Recife

Mateo and I arrived in Recife on Saturday after a grueling 50 hour bus marathon. So far it's been great. We spent the day yesterday in Olinda, a historical city about 30 minutes to the north, where we saw some good capoeira, repente, and drumming and ate some tasty acaraje. A gorgeous sunset over the city rounded out the day of historical sightseeing and beach bumming.

A few impressions from our first couple days in the northeast of Brazil: life is slow here. You see it in the way people talk, the way they move, the length of time it takes to get a waiter's attention. I think it's refreshing actually. It makes you wonder how much more we actually get done with our constant activity.

Asking for directions is quite an experience here. First of all, you never want to ask an individual person for directions. Seeing as "I don't know" is, in general, a culturally forbidden answer, they will more likely direct you to an area where they believe there should be someone that may know how to get there. I speak from personal experience when I say you can spend all day at this game.

But asking groups isn't exactly a picnic either. The first 5 minutes or so are spent in bewildered stares as they try to comprehend what planet you came from. Then comes the obligatory 15 minutes of passionate discussion about what you mean exactly when you say "the Recife Palace Hotel right next to the Holiday Inn and Pizza Hut in the Boa Viagem neighborhood." By this time surrounding people have been drawn into the debate, battle lines are drawn, weapons unscathed, and then begins the half-hour or so of discussion on which of the virtually infinite ways to get there is the best, of course taking into account traffic patterns, the weather, any local holidays or special events, the location of any favelas or bad neighborhoods, police presence, alignment of relevant constellations, and if anyone is on their way there or on their way anywhere or even not planning on going anywhere at all but will gladly take you personally.

Even after this ordeal, the designated spokesperson (usually the individual whose proposed route was chosen as the best and therefore who won the prize) insists on telling you no less than 10 times how EXACTLY it is one gets there. There's no use in trying to get this number down into the single digits. It's not gonna happen. You can interrupt, walk away, punch him in the face - all this will only encourage him because he's not sure you're listening. By the time you leave you'll know not only how to get there, but also the Top 30 Things That If You See Them It Means You Are Going the Wrong Way (all rights reserved). Yesterday an old guy literally ran after us, leaving behind his refreshment cart, to make absolutely sure we hadn't somehow misunderstood "end of the beach." Amazing, just amazing.

But no really, the people are great. They are extremely kind and caring and truly want to help you.

Looks like we are going to Porto de Galinhas (voted best beach in Brazil) either today or tomorrow, depending on whether we can find anything to do here, since the city is dead right now. School's not really out yet so we're kind of just waiting for the parties to start in the meantime. After that we're thinking of going to Palmares (site of the biggest runaway slave city in olden times) and then to Maceio.

Check out the pictures on the right.