MondayMorningMutiny.com

I left Sao Paulo and another enjoyable time with my Brazilian friends in Limeira followed, spent socialising and route planning.
Themed parties are popular here and another coincided with my visit. This time the theme was `Hillbillies´ or whatever the Brazilian equivalent is: think straw hats, chequered flannel shirts, blacked out teeth, straw in mouth, pigtails for the ladies and braces.

A novel feature was a jail in which a hillbilly reveller could be incarcerated by another for 15 minutes for a small fee. For the same small fee, the prisoner could buy their release, without knowing who was responsible. This information cost a little more.

Much drinking, dancing and talking ensued. I exchanged emails with a guy who who was going to be in Indonesia at the same time as me, whilst successfully avoiding doing time for the duration of the party. The address was promptly lost but it was a good conversation nonetheless.

Aloha, the slightly schizophrenic Rottweiler was still there, this time at a new house. She was friendly enough most of the time, just bored.  A classic example of her unpredictability was one occasion when she nuzzled up to me for attention – after a mere 5 seconds of what i would have considered good quality fuss, she decided that she didn´t want any more and snapped at my arm!

Cross words were exchanged and she was sent outside; at least she makes a good guard dog..

On the penultimate night, I got a bit of portrait practice as some friends were going to an evening wedding and arose early the following day in order to go to a party at a holiday home, somewhere off the beaten track in Sao Paulo state. A great day of sunshine, swimming, barbecue, drinks, cards, pool, table tennis and football was a nice way to wrap up this segment before moving on again.

Most surprising about the day was the revealing of a hidden talent at table tennis. It´s been years since I played properly – I did play briefly in Mendoza, Argentina, but discount that due to being inebriated, travel lagged and using a plasterers trowel as a bat.

I retired unbeaten.

Brazil losing to England at a sport?

There´s a first time for everything..

To even things out, Brazil triumphed at pool.

My next major destination was Rio de Janeiro – there´s little to write about here as I spent most of the few days I was here holed up with a fever and flu watching Bruce Willis movies on what appeared to be a Bruce Willis channel.. I forget which films they were now, the plots are for the most part irrelevant anyway – generally something about a man in a vest, documenting the gradual dirtying and degradation of said vest throughout the film. There´s a high likelihood that the world or some part of it gets saved from otherwise impending doom at the end.

On an idle moment, I went through the drawers in the apartment to see if anything interesting had been left behind by a previous occupant. Not much of note, although I wondered if the XL Trojan Magnum Powers (or whatever they were called) had been left behind as some sort of amusing propaganda. They weren´t that big anyway…

My track record with Rio isn´t particularly good and this time was no better.

Blame it on Rio..

The precursor to me getting ill and quite possibly also the trigger was on the first night when I am fairly certain that I was drugged. I say fairly certain because it was a remarkably similar feeling to a time back in Newbury. That, coupled with the fact that I have no recollection of the following day and a half and woke up fully clothed, half on the bed, half on the floor, enormously confused and feeling like an observer to my own actions cements it, I think.

I remember starting to feel strange at a bar, suspecting something was up and thinking that I ought to leave and try to lose any tail I might have. Although I can´t really remember what I did to achieve this, it obviously worked as I got back to my flat safely with all my original body organs and money. The only casualty was a pair of sunglasses but they are more easily replaceable than my life so it didn´t bother me too much.
This must have made my immune system let it´s guard down and subsequently take a hammering from a variety of bugs that were all waiting patiently for such a moment. I´m still ill and it´s over two weeks after the event – fever, flu, heavy cold and stomach bug have all taken their turn. All have left again, except for the remnants of the cold, which persists despite my wishes otherwise, as I was hoping to either be surfing or walking and exploring the region of Chapada Diamantina by now.

I should probably point out my travels aren´t just a series of one close call after another – it´s just that, for some reason, I prefer writing about these edgier moments – the normal, particularly happy and engaged ones don´t get given as much writing time – mainly due to being otherwise occupied!

I made it out again for one other night in Rio, decided to keep the tone low and go to the infamous Help disco on Copacabana. I was heavily feverish and still disoriented from the other day´s misadventure. It felt like a rap video gone wrong once inside – every girl in there was professional, bumping and grinding with anyone who looked like they had some cash. At the tables sat large Americans with bevies of young girls, pretending that they liked these probably married men. Not entirely sure what to do at first, I figured dancing was best bet and so I did, all the while complaining that pathetically few of the other guys were attempting to do so.
Once the girls realised I had no intention of buying them drinks, or indeed their company for the evening and that I was just there for a laugh, I´ll admit that I did actually have fun – in a once off novelty, unlikely to ever go there again kind of way.

So much for more relaxed activities like hangliding..
I was looking forward to doing that.

Time to start wearing glasses?

Here´s the photo gallery.

This entry was posted on July 7, 2007 at 7:43 pm and is filed under Brazil, Photos. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments. You can comment below, or link to this permanent URL from your own site.