Rio de Janeiro, the marvelous city …

11th of November till 16 of November

I left Brasília early in the morning while the sky was grey and it seemed to start raining. I hoped to meet the sun in Rio, as the organizing committee promised that it hardly rains in Rio. But their promise didn’t come true as the weather was even worse than in Brasília. Snifsnif. Due to the clouds I hardly could find Christo, the symbol of the city. This is a shot taken on my first day out of the window of Rodrigo’s room, where I stayed the whole time.

On Saturday, the other delegates from Nigeria, Poland, Norway, Australia, Sweden and Peru arrived. We started the day with an explanation of the weekend and moved to Santa Tereza for lunch. We got there by the “Bonde”, an old tram that is still in use under the locals. It had something nostalgic.
In the afternoon, we visited some museums, and prepared ourselves for the famous Samba School “Mangueiras”. I didn’t take my camera there to be able to dance and shake with my entire body on the energetic rhythms of the “batteria” of drums. And it was wonderful! In this atmosphere, no one can stay motionless. Maybe you think that we had classes of Samba there at the school, but actually, during weekends, all Cariocas (citizens of Rio) gather together and dance Samba the entire night on the tones of the Mangueira batteria. There were some older ladies on the dance floor leading the parade. These ladies used to dance during Carnival in the past. So, you just have to imitate the Cariocas.
Three rules to dance Samba are:
put all your energy in your legs
bend your knees and move you feet one by one to outside
and shake the ass while you keep the rest of your body quiet
Not easy, but the music is so energetic that you start moving by yourself!

Sunday was the day of the nice views. We visited the Christo and Pão de Açúcar. Actually, the Christo is much smaller in real life than what I expected from the touristical pictures you see in many books or folders. But on the feet of the statue, he’s indeed enormous. And the view from there is marvelous! The Christo was put high on the hill to bless the fishermen and he had to be visible from all around the city, as it’s surrounded by the ocean. And oceans make you think about beaches of course. The beaches here are so beautiful: white sand, many beautiful suntanned cariocas, some palm trees. The ideal spot for holidays!! The most famous beaches are Ipanema and Copacabana. This picture is not taken by myself, but is ‘stolen’ from the internet, as sand and risk for robbery made me decide to leave my camera at home.

We finished the day with the sunset on top of Pão de Açúcar, Sugar Loaf or de Suikerberg. Enjoy the pictures …

The night was filled with Samba again, but this time the more quiet version, in a nice authentic bar.

We had to reshuffle the program on Monday, because our guide for the favela (shanty town) couldn’t come today. So we went to the Botanical Gardens, initiated by the Portuguese Royal family that escaped from their country for the suppression of Napoleon. This results in massive palm trees and a large variety of plants from all over the world. We spent the afternoon at Ipanema beach and went to the bar where the famous song “Garota de Ipanema” was written. You don’t have to feel stupid if you don’t know the song. I didn’t know before coming eighter, but I like the song a lot! The funny thing at the beach was the division in 3 groups of people: the ones laying on the beach, the ones swimming in the ocean and the ones standing on the beach looking at the ocean and doubting if they will swim or not, because the water was damn cold, but so refreshing.
The evening started with a global village, where every delegate presents his/her country with some pictures, nice stories, foods and drinks. And yes, they liked the Belgian chocolates. Afterwards we went to the beach again for a LUAL, or beach party. Amazing!!! A lot of beer put in an isomo box with ice to keep them cool, lemon, sugar and cachaça for the caipirinha, and some guys playing the guitar. I really liked this party, with sugar loaf lit in the back ground, the quiet noise of the ocean, and some much more … Let your imagination work.

Tuesday was already the last day of the reception activity. Wow, the time went so fast.
In the morning, we visited a favela (shanty town). It was interesting to see life in the favela, hear stories of people who live there and get a better view on their way of living. And no, they don’t shoot people every single second nor walk all with guns nor whatever other bad thing you are thinking about. The favela’s in Rio are part of the city and not hidden away like in São Paulo or Brasília. Every quarter has a favela built on the mountain where people live from generation to generation. I’d advice you to visit one with a person living there to understand it better.

We finished the tour … on the beach of course, as many of the delegates live far away from it. It’s so nice to have these beaches so close to your back yard, but many cariocas don’t know how lucky they are. In the evening, everyone went back home to São Paulo, Campinas or São José dos Campos.
Luckily, I could spend one day longer than the other delegates. And guess what I did … I went paragliding (delta flying, or whatever it’s called). It was amazing, but I was a little scared in the beginning. The instructor tells you: um dois três ja. And you start running for only 4 steps, and there you go flying as a bird. But the view was great, and the feeling to be a bird for some time was wonderful! This is how my trip to the marvelous city ended, and I do hope that I can go back, because I fell in love with the city.