Rio (Copacabana)

Well, the actual business of getting from Santiago to Rio de Janeiro proved eventful enough - at Santiago airport we were offered the tidy sum of $200 EACH to take a later flight instead, doubtless because the airline had overbooked the seats, and were scrambling around desperately to sort out their mess. This seemed like a good idea to us, until we were told the later flight was in fact 12 hours later (not the original 4 hours), and got to Rio after midnight! So we changed our minds back, only to be told it was too late - cue lots of arguing with airline staff, and, thankfully, eventually getting our way... We´ll just have to do without the extra cash!

It´s summer in Rio, which means temperatures between 30-35 degrees at the moment, constant sweating, several showers a day etc (apologies to those back home in Britain, shivering and probably cursing us!). In contrast to Chile and Argentina, I can´t even imagine wanting to drink red wine over here - only ice-cold Antartica beers, coconut water, and LOTS of the incredibly exciting fruit juices that are sold at stalls all over. Passion fruit juice, melon juice, fruit-you´ve never-heard-of-or-seen-before juice... All delicious! Convinced Becka to try some comida mineira with me on the first night - she seemed wary of the tutu and couve, and other unknown quantities, but it proved delicious.

In fact, Rio is a massive contrast to Chile in general. Brazil´s incredibly rich racial diversity in particular stands out - it seems to have created a ludicrously high concentration of highly attractive people (even the shop window dummies have conspicuous curves and much larger bums!). Though before anyone could get too carried away with ideas of racial utopia, an incident in the supermarket yesterday would bring you back down to earth - a black man who´d been accused of stealing and was yelling at the security and the customers, claiming to have been accused on the basis of his skin colour alone.

At the moment we´re staying in Copacabana, which we´re enjoying very much - full of locals just going about their business, not too fancy or geared towards tourists. (Oh, if you´re wondering why there aren´t more photos with this entry, it´s mainly because we´ve been in such a state of paranoia about getting stuff nicked that the camera has been mostly under lock and key back in the hostel!) As it is, the area is apparently much safer than it has been for a while - there are favelas visible from the hostel - though this seems to be mainly due to the heavy presence of police with machine guns...

Schlepped over to the British Embassy (to register our passports, in case of any future problems) over in Flamengo, which closed at 12.30pm, though for some reason I´d lost the plot and decided the address was no.94 rather than no.284... Of course we dashed PAST no.284 just before closing time, only to arrive at no.94 panting and wheezing and find no such Embassy. (Brilliantly enough, the security guard told us we´d be better off going to the beach for the afternoon instead) When we DID get to the Embassy the next day, they told us to register online instead. AARGHH!!

Have been enjoying the local botequims for drinking (basically, a bar in as much as it serves alcohol and food, but often only consisting of a couple of plastic tables and chairs outside, for a handful of punters). We did actually take the bus (a hair-raising experience in itself - it´s no lie that the bus drivers here are living out Formula One fantasies!) over to Leblon last night to check out the nightlife, only to decide that it really wasn´t us and take the bus straight back! Seemed like a bit of a rich kids´playground really...

The hostel (Newton´s Rooftop) is pretty, well, characterful and laid-back, if at times downright hazardous. We´re moving across town to Santa Teresa tomorrow, which is probably a good thing as anyone who stays at Newton´s more than a few days seems to end up working here!