Welcome to crazy town! I've come back to the hotel for a bit of a break as the streets are totally bonkers outside. There is a bloca (street party) going on all around the hotel. From about 9 this morning thousands of people began arriving. I went for a walk earlier, and it was nuts. People dancing and singing (some just dancing to the music playing in their heads), street vendors selling food, drinks and weird and wonderful things to wear, people in crazy costumes, music blaring from speakers competing with each other. Ive not seen anything like it. I want to go out again soon and see if anything is happening on the stage behind the hotel. They say its not safe to go alone, bu I had no problems when I went out earlier. My roommate still hasnt checked in, and until the football game this afternoon I probably wont meet any people to hang out with so its either brave it alone or hide in the hotel and wheres the fun in that!?!?!

Yesterday was my last day with the Tucan group. I headed out with them to do a tour of the largest Favela in south america before switching hotels (on a side note, the Hotel Regina is much nicer than the Hotel OK even if the OK is more expensive and a bit better located).

The Favela tour was interesting. A minivan picked us up from the hotel and we drove for over half an hour through Rio's traffic clogged streets to the bottom of the Favela. For those that don't know, a favela is basically a shanty town. Usually built on the outskirts of the city up into the hills. People make houses out of whatever materials they can find. Once we reached the base, we transferred to motorcycle taxis for a hilarious ride up through the narrow streets, dodging traffic to the top of the favela. One of those rides where you're sure youre going to crash at any moment but its so exhilerating you laugh your butt off the whole way :) Once at the top we dismounted, regrouped and started the tour proper - following the "street number 1" all the way back down to the bottom. The term "street" is a very loose one. In places it is less than 1m wide, cables run at head level where the residents have plugged into meters to steal electricity (no one pays for water or electricity here). There is barely room to pass people walking in the opposite direction. On either side of the street, homes made from leftover timbers, or home made bricks crowd together. Basically people buld a house, then they can sell their roof space for 2000 Real to another family who build their house on top and then they in turn sell the roof space and so on. Id hate to be on the top floor of some of the houses as they really dont look that solid! Along the street there were homes that had been destoyed by mudslides from the surrounding rainforest covered mountains. Funnily enough it was quite cool as we walked down as the crowded nature of the houses provided shade from the relentless sun.

Along the way down we visited a local baker (who also sold hardware), had a group of local boys play and dance a samba for us on home made drums (tin cans and overturned buckets but surprisingly good), women sold jewellrey made out of seeds and telephone cables, and lastly we visited a daycare centre sponsored by the company conducting the tour.

I had kind of mixed feelings about the tour - on the one hand it was fascinating to visit this place and imagine what it would have been like when it was run by the drug lords (the police went in recently and cleaned them out from the biggest favelas in order to make improvements to the living conditions of the people. Bullet holes in the walls and demolished drug houses are all that remain). On the other hand I dont know how I would feel about a bunch of tourists visiting my neighbourhood as an example of the slums of a city. At least I know the group we used put back into the community (even if it did at times feel like everywhere we went we were being asked for money). It does make you feel lucky to live in Australia though.

Anyway I think it might be time to see how the party is going outside :)

Have fun all! Bom Carnival!!