horrible. I still don't know if it was deliberate or not.

The funniest thing I've seen since being here happened within 5 mins of getting into the house. Patricia accidently dropped the 2L of Coke we just bought, off the patio and it bounces off the ground and FLIES across the yard onto the neighbour's roof!! It was so cool, DEFINITELY worthy of YouTube!!! hehe. I loved it. Made my day, it reminded me of the Coke with the mentos video I've seen before. We played some soccer in the backyard and sat by the pool. There was construction to have another little house built in the back with a sauna, snooker room and storage room.

Prior to Nipo, I rarely ever saw any Asians in the streets of Brasilia but Nipo proved they did exist in the city. It was 8pm and there were already hundred's of cars parked everywhere! This was definitely the place to be. The food wasn't great especially for me because I've tried good sushi before but I tried some Yaksiba, which I don't think I've ever had before and Camarao (fried shrimps). Sadly, I didn't even have any sushi. Everything was kinda expensive. The Yaksiba was 12$ reais and the shrimps were 10$ reais. Whoever thought of this festival was BRILLIANT! Seriously, it was just getting the manpower to make and sell the food and you could easily make $30 000 reais in a couple of hours. My friend who's lived in Japan for a year also didn't think the food was amazing but I guess its the atmosphere. The thing was, the whole night was mainly just eatting and chatting with your friends. There were no shows, music but it wasn't even Japanese. A little lacking in substance.

One of Patricia's friend (Sheida) wanted to go see some of her friends sitting far off and so she brought me. It was probably the worst social experience I've had here. They were really not friendly. They just said hi and I tried to speak to them in Portuguese and then they just continued talking without really acknowledging me. When they did talk about me, they asked Sheida instead of me but still were pointing at me. It was so awkward. I just wanted to leave.

Anywho, it was an ok experience, I ran into some AIESEC friends and so it wasn't so bad. I normally love meeting new people but here it's almost becoming stressful because I can't really talk, I feel so mute.

Then we went to Melting Lounge to eat and I tried Sheesha for the first time with Mint and Citrus flavour in it.

Next week I'm off to Rio de Janiero for their Corpus Christi holiday to have a reunion with some of the trainees I met at the Brazilian conference. Hopefully it all works out! Stay tuned for pictures. I just need to figure out why I can't post them?!

Quote of the Night:
Rogerio: "Wow, there are a lot of Japanese people here!"

Pre-packaged goodness, I have no idea what they were but they were EXPENSIVE!

The sign says "Camarao" which means, shrimp. They seriously had like 100 people working behind the scenes that night.

Into my 3rd week here

This week was a bit rough. I had a quarrel with my host friend and since then it just hasn't been the same living here. I'm going to move out soon because I need to live closer to the AIESEC office which if I had to get there by bus would require taking 2 buses in total and spending about $5 reais each day. I guess it was like the burst to my fantasy bubble. That I am in a real world and I have to deal with real interpersonal problems. I was so sad I just wanted to go home that night. I think this was Monday night. This week feels like a blur because of it. There have been improvements since then. Because of the argument, I've gotten a more structured schedule on how my day runs, concrete mandates on what I should be doing here and also definitely meal plans each day. No more starving at 9:30pm and not knowing when my next meal is!:)

The Vice President of Talent Management (VPMD) has been doing some coaching with me and career planning sessions. AIESEC runs SOOOOO differently here and is a lot more structured. People really put a lot of time into AIESEC. Most of them don't even have part-time jobs because they don't have those in my city. So they work at AIESEC as if it is a full-time job in addition to school. It's really motivating to see. People have been great, despite feeling somewhat lonely when everyone in the office speaks Portuguese the whole time in the office. But I need to learn. I just really need a grammar book or something to practise my Portuguese. I'm picking up words here and there but I (like Melissa) still can't understand 99% of what they are saying.

The most awkward thing has been the greeting. Since people know I'm from Canada they just kinda automatically give me their hand but I've been here long enough that I've been greeting people with a hug and so sometimes we don't even know what to do lol. It definitely requires quick thinking so that awkwardness doesn't occur so frequently.

I saw Pirates of the Carribean on Wednesday night with my host family. It was a GREAT MOVIE! I loved it. I never realized how funny that series could be! We even stayed after all the credits to see the last little part. The only thing I didn't know was we were going to sit there and wait 10 mins just to see a 2 sec clip. Oh well. That night I guess the argument was not resolved but my host friend gave me açai (my favorite food here) to say I'm sorry, minus saying the words? I just hope its not so awkward anymore.

I got a really homesick the night of the fight. I miss you guys! More happier entries to come.

Best wedding ever!!

Friday:
I had my first manicure and pedicure of my life lol. I'm not really high maintenance, so I never really took the time to do this. It was fun being pampered. I was surprised at the number of people at the salons! I guess most normal people don't wash and straighten their hair themselves. They pay $10 reais or so once and week and get the people to do it for them.

Saturday:
I kinda melted a part of my dress a little while ironing it and I just kept thinking I wish my mom was here because she would know what to do. I was a little upset also because I missed the first hour of the wedding because my friend was late coming back from the salon from her haircut. Then she takes and shower and washes out her straightened hair?! I was so confused. A little frustrated. So when we arrived it was SO confusing. There was a live jazz band right by the lake and it was just jazz music and lots of hugging going on with the family and bride and groom. I didn't know if we were seeing the beginning (due to Brasilian time) or the end. It was definitely the end because the FIREWORKS, started going off. FIREWORKS! I totally didn't expect it! I felt like I went to a celebrity's wedding! It was so beautiful. Catered of course, with people running around serving appetizers and the best champagne I've ever had. They had a station for making your own piece of wedding cake! They had all the fruit and like 15 toppings and even 6 types of cake. I had pistachio and some other mixed cake flavour. Oh it was heaven hehe. 2 crepes centres, one for salty crepes (shrimp or meat) and the other for sweet ones. The food was AMAZING. I was full before the dinner started. Here the wedding didn't have any speeches or anything that required people speaking too much. The bride and groom said thanks for coming and that everyone enjoyed the party and that was it. They had a slide show of a lot of pictures on a screen and the dancing started, even BEFORE dinner! There was dancing for 5 hours! It was so so much fun. All the moms, aunts and uncles were on the dance floor. They were good dancers too!! My host dad has 15 siblings so there were a lot of relatives for me to meet and mingle with. The bride loves hip hop so they played a lot of music I knew and enjoyed. I was in my element.:) We had so much fun. I felt like I was with the cool family of the party, where everyone danced like crazy and enjoyed themselves. We stayed till they stopped the music.

Sunday:
I started off my day going to church. Its been a few weeks so it was so nice of my friend, Roberta to have found this place. The service was all in English and they sang, "As the Deer", "Did you feel the mountains tremble" and also "Worthy is the Lamb." They had other ones but those reminded me of home. It was a really good service, I felt at home. They have a friday night program here too but I don't know if I wanna go. I'm still contemplating it.

Afterwards, I went to the bride's condo for lunch and it was also amazing! The difference in wealth in Brazil is true, that the rich are really rich and the poor are very poor. This condo had 2 levels, I think we would call this a penthouse in Canada. They had this Spanish dish called Paella. Its rice with all types of seafood and its probably the best thing I've had in Brazil! It was amazing! Super yummy and then they had the best chocolates I've ever tasted. All wrapped as if they were flowers. I ate like 10 pieces of chocolate today! The server came around serving the usually beer, Guarana (a famous pop here), water and coke. I went for a walk with the little cousin Loreana. She hardly speaks any English so a lot of it was hand motions and confused looks. (I have never used the word "CONFUSED" so much in my life, compared to the 2 weeks I've been in Brazil.) In the end, we did understand each other for the most part. CEEDers, its true that your communication is 90% non-verbal!

Here are some visuals:

Some realizations

So I'm back in Brasilia and I was kinda depressed last night because I realized that in Brazil I am sooooo unhealthy. I eat dinner at 10 pm practically everynight! I hate it. I haven't exercised in about 3 weeks and I just feel really blah. I started my first day of AIESEC work. We're trying to match a bunch of developmental internships for June 1st, 2007. Anyone know someone interested? Its working with social entrepreneurship and facilitate the exportation of goods for a bunch of craftman. I think its similar to Ten Thousand Villages. We're hoping to do something like there here. Its not paid but living and food should be covered.

Anyways, so just talking to people about the fact my camera and nano were possibly dead, I was just really sad, frustrated and annoyed. I don't have the necessary paperwork here to send in my nano and its just so annoying to think of having to deal with it all so far from home. I tested both out today and thank God my camera works but my nano has water damage in it. I can see on the screen. I hope I can send it in. I can't even remember when I bought it. I guess I was little homesick yesterday while going out to eat, they had this chicken and cheese bun which looked just like our Chinese Buns back home and it made me miss home. We laughed a lot during the car ride to go try Açai (an Amazonian fruit) because of me trying to guess what they were saying and I was totally off hehe. Yes, I have brought my randomness to Brazil too.

Sao Paulo: The world's second largest city

So arranging a place for me to stay in this city was super stressful. I had no idea where I was going to live until hours before the bus was leaving the conference. Luckily AIESECers are awesome and a girl that I've never met before (Patricia) let me stay with her. Her apartment was super nice! Definitely one of the more expensive ones. There was a pool, hot tub and tennis court on the first level and security everywhere.

Her brother became my hostess because she was busy with school and work and got really sick. Actually, all the AIESECers are sick because of the lack of sleep. I know a lot of you can relate. Anyways, he brought me around his university (Universidade de Sao Paulo). It was quite ghetto. Mold everywhere, but some of the areas were nice, like having plants inside the buildings and also a little pond with fish and turtles. (I took pics for you Lil). We toured a lot of the campus and went into the architecture building that was very artsy inside. The whole building was opened concept. Maybe just some 6 feet walls everywhere.

I was supposed to go out that night but the problem with Brasilians is they aren't very dependable on what they say. We eneded up just eatting cheese and ham sandwiches for dinner.

The next morning I went to GV, where they had a bunch of security just to get into the school because some government official's kids went there and so they had to be protected. There was an event AIESEC GV hosted, a forum discussing social responsiblities and sustainabilities and there were like 60 externals there! It was there first event and it was so well done! They had AMAZING food there too. I was not impressed that I didn't know it was a business formal event and I arrived in running shoes and jeans! AHHHHHH. It was bad. I learned a lot about issues we don't talk enough about in Canada but are important.

Afterwards I waited for my friend, a trainee from AIESEC Melbourne, whom I met at the conference was planning to come visit me so we could tour Sao Paulo together. That took a little while and then we had to wait for another guy who said he would be helpful in our process to get to the Body exhibition (the one that was in toronto, with the nicely dissected muscles?). So it took us longer because we had to take the metro to get to his house and then walk to pick up his car and then drive to go to the place. It was an awful idea. Then he bought us the wrong tickets! omgosh. I was trying not to freak out after everything that went wrong that day. So we saw the exhibition and I think Toronto's was certainly better, but it was only 20 $ reais (about $15 Canadian) to see it. Then we took some fun pictures in the dark on the playground.

We looked all over the place to find a restaurant to have sushi. Then we went to the famous Liberdade area (where all the Japanese things are). The sushi here was soooooo expensive (caro). I couldn't believe it. But it was pretty good even though I paid 27 $ reais for it. In the car after sending my friend off, that's when I discovered my water bottle had spilt all over my camera and Ipod nano! I couldn't believe both of my favorite things were ruined in one night! I was in shock. I think the fact my passport was still ok gave me a little bit of comfort but I was not impressed that night. Finally after taking an hour to get to another friend's apartment, I got changed and at first was supposed to go to an Australian bar but it was closed. It seemed like everything was closed actually. We drove around for 30 mins. At least I got to see all the mansions in Sao Paulo. Then we ended up at an Irish pub. I had strawberry Caprinaha (a really strong vodka drink). It was yummy because they actually put fresh strawberries (morangas) in it. Then to end the night my friend (Gustavo) and I danced role calls till 4am in the morning! hehe It was a fun end to a horrible night.

Some embarrassing moments so far:
1. First morning here, I didn't have toothpaste with me so I just took a tube in the washroom and used it. Hmmm.. definitely a lot more bubbly then I was used to and tasted horrible. It was definitely not toothpaste! I think it said Creme de Barbarar. (I think that means shaving creme.)
2. Tripped about 3 times everywhere and almost cut my foot open.
3. We were looking at rings on the streets and I wanted to try one on. The problem was it wouldn't come off!!! Ahhh.. we spent like 5 minutes staying there, trying to pull it off. Darn fat fingers! I finally got it off and not have to buy it.
4. Tripping over my own suitcase in the elevator face first.
5. While my camera and nano were being dreached in water in my purse, the water leaked all over my pants. Great! Another thing to add to my awesome night.

I think there are more but I'll keep this list updated.