Getting Closer to Jesus

Brazil.

Skimpily dressed people hanging out at the beach. Favelas where drug lords rule. Kilo buffets filled with foods of all kinds. You would think that this was a country of self-indulgent decadence. Maybe it is, but then again, maybe it isn't.

Brazil seems to have a religious streak hardwired into the population as well. For one, the long-distance buses in Brazil tend to screen Christ-related movies, while Buses in Peru and Argentina tend to screen popular Hollywood movies.

Two of the movies we got to watch in Brazil were 'Fireproof' and 'The Passion of Christ'. The first was a touching story of how the power of Christ helped heal a broken marriage. It was so good that both the wife and I found tears in our eyes by the end of the movie; and I just had to get a copy for my parents - I think they will like it too! The latter was the controversial movie directed by Mel Gibson, which graphically depicted the pain and agony Christ went through before He finally died for our sins.

Which, of course, brings me to the iconic Christ the Redeemer statue atop the Corcovado mountain in Rio de Janeiro. The statue was last seen by most Singaporeans in the movie 2012 being swamped by a tidal wave, but we're glad to report that this New Wonder of the World is still safe and sound.

Despite standing in a high, prominent spot in Rio de Janeiro, it is pretty difficult to snap a nice, good shot of the statue. For one, it was on top a mountain, so distance played a part. Then, you would also have to take into account the often misty/cloudy weather that seems part and parcel of Rio. Our path to Jesus was therefore full of little steps as we made our way closer and closer to Him.

Our first glimpse of him was when we wanted to go cycling along Lagoa Rodrigo de Freitas. Because we were told that there was a helipad around the lake where we could get a helicopter ride to fly round the statue. But, one look at the gloomy, low-lying clouds and we decided that that wasn't the day. Besides, you know how lying is a sin... it was just not an auspicious day!

Our very, very first look at Christ the Redeemer

There was a bit of sun a couple of days later, and we DID cycle round the lagoon and make it to the helipad. Unfortunately, the prices were quite a bit higher than our hosts at Rio Dolphin had presumed. We had expected a short flight for about 70 Reals, but the cheapest flight turned out to cost 150 Reals. And it did not take off from this particular helipad, but the one nearer to Sugar Loaf Mountain, which would take too long for us to get to (by which time the clouds would swamp the mountain again).

The next level up was 230 Reals, but did not include flying past Christ the Redeemer. Moreover, no others were taking that particular route, and I needed 4 pax to make a flight.

So we were eventually forced to 'upgrade' all the way up to a flight costing 280 Reals. Or rather, I was 'upgraded'. It just did not make sense for both of us to pay almost 600 Reals for a 12 minute ride in a helicopter! So, after some debate, it was decided that I should go alone while she waited at the helipad for me. And she would just view the video footage I shot later. Alas... the restraints of budget shackles us!

As my friend Celine remarked, not many Singaporeans can say they flew past Jesus on a helicopter!

Oh, and a recommendation to those who ever intend to do a helicopter ride in Rio de Janeiro. Do whatever you can to either sit beside the pilot in front, or if you have to sit at the back, take the extreme left seat! I discovered, to my chagrin, that all the good views are on the left, and being seated on the right-back seat, I was forced to shoot my video past the bellies and hands (holding cameras) of two other guys. Gah!

From the helipad, you can only see His back

Just hoping that by the time my flight was announced, the statue would not be shrouded in clouds!

So, I had my close encounter with Christ, but the wife was still unenlightened. And frankly, my close encounter was really too, too brief, and left me wanting more. We had already decided that we would be taking a half-day city tour in Rio de Janeiro that includes a visit up the mountain to Christ the Redeemer. The only question was when. After all, it would so totally, totally suck to take a ride up to the top of the mountain, and find that we can only see half of Him, right?

The next few days turned cloudy again, and we filled our time with a visit to the favela. And another realisation hit us. With the favela on one mountain, and Christ the Redeemer on another, most residents would have a constant reminder that Christ was constantly watching over them. Serendipity or design? We can't decide!

A good view from a favela

View from another part of the same favela, just 15 minutes later. See how fast the weather turns?

With our little side trip to Buzios beckoning, we decided to just take a leap of faith, and book the tour for the next day. And wonder of wonder, miracles of miracles... the weather turned out perfect! The vertical panorama you see on the upper part of the blog's sidebar was taken during the tour, as are these other pictures below.

Welcomed with open arms

The heart design on his chest was a nice touch

We took a normal picture, because we refused to take cheesy ones like most others - with arms similarly outstretched!

I remembered flinching while watching them nail Jesus to the cross, in the Passion of Christ

Radiating benevolence

And then, the most amazing thing happened. As the wife and I were snapping pictures of Christ the Redeemer up close, we saw a circular rainbow appear right about Christ. To my eyes, it looked like the energy ball in the Dragonballz cartoons, the standard last gasp effort of Son Goku to pulverise deadly enemies. But we knew it wasn't an enery ball (duh) - it was a weather phenomenon our friend Gerald has described as an icebow (not rainbow). To us, it was just beautiful, and a very apt way of ending our path to finally find ourselves at the feet of Christ the Redeemer.

Surprisingly, none of the others in our little tour group noticed it. Only us. Are we blessed or what? :)

Buzios By Bardot

There are a handful of Brazilian icons who have brought their beautiful country fame in many aspects.

There's Pele and Ronaldo, who have graced many a pitch in the World Cup football finals with their nifty footwork and agility.

There's Helo Pinheiro, better known as The Girl of Ipanema, and the singer behind that hauntingly catchy bossa nova tune of the same title, Vinicius de Moraes.

There's Oscar Niemeyer, the 102-year-old Brazilian architect whose modern, edgy buildings form the skyline of the capital, Brasilia. His futuristic creation in Rio de Janeiro, which looks like a spaceship parked by the sea, houses the museum of modern art.

There's supermodel Gisele Bundchen, leggy, bronze and beautiful, who has been pelted with names like "fur scum" for, well, wearing animal pelts.

Then, somewhere along that time line came Brigitte Bardot, former actress, model, singer and key ingredient in the popularisation of the bikini in the 1950s. (She's now a whoppping 75 years old, by the way.)

Huh? She's not even Brazilian. And what did she do for Brazil?

Buzios by Bardot, that's what. Nope, Buzios isn't some French eau de toilette - it's a small fishing and whaling village about 2-hours north of Rio de Janeiro.

Well, it used to be a small fishing and whaling village. Up to 1934. That's when Brigitte Bardot arrived on its shores on a vacation with her then Brazilian boyfriend. The buzz that followed on her celebrity heels eventually made Buzios a popular holiday destination. Details are scant as to how she actually helped promote and elevate Buzios' sunny reputation, but she must have done a fair bit because a bronze statue of her now sits in the centre of town.

Of course, we didn't go to Buzios because of Brigitte Bardot. We didn't even know such a lovely place existed. It was thanks to John and Nina, our hosts at the Rio Dolphin Inn, who suggested that we make a side-trip from Rio and spend a couple of nights in Buzios. The couple spends Christmas in Buzios every year with their dalmatians Yangyi and Genki (who rummaged through my beach bag left carelessly within reach of their spotty paws and gobbled down my newly-bought bread rolls... which John kindly replaced.) At first, we were loving the vibe of Rio's crowded beaches too much to want to get away from the city, but John and Nina convinced us that we would love Buzios' quaint laidback charm and cobblestone streets (I recall saying somewhere in my previous entries that we're a tad tired of quaint cobblestone villages), just like how their other guests had. We eventually let them book us on a northbound bus and waved them goodbye at their gate.

Aaaannddd..... WELCOME TO BUZIOS!

Picture taken from our porch!

Buzios is a warped squiggle of land sticking out of Brazil's east coast and into the Atlantic Ocean. It's undulating coast creates many different beaches, about 26 sandy parcels, all cradled in bays, protected by the harsh pounding waves sweeping in from the Atlantic. I loved gazing at the little blobs of colour interspersing the big blue body of water - fishing boats - while bigger, fancier sailing boats ferried tourists around on beach-hopping cruises all day long.

Getting from beach to beach is easy - you just hop onto a water taxi and zip along the coast to your desired sand patch. You can also rent a buggy to get around the hilly peninsula. We were expecting to see rickety little golf carts putt-putting along the streets and struggling up the steep slopes. Well, we were so wrong...

I'm a Barbie girl, in a Barbie world. Life in pink...

Seems like we should have higher expectations for a place that was "founded" by a glamourous French starlet! S$60 and up isn't too high a price to pay to get a semi-stylish convertible to yourself for an entire day. But since we were staying right smack in the middle of some very good beaches, we decided to hike the sandy trails to the nearby beach instead.

Guess we weren't the only ones who decided to take a stroll...

Who dares cross my path?

When I first saw one of these little lizards, the shade of the green band across its torso was so evenly positioned and so fluorescent that I thought somebody had spray-painted it as a joke! It was as bright as that neon highlighter ink that I used to line my school textbooks with. I felt so sorry for the lizard and was going on and on about how cruel some people could be to animals when...

I saw another one.

And another one.

And another.

Okaaaay. So I don't think these crawling green highlighter markers are the result of Bart Simpson going around Buzios with a can of spray paint after all. Fascinating little creatures. I tried looking up the Internet for information on these reptiles and why is it that only half their bodies are shaded green but all references to lizards in Brazil pointed to "lounging like a lizard" on a Brazilian beach. Not quite what I was looking for.

The perfect camouflage - half leaf, half earth.

On our first day in Buzios, we walked to Praia Azeda and its small sister, Praia Azedinha. The water was calm, clear and cool - a far cry from the huge crashing surf on Ipanema in Rio. I had a whale of a time floating on my back without worrying about being pushed under by a giant wave or swept out to sea by the ripping current. I loved wading around the rocky banks, where small schools of little reef fish milled around my legs. Make that vicious little reef fish - they took many a sharp nip outta my calves. (Should I take that as a compliment that I have nice legs - albeit to fish only?)

Praia Azeda. Across the rocky ledge in the background is Praia Azedinha.

Both Praia Azeda and Azedinha are very small beaches. Which makes for a rather intimate session with all the other visitors. We stepped over a few outstretched ankles and squeezed ourselves into a tiny spot of sand on Azedinha and settled down on our cangas (sarongs, in Brazilian-speak) for our favourite beach activity in Brazil: voyeurism.

Working hard towards graduating from a frilly skirt to a skimpy Brazilian tanga

I wasn't the only person surreptitiously photographing this pair of lithe girls on the cliff. Their deep brown skin looked beautiful against the dark rocks.

Smiling for a self-portrait

Find a spot by the beach bar - old fishing boats perched on rocks, beautifully painted and stocked with fresh fruit and strong liquors

Run out of interesting people to spy on? There's always your own husband to watch (closely) in his spiffy new Brazilian-style trunks

The next day, we trudged a little further to Praia Joao Fernandes. This beach was much bigger than Azeda and Azedinha, and more commercial. The top of the beach was lined with wooden shacks, plastic chairs and beach umbrellas, under which people were enjoying ice-cold beers and coconut water straight out of the husks. The restaurants rented out beach umbrellas and deck chairs. Vendors plied the sands with bamboo poles balanced on their shoulders, draped with colourful cangas, and a tempting range of floaty white cotton sundresses and swinging bikinis pieces. Locals lugged styrofoam boxes filled with canned drinks, juices, ice-cream and hot food for sale. One enterprising ice-cream seller reached over our tanning torsos to hand us a couple of lollipops, even though we declined to buy anything from him. "Marketing", he grinned. Sure, but for an S$8 ice-cream bar? No thanks. But thanks for the lolly anyway.

We whiled away the day just reading, snoozing, tanning, swimming and people-watching. I had the additional pleasure of browsing the mobile bikini and dress stalls in search for the perfect white cotton sundress and yet another bikini. One of the vendors let me pull a sundress over my wet body and told me to run along to model it for my esposo, hoping that Dan's approval would convince me to buy the dress. His plan backfired - Dan didn't think it looked too great. At least I had someone else to blame when I returned the damp slightly salty dress to the vendor. I didn't succeed in finding another bikini either, cos I didn't like the ubiquitous twist-tie, one-size-fits-all tube top designs that were all over Buzios. Ah well, I guess a girl can only find so many perfect bikinis in a lifetime.

Praia Joao Fernandes. Dan claimed that the girl in the foreground was Jennifer Love Hewitt. I couldn't be sure enough to be able to agree with him.

Butt-floss galore

Even the aliens come all the way from outer space just to tan on this beach

At sundown, the streets in Buzios - albeit fashioned out of age-old cobblestone - throb with nightlife. Stylish restaurants, chill-out cafes, low-lit bars and no-frills eateries sit alongside one another. Throw a stone and you'll hit a souvenir store that's still open, waiting to catch revelers pouring onto the pier after a sunset cruise. Need another bikini or pair of boardshorts for tomorrow's beach? Just step into a store and select from the many choices available.

Boats come to a halt at sundown. It's quiet out at sea but look further inland and you'll find that the night is still young!

As for us, we were too knackered to stay out late. We knocked back a pizza while giving our fingers some exercise on our macbooks at a cafe with free WiFi and called it a night!

Hey, living life on a beach is tiring okay!

At the top of the world... before we crashed onto the bed.

Hairy Potty Man and the Deafly Hollows

-- Prologue --

It finally looked like something was happening. The pink-and-green clad ushers pushed all the onlookers back from the open area in the middle of the hall, forming a clear space for the performers for the Carnivale. The performers formed two lines, lips twitching in anticipation for the start of the music that will drive them into an orgiastic fervor.

The drummers from the stage started a rhythmic cadence signature to samba. The song had started! The performers began their sinuous movements around the cleared area, dancing in the manner of a conga line. Only that it was samba. A dance that, as Yi Lin says, makes the participants look like they were busy stamping dead millions of ants at their feet.

The visitors to the rehearsal looked on, swaying along as if enthralled by the beat. All of a sudden, as if the snaking conga line decided that it was hungry, the dancers started pulling in the onlookers. It looks like they are no longer here to watch the show, they are going to be part of the show! The conga line was now going to be half-local blood, and half-foreign blood!

And then, the Hairy Potty man made his appearance...

-- End Prologue --



Part One: The Philosopher's Cash

We had traded price for experience in deciding to come to Rio de Janeiro in December rather than in January. We had known that we would miss the world-famous Carnivale, but our budget was just too tight for the skyrocketing prices that the Carnivale peak would cause. Fortunately, we were just in time for the Carnivale rehearsals at the various samba schools, and could easily make plans to visit them on either of the Saturday nights that we were in Rio.

The school we chose to visit was Mangueira, one of the oldest samba schools in Rio, with a rich tradition of winning at the Carnivale. As the school was located in a favela, we decided to take as little money as possible.

Taxi fare (about 30 Reals per way) turned out to cost a bit more than expected, and I had totally forgotten to bring additional cash for the entrance fee (another 20 Reals each)!

After paying off the taxi driver for bringing us there, we were left with only 30 Reals, just enough to admit one person. I tried to convince the wife to go into the school alone.

"It should be safer in the school that out here in the favela. I'll just wait here. You just go in, take a few photos and come right out, okay? Here, take my camera."

And just as I was handing her my camera, I remembered that we had secreted some extra cash into the pouch when we went to the beach earlier. Hooray! We now have enough cash to go in together!



Part Two: The Chamber of Samba

This guys formed the band, and they literally sang all night

We entered the main chamber of the samba school, immediately noting that everything was decked in pink and green. Nervously, hoping that we were not wearing the colors of another school, we strode forward into the hall.

Big man, little instrument

There was currently only a small band playing, but the music echoed throughout the hall. The walls and tables were vibrating along with all the tables and chairs set out for guests. It seemed like speakers were lined throughout the hall, and every one of them was turned to the 'Are You Nuts??!' volume setting!



Part Three: The Prisoners of Standing

Getting a table is useful only until the rehearsal starts. After that, everyone is standing and/or dancing!

We picked a table out of those placed along both ends of the hall, and settled in to wait for rehearsals to begin. Then an pink-and-green clad usher came along and yelled something that we couldn't hear. And frankly, even if we heard what he was saying, we wouldn't understand a word. Locals here speak Portuguese, remember? In the end, he was jabbing his finger angrily at a little strip of masking tape that had some marking on it. Oooohh... the table was reserved!

Fine, fine. We moved on to another table that had no masking tape on it. After another 15 minutes, yet another pink-and-green man came along. That was when we realised... you want to sit at a table, you gotta pay another 30 Reals!

Since we had no more money, we had no choice. We just had to stand till the rehearsal started!



Part Four: The Legs on Fire

A samba school is okay, but discos, video arcades and bowling alleys give her headaches!

Coming to the rehearsal at 9.30pm was beginning to seem like a bad mistake. The rehearsal was expected to start at around midnight, which meant a minimum of 2.5 hours wait. We could not chat with each other to pass the time, because the music was just too loud. We could not sit around because we did not have the money to pay for the tables. There was nothing to do but to stand around and look like we were having fun, like some of the other locals and (drunk) foreigners who were dancing to the band on stage.

Midnight came, and the show had not started. But that ache in the legs from standing too long started to grow. By the time the rehearsal finally started at 1am, our legs were afire!



Part Five: The Order of the Maestro

The guy conducts with his hands. The girl conducts with her ass. I'm not kidding!

Something was finally happening. Loads of people suddenly showed up on the stage at the far end of the hall. A young man appeared, and took the conductor's platform. And without further ado, the entire percussion band (for that's what they were) burst into a cacophony of sound. Unfortunately, while I did shoot a video, the speakers at full blast drove the microphone on my camera nuts, and the audio it captured was very similar to static with a beat.

Not the pink-lingerie tranny at Sentosa, but we believe they are trannies nonetheless

This maestro was impressive though. He know what he was doing, and the percussionists followed his every signal perfectly, much to the pleasure of the Evil Queen Clown of Mangueira...

Okay, seriously, I have no idea who she is. But she reminds me of the clown from IT.

Part Six: The Half-Blood Performers

Locals and foreigners jiving to the samba beat

As the percussionists built up to a crescendo and finished off their performance, the rest of the band came back. The pink-and-green clad ushers pushed all the onlookers back from the open area in the middle of the hall, forming a clear space for the performers for the Carnivale. The performers formed two lines, lips twitching in anticipation for the start of the music that will drive them into an orgiastic fervor.

The drummers from the stage started a rhythmic cadence signature to samba. The song had started! The performers began their sinuous movements around the cleared area, dancing in the manner of a conga line. Only that it was samba. A dance that, as Yi Lin says, makes the participants look like they were busy stamping dead millions of ants at their feet.

Little girl knows her moves! She'll be a heartbreaker one day!

The visitors to the rehearsal looked on, swaying along as if enthralled by the beat. All of a sudden, as if the snaking conga line decided that it was hungry, the dancers started pulling in the onlookers. It looks like they are no longer here to watch the show, they are going to be part of the show! The conga line was now going to be half-local blood, and half-foreign blood!

And then, the Hairy Potty man made his appearance. This guy, obviously potty from an over-indulgence of alcohol, decided that because I was swaying to the beat, I must be interested in joining the conga line! Coming straight for me, he clasped one huge, hairy arm across my back (I could feel his sweaty pits against my shoulder... erks!) and tried pulling me in. I tried to resist and say no, I wasn't interested, but despite the Portuguese 'nao' sounding very similar to the English 'no', I somehow could not get my point across, and was sucked into the ever-growing conga line.

For the 15 seconds or so that I spent in the line, I must have been the stiffest person there. Thankfully, Yi Lin joined in as well, and I did not lose her in the crowd. We got out of the conga line as soon as we could. Spoilsports, yeah. But this was one occasion that we just preferred to watch and not participate!



Part Seven: The Deafly Hollows

The conga line goes around these two central dancers

Samba schools that compete in the Carnivale are judged upon several criteria, including costumes, the dance, and most importantly the song. The response of the crowd, however, plays an unofficial part in the scoring criteria, and that is why the samba school takes great pains to invite singwriters to compose new songs every year, then select them and try to gain popular favor for them. And they do this by singing the song over and over again, to get people familiar with it. Once peopls are familiar with it, then they would naturally react to the song being played at the Carnivale.

It's like this: You may not be a fan of 'Play that Funky Music' by Wild Cherry, but you recognise it when it's being played. And if you were listening to to it one day on the radio, wouldn't you sing along ...'lay down the boogie and play that funky music till you die"?

The rehearsal at Mangueira that night was the same. The same song kept repeating over and over, and the conga line just kept going round and round. By about the 30th cycle, we decided that we've had enough, and decided to make our way back to our guest house.

I wonder when did they finally stop dancing

We stepped out into the cool night air, with our ears still ringing. After spending some 4 hours in the samba school, we had developed a ringing hollow sound in our years. I'm not proud to admit it, but I think we shouted our address to the taxi driver. He just grinned like he was used to people shouting at him after a long night at the samba school, and brought us safely back to our guest house.

Home (sorta) Sweet Home (sorta).

Let The Feasting Begin!

Actually, the feasting had already begun a looooooong time ago - last year to be exact - and we started 2010 all feasted and fattened up already. I feel as if all this food has already sunk to hip level and attached themselves snugly to the inside of my jeans.

Before coming to Brazil, I had no inkling what Brazilian food was really like. We all know about this country's famous churrascarias (steakhouses) where piping hot, tender, juicy meat is brought straight from the grill and sliced right off the skewer and onto your plate. Back home in Singapore, a visit to a Brazilian churrascaria is always a full-blast all-you-can-eat pig-out event.

But looking at the svelte bodies on the beach, it's hard to believe that the locals stuff themselves with grilled meats at every meal. If Gisele Bundchen could eat a cow a day and still look so fabulously slim, then I can't help but hate her. So what do they eat here in Brazil?

Kilo Buffets

At home, the concept of a buffet is to let you consume as much as you can for a fixed price. It preys on a certain human weakness - greed - to entice people to get their moneys worth by either overeating or zooming in on specific items like oysters and sashimi, which are considered to be of higher value. More often than not, I feel really sick after a buffet and end up regretting that extra slice of cake (and ice-cream, and pie, and prawn, etc.) or an overdose of raw fish. And admit it - how may of us actually finish every plate of food that we cart back from the buffet spread?

Kilo buffets, on the other hand, are great way to eat anything that you fancy from the buffet table and yet control your gastronomic desires. You fill a plate with food from the spread, which is then priced at a fixed rate accordingly to its weight. Kilo buffets also help curb the temptation to make repeat trips to the buffet table - you try to fit your meal onto one plate, cos the weight of the plate is taken into account, so you don't want to keep paying for each plate that you take. The end result is that you pay only for what you eat, and that helps minimize food wastage from the buffet table too.

In Singaporean terms, a kilo buffet is basically the same as ordering "economical rice". But instead of choosing 2 Meat + 1 Vegetable, you can dine on quality steak, rich seafood and sinful deserts.

Or you could think of it as eating yong tau foo. The more pieces you pick from the fishball and beancurd spread, the more you pay.

Holding my breath for the result at the weighing station

Kilo buffets come in various qualities, which are priced anything from S$0.98 per 100g to more. We had our first buffet lunch at Broth, a small lunch-only restaurant with an average spread. Together, we consumed about S$30 worth of food.

Not cheap huh. Wait till you dine at Frontera. The buffet is priced at a higher rate than Broth. Rightly so, because the quality of the dishes at Frontera is excellent. Plus, you can really good churrasco hot off the restaurant grill.

My pick of the buffet: saffron rice, slices of picante from the churrasco, caesar salad, fillet of steak and some fall-of-the-bone stewed pork.

An amazing salad spread - which I didn't want to waste stomach space on

Large selection of meat, seafood, pasta, veggies and grains from the main buffet

Obviously, hunks of juicy meat weigh more than leaves. So you can pick according to your budget. If your pockets are feeling empty, you'll literally be eating grass to survive. What I couldn't fathom was why people were loading their plates with heavy potato dishes and dense, soggy, pasta! It's a pay-by-weight buffet.... hellooo....

We learnt, by trial and error, that certain food items are accorded a higher price rate. We paid dearly for a small plate of sashimi, which cost more than items from the main buffet.

How could we resist this after abstaining from (expensive) Japanese food for 6 months in South America?

Frontera is really popular and is pretty packed, all the way till midnight

We spent a whopping S$70 at Frontera during a dinner visit. Thankfully, we were too stuffed to seriously consider anything from the dessert counter.

But that didn't stop us from returning, just for dessert! We chose to come back on 18 December, to celebrate 4 years of marriage (4 years 8 months, if you take into account the day we legally signed our lives away to each other) with some sweet stuff. We chose our candies carefully and took care not to repeat items on each others plate. We learnt that Brazilians have a very big sweet tooth - the cakes were all stuffed with cream and custard and laden with caramel, sugar frosting, chocolate rice, chocolate balls, coconut, etc.

Which made dessert very heavy - literally. Which in turn made it very expensive, as cakes are priced higher than items from the main buffet.

Ouch. But wedding anniversaries are special events that call for some splurging right? (Please agree - it would make me feel better.)

Close your eyes and pick your calories

Snacks

Away from the buffet tables, there are a couple of snacks that we liked in Brazil, like this molten lump of cheese encased in a layer of bread:

Chewy cheese-filled pao de queijo or cheese bread

Fresh Fruit

Brazilians enjoy an abundance of fresh tropical fruit like papayas, pineapples, watermelons, honeydews and rock melons. Plus, they are blessed with the fruits of the Amazonian jungle - many of them known only by their indigenous names that have no English equivalent.

We loved assai, an Amazonian fruit rich in vitamins and minerals, and reported to aid weight loss, give you nice skin and heighten your prowess under the blankets. It's the new wonder fruit! The purple berries are blended with ice, and you eat the gritty slushy mixture by the spoonful. It's hard to describe the taste - I would say, like Ribena blackcurrant drinks, but more flavourful.

We also tried cashew juice. Yups, you've heard and eaten tonnes of cashew nuts, but few people know that the nut is actually the stem of the cashew fruit. Which is what makes these nuts so expensive - you have to wait for an entire fruit to grow and mature before you can harvest it's stem. The fruit itself, which looks like a yellow pepper, is not usually eaten. Not surprisingly - cos it doesn't taste too good. It doesn't even have much taste, really. And the juice leaves a strange after-feeling in the mouth. It's funny how drinking juice left my mouth felt dried out!

Fruit juice stands are literally chock-a-block - there is at least one for every block you walk, and sometimes even 2. Brazilians are a lucky lot.

My favourite - a healthy does of assai. A great frozen snack to have after a hot day at the beach.

Japanese Food

We were surprised to learn that Sao Paolo has the largest Japanese community outside of Japan. So it's no wonder that Japanese cuisine has found its way to Rio and into the hearts of the cariocas.

When we heard about the all-you-can-eat ala carte buffet or rodezio at Nik, a Japanese restaurant in Ipanema, we purposely avoided going there until our final night in Brazil, with an idea of saving the best for the last.

Sad to say, all that deprivation only made the glutton in us reared its ugly head. We had arrived at the restaurant pretty late for dinner, around 10pm, only to learn that the place closes at 11pm. All discretion flew out of the window as we frantically ticked plate after plate of sushi off the food list. Even before we had finished eating what was already delivered to our table.

Chew. Chew. Chew. Tickticktickticktickticktick!

While it was a pretty good selection, I was a bit bummed to find out that many cooked items like tonkatsu, agadashi tofu and grilled fish weren't available for the rodezio.

Which means that we ended up with lots of sushi...

Clearly very happy to be eating sushi again

And more sushi... and a couple of giant handrolls.

Stuffing our mouths with rice

And finally, TOO MUCH FRICKIN' SUSHI!!! My eyes widened each time the waiter appeared with a platter filled with rice rolls and my mind whirled, "Did I really order that?!" And to make things worse, we were horrified to discover that we had somehow ticked off bowls of rice, noodles and vegetables along the way. I didn't even remember doing that! My stomach must have had wiped out my brain and taken over my entire body, especially my writing (or ticking) hand.

OH. DEAR.

Erm, waiter, can we da pao please?

We knew that leftovers were charged at S$1.50 per piece. We did a quick calculation of the damage. Not good. We sheepishly tried to ask for the leftovers to be packed for take-away, only to be told that the S$1.50/piece charge applied. Uh oh.

The next best thing to do was to minimise the damage - but not by eating (cos I couldn't eat anymore - not with pieces of half-digested fish threatening to come back up my throat!) I'm not proud to say this, but I found the bowl of fried rice very useful for hiding pieces of sushi under. And the remains of the broccoli skewer found a new home in the bowl of vegetables while the leftover chicken pieces gravitated towards the noodle bowl. Dan, however, was an honourable being and made a highly commendable effort to put away the food with his mouth. Unlike his wife who was guilty of fervently stabbing at her food to make it all fit into the rice/veg/noodle bowls.

We finally admitted defeat when the restaurant closed it doors and all the staff were waiting for us to finish eating so that they could go home. We felt like criminals for wasting all that food.

And so, that brain-numbing eating ordeal meal put our pre-Christmas feasting to an end. We repented greatly by surviving on instant noodles and airline food (not that there was any served on American Airlines at all. Lousy airline!) till the after Boxing Day, where we restarted our feasting machinery with pancakes at IHOP and kept it well-oiled with pints of creamy Ben & Jerry's!

But no, no sushi for us for awhile. Ugh.

Capoeira by the Beach

At one end of Ipanema beach is a rocky outcrop which we (not the Brazilians) call The Rocky Outcrop.

We climbed TRO one fine sunny day, hoping to get a good view of the seals along Ipanema. Unfortunately, we only managed to get pictures of people who look like seals from afar. Good enough, I guess.

Better enjoy this beach before 12 December 2012! :)

But the bonus was, we stumbled upon a crew filming a foursome atop TRO. Took a video of the foursome, edited it, and now, uploaded it for your viewing pleasure! :)



It's amazing how these guys were so smooth and slow and sure in their movements. Interestingly enough, they were so good that we abandoned our plans to take up capoeira while in Rio de Janeiro. Simply because we only had time for one lesson, and it seemed wasteful to pay money just to learn the basic steps with no follow up lessons, knowing for sure, that we would be at nowhere near this level when we're done.

As the wife says, "I can't even do a handstand!"