The last hurrah

Well since last Thursday my life has been a bit of a whirlwind.
Friday was our final Portuguese test as well as the due date of our final proposal for the independent project part of the program. So while Thursday night was a little less than ideal (it sucked) I believe I was able to make up for it by cramming the weekend full of fun.
After I turned in my proposal I went and walked around the historic center of the city (Pelorinho), watched people and tried (unsuccessfully) to find prices that weren't ridiculously high. I then met up with Alison and we journeyed to the beach, hung out for a while then went behind the lighthouse on a grassy knoll to watch the sunset (along with about half the couples in Salvador.) It was a gorgeous night but not prime for sunsets as a herd of clouds sat themselves right on the horizon. I went home and talked to my mae about me leaving and about today's election. She was previously going to leave her ballot blank because her candidate didn't make it past the first round but her church told her to vote Pinheiro so that settled that. I headed back down by the beach for the night and hung out with a few friends (Brazilian and otherwise) who were playing guitar in the shadow of the lighthouse. I got back and my other brother had arrived from Sao Paulo where he lives and works to stay for the weekend. He is twenty-five and pretty hilarious. He studied in Canada for a year and speaks English with a Canadian accent which is a little bit of a shock to hear in the middle of Brazil. He works so much that he doesn't get to go to the beach or hang around outside too much so he is whiter than I am which was a source of endless amusement for the whole family. We devoured what remained of the triple chocolate cake my mae made for his homecoming (prodigal son?) and talked for a couple hours.

I was pretty sure that I had just closed my eyes when I had to wake up on Saturday. We had to meet at Campo Grande for a picnic with everyone's host family at the beach house of one of the families. We got on a huge and hugely awkward tourist bus for the trek out there and basically played around on the beach and ate all day. Neither of which I have a problem with. Some of us also walked up the road a little ways to a sea turtle hatchery and education center. There were big turtles that were rescued and being rehabbed as well as little babies swimming around in a pool and waiting until they get big enough to be released. I wanted to slip one into my pocket but I don't have a supply of freshly dead fish for him so I decided against it. We got back, got home, ate dinner and I met back up with some of the girls in Campo Grande. We headed to a jazz show at the modern art museum which overlooks the bay. The show is every Saturday and is live music outdoors for REALLY cheap. And I mean under one American dollar when you get there late like we did. We left after a couple hours and went to Frances' house which is fairly close by. Her host mom's best friend was having a birthday party at this crazy expensive club and got extra free passes. We are always up for free so we got ready to go out again and headed down to the club (which apparently has two sister clubs - in NYC and Sao Paulo.) We got in but it was a bit awkward because we used passport photocopies as ID (which was not a problem at all) but some of the girls in the birthday group had non-plasticized IDs and the bouncer was not a very sympathetic man. So we got in way before the rest of the people we had gotten the free passes from. But once we were in I felt like I was in a club from a movie. Sleek everything - all the chairs were L-shaped moderny white couches and there were balconies for extra special people. The DJ was up on a balcony above the dance floor and there were some glowing lotus flowers hanging from the ceiling (the club name is Lotus). It was pretty highbrow stuff (or as they say here "chic-y") and certainly an experience. At a couple random points during the music there were also color coordinated dancers on top of some of the tables which was heartily appreciated by the men in the room but caused a female rush to the bathrooms. The taxi driver home tried to trick us into paying him more but when we fought back in Portuguese he backed down real quick and apologized too.

And now I must pack. I am sitting in a dirty room with all my stuff having apparently migrated out of the places it belongs. I can't believe I am leaving tomorrow and I really can't believe I am supposed to have seven weeks worth of stuff packed by ten a.m. tomorrow. I may need luck on my side today.

Oh and I realized a couple days ago how dependent my TWENTY NINE year old brother is on his mom to cook for him, clean his clothes and wash his dishes. I am pretty sure I have not seen him do any of the above even once while I have been here. However he is really good at asking his mom to make him fried bananas. So ma and pa - thanks for forcing me into laboring at a young age. I'm glad I'm not a dependent blob and I have you to thank for that.