Adventure Around the World

To start off, we hear your requests for pictures but are having some technical issues (i.e., we forgot the USB cord) so we´ll try to put some on in the future.

Well, our time in Sao Paulo can be summed up in one word: sickness. After exploring Sao Paulo the day we landed, we realized that while hand gestures had gotten us through Peru, the Brazilian people just weren´t picking it up(right, we´ll blame them). So we purchased a Portugese phrasebook and a Letś Go Brazil to prepare us for the upcoming days - we should have spent that $60 on a nicer hotel. We both ended up getting pretty sick (for those of you assuming I drank the water out of convenience - I didn´t) and spending the vast majority of our time lying on our beds, searching for English cable stations. We are now quite up to date on world happenings (thank you CNN) and watched more made-for-TV Hallmark movies than I will ever admit... to anyone. I guess ¨the plague¨, which we lovingly refer to it as, hit at a decent time since Sao Paulo is really a large city, with museums and shopping, but no sights which we were dying to see. The two highlights of Sao Paulo (read: two things we did) were the Institute Buhtantha and the Museum of Modern Art. The Institute is a leading researcher and pŕoducer of snake and spider anti-venoms and had a collection of scary looking animals - made me glad we didn´t go to the Amazon. The Art Museum was nothing to write home about, but on the walk there we did witness a Brazillian criminal run past us, with a policeman chasing him, gun out, about 30 yards behind. The memorable scene was when the police officer tripped over a crack in the sidewalk, falling face first on the ground, gun thrown from his arm (still attached by a cord though. I guess this happens to him every now and again). But justice was served and minutes later we saw the man in the back of a cop car.

The plane trip to Rio de Janeiro brought health back to us, as well as cleaner air. Rio is definitely a big city, and with the beaches and the Tijuica Forest, it has many sites that we can´t wait to see. Thankfully, Rio is also full of international tourists so we have had fewer problems with communication. To the benefit of the locals (and at the request of many) Meridith has given up on attempting Portugese and I think the phrasebook may be retired.


Being back near 90% health (Mer may still be hovering around 70%), and after doing little to nothing in Sao Paulo, we´re definitely planning full days here. So far, we´ve been to a samba club (Brazilians don´t know the term for personal space), papparazzied the monkeys at the Jardin Botanique (Botanical Gardins), perused the Hippie Market (our first shipment back to the US should be happening in the next few days), avoided the numerous displays of public urination (Brazil is a drunk guy's paradise), and sipped coconut water on the sidewalk at Copacabana Beach. Our future plans include catching a ¨football¨ game, being at the feet of Christ the Redeemer, hang gliding from some large rock we´re going to hike up (you can tell which part of that I´m interested in) and staying away from the local water, fruits, vegetables, dairy, meats and anything else that makes my stomach say ¨What?¨