katie christon

This past week, I went with Paula — a friend of mine from Sao Carlos–  on a family trip! It was kind of a last minute plan, and I didn’t really know what to expect, but I would never turn down such an offer. So, we set off for the week in her friend’s car to go to Paula’s house in Campinas. Little did I know, this car ride was the beginning of new friendships and a chance to see four different Brazilian cities!

Paula’s old university– Unicampi

Upon arrival in Campinas, we went on a short walk to Unicampi, the university that Paula used to go to college at. It was an beautiful campus– there were a lot of trees, and it was really cool to see another university in Brazil! At Unicampi, we met up with one of Paula’s friends named Barbara who I had meet a couple weeks ago in Sao Carlos.

Me, Paula, and Barbara

That evening, Paula’s dad took us to eat dinner at a batataria — or a restaurant that serves potatoes. It is interesting, because in Portuguese, it is common to add endings to words to change the meaning. For example, they add “aria” to the end of words to indicate that it serves that word. Batataria = potatoes, Sorveteria = ice cream store, Temakaria = Japanese food… and the list goes on. They do the same with “ina” to make a cute “little” nickname — for example, some of Paula’s family/friends call her Paulina or “Little Paula.”

I forgot to take a picture of the potatoes– but this is like what we ate at the batataria– SO DELICIOUS!

Then, we stayed the night at Barbara’s house. There, I tried many different Brazilian sweets– her family is a family of bakers! We made brigadeiro (a sweet made out of condensed milk + cocoa), and I tried several other yummy baked goods homemade by her mom and sister.

Getting ready to depart from Paula’s house in Campinas

The next day, Paula, Paula’s dad (Paulo), brother (Daniel), sister (Carolina), and I drove to a city near-by called Sao Jose dos Campos where their good family friends live. The dads of the families grew up together in a small town, and have stayed good friends ever since.

The view from Paula’s friends’ house in Sao Jose dos Campos

We stayed the next few days in Sao Jose dos Campos to explore the city. It is a really beautiful city with tall buildings, nice parks, and a beautiful view of mountains in the distance. Rose, the family friends’ mom, drove us all around the city to see the shopping malls, coffee shops, parks, and even sunsets. The city is known for having some of the most beautiful sunsets in Brazil!

Paula and Carolina awaiting the sunset in Sao Jose dos Campos

After a few days, we drove to Ubatuba beach which was just a little over an hour away from Sao Jose dos Campos. For beaches in this part of Brazil, there are many hills on the way to the beach. You know you are getting close to the beach when the road starts to have sharp twists and turns and the trees get very dense and green. We even saw natural bamboo!

When we arrived, it was raining at Ubatuba beach– but still beautiful.

Ubatuba beach was so amazing! Every beach I have been to in Brazil makes me melt inside– and this was one of my favorites (well, I guess all of them are favorites in some way!). It began to rain during the first day when we got down to the beach, and I was accused of having “cold feet.” There is a saying here that you either have cold feet or hot feet. Those with cold feet bring bad weather to the beach, and those with hot feet bring good weather to the beach.

Ubatuba Beach on a sunny day

The next day; however, there was great weather at the beach (maybe my feet are warming up!). With the sun shining over the hills, people out on the beach, and the chance to walk around a bathing suit… I’m pretty sure I had everything I would ever need in that moment.

Me and Paula at the pool at Ubatuba beach

That afternoon; however, we packed up and went back to Sao Jose dos Campos. We spent the next day there, just relaxing, and then went to Campos do Jordao the next day! Campos do Jordao is like a European town right in the middle of Brazil. The buildings are similar to German or Swiss architecture, and the place is known for having excellent chocolate. I bought a bar of chocolate to bring home with me, but I already ate it (whoops, sorry guys!) .

Me in Campos de Jordao. See the buildings??

It was kind of cold there too, due to the high elevation, so I actually had to purchase a scarf! Who would have known that I would have to buy a scarf in Brazil!! On the way out of the Campos do Jordao, we stopped at a look-out point to see one of the most beautiful views I have ever seen in my life. All you could see for miles and miles were rolling hills– it was really breathtaking.

Me and Paula

That night, we stayed in Sao Jose dos Campos, and took the bus back to Sao Carlos the next day. It is amazing how welcoming everyone was to me during the week– as a complete stranger, they welcomed me into their homes and treated me like family. Between the trips to different cities, meals, and conversations– I was so lucky to have such an experience– and it was definitely an experience I will never forget.

Thank you from the bottom of my heart, Paula and your wonderful friends and family. You showed me Brazil in a way that I never could have seen without you to welcome me into your homes. Please do not ever hesitate to e-mail or message me if you are ever travelling to the United States!

I learned so much about Brazil and the Brazilian way of life during the trip, so I plan on writing some future blog posts about meals, education, etc. Keep an eye out!

This last weekend, me and many of the other trainees went to a city you might have heard of before called Rio de Janeiro. I’ve been awaiting this trip since arriving in Brazil, and it did not dissapoint. Despite the fact that the weather was absolutely horrible (rainy and cloudy everyday), we still were able to see much of the city and get a feel for the energy in the city.

Market

We arrived early Thursday morning, and after dropping off our stuff in the hostel, we began our trek through the city. I think I was most surprised by the fact that even though it is a city, it is a city surrounded by mountains and beach. Of course you can tell this by looking at a map, but walking through the city, you can actually see the mountains in the streets between buildings. Day one started off walking through a food market (pictured above). There were live crabs, fresh fruit, meat hanging on hooks, fish, vegetables… pretty much anything you might need.

Inside the Cathedral

After the market, we went to a shopping mall because it was pouring rain. Turns out the mall was closed, so we took a bus towards “Catedral do Sao Sebastiao” which was really tall and beautiful. Near the cathedral, there was artwork made up of colored sand and other fine grain that extended down the entire street

Street Artwork

After the cathedral, we made our way to the famous stairs, “Escadaria Selarón.” These colorful stairs are a collage of tiles that are either solid colors or painted on to represent a country or a person. The artist who made these stairs, Selarón, is not yet finished and claims that he will never be finished until he dies.

Escadaria Selarón

We then made our way up to Santa Teresa, a neighborhood on top of a mountain with stunning views, local art, and tasty food. I bought a couple souvenirs, we ate some dinner, and then we made our way down.

View from Santa Teresa

During the evening, we dressed up and went to a club. They were playing a lot of older American music and there was even a Pac-Man machine! Unfortunately, I was stepped on by a girl in a massive high heel (on the foot I sprained last weekend in Florianopolis…), so I ended up limping around for the rest of the weekend. I guess it was proven to me that I have made good friends here because the group I was with walked slowly with me so that I could still go see everything. Thanks guys :).

Coffee + Pie

The next day, we changed hostels because the second hostel didn’t have availability for the first night. While the first one looked nicer, the people were much more friendly in the second one. It took a while to get to the next hostel and everything, so upon arrival, we ended up grabbing some coffee at a really cute local coffee shop. In the picture above, you can see I also got a little pie– who would have known that they make salty pies! Inside was cheese, chicken, and heart of palm (which is used in a lot of dishes here). After coffee, we took the 4 block stroll down to Copacabana beach!

Copacabana Beach

You can see in the images above how much action was going on by the beach, even though it was sort of cold and rainy! There were a bunch of kids playing soccer, food vendors, a market with souvenirs and art, and even places to buy fresh coconut juice!! I would love to go back to the beach someday when it is hot and sunny to get the real feel for one of the most famous beaches in the world.

The next day, we went on a favela tour. Favelas are essentially “slums” and according to our tour guide, out of the 6 million people living in Rio, 1 million of them are estimated to live in favelas. It felt really wrong to be going on a tour through one of the poorest parts of town during my vacation, and I’m still not sure how I really feel about the idea. Either way, we rode a motorcycle up to the top of the mountain and walked (well, I limped) down through the “streets”. I didn’t bring my camera, so any of the pictures I show of the favelas here I just took from Google.

Favela

We were told that favelas are any sort of improvised living, and that many of the people living in the favelas in Rio came to Rio from the Northern part of the country in search of a better life. Our tour guide also told us that the favela we walked through is a part of a government initiative to police favelas and to begin imposing regulations for the safety of the people living there. Before this initiative, drug lords ruled the favela. Now, there are hundreds of police imposing laws on the favela. I think I would like to do more research on favelas before forming any opinions about anything because I feel like our tour guide gave a somewhat biased account of the reality in favelas.

After the favela tour, we showered and got ready for dinner! This was one of my favorite dinners here so far because we went out for rodizio of Brazilian barbecue! How it works is you pay a flat rate for unlimited salad bar (which had everything from shrimp to sushi to vegetables to potatoes…), and then waiters come around with freshly grilled meat on long sticks. They shave off meat onto your plate until you tell them to stop. I ordered orange juice, and it came in a mini-pitcher full of freshly-squeezed juice! Yeah, I was in heaven.

Brazilian Barbecue

The next day was our last day in Rio, so we got up early and headed up to the statue of Christ. A bus ride, two shuttles, and a couple hundred stairs later, we made it to the statue. The statue was absolutely massive, and the view from the top of the mountain was stunning.

The statue of Christ

Here is a view from the top of the mountain (imagine how awesome it would have been without any clouds!):

View from the top

After making our way down the mountain and back to the city, we had just enough time to buy some last-minute souvenirs and head to the bus station. I don’t think I had enough time in Rio, but what I was able to see was amazing. Perhaps I will have to try to make it back sometime when it is summer here :).

This past weekend, six of the other trainees and I made a trip to Florianopolis (the Brazilians abbreviate it to be “Floripa”). If you look on the map below, “A” is Sao Carlos, and “B” is Florianopolis– the total travel time ended up being about 14.5 hours there and 14.5 hours back. The bus seats are pretty big and can lean back really far, but the ride was still pretty uncomfortable. However, every few hours we’d stop at these truck-stop-like things that served nice, fresh food and had bathrooms and stuff.

A = Sao Carlos; B = Florianopolis

We arrived in Florianopolis early Friday morning and dropped our stuff off at the hostel. Now, I’ve never stayed in a hostel before, so I had no clue what to expect. To be honest, for the equivalent of $15 per night, I expected to be sleeping on moldy sheets in the middle of no-where. Man did I get it wrong! We ended up in this beautiful hostel overlooking the lagoon (beautiful sunsets!!), and the people we met there were really awesome. Upon arrival, we dropped our stuff off in a cubby upstairs, and ate some free breakfast overlooking the view you can see in the picture below.

View from the bar/restaurant room

Then, we changed into our suits and walked to the beach Praia da Joaquina where we walked around on some rocks and went SANDBOARDING. For those of you who don’t know what sandboarding is, it is basically like snowboarding on sand dunes.

Praia da Joaquina, surrounded by mountains

One of the other trainees, Jeff, Sandboarding

Lucky me, I made it down the slope successfully once, but due to my clumsiness, I took an awkward fall the second time and hurt my foot. For those of you who have known me for a while, you will know that last summer I fell off my bike and hurt my foot. At least now I have a good story of how I hurt my foot– sandboarding in Florianopolis Brazil is a pretty cool way to hurt yourself!! Either way, since we had walked over a mile to the beach, there was no way I was going to walk home hurt. So, we tried calling a cab, but none of them showed up. Just as we had given up hope and began walking, (well– limping) home,  a guy pulled up in his car and asked me “Carona??” I hesitated thinking eh I have no clue where this place called “Carona” is… when I remembered back to 30 minutes earlier when my friend Ryan taught me that Carona actually means “do you need a ride?” So of course we were dying of happiness thanking him as we piled into his car.

Sunset Backpackers Hostel– pool

Once we made it back to the hostel, we took turns showering, and sat by the pool overlooking the lagoon until the sunset. Dinner was roast beef with potatoes, rice, and a salad. We started the night off with a free caipirinha (included in our $15 per night fee) and checked out a bar in Florinapolis.

Brazil Bracelets and Caipirinhas

The next morning, we headed to a beach at the South of the island called Lagoinha do Leste. We took a bus with some of the people from the hostel– a guy from Austrailia, a guy from Germany, and a guy from Brazil who were planning on surfing there. Since we were told it was a short hike to the beach, we grabbed some beach stuff and headed to the car. After stopping at a little supermarket to grab some lunch, we started the “short hike.”

Supermaket

Keeping in mind that I had just sprained my foot the day before, we began the hike. Turns out the hike was defintely  not a “short hike” — instead it was an hour and a half climb up and down a mountain. Let me tell you though, it was completely worth it. Despite my foot hurting and a sweaty tank top, the view at the top of the mountain was absolutely stunning.

Top of the mountain on the way to Lagoinha do leste

The second half of the walk was more difficult than the first half, but the beach was wonderful. It’s winter here in Brazil, so there are a lot fewer people on the beaches here now than in summer, so it almost felt like a private beach!

Lagoinha do leste

That night, we ate barbecue at the hostel, and I headed to bed after my free caiparinha because I was tired from the day! The next morning, we woke up and headed down to Mole beach for about an hour before we had to leave to catch our bus home.

Me at Mole Beach

We hardly caught the bus on the way home, but we did. Made it home safe and sound this morning at 4:00AM. Good thing I did because my mom said she was going to call the embassy if she didn’t hear from me soon– haha, at least I know she cares :).

Yesterday, we went to a new school called CAASO to teach. The class was much smaller than what we were used to (only about 10 kids), which was kind of nice because it was easier to interact with each of them individually in some way. During our presentation on America, we ask what the high schoolers think of when they think of Americans. Each classroom seems to answer differently– some classrooms answer “fat, McDonalds, blonde, rich…” and others answer “normal, just like anyone else…” Then, during our question & answer portion of the presentation, we are inevitably asked what we thought of Brazilians before coming to Brazil. It seems to be a serious concern that these high school students think that Americans think of Brazilians as “a bunch of indians that swing around on trees.” So, that got me to thinking… I wonder what people in the US think about people in Brazil. If you’d like to help me get a grasp on it– describe in the box below! This way, I’ll have a better answer when the high schoolers ask me!

After teaching, a group of the other trainees and me got lunch at what has become one of our new favorite restaurants, Kallahs. I’ll have to get a picture of it soon! Then I just spent the afternoon relaxing. To be honest, I was pretty tired yesterday. Now that I am settled and feeling comfortable here in Sao Carlos, I decided it was time to get some relaxation :).

The street I live on– Rua Dona Alexandrina

Last night, I went to a party with my roommate. Let me tell you, Brazilian parties are a little different than parties in the United States. There was real DJ with actual equipment, I’m guessing over 100 people, security guards, wristbands, and cooks!! For the equivalent of $4, at this party, you could eat unlimited hot dogs, and drink unlimited Cachaça (a Brazilian liquor). I didn’t stay late enough to find out, but I’m assuming that the combination of food and liquor wouldn’t sit well with most people’s stomachs.

Me and Marina, one of my hosts

After the party, we went to go eat at McDonalds– I haven’t eaten at one since being here yet! However, I didn’t end up ordering because it is so expensive here! A normal meal similar to the ones I have shown you in previous posts will cost around 7-10 Reals (3.5-5 USD), and McDonalds was around 15 Reals (7.5 USD). We ended up going to a near by restaurant to get hamburgers– I split one with Marina (they are HUGE) and only had to pay 3 Reals (1.5 USD)– and it tasted better than McDonalds :). While we were at the restaurant sitting outside, we were speaking in English, and a guy came up asking for money. Apparently when people here speak in English, they are assumed to have money. I suppose it makes sense because people speaking English are probably are tourists who can afford a plane ticket to Brazil.

McDonalds Sao Carlos

Today, I went to a meeting for TEDxSanca, you can see the website here: http://www.ted.com/tedx/events/3448. I am on the organizing committee with 3 other girls who all speak a little English. I’m a little nervous though because I need to start making sales calls to find sponsors for the event. It wouldn’t usually be too much of a problem, but the secretaries do not speak English so I need to learn how sell (at least on a basic level) in Portuguese. I’ll be starting later this week, so wish me luck!

Now, I’m going to go buy a bus ticket to go to Florianopolis this weekend! One of my friends here says she liked Florianopolis more than Rio, so I’m really excited.

This morning for breakfast, we had cheese and bread which is very common to eat for breakfast here. One of the cheeses we ate was a white, hard, cheese that tasted pretty mild and is from the state of Menais Gerais. The other cheese we ate is a very soft cheese that is also very mild, but you spread it. The consistency is something like really liquidy peanut butter, and it tastes a little bit like cream cheese.  On the side, we drank coffee with milk which tasted amazing because Bianca’s dad likes good coffee (as do I). The Brazilians think it is crazy that Americans eat eggs and bacon for breakfast– I told them that what people eat for breakfast varies a lot in the US, anything from granola bars to eggs to toast to cereal… etc.

Bianca’s Neighborhood

In the picture above, you can see the road that Bianca’s family lives on. It is a gated community, and there are three different sizes of houses. Within each size of house, the houses are built identically. Families differentiate their homes by painting them different colors, using different mailboxes, landscaping differently, and using different front doors. None of the houses have a garage, but I suppose it is unnecessary because it is so warm year-round! Bianca’s grandparents live on the street next door, and can easily come over to eat dinner and hang out with their family. In fact, since there was not an extra bed for me to sleep in when we arrived, Bianca’s parents drove to her grandparent’s house and brought a bed for me to sleep on!! It was so nice of them!

Bianca and her brother outside of their house.

After packing up our things, we drove to Campinas (about 30 minutes from Louveira where Bianca lives) to go to the largest shopping mall in Latin America called Parque D. Pedro. We ate lunch at the mall, and shopped for about 30 minutes, so we didn’t see too much of it– but just by driving up to the place, you could tell how huge it was!! None of my pictures did it justice, so I looked up an aerial picture on Google Images.

Parque D. Pedro

From the picture, it almost looks more like an airport than a shopping mall. It’s also two stories high… knowing that might help you to imagine it! I only spent the equivalent of $15 today (I’m saving for travelling!), and it was all at a store called Tasy B Jous. I’m pretty sure my younger sisters would go crazy here– they had a ton of cute jewelry and hair accessories for really cheap (and decent quality)!

Tasy B. Jous — a girl’s paradise

Here is another picture of the inside of the mall– they had a lot of plants growing everywhere in the mall. Flowers, trees, vines….

Inside the mall– see the palm trees??

Another thing that was interesting about the mall is that everything has a total price, but can also be paid for in installments. For example, in the picture below, you can see that the shoes can be paid for in full at R$139.98, or they can be paid for in three payments of R$46.66. According to Bianca, everything in Brazil can be paid for like this because it provides access to more expensive items (like nice clothing, ovens, refrigerators, etc.) to poorer people who can only afford smaller payments at once. We learned that this is common in Brazil in my retail class last semester, so it was cool to see it in practice!

Shoe payment plan

After finishing shopping, we were almost late to our bus! We ran to make it on time, and made it just as people began to board. The ride home was really nice because Bianca and I shared with each other our favorite music (one of my favorite activities). Now I’m back at my apartment in Sao Carlos, kind of tired from the weekend :).

The last few days here in Brazil have been really nice. Yesterday, the other trainees and I had a “team day” where we learned more about the purpose of our work, the purpose of AIESEC, and got to know each other better. You can see a picture of all of the trainees in our project as well as the AIESECers that were are in charge of the project in the picture below.

The other trainees and AIESECers in charge of our project

After team day, I went home with my one of my roommates, Bianca to her hometown in Louveira, Brazil– a two hour bus ride from Sao Carlos. Her family is really nice and welcoming. Yesterday, Bianca, her mom, and I just laid in her mom’s bed and talked which was really nice (and kind of made me miss my mom). Bianca was essentially acting as the translator because I speak just a little Portuguese, and her mother speaks just a little English. This morning Bianca’s dad and I were talking to each other using Google Translate– and it worked pretty well!

Bianca, my roommate (in Louveira)

This afternoon, we went to a barbecue with Bianca’s family for one of their family friends. They grill meat, sausage, garlic bread– and it tastes so awesome! It is very common to barbecue here in Brazil, I think I picked the right place to go this summer (well, I guess it’s winter here…) because I love barbecue!

Barbecue meat

The house we went to was out in the countryside, and it was the most beautiful drive out there. Apparently, this area of Brazil was settled because of wine production and coffee production. The people of this region speak a little bit of Italian in their Portuguese (such as the way they pronounce certain words).

Louveira Countryside

Just like in Wisconsin, how we have squirrels in our trees– here they have little monkeys!! It was the coolest thing when someone called me over to take a look, they are little monkeys, about the same size as squirrels. I saw about five of them, just running and swinging through the trees. I will post a video next time I have the time to upload it.

Monkey!

The people at the barbecue were really welcoming, too. We played instruments together (they taught me how to play a drum), and they had a band that was playing some rock songs. It’s nice because just like in the United States, foreigners here are considered “attractive” haha, I don’t think I’ve been told that I am beautiful more times in my life. Brazilian men are attractive, so I guess I don’t mind!

Some of the people at the barbecue

Well, things are good here. I will be back in Sao Carlos tomorrow night, but will spend the day here in Louveira tomorrow.

More soon :)  -Katie