Posterous theme by Cory Watilo
Haley A

Para Mim?

After I returned from my ten days (that went way too quickly) in easy-going Salvador, it was back to real life.  Or, rather, the “real” start of classes at PUC.  It’s kind of like a soft opening and Grand Opening- classes do begin during the first week of February, but they don’t really count.  A lot of students don’t even go.  But after Carnaval, professors begin to keep track of attendance, and students get a little bit more serious (so what if a great number can still be found drinking beer at the bars across from campus at 10 am or smoking pot near the Xeroxes? At least they’re going to class… or hanging out near their classrooms).  

Higher education seems to be much less formal in Brazil.  I’ve hear the stories about Tulane professors holding classes in bars, but my professors have never done this.  Here, students call professors by their first names, they come to class late and/or leave class early, and they come and go from class about a million times during the period, even though we have a 20-30 minute break in the middle (this is a little irritating).  So, classes are still pretty relaxed.  We have our midterms during the first week of April; I’ll report back after that.

Basically, the end of February/beginning of March went exactly like:  back to São Paulo, first week of classes, off to Paraty.  I really had nothing to complain about.  

CIEE took us to Paraty (word play:  Parati, Para-mim, Para-todos).  I’m really glad that we went, as I would never have considered going there, and I ended up loving it (I also loved that it was part of our program cost, so it felt like I wasn’t spending money).  The Historic Center is amazing- no cars, cobblestone streets, and Masonic symbolism (Robert Langdon goes to Paraty?).  I think I could live there someday.  I could definitely become a street performer (we saw Charlie Chaplin, among others).  In addition, the town was built to accommodate the fact that some of the streets flood when there’s a full moon.  I know that Eagles Mere, PA has a claim on “the town that time forgot,” but Paraty outdoes EM for sure.  

We left for Paraty on Friday morning, stopped at Ubatuba (a gorgeous beach on the northern coast of SP state), and arrived at our “inn” late on Friday afternoon.  Of course it was raining by that time, so we took a beautiful tour of Paraty in the rain.  If I had to sum up my study abroad trip so far in three words, those words would be “IN THE RAIN.”  Anyway, after the tour, it stopped raining, and we all went out for the evening.  I went to a restaurant with some friends, shared a bottle of wine, befriended the entire wait-staff, got a free caipirinha, and sang “Ai se eu te pego.”  At some point the electricity went out.  We would learn that this is a regular occurrence in Paraty.  It was ok, though, because our new waiter friends fanned us with menus.

On Saturday, CIEE made us get up early to go on a boat tour.  Getting up early isn’t fun, but it was definitely worth it.  The fact that our pousada had the best pão de quejo ever also helped.  Our boat tour took up most of the day- we went to several different spots where we anchored and were allowed to swim.  Then, that evening, we went out again in the historic center to celebrate two friends’ birthdays.  We had dinner at a Thai restaurant, in the dark, because the power went out again.  I continue to consume everything passion fruit flavored that is made available to me (cake, caipirinhas, mousse-type things).  I don’t know what I’m going to do when I go home to the country of the United States of We Don’t Have Passion Fruit Here-merica.

The fun continued on Sunday (at least for most of the day), as we “hiked” –in Havaianas- to several waterfalls in the Mata Atlantica (what remains of the once huge Atlantic Forest), jumped off of rocks and swam beneath the falls, and visited a cachaça distillery. 

002
For part of the trip, we were on the “Gold Trail” that the Portuguese used to transport excavated gold when Brazil was still a colonial installation.  As you can see, this trip was not all fun and games- especially not the part where it took us a million years to get home.  Word of advice:  if you ever travel by vehicle in Brazil, don’t plan to make any interstate trips on Sunday night.  This experience really made me appreciate the U.S. highway system.