We made it to Brazil! This, despite a couple of missed connections in both the U.S. and Brazil. Jade provides the details below:
So first flight left on time, or maybe just a few minutes late, but as we got to Charlotte (our connection to Miami) there were bad storms or maybe just communication issues so our landing was delayed. Once we got there we RAN to our next gate, which was the complete opposite side of a HUGE airport and missed the flight. We got on the next flight luckily and made it to Miami. Bienvenidos a Miami!
In Miami we took a bus down to Mami Beach, drank a bottle of wine and walked barefoot in the sand. Miami was cool, too bad we didn´t get to experience the nightlife there.
In the morning, we left to the airport to catch the flight with TAM airlines (Brazilian airline notorious for running late), boarded slightly late, and somehow just took more time getting there than was planned. The flight was nice though. We had an interactive touch screen computer with movies, tv shows, music, and games. I watched a few episodes of Friends in Portuguese, studied a lot, and watched a movie. We bought a bottle of vodka duty-free at $16 US and had shot time on the plane.
So we get to the Sao Paulo Airport, get throught the 1st part of customs no problem. We had to check the bag and it took over 30 mins to get it. We get stuck at the second part of customs and miss the flight to Natal. We were so frustrated but they hooked us up with a hotel, transportation, free breakfast, and a new flight today and we didn´t even have to bitch or complain!
We made it to Natal and Jacob´s parents and brother picked us up. The area they live in is poor and kind of reminds me of Mexico, but their house is HUGE. I keep finding new rooms here. They have multiple guest bedrooms and living areas, a garden, a pool, open air atrium, 2nd story with an open air hammock room, workout room, and I could seriously go on. Jacob´s dad speaks pretty good English and we are doing our best to communicate with our Portuganglish! His mom made us a huge meal with 6 dishes most of which included fresh veggies from the garden and fresh guava juice (suco de goibo, I think).
Even the keyboards are different!
I actually just woke up from a nap after our meal and thought I´d slept a whole day. Now I´m fully rested and it´s 11pm… :-\
You can see more pictures at http://www.flickr.com/photos/atxryan/tags/brazil2008/.
Boa noite!
