Oi Gente,
It is almost two months ago since our last blog, shame on us (!) But it also means we can tell some nice stories!
In those two months a lot of stuff happened. We found our apartment (which is still not ready), bought our car, arranged a lot of administrative things, travelled to The Netherlands and Greece for a wedding, went to Rio and Buenos Aires and we received our first Dutch visitor with whom we travelled to the Amazon.
Looking back we can say that the most time consuming (and sometimes frustrating) was arranging the basic things like a bank account (Ronald and I spent quite some hours at the Bradesco counter), a car (in contrary, this went quite quick) and an apartment (see description below). In the Netherlands you would probably finish all this in one month, but NOT in Brazil.
Why? They are in our opinion a bit slow, not very efficient and have difficulties in managing expectations. A good example is that every shop you visit seems to have an overload of employees standing, hanging, talking…..actually doing nothing. At supermarkets you have employees packing your groceries using a bag for almost every single piece, at restaurants you have somebody who writes down your order, who gives this to another employee who hands this over to the kitchen and who comes back with your order, which then will be served by the first person himself. But, we need to be honest; it also provides jobs to those millions of people living in this country.
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| Our new car |
Another example regarding managing expectations is our apartment. We found the apartment mid September, but it needed some renovation. We set the deadline on the 28th of November (already 2 weeks more than the original planning). Three days before the movement we got a message from the owner that the apartment was not finished yet and that we could move in the 29th. Just some small things needed to be done, he said. On Monday the 28th we went there for the final inspection and for signing the contract. You can guess, it was not ready at all. The whole outside area still needed to be done, the painting of the second floor and some final things in the bathrooms. We, Dutch people, ask ourselves then “why didn’t he tell this before!!!” Why didn’t he set the right expectations?” We experienced many times that something was supposed to be ready or almost ready and it wasn’t. Especially for me, having quite a high trust in people, this is sometimes disappointing and a lesson in Brazilian way of life. Well, we now hope that we can move in next week. This would be nice, especially, since we will get a new guest, Ronald’s brother.
Besides the lessons in Brazilian culture we enjoy this country a lot. First of all, these people are the most positive people we have ever met, they can party as the best and enjoying life is something they are born with. I always say to people when characterizing Brasil “It doesn’t matter how poor people are they at least have three things: a big television (on high volume), music, a hammock and some (alcoholic) drinks”.
Second, this country offers one of the most beautiful natures on this planet. This we saw recently when travelling to the Amazon. Together with Suus (my former roommate in Amsterdam) we went on a six day adventure to the Amazon. Imagine: no internet or phone connection possible, no noise of traffic or people, only the sounds of the birds and insects of the rain forest. Ronald and Suus needed to adjust themselves to relaxing and doing nothing (I was already used doing nothing…) We have seen amazing animals like the Amazon dolphins, piranha’s (no toes where bitten off), flying Ara’s, monkeys, a black scorpion (that almost stung Suus), a tapir and one of the most dangerous snakes in South America.
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| The snake who was taken a refuge on our veranda |
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| How we were sleeping in the jungle... |
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| Our view from our room |
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| The Tapir |
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| Scorpio |
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| Piranha fishing |
After the Amazon experience Ronald went back home and we travelled further to Rio de Janeiro, Ilha Grande and Paraty. At this last spot Ronald joined us again and we celebrated his birthday together. We and the rest of the restaurant together sung “Parabens pra você” for him. This is also typical Brazilian, when somebody celebrates his birthday and people start to sing, everybody joins and claps. So nice!
Well, this was is it for now. In our next blog, which I promise will not take that long anymore; we hope to tell you more about our new apartment and to show you some pictures.
Beijos
Ronald & Sanne
