Hi!

A new blog post, written in Brazil. I have spring break at my university in Southampton which means two weeks off. Lucky me!

My mom and I decided early this year to go visit my family in South America. I have never been to this continent so I am/was really excited to visit. We flew last Friday with an amazing airplane, very luxery! I watched all the new movies that are shown in the cinema right now so the 12 hour long flight didn’t feel that exhausting. We also got four different meals included ice cream and crisps so I was really statisfied. The view in the air was amazing, the sky was blue without any clouds so I took a lot of pictures. However, I was relieved we arrived safely!

DAY 1 RIO

Last night when we arrived at the airport, we took a cap to our hotel and met some friends/family. We quickly got to our room to put our stuff down and went to a bar in the neighborhood Gloria to drink my first Brazilian beer. Tasted really good by the way. It was 10 PM and it was still almost thirty degrees Celsius outside. Such a big difference compared to UK!

Saturday during the day, we had a nice tour through the city, which looks so much better than I expected. Such pretty archicture and some really nice buildings, modern and old at the same time. I didn’t feel unsafe which was a relieve since people told us to not wear any jewelry because people on the streets will just grab it. I noticed a lot of people live on the streets. They seem poor but whenever you smile at them, they wave at you and seem happy. I captured a couple of those moments.

DAY 2 RIO

Another day in Rio. Today, we went to Niteroi. An island with a beautiful view over the skyline of Rio. We saw some really pretty buildings and musea from architect Niemeyer, just amazing! From the inside, you had another view over Rio with the mountains and sea. I’m not sure if I have ever seen such a beautiful view like this. Really breathtaking.

Since the weather was so hot and humid, we drank a lot of coconut milk, which helps you against being thirsty.

In the night, we went to a concert on the beach with thousands of people. One thing I noticed is the fact that Brazilian people are SO nice! They are really friendly and smile all the time. They always ask me if I need any help. Most of them don’t speak English so they start a whole conversation in Portuguese and I will just nod and smile. After the concert, we had a really nice dinner all together. The food in any restaurant here is amazing, the waiters are all so friendly. Their personality is so much better, compared to most of them in Europe.

DAY 3 RIO

I slept till 11 AM, since I was really tired of walking so much, the heat and talking in all different languages – Portuguese, Swedish, English, Spanish and Dutch. We went to Favela, a really poor neighborhood in Rio. It was really sad to see those little kids living on the streets. Though, it was a beautiful place to photograpgh these young sad kids. People told me I shouldn’t since it was dangerous. Whenever I saw this little cute kid staring outside of the window, I just needed to take my camera out of my bag.

The neighborhood really impressed me. It gives you a view of the real, unfair world but at the same time, it makes me feel blessed that I can experience this by myself instead of watching the news on television. After we had lunch, we went to the Christ statue by train through the jungle, really cool! There were a lot of clouds but I finally got the right picture. Really cool experience for me and I’m glad I can cross if off from my bucketlist.

Today, we will fly from Rio to Belo Horizonto. I'll stay in Brazil two more weeks and go to all different kind of places; big cities, small villages and of course a couple days to the beach. I'm at the airport right now and we will be boarding in a couple minutes.

Bye bye Rio, you were a blast to me and I will definitely come back some time. For now, let's go travel to a new place, new journey, new adventures!

X

Femke