Rainy Days in PoA

It rained a lot in Porto Alegre.

Perhaps I should have taken it as a clue when I first arrived and the airplane had to circle the city for quite some time before landing.

But, I liked the rain.

Except when it soaked through my shoes and into my socks.

And except when cars surfed by on the road and splashed me on the sidewalk.

Except for those things.

There was just something almost romantic and adventurous in setting out, armed with an umbrella, to hop through a downpour on my way to the bus...

It did feel like hopping. There were all sorts of gaping puddles to avoid. And there were also strange pieces of sidewalk, where it appeared that square foot tiles had been placed upon uneven dirt. Sometimes you'd step on the wrong tile to discover that it was only loosely covering a well of water that would promptly come raining down upon your ankle and foot.

Nice.

But, no, really. It's not just romantic conjecture now that I'm no longer there and am recalling my time tere wistfully.

I did enjoy the rain. The sound of it battering the windowpanes as I slept. How Cipote would always want to cuddle because it scared him. How big the drops of water were. How absolutely saturated and green the world became.

The happy reflection of the sky on the wet ground in between showers...

Ah, so beautiful...

Morning Greetings

Rainbow Portrait of My Umbrella
Originally uploaded by Blue Dragonfly Girl

This morning I didn't yet know it was going to rain all day long. I was walking to the bus to head out to Lomba do Pinheiro for the last time...the last time this trip anyway.

The ground was wet from the rain the night before.

I saw a man on the ground in the shadow of the hospital, covered by many blankets. And I wondered, if he'd slept this way, wet and damp, throughout the downpour. Had he been up all night moving until the rain ended? How did he bear the cold? And I saw he was cuddling with a sweet puppy.

He saw me looking at him and he looked me in the eye and said, "Good morning." I felt touched. I didn't know if he was calling me out for staring at him or if he'd seen the smile on my face, but I appreciated his words all the same.

"Good morning," I said back to him, thinking about all the people who affect us positively and don't even know how much their kindness matters.

Twilight in Foz do Iguaçu

On our second to last day at the waterfalls we had planned to return to the national park. It was Samosa's birthday so we figured we'd celebrate with some biking through the rain forest or maybe rappelling with a view of the falls. Something fun.

We woke up and it was pouring outside. Buckets of rain.

Downstairs the woman at the front-desk confirmed, "Yes, it's going to be like this all day." She agreed that a trip to the waterfalls might not be worth it, "You won't even see them through all the mist."

I asked her if she could recommend anything else to do. Perhaps there were some museums downtown worth getting lost in for the afternoon?

"Have you been to Itaipu?"

Check.

"Have you been to the bird park?"

Check.

"Hmm.." she thought for a moment, "Well there's always the Shopping." Literally "Shopping" is the Portuguese word for "Mall." As in shopping mall. They took the first word and we in the USA decided to stick with the second. Here in Brazil, everyone hangs out at the Shopping. [Here in Porto Alegre there are a crazy amount of Shoppings, 16 I think. Of which I've been to 4 already, meu deus]

And in some ways, I think this day turned out to be my favorite day in the small town of Foz do Iguaçu. Okay, maybe not that small of town. There are around 300,000 residents there, but when you walk the empty street at night, it doesn't feel that big.

It's just that there's something about a day when your expectations are wiped clear and you've got a blank slate. You can't go do the grandiose, marvelous stuff, so you might as well enjoy the small things:

Like walking through the main street trying to share a tiny umbrella between the two of you, nearly knocking each other out in the process. No matter how much you love a person, trying to squeeze both bodies into the space offered underneath tiny umbrella is just not easy.

And getting to observe some Foz do Iguaçu street art.





Enjoying lunch at an shawarma cafe where the hummus tastes like chalky paste but the waitress is nice. Where the man at the cash register, who refused to talk to you earlier, presides over the place in the same manner as the man in the ginormous poster above his head. A man dressed like a king who sits fully waited upon by a young lad, putting more coal on his hookah, and a young lass serving him drinks.

Where you get to marvel again at the utter deliciousness of a fresh passion fruit and milk smoothie at a little roadside stand while Samosa downs an espresso. And the two young women who work there are so kind and just laughing all the time.

Where you realize nearly slipping across all the slick sidewalks that your old flip flops have finally had their day. And luckily, the Shopping has a rainbow selection of new ones (with the Brazilian flag on the straps of course) so the walk home won't be so treacherous.

Where finally you realize your dream of finding "Twilight" in Portuguese (Crepúsculo) at a bookstore in the Shopping. And your boyfriend is thoroughly embarrassed by your literary selection. "Hey," you try to rationalize, "I've wanted to read this book for some time now, ever since the kids I worked with in the high school gushed about it so much. And my friends all admitted to having a hard time putting it down. So, I figured that the best way to do it would be in another language - that way I'm technically learning at the same time as indulging in a guilty pleasure."



"Yeah, yeah, yeah" says Samosa, rolling his eyes, not buying any of it and aghast at how much this frivolous book cost in Brazilian reais.



Where you think you know where you're going as you walk the wet streets but in fact you don't. Neither of you do. The maps only mention the big streets anyhow. And you walk several more miles than necessary. But in fact it's great because you "discover" a totally different neighborhood you never would have seen otherwise. And you're both taking pictures and just having a good time.



And when in the late afternoon the sun starts to come out. You recognize where you are because you saw the Hotel San Juan, glowing blue, when you swam in the rooftop pool of your hotel the other night. 



Yup, nerds having fun on a mostly rainy day in Foz do Iguaçu.

Happy birthday Samosa!

Brazilian Teenagers After a Downpour

Rain
Originally uploaded by Blue Dragonfly Girl

A week ago today, I got caught in a terrific downpour on my way home from my internship. Of course, I hadn't remembered my umbrella. Worse than that, I'd considered taking it, but thought, "Nah!" Eventually I stopped caring about getting wet (it was too late for that) and just started enjoying myself.

A few blocks away from the hostel, with the rain subsiding, I found myself behind a group of teenagers, dressed mostly in black clothing. They were giggling and doing silly things (pressing all the call buttons outside an apartment building and then running away, for example) and skipping over puddles. Like me, they were soaking wet.

One of the girls turned to me and said, "Will you give me a hug?"

I paused for a second to comprehend and then said, "Ok."

Inwardly, I felt a bit nervous. Everyone I talk to is reminding me to take precautions, to be careful.

But at the same point, I didn't want to deny a hug. It was part of the fun that she was half joking and half genuine.

We hugged.

I was quite aware of how my bag was hanging and aware that no movement was being made towards it. Though I'm sure in that moment someone could have pick-pocketed me without me noticing. So, I was a little tense. But, I was trying to overcome that because it just felt like extra, unnecessary weight.

"Don't worry," said one of the other boys, laughing, and reading my subconscious fears, "We're not going to assault you."

"No, we love you" said the hugging girl and then repeated in English this time, "I love you." They were laughing. I laughed.We smiled. I felt a lot of love for them.

Our paths parted ways.

And I just smiled to myself about that little encounter. Who knows what they were intending. Really, it didn't matter. I'm sure it was a spontaneous part of their antics. The energy behind it was silly and sweet. Reminding me that sometimes it's good to let down our guard a little, just to trust in a wet hug with a stranger on a street corner, because maybe that's exactly what we need.

Weather Report

Toxic Rainbow
Originally uploaded by Blue Dragonfly Girl

The guy who works the early morning shift at the hostel is from Uruguay. We usually exchange greetings in a kind of Portuñol whenever I'm passing through and either picking up or handing him my room key.

"Everything good?" I'll ask in Portuguese.

"Everything's good," he'll respond in Spanish.

I always enjoy talking with him because I know that if I unintentionally throw some Spanish words into the mix he'll still understand what I'm trying to say.
The other day it was overcast when I was leaving. I was carrying my laptop in my bag and didn't want it to get wet. So I asked him, "Do you know if it's supposed to rain?"

"Hmmm," he said, "The answer is always here in this newspaper. Let's take a look."

He flipped through the paper, glanced at a map of Brazil dotted with suns and clouds over different cities.

"Nope," he said, "It's definitely not going to rain today."

"Good" I said, "Because I'm carrying enough stuff as it is. But you know how it goes, if I don't bring my umbrella it will rain. If I do, it won't."

"Funny how they call umbrella guarda-chuvas in Portuguese, isn't it?" he said, "I mean 'hold-water'? Hopefully, it doesn't do that!"

I went to the computer lab at the university and typed away at something until lunchtime. Then I looked out the window and saw that the streets were wet.

It was raining.

I started laughing. The hostel was in the opposite direction of where I was going, but still it was worth it to go back and grab my umbrella.

As I neared the hostel, I saw the Uruguayan walking down the street heading in my direction. When he saw me he pretended to hide from me, to pull his shirt up over his face.

"I wanted to avoid you," he said, "You probably want to kill me don't you!...Luckily, you're not that wet yet."

"Just watch," I replied, "Now that I'm going to get the umbrella, it's going to stop raining."

And of course I was right. It stopped raining 10 minutes later.

Now every morning when I greet the Uruguayan we have a good conversation about the weather. "You better bring your umbrella, just in case" he warns, "I don't want it to be my fault if it rains on you."