December 1, 2009

I cannot believe that it’s already December!  Time has gone by too fast here.  Since the last blog I wrote, I visited yet again another beach here in the Northeast called Barra do Cunhaú for the weekend with Adriana, Cabral, Luana, Kelsie, and my host aunt and uncle Brivaldo and Ana.  Brivaldo’s mom has a huge house there where we stayed, and here is a view from the deck...

 

 

One of the days out of that weekend we traveled 15 minutes North to a famous beach here in Northeast Brazil called Praia de Pipa.  There Kelsie, Luana, and I went on a speed boat ride to a beach close by where there are tons of dolphins.  The dolphins would jump out of the water Just 10 feet from the boat.  We all jumped in the water and swam for a while before going back.  The ride back was one of the scariest boat rides I’ve ever been on.  We would go over rows and rows of 5 foot waves, and you had to hold on tight to the boat so you wouldn’t fly out!  This day was definitely something I’ll always remember!

At the beginning of November, I caught some crazy sickness.  I was in bed for one week, and I could hardly get up and eat anything.  Everyone here thought I had a mild case of dengue fever.  I had to go to the doctor twice and do a blood test, but now I’m all better :). 

 

After I recovered, my host mom, Kelsie, and I went to something João Pessoa is really famous for… the sunset.  I might have already said something about Jacaré, but it’s a place where there are lots of shows, and the famous sunset.  I’ve heard people say that it’s the prettiest sunset in the world, but that could be just people here being proud of their city.   But I definitely thought it lived up to its nickname!  Here are some pictures…

 

 

 

November 18^th was my last day of high school.  I’m now on summer break until February or March :).  Everyone brought their cameras, but it wasn’t like the last day in the U.S.  In the United States, the last day there really aren’t any classes, but here the students still have to study because last week and this week there are tests called the Vestibular, similar to the ACT or SAT, but here they take 3 to 6 vestibulars that last 5 hours each.  So the last day was good just for me really, because my friends only would have the tests after!

 

For Thanksgiving Kelsie and I decided that we would make a Thanksgiving dinner for her family and mine… at 10:00 the night before.  So the next morning we went to the grocery store and bought everything that we would need.  When we arrived home, we realized that the turkey was frozen, so we decided to make Peru do sol (Turkey of the sun).  A famous meat here in Brazil is called Carne do sol (Meat of the sun), and they make it by putting raw meat out in the sun to dry up and then they grill it.  So Kelsie and I went up to her deck and put the turkey out in the sun for a few hours haha.  We spent the whole day in the kitchen cooking.  We made turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, salads, apple crisp, and pumpkin pie.  It took us only about 7 hours to do everything.  Before eating, we explained the story of Thanksgiving to our families.  Everyone loved the food and they keep asking us to make the turkey and gravy again!  So our peru do sol turned out alright and no one got sick :).

 

 

 

 

 

Right now I’m in my second host family’s house.  I’m living with the mom and dad, and their son who is 16.  They have a daughter who is 18 years old that’s in Canada on exchange right now, but she’s coming back early in January because she’s not having a good exchange year.  The family is really nice and the apartment is amazing.  I’m on the 13^th floor, same as my other house, so the view of the ocean is incredible.  There’s a huge gym and pool on the main floor, and today I went and worked out for the first time in 4 months.  It felt sooo good to finally exercise!  The family has another apartment right on the beach that’s only a 15 minute drive from here.  The beach is called Ponto de Campina, and everyone in João Pessoa has summer houses there or goes there every day in the summer.  I already miss my first family a lot though, and I skyped with Marisa and Lucas earlier today!

 

The day of the switch, Marisa took me out for a going away lunch.  We went to Jacaré where there are a lot of restaurants with Marisa, Lucas, Daniel, his girlfriend Laura, and Lucas & Daniel’s dad.  It was a lot of fun and after eating we waited for the sunset.

 

This weekend I’m going to the biggest city in Northeastern Brazil called Recife with Adriana, Cabral, Luana, and Marisa to go shopping and see the city and the weekend after that I’m going to Natal (the same city I went my first weekend here in Brazil) with Rotary for what they call Natal em Natal.  Natal in Portuguese means Christmas!  So I’ll try to update it after I get back from Natal because I’m sure there’ll be a lot to write about!

 

Até Mais! Tchau Beijão