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Ain't No Rest For The Wicked!! I found myself up at 3am again partly due to the extreme heat and partly due to my obsessive and compulsive thinking mind. I managed to get a little more sleep before getting out of bed at 6:30am and joining Walter & Bruna for breakfast. I started the day with another cup of Brazil's finest coffee before saying goodbye to Walter. I also got to have a really nice chat with Bruna; a first as Bruna has been incredibly busy all week and in bed every night early. At 9am I made my way to the shopping mall where yesterday I had worked out where I needed to take bus from. The bus came after about a 40 minute wait (I had given myself plenty of time today) and I was able to breathe a little sigh of relief. The bus journey out to the new airport (opened 7 days ago) was long, rough and incredibly hot; but had me arriving cheaply and with plenty of time before my flight. The airport is brilliantly spacious, well-laid out and with more staff working then customers flying. After a very speedy check-in I made my way up to the waiting lounge and made use of the free wifi. Boarding commenced 10 minutes before the scheduled departure time and amazingly they were able to depart on time. The flight was very quick and we arrived at Foetaleza on time where I disembarked in less then 10 minutes. My friend Isabelle (who I met 2 years ago in Portugal) was coming to pick me up so I went and met her outside the airport. Isabelle is lovely and it was so nice to see her again - unfortunately she had just had her car broken into today so her mind was a little preoccupied. Isabelle took me for a drive around the city and then to her families apartment so I can meet her family. Isabelle lives on the top floor of a really nice apartment complex and her home is beautiful - complete with pool and outside BBQ area. Her family were lovely and offered me food lots of it and I was able to take a nice shower. I left my things at Isabelle's and then we drove down to the waterfront/broad walk and had a look at all the interesting markets that were set up. It was obviously where all the tourists hang-out but it was still interesting and had a good vibe - a few tourists warned me about having my phone in my hand; as it was too easy for thiefs to grab it - this made me a little nervous. Isabelle brought me some typical snacks from this area of Brazil which included this bar of sugar cane and cashews covered in caramel and sesame seeds. Isabelle goes to church every Saturday night and had invited me to join her tonight; on arrival at the church (Protestant) it became quite apparent I was about to experience something very different to a normal church gathering. Firstly all the people were under 35 years old and the service took part in a school gymnasium and there was a stage with a rock band setup at the front. There were about 300 people all of which Isabelle seemed to know; the service started with an hour of rock music, singing and people jumping up and down like you would see at any concert. Amazingly the people got right into the music whilst at the same time - arms spread out, looking to the sky's and preying to Jesus. It was a little strange but the people seemed to enjoy and you must also remember it is all in Portuguese so I could literally not understand one word of what was being said. After some more singing, preying, holding hands and standing (stood for nearly 2 hours) Isabelle said we could go - thankfully as I was starving hungry, falling asleep and my legs were about to fall off. We went to the mall and I grabbed a few things from the supermarket as the plan was to go back to Isabelle's and eat some dinner before I would go to my new host; Sara's place. In the end it was very late so we skipped having dinner and after picking my things up from Isabelle's place we headed out to my new hosts place. We met my new host Sara at another mall and I said goodby to Isabelle for now. Sara doesn't speak any English so our conversation was very limited and it didn't help I was very tired and hungry. I met Sara's roommates for 2 minutes and then I was able to boil some eggs and eat something before everyone went to bed. Sara gave me a hammock to hang in the front room; my first time sleeping in a hammock and it was actually quite comfortable.
OBSERVATIONS:
- Coffee addiction - 2 days back on coffee and I am hooked again
- Very long bus ride out to new airport
- Natals new state of the art airport - complete with free wifi
- Fortaleza - big city; dangerous
- Christian rock church - symbols, miracles
- Fortaleza Broadwalk - very touristic but nice
- Tried Cane sugar bar and caramelized cashews with sesame seeds
- Couchsurfed with Sara
- Sleeping In a hammock for first time
- comments