Alright, so I know I've probably disappointed all of you that care enough to read my blog with my lack of posts. What can I say? Life happens. And I have a lot of "preguiça" to write. But as I move families for my last time I figured it was time.
Where has my life taken me the last few months... So many places.
Since you've last read from me, the new year had just begun with many opportunites for me. My new years was the best new years I've ever had in my life. I honestly don't know what is better than spending new years on the beach, watching fireworks, with a little bit of champagne and warm rain surrounded by your friends, family and people that just want to have a good time. It is a breath-taking feeling.
Also my Christmas was amazing. I spent it with both of my host families, one extremely different from the other. My first family snacked on fruit and nut platters while conversing about what I had missed out on and life in general. My younger cousins enjoyed running around and my uncle even dressed up as Santa Clause!
My second fam is more calm, because it is an older crowd and cousins closer to my age. We ate dinner and sat around watching movies for most of the night, with some small talk included. The loudiest noise in the this celebration with the amount of fireworks lit off at midnight.
Both of my families are very different but I love them both so very much.
Shortly after new years I headed on my Rotary trip to the Northeast of Brasil. I went with 48 other exchange students to more than 10 cities. Not even pictures can capture this trip. Each town was just as beautiful as the last and the things we did got crazier and crazier. My group explored all the sites of Rio (Christ Redeemer, Sugar Loaf, favela..), went by boat to a deserted island in Salvador, visited the president's house in Brasilia, went to two clubs in Porto Seguro and a concert in Natal, dune buggy, sledding down sand hills and horse back riding in Fortaleza, and spent countless days on the beaches of Brasil. In my group of 49, the majority was from Germany, United States and Mexico. However my best friend from the trip was a girl from Japan. We slept in the same room almost every night. I made friends that I will have for the rest of my life. My favorite city was Salvador, though I probably felt the worst of the trip my second day there. Not only was the deserted island amazing, the city itself is very quaint and I feel in love with it. There is a famous elevator in the middle of the city, separating the upper city from the lower city. The main market is incredible as well. My other favorite city was Lençois. It is a small town, with not a lot of shopping or cafes like the other towns, but the natural beauty is amazing. We went on a set of hikes around Lençois to rivers with natural water slides, copper colored water, caves with stalagmite and stalactites, and mountains with incredible views. One afternoon just a small group of us, 15, went on a second hike to see some sand caverns. The coolest part of this was that when some of the rocks get wet, the sandstone and granite make a sort of paint/clay mixture. We spent the afternoon finding different rocks and making designs on our bodies.
I got a couple days of relaxation then it was CARNAVAL (famous worldwide). What I didn't know is that there are three different kinds of Carnaval, and I got to experience them all. First on Friday my host parents took me to São Paulo to see how the Samba schools do Carnaval. There is a long roadway that looks like a speedway and concrete bleachers on each side. We got there really really early to get a good spot, and also didn't realize that the first school won't start until 11:15.. But what do you do while you wait? Make friends of course. Then the schools get start, singing one song as they take an hour to dance their way to end of the road. You get to know the words after a while and start singing with the song and dancing of course. Each school has a theme, which the song is centered around, and normally 4 big floats, plus thousands of people dancing. And the Carnaval in São Paulo is not as big as the one in Rio. I had to see all of the schools so we stayed until 7:30 in the morning.
The next day we drove to the beach! Here I got to see Carnaval "de rua" (in the street). The main square in Caragua was playing old Samba songs and pack with people dancing and singing along. Some people had brought confetti which they would random throw or a conga line would pass by. On the main road there were trucks blaring music and a drumline playing a tune, with everyone around dancing.
I spent a few more days relaxing on beautiful, practically empty beaches. Then it was time to head back to São José dos Campos.
The last type of Carnaval is "salão" or Carnaval in the club. I headed to the Santa Rita on Tuesday with my host brother and host cousins. The Santa Rita was also packed with people because Tuesday is the last day. There were two different sections to suit everyone's music tastes. One room was playing your classic Samba songs and then through the crowd to the next "room" (it was more like a covered outdoor stage) they were playing techno music. I choose to wander between the two, meeting up with friends from school and getting lost in the massive amounts of people.
I got a little bit of a break before I started school. I switched schools this year because all my friends from last year are going to college and I wanted to learn something new. My school now is Opção and it's located in the center of town. Another exchange student goes there, Jill from Germany, and she is in my class. The school itself is a lot smaller, about 300 students, with tight classrooms. They actually expanded my class, taking up the covered area so when it rains now we have no where to stand and remain dry. I am in high school (more or less sophomore year level) and a technical course about the environment. So, the high school classes are really easy (I normally finish all my exercises in class because I don't have a book) but the tech classes are really hard (I have to translate the material to English and most of the time I still don't understand it).
I have done some fun things with my school, like going to a fantasy party (I went as a Brasilian) and helping out at an event at the main city park. The students at school seem more interested in me than the kids at COC and maybe that's just because they don't have to study as much. However they are younger and don't go out during the weekend.
I made a short trip to São Paulo with my host parents on my last days in their house. We went on a Thursday because my host parents were applying (and recieving) a visa to go visit their daughter in Yakima! So I spent Thursday morning with them in conslate, doing math homework because you can't bring any electronics in. This was a slight problem with me, being the exchange student I am and also spending a night in São Paulo. I had a camera, cellphone, iPod, chargers for all of them.. my hands were full. And apparently I missed something and was ordered to find the flash drive in my host dad's backpack. I headed back out of security to get harassed by the officals over and over. I found the flash drive and looking in little pockets of the backpack and handed over my hair straigtener. As I was leaving the offical asked me if I planned on straigtening my hair there, they had an outlet I could use as I wished. :) Then we went to Morumbi shopping for lunch. This is the upscale shopping of São Paulo and I felt very undressed. The next stop was the art muesum, MASP. I saw famous works by Van Gogh, Monet and Picasso. Maria and I headed back to Lucas' (her nephew) apartment and João headed back to SJC. Maria and I went out to eat and when I came back I headed to the apartment's gym with Lucas. The next day we went to the cheapest street to buy things in São Paulo, 25 de Março. It is shop after shop, plus stands on the street. Endless things to see and buy. Then we headed to the main market to eat famous cod pastel. It is very cool there, but also very crowded as everything is in São Paulo. After lunch we headed to the Museu de Lingua Portuguesa (Portugues Language Muesum). It was actually a very interesting place with lots of videos to watch and counts articles to read. There was a show in another room where the words flew around the walls and the ceiling. That was the end of my visit in São Paulo, we caught the metro back to the bus station and were back in SJC that night.
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