I bade an ate pronto farewell to Gobira, Tyr and Dona Tereza, stepped on the bus and set off for the aeroporto to catch the plane to the North-East.
There was a traffic accident in the middle of Belo Horizonte, the bus was an hour late at the rodoviaria and what should have been a leisurely trip turned into a race against the clock and bus timetabling but luckily I made the onibus connection with minutes to spare, boarded TAM flight 3226 after a curious 10-minute conversation with an old guy from Scunthorpe who appeared very discomfited by meeting a fellow Brit (either he was just odd or he had unsavoury motives for visiting the city - either are possible), and four hours later was sitting in a taxi thinking "I must remove the hoodie IMMEDIATELY!". I spent the night in a cheap hotel in Itapua, lulled to sleep by the rattle of the ceiling fan but feeling strangely unprotected by the single sheet covering the bed (entry for cheap detective novel start)
The next day I awoke at 6.30 with bright sunlight streaming through the windows. However, by the time I had located another hotel closer to the centre of Salvador and got a taxi there, clouds were gathering over the 400-year old city, the precursor to four days of rain heavy enough to confine me to a room, reading and writing (re-vamping my file of workshop activities, adding more activities and organising them into four chapters). However, I organised a very positive meeting with Jackie at Cultura Inglesa, who encouraged me to continue composing more complex activities after I showed her the linguistic activities collection that is growing in my documents file.
In a hostel I stayed at in Pelourinho the old city centre I met a very charming French flight attendant called Alex who had the strongest Manchester accent I"ve heard in a long time and asked me "Do you know Blackley?". How odd to be discussing the maternal birthplace thus! Pelourinho is a bit raggy round the edges but will be buzzing in a few years time when the world cup happens. Best of all is the amount of music to be experienced there, which will be the second blog, to appear soon once Iṽe figured out how to upload the video using Linux, whcih is the only way to connect to the internet where I am just now...
At this point in my stay the clouds parted and also the wonderful Bira Azeveda returned to Salvador, and offered me a floor to sleep on at the flat he shares with an English teacher from Albany NY called Andy della Rocca until my flight to the south...Bira was up to his ears in preparations for a show involving 700 people to be part of the celebrations for the beatification of Irma Dulce, a Brasilian Mother Teresa figure. His show opens on May 22nd. Break a leg, Bira!!
Watch this spacef for Salvadorean tunes
Paddy
There was a traffic accident in the middle of Belo Horizonte, the bus was an hour late at the rodoviaria and what should have been a leisurely trip turned into a race against the clock and bus timetabling but luckily I made the onibus connection with minutes to spare, boarded TAM flight 3226 after a curious 10-minute conversation with an old guy from Scunthorpe who appeared very discomfited by meeting a fellow Brit (either he was just odd or he had unsavoury motives for visiting the city - either are possible), and four hours later was sitting in a taxi thinking "I must remove the hoodie IMMEDIATELY!". I spent the night in a cheap hotel in Itapua, lulled to sleep by the rattle of the ceiling fan but feeling strangely unprotected by the single sheet covering the bed (entry for cheap detective novel start)
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| pregnant sky over baroque cathedral |
In a hostel I stayed at in Pelourinho the old city centre I met a very charming French flight attendant called Alex who had the strongest Manchester accent I"ve heard in a long time and asked me "Do you know Blackley?". How odd to be discussing the maternal birthplace thus! Pelourinho is a bit raggy round the edges but will be buzzing in a few years time when the world cup happens. Best of all is the amount of music to be experienced there, which will be the second blog, to appear soon once Iṽe figured out how to upload the video using Linux, whcih is the only way to connect to the internet where I am just now...
At this point in my stay the clouds parted and also the wonderful Bira Azeveda returned to Salvador, and offered me a floor to sleep on at the flat he shares with an English teacher from Albany NY called Andy della Rocca until my flight to the south...Bira was up to his ears in preparations for a show involving 700 people to be part of the celebrations for the beatification of Irma Dulce, a Brasilian Mother Teresa figure. His show opens on May 22nd. Break a leg, Bira!!
Watch this spacef for Salvadorean tunes
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| Sunset over Bahia de todos os Santos |
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