A smile means the same thing in every language...

Except in Portuguese, where you either just say Obrigado or “ingles?” and you raise your voice and eyebrows at the end to make it a question, and 9.9 times out of 10 they walk away! It has been great. My trip over was an adventure in itself. I will try and condense it. Well when leaving CLT, my first flight, the guy behind be saw my Brazil book, and was like oh are you going to Brazil, and I said yea, Florianopolis. He said he was going to Rio, then he asked if I was traveling alone, and I said, well yea, but I’m meeting up with like a school and a host family. Then he goes on to be like “Oh I just saw a really scary movie about women who travel alone, it was really scary, it was called...” I said, “No I don’t want to see a scary movie about traveling alone.” I mean who does that, oh your traveling alone let me freak you out! Well anyway. In Atlanta I found out that when I got to Sao Paulo, I would have to go through customs, and then take all my bags and leave the airport get on a bus for an HOUR ride to another airport then check in again. All of this in Brazil, where I know 0 Portuguese. So I finally got nervous. On the plane to Sao Paulo, everyone was Brazilian. The flight attendants knew both but while sitting on the plane everyone spoke Portuguese. It got me very excited. The woman who sat next to me knew no English, so I whipped out book after book to try to talk to her. In the end all five of my Brazil books were out and we were going through them trying to talk to each other. I did learn that she had 2 sons and one granddaughter, and she was just visiting one son in Boston. So the flight was not bad each person had there own TV with hundreds of cds you could listen to, tons of movies, including WallE, Dark Knight, Mamma Mia, Pineapple Express, all movies I wanted to watch, so I listened to music, then I tried to watch a movie and no sound would work. Then my light wouldn’t turn off. OF COURSE I get the TV where I can’t call the attendant b/c its on the tv which doesn’t work, my partner doesn’t know English, and is asleep. Finally I got an attendant, and we reset my TV, twice. I got the light off and settled down with the Dark Knight. It was great accept it was midnight. I finally attempted sleep at one. I didn’t sleep well but took lots of short naps. Then at 3:30 the lights in the airplane came on and they started serving us breakfast! I was like NO I didn’t even get two hours! So we landed at 430 am which was 730 there. I was tired. Then the test came. I got off the plane waited for my luggage for over 30 min. started worrying it wasn’t coming. Then I thought oh that would be great because then I wouldn’t have to lug it to the Bus and through everything. So right when I thought it was better not to have my luggage it showed up! I got my bags, went through customs, pretty easy. Then I went up to the first person I saw that worked there and asked if they spoke English. The said little, I asked them about the bus and showed the name of the other airport and he walked me throughout the airport and pointed down to the end of the road where there were buses. I walked there and had to ask five people if the bus was going to Gonganhos, of course I pronounced it wrong and no one understood me. Then a guy who spoke English and was from somewhere in northern Brazil said yeah, I am going there to. The bus isn’t here yet. So I stand with him and then I see he has a ticket. Now NOONE in delta, even after I asked them gave me anything for the bus or plane, they just said I would be helped when I got there. Yeah right. So the guy winds up walking me through the airport asking everyone how to get wherever were going and I get to the GOL desk or whatever, clear on the other side of the airport. I thank him so much and am just thinking, Thanks Jesus. Then I wait in line for twenty minutes and the girl at the desk changes my flight out of the airport I am in instead so YAY no bus. All I have to do is go wait in line and check in! so I am in line for a while and start talking to the guy behind be who is from northern brazil and also speaks English b/c he spent two years in Australia (he even had the accent!). He is very kind, gives me his email, and offers me a place to stay if I travel up north (Don’t worry he is a teacher, married, and a Christian). Then I am checking in and of course they don’t speak English, they don’t realize I am traveling internationally and are going to charge me because you are only allowed 23 Kg and I had 60! Luckily my friend, Marcello is done checking out and walks over and asks if I need help. He talks to them and I end up checking all three bags (my backpack was to big for a carryon) with an apology and no money spent. Once again I was thanking Jesus! So I flew into Florianopolis, which is beautiful! I was exhausted but stayed up all day. My host dad Sergio picked me up with his niece and nephew! They are all sooo sweet! I loved them all! I met Rodrigo, the son who helps in the study abroad office at Unisul and offered his home. He is great. There is also a guy studying here from NC named John. He is staying with Rodrigo and his grandmother at another house. I live with Sergio, Beatriz, and Amanda, there daughter. They are all very very kind, but don’t know English. It has been very fun! I have to learn the language soon! I really love my host family and my house! It is all such a blessing. More to come later. Oh one more thing, Brazilians are all very close, on the first day, I met their grandmother, three cousins, Aunt, talked to the other aunt on the phone, everyone it feels like. I love it. I promise most blogs won’t be this long! There was just too much to tell!

The photos: saying goodbye to meg, my sad parents in airport, and my first view of Florianopolis!