Years of Poems and Spirits

The flight left with minimal delay. It looks like the worst is over. Our next stop is Rio de Janeiro. When the plane slowed down to land, we looked out the side windows: the lash green land is once again waiting for us. Our guide is a tall young man, he drove us to the hotel and told us that Rio is divided by a mountain range into two sections: the slum north and the rich south.

Indeed, the north side (closer to the airport) of the mountain is covered by small red-bricked houses that are connected at all-sides to others like beehives. The highway then passes through a tunnel right under the fame Christ statue on the Corcovado (Portuguese for hunchback) mountain. Once coming out of the tunnel, it is a very different world: sky scrapers lined up the well manicured avenues; Highway becomes live with intersections, bypass bridges and traffic signs as if inviting drivers to diving into the neighborhood. There is a lagoon with a floating Christmas tree in the middle and parks all around its bank. This is the Rio known to the world prior to City of God.

Hotel staff recommended a nearby restaurant for lunch. Another BBQ place of course but meats there are less well-done and more tasty. Again it is buffet style. It looks like the most popular form of eating in Brazil. At least half the meals we had in Brazil were in buffet style. I am sure if beef can be made to come out of a fountain, the Brazilians would gladly have it.

Visited a jeweler, H Sterns, in the afternoon. Brazil is one of the largest diamond and gem stone producers in the world. The workshop tour was short but the sales pressure was intense.

We came back from the tour very tired. We thought we were taking a nap in time for dinner but when we woke up, it is already the next morning.