Brazil

Our last school trip was to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. After this trip, I could honestly say that I was getting a little tired of traveling. By now I have seen (it seems) the majority of South America. And with just a little over a month of school left, I am ready to come home! But don’t get me wrong, Brazil was fantastic. Rio de Janeiro itself was a city unlike any other. The landscape was very unique in itself. Rio is surrounded by tall dome-like mountains, beaches, and inlets. It’s anything but flat. Yet somehow they manage to squeeze millions of people into the compact “favelas”, which are the endless shanytowns that cover the surrounding hills as far as the eye can see. When I came back to the UAP, I talked with some Brazilians about Rio and they said that it's really violent and the police don’t even go into the favelas. Then they went on how Rio was the most dangerous city in Brazil, even more than São Paulo. I just kind of stood there, nodding my head, imagining myself being sold into slavery or getting stabbed to death. My wild imagination was put to rest when they said things like that usually only happen in the bad parts of town. I just gave a nervous laugh and replied, “Oh that’s good.” Our hotel was right on Copacabana Beach in one of the more touristy spots, so we turned out to be quite fine. Although some of the others were saying two blocks down was the biggest brothel in South America. I don’t really know if that was true, or if it was an exaggeration, but one thing was for sure--I saw prostitutes everywhere! I guess prostitution is very legal in Brazil.

So Brazil was quite a bit different from its nieghboring country that I have spent most of my time in (Argentina). Brazil is huge. Out of all of South America it probably has the strongest economy (however Chile's is the most stable), yet Brazil has a tremendous amount of poverty. I found this to be very true, seeing homeless children everywhere roaming the streets and begging for food. As glamorous as the city was, there definitely was a very unattractive side.

The two big things to see in Rio are Christ the Redeemer and the Sugarloaf. Christ the Redeemer is an enormous statue, roughly the size of the Statue of Liberty, that rests upon the top of Corcovado Mountain with its arms outstreched in sort of a "blessing-the-city" position. Sugarloaf Mountain (or just Sugarloaf), is a picturesque dome-like mountain that juts out of the water at the end of the city. Unfortunately due to some bad weather, it was difficult to appreciate Christ the Redeemer at its finest, but even with the clouds it was still pretty neat.Standing on the other side of the city and seeing a giant statue of Jesus overlooking the city with his arms stretched out is a pretty cool sight.Looking up at the statueEl Pan de Azúcar (The Surgarloaf). Interestly enough, explorers named it after a dessert.This shot gives you an idea of how perfectly shaped it is.They say that at the base of this tree, Vinicius de Moraes wrote out the lyrics to "The Girl from Ipanema" (it's located in a big nature park within the city). I thought that was pretty neat.Copacabana Beach! Right in front of our hotel. Yes, everyone does wear a speedo too. It's normal to walk around downtown in your swimsuit--even if it only covers 2% of you body.On the beach! You can see the Sugarloaf in the background.

Next stop: The United States!