Two Beers and a Pretzel

On Thursday I met Julia (friend of a friend) and visited her at the restraunt she works at where there was a comic book release party going on.  I chatted with Deborah, who’s brother wrote the comic.  Then Julia, Debora and I went to a Rock club where a decent band was covering the Strokes.  I somehow got home around 6 AM.

I was supposed to go out with them again on Friday, but I think my tolerance it improving because both girls were hungover and/or sick that night, but I was fine.

On Saturday, my aunt and uncle took me to the Ibere Camargo art gallery.  He and my aunt’s father were friends.  I liked his use of texture, but the paintings on display were pretty dark.  Even so, the gallery is a neat building.

Those small windows in the walkways had a great panoramic view of the city.

One last artsy shot of the building.

Yesterday, my uncle took me to a park that has an outdoor flea market every Sunday.  The park has a pond with paddle boats, a mini-zoo, and rides.  Fun for the kids, but I was enjoying the market with Peruvian Flute bands, Guatemalan indian rock bands, hippie art, and bizarre collections of junk.

I almost bought the Michael Jackson BAD LP – thinking of my buddy Ken who does a mean moonwalk…

There were also masked people in black with white words on their chest performing a silent protest against Oppression, Imperialism, Injustice, Exploitation, etc…  I decided that someday I would march on Washington to protest against people who protest against abstract concepts.  That’s almost stupid enough to make it on to CNN.

Last night (Sunday), Julia picked up me and her best friend Mariana for a night on the town.  We went to a dance club on the shady side of town – similar to the Samba bar back in Florianopolis.  Also similar to when I went out with Bile and Rafa are the looks on people’s faces that seem to say “who the heck is that gringo and with those two babes?”   But the same as everywhere in Brazil, the people turn out to be really friendly.

The band was kind of Samba / Reggae / Funk.  Interesting to listen to, but you had to wait for them to play a fast enough song to really dance.  That place slowed down after midnight, so we left for a street full of bars that are usually hopping…  except with most of the city out at the beach for the holiday weekend, the bars decided to close early.  We ended up eating, drinking, and having some fun conversations at a corner cafe until almost 3 AM.  Here’s me, Mariana, Julia, and part of Christopher Walken’s face.

We asked an old guy at the bar to take our picture.  About 30 minutes later, Julia comes over cracking up because this 70 year old guy was asking if I was her boyfriend.  When she said no, he told her that she needs a real man with experience to teach her the ways of the world.  I wish I had taken a picture of that guy.

We’re supposed to all go out again tonight, then possibly to the Alanis Morissette concert where Julia is working tomorrow before I fly out on the 4th.

Through the course of the evening I learned that McDonald’s is open until 6 am on weekends, and everyone goes there after drinking.  That niche is seemingly secure unless White Castle, Steak & Shake, Waffle House, or Skyline Chili ever make it down to Brazil.  Boy, do I miss Skyline…

Hello from Brazil!!!!

The 6th country on my world tour (yes, I’m counting Panama since I was stuck there for nearly 4 hours).

I’m with my uncle and his family in Porto Alegre.  He took me for a tour of the town last night…  It turned into a godfather/godson mini pub-crawl.  I sampled some local euro-style pizza and a number of local beers an a really hip neighborhood.

Today we dropped off my cousin at kindergarten, went shopping for the coming Christmas party, and I unsuccessfully tried to find a spare battery for my Canon camera.  We need to find a real camera shop…  the electronic boutiques do not carry the fancy pro-sumer camera gear.  Still, I tested a few camera modes and even tried the time lapse video mode, which was pretty neat.  We were just driving, so the video is not special, but it gives you an idea of the potential of this new camera on longer journey’s…

Aside from everyone speaking Portugese, this could be Miami.  Very cosmopolitan and modern.

Also, yes guys, there are some stunningly beautiful women here (no photos of them yet – wait until I hit the beach at Florinopolis in a few days), and the average is higher than normal.  For the regional battle of who has the hottest babes, so far Brazil is beating Argentina.  Word on the street is that there’s 5% more women than men, and closer to 10% if you discount the men who bat for the other team.

The downside here is that it’s expensive to get things you’re used to getting in the USA for minimal expense like cars and electronics.  Take any car and multiply the US cost by 2x to 2.5x to get the cost in Brazil in US Dollars.  A loaded Honda Accord would be near $60,000.00.  Yowza!!  You’re buying one for yourself and one for a government official…  One small 99 cent bag of Snyder’s of Hanover pretzel snacks was $5 in a “gourmet” shop (the only place you could find them).  However, commonly available items and food are generally cheaper and you get a level of service from every shop that is completely lacking back home.