Boats, Beaches and Helicopters

The weekend was a laugh!

Well, friday and saturday were amazing.

We drove about 40 km out of Rio, flying though a hectic load of insane traffic and past the Maracana' stadium, along what seemed to be a never-ending beach dotted with people of all ages, and ended up in a small shack on the beachside.

The Maracana' with a flag waiver hired by the govenment to welcome my arrival

Here we proceeded to drink 4 beers, 3 caipirinas, 2 bottles of water, and eat a huge roast fish with salads and chips which generously fed 3 of us. The total bill was a staggering 20 euros...

No further comments required I believe!

Smidgeons of coast

Ok so after a terribly harsh friday morning we decided to hit a field and try home remote-controlled helicopters.

Its an incredibly fun and hard sport.

Ideal for the energetically challenged

My father, confident of his abilities as a smart man bought a combustion engine remote control Helicopter a few months ago.

Fortunately the Engine was french and therefore on strike. Fortunately because this stopped my dad from assuming he could fly it and probably dumping 1000 euros worth of plastic and carbon fibre into the ocean.

Breakfast or Blender?

So there we sat, watching and learning for a couple of hours; whilst a royal eagle hovered overhead, curiously scanning the humming demonic machines that were invading its space, and probably wondering whether it was a predator or a prey.

Brazil Fun Fact #1: Drugs is "droga" and so is "crap!" made for a funny reaction on my behalf when I heard a guy at a serious (but informal) meeting saying "why do people allways hide my drugs!!!"

Slave to the wage!? Nah!

Let me start by saying that the main reason I came to Brazil was to stop working, so it only seems right that I spend sunday and monday under a 35 degreese sun dressed in Safety gear, loading and unloading a Diamond Wire cutting machine from one of Subsea 7 vessels.

The "USS I Can't Believe It's Not Sinkin'"

You see, Achille is the MD of CUT-Brazil, so when he told me he had a bit of a test to run I said "sure!" problem is that Brazilians work at a rate which is rather different from what I was used to in the US, more like that of Norwegians but in a different way.

Achille explaining how to take Troy

Whilst in Norway people work hard but not for long because the government won't let them work offshore for over 2 weeks, here in Brazil people go offshore for 6 weeks at a time.

Tons you say? Well, yeah but lets put it this way, they don't kill themselves, at least not when in dock :P

In fact what is normally a 2 man job becomes a 8 man debating society. It's actually pretty interesting, everyone brainstorms, from the Head of Engineering to the welders, everyone talks over eachother and at the end, after quite a long time, something totally different is agreed since nobody really listens to eachother.

An example of this is the connections, usually we simply send a CAD drawing to the company and they provide the connections, but not here! 8 people stood (+myself and a scottish bloke to a side, no point overcrowding!) next to a machine, which only 1 person understood and tried to estimate how to connect it up.

Things do eventually get done, and I have to say, although things move slowly its a totally stress-free environment and everybody is smiling.

See today I realised something. Some guy yeaterday told me that there's no need to be rich in Brazil, only middle-class. I thought he was wrong but thinking about it, he's not.

See, most people start working their asses off to have a nice house, a nice car and so they can retire one day and have enough money to have a good life. But then they forget what the original objective was happyness and their objectie becomes making money which is really only a mean to happyness, so they're kinda fucked.

Here, you can lead a great life if you have an average income and that just sounds great for now :)

Anyway, all went well and we packed up the stuff and went home.

Wingardium leviosa!! (aka a really big guy pulling a chain)

Btw, anyone who thinks that Brazil is a machistic society has never been to Rio. There is a female to male ratio of 8 to 1 for some reason (I kid you not) and anywhere you go, including the manly world of offshore offices, there are way more women than men! Can't complain...

Oh, and I did actually do some work, I didn't only take photos of other people working...

Brazil Fun Facts #2 & #3

2. The Offshore Personal Protective Equipment for women is not a reinforced G-String :(

3. In Brazil the "Pierino" (Italy) or "Kerryman" (Irish) jokes, have Hugo Chavez as a subject :P

I saw a monkey!!

And here it is:

A monkey on a tree that looks like Italy's Prime Minister (the monkey, not the tree)

I know, it looks like a cat on a tree, but trust me:

1. it looked a hell of a lot like Romano Prodi

2. it was also trying to throw feces at an italian whilst running away,

Hence it was either an Italian politician or a monkey, and since it was about 40cm tall and we're not in Italy, I opted for the second.

Not that much to write actually, we spent most of the day driving around the mountains around Rio, its simply unbelievable, check out the photos, although I can assure you that they just can't render justice to the real sight.

Smidgens of Rio

The city itself is a work of art placed on nature's most incredible canvas.

I'll stop there because I promised Gaston that this blog wouldn't be a hippy/poetic one like Natxo's and I'd try to keep it real.

Unfortunately you're always aware that this isn't Europe and you just have to be alert. It just seems like paradise does not exists, no matter how beautiful the people, food, city and weather are there is something that taints the perfection, the crime and the poverty.

Its quite ironic, if you're in Ireland everything costs way too much and you freeze you're nuts off, if you're in italy life is affordable and good but the people just complain too much, here people are friendly everything seems to be idillic until someone pulls a gun at you at a traffic light.

They say that the city really needs the Christ Redeemer looking over it, and he will provide protection.

I say, all you really need is a bit of luck, cop-on (basically don't wear gold, watches, use mobile phones in certain areas, etc) and someone who knows the places where you can and must not go.

In other words you need either a Jesus or an Achille, my butt should be pretty safe, 'cos I've got both:

The Achille & The Jesus

We drive through the city, hit Copacabana and after a quick warning from my mentor, the AC goes on and the windows go up.

Shortly after that we arrive at Ipanema, another planet apparently, down come the windows and off goes the AC, which donates enough new hp to the methane pickup to easily climb over the mountains and reach the 60 km of beach which streach out of the city.

An there we sat, looking out over the ocean, sipping coconut milk (genetically engineered to be more refreshing than usual) and wondering why would anyone not want to live here...

My new hobby: doing fuck all

Finally, still wondering why places like Aberdeen even exist, we head back to the city to a small town called Urca.

Its like a corner of paradise, built on a small island in the middle of the city, it is comprised of beautiful houses but, because there is only a bridge to access the island, it is crime-free.

See, here in Rio people don't burgle your house, they assault you.

A certain number of guys break a window, knock down a wall or pretend to be techs or cops.

They come into your house with guns, lock you up in your toiler (if you're lucky), and then proceed to take everything you own, perhaps even you if they think you're worth some cash.

But Urca is different, the bottle neck of the island access would allow the cops to intercept any assault as it were leaving. And lets put it this way... assaulters here aren't arrested...

So there you have it, perhaps perfection does exist, it just comes in small portions :)

Urca & the city

Finally we headed home, relaxed after a devastatingly tiring day and headed out to Rio's most antique churrascaria where we ate steaks good and large enough to convert a vegan.

And that's it really, my tiny post with a couple of photos and not much to say has become a poem.

Don't get used to it tho, here in Rio I've got internet daily but I'm off to reach the carovan of love on the 29th in Belize City (http://www.dondelloranlosvalientes.blogspot.com/), so from then on its only sporadic internet cafes, ciao!

Rio de Janeiro!!

I made it! finally in Rio after one very long trip across the pacific.

I arrived just in time too! Achille met me at the airport and has offered me some shelter for the coming nights. Met his charming Brasilian girlfriend Rosana back at the house and settled into my room.

After a quick change we darted out under a starry sky to drive along a desolated Copacabana & Ipanema and finally settle down to watch Brazil beat Uruguay 2-1 last drinking Cachaça and eating some amazing meat next to the Lagoa Rodrigo de Freitas, Rio's internal lagune.

Rio's somewhat familiar roads remind me of parts of Houston for the vegetation, but the feel is more european, italian even.

The streets are lit up like those of the ligurian Riviera with dashes of Palma di Mallorca.

All in all a wonderful first impression, I'm posting the view from my bedroom 'cos you can see the Cristo Redentor!

Let you know more when it happens to me.
Ciao!