Cover image is the hummingbird that visits our neighbour's terrace most mornings. We are slowly overcoming (getting used to?) the challenges of Rio. Today a selection of joss sticks - useful that we live by the hippy fair - are combatting the kitchen smells from down below. With a home made caipirinha for company, this blog will be rather short as the successes - buying two crystal glasses so we can enjoy the S American wine - are rather modest ones. We also bought two rugs to break up the whiteness and with a floral stairway and some orchids we are making our (temporary!) home softer. Strong winds, dull weather and rain this week - with more of the latter due tomorrow. Bad weather comes up from Argentina here.
We are becoming more familiar with the sights & sounds of Rio. We learnt this week that firecrackers going off are a signal from the local favela - drugs or police coming - although which signal is which we haven't figured out yet. The Borgen DVD is our current evening entertainment - Denmark is quite the place of the moment with H maybe there next year.
Kate now! (Clear enough Will?!) I'm going to start by making a few random observations that strike us as odd now but may not by the time we come to leave. Shops in this area of Zona Sul stock a lot of plastic tat including an over-abundance of nasty lavatory seats; there are a surprising number of bed shops & there seems to be a key-cutter on every street corner. Their supermarkets lag behind ours both in terms of what they stock & the quality of the products, the way things are displayed and general cleanliness. While you can generally find kitchen implements, bowls, whether cereal, salad or mixing are unavailable, even in plastic, and we have been defeated in our attempt to find a bathroom plug.
Anyway, that's enough of such domestic excitements but it gives an indication of what's been preoccupying me since we moved into this flat!
What else have I been doing? I went to a great exhibition of Doisneau photos the other day & we have tickets for a ballet/samba combo in a week or so which comes recommended...
I've met some interesting people through the International Club here in Rio. Maybe unsurprisingly the ones I find I have most in common with are Europeans, particularly Brits needless to say. It's reassuring that there are a lot of us in the same position - ie interested in the reality of daily life in Brazil rather than just as seen through the life of ex-pat. Patrick & I have enough Portuguese vocabulary now that we can make sense of newspaper articles though aurally & orally we're still weak. We're aware of how corruption is still a big issue out here & that there is concern that while Brazil is expanding rapidly, growth is not necessarily the same as development.
I'm starting Portuguese classes next week at somewhere close by called Casa do Caminho that puts the fees to supporting an orphanage outside Rio & we're also hoping to get someone to come to the flat so Patrick can learn too, though he does get some practice with students & colleagues at UFRJ.
I've had another session to do with teaching English to favela kids which is due to start in July & have been to a couple of fascinating talks organised by the International Club. One was given by a young woman who has started an organisation out here called Catalytic Communities which is concerned with trying to minimise the stigma attached to favelas & integrating them into Rio society. Roughly a third of Rio's population lives in favelas which are unserviced / unrecognised by the powers that be. Through her I've got an invite to visit our local favela to see a project called Favela Verde which is trying to bring back a bit of the Atlantic Forest to the favela.
This week I attended a talk by an inspirational woman called Yvonne Bezerra de Mello whose charity the Inc is supporting this year. She's the founder of an innovative and well-respected educational facility which specialises in helping favela kids who suffer learning disabilities due to the domestic and urban violence they experience in their daily lives.
Her enthusiasm, energy and commitment were infectious & humbling
A statistic to finish with: Brazil is the 6th largest economy in the world now but its state school system rates 88th out of 120+ countries, behind countries that include Botswana & the Philippines.