Beach

So…. In the last ten days I went to the beach!!! It’s not the coast, but it was beautiful. See, Tocantins has natural non-touristic beauty and the Rio Araguaia (Araguaia River) is one of those beauties.  The river provides a border between my state and Pará to the north.  Our trip was to Conceção de Araguaia, Pará.

We stayed with a girl named Andréia.  She’s from Conceção and is living in Araguaína while she attends law school here.  She is one of the most fashionable people I’ve ever met. In fact, everybody here is.  Going out is like going to a real-life shopping mall where people are mannequins.  We met Andréia through Camilia, another one of my good friends here.  Camilia is one of our students at UFT. Her mom makes some of the best feijoada I’ve ever tasted. Feijoada is a typical Brazilian dish. It’s made of beans (Feijão) and sausage and other goodness.  Camilia is studying abroad in Argentina this semester and won’t be back until December, i.e. after we leave for the states. Sadness. So, I decided to go spend a week to make a new friend, say bye to an old one, and see a beach all at the same time. Camila’s married to Daniel. She met him during a semester abroad in Portugal (where he’s from). Daniel lives in Brazil now and works at CNA (the school that hosted the American Camp). 

The restaurants, tables, chairs, and everything was in the water

The tents and stuff from far away

Michol, Andreia, Camila, Daniel

me

My first day in the water I was psyched cuz was the first time I had seen sand since I got here.  As I’m running into the water Andreia is like, “Woah, don’t do that”. She then told me that the Araguaia River has stingrays. They typically don’t come to the area where we are because they’re scared of the people and usually only come out at night, but we try to be careful anyway. That simply meant walking slowly and dragging your feet. Not sure what that does, but if you say so I believe you.  We actually met a guy who had been stung.  We went to the beach every day. We also went to a beach luao one night.  It’s not the Hawaiian luau you may be thinking of. In Portuguese, moon is lua so luao is a party under the moon.  The party goers were hard core Brazilian rockers who love lots of old-school American rock bands. None of which I knew much about,lol.  Still a great time. With a great view. The beach had the biggest moon you ever did see and clear nights so you could actually watch the moon rise and set if you sat outside long enough.

We went to the farm. Two of them actually. I had a circle of farm-fresh cheese in my fridge before the trip courtesy of Rosy’s mom but this trip I got to see it made.  You just milk the cows put coagulator in it, after an hour you put the curdled milk in those circle presses and let it sit out to dry. Yum. I also saw chicken’s killed, defeathered, cut up and put into bags. I left those pictures off for your sake.  Got on a horse for the first time since Chile. It was funny to say the least. They were 20 year old cattle horses. They like us were also hot so they just weren’t feeling the joy ride or ride giving in their case. Every time we passed the gate my horse tried to veer back.  After about 10 or 15 minutes I just let him go and he walked himself (us) back to the gate and waited for me to get down and open it,lol. I laughed uncontrollably.

They had pet monkeys at the first farm. Like they were in the trees and dude was like come eat and they came.

These are pineapples that grow on the ground. Lots and lots of pineapple plants.

 The beautiful Brazilian countryside

Lastly, we were asked if we wanted to see a Sertanejo show.  It was pretty costly in Brazilian terms, but it was vacation and would be an experience.  We said sure expecting a random dupla to sing at a bar.  What we got was a concert. Like a real one. With special effects and everything. It didn’t start till 1:30am and went till 3:30. It actually started at 1:40 but 10 minutes late is 15 mins early on Brazil time.  I slept before the show so I was alert. During the pre-show waiting music. The lazy song played, cool. The next song was PIMP by 50 Cent. I was thoroughly amused. 

Sertanejo is danced in couples. People generally get lost here when you ask them to dance by themselves. They think I'm the best dancer ever. I'm not,lol. 

So that’s more or less my beach experience. Till next time.