Weekend Round-up

A really good weekend, by any season´s standards.

Friday night in Lapa, good weather, good caipirinhas, good hostel crowd. Not very many other backpackers, and the Samba Villa hostel next to the Arcos was closed... curious... seasonal operations in Rio? Doesn´t seem likely. Maybe they just nix the night activities.

I went to Saquarema Saturday morning, and ended up swimming with a penguin. In July, apparently, they were all over the beach. This has nothing to do with climate change, just the natural route... who knew? Not this guy.

Yesterday was the big election day. Remember how I said the bars don´t serve alcohol on Saturdays... lets take a closer look at that. The centers of the towns and cities turn into political pep rallies and tail-gate parties, everyone drinking and partying and throwing fireworks and wearing the colors of their candidate. Sunday I went with some people to their voting center; the local school, room assignment based on a district designation, 1 electronic machine (that looked like an ancient cash register) in each room, behind curtains. Piece of cake.

The big question: did our boy, MARINHO, win? Don´t know yet.

Last night we took a full van to Rocinha for the favela funk... a good, crowded funk night, the fastest collective exit we´ve ever managed, and we´d brought along some friends of guests who this morning switched over to Piratas. All good things.