The Boa Viagem

September 08, 2015

The Boa Viagem

Christ the Redeemer Statue

At Sao Conrado Beach

Between January and June of this year, Harvey racked up the airline miles as he flew back and forth from Oklahoma to Washington. Little did I know he had a big plan for those miles: a getaway for the two of us. In mid-June, he finally revealed the plan to me: he was booking a vacation to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

We've dreamed of going to Brazil ever since we began to learn Portuguese from Telma, our Brazilian teacher, in Mozambique twelve years ago. We were eager to use the language again, and we had heard and read how beautiful the country was. But getting plane tickets at the right time proved to be tricky. Ideally, we would take the trip in August, when, because of the congressional recess in DC, we could go back to Oklahoma and leave our kids with our family there. We also considered doing it in the fall when Harvey's parents came to DC to visit, but then they would have the stress of getting the kids to and from school, and that's a lot to ask (as I've been discovering over the past two weeks). Harvey would check the available flights every day, and he finally found August dates that would work for us. The trip was on.

And I can look back on it now and say that it was perfect. Wonderful hotel, beautiful beach, amazing weather, gracious people, breathtaking sights. I've posted the best of the photos I took on Facebook, but there are some parts of the experience that you just can't see in a picture, so I wanted to share a few of those here.

The hospitality. When we arrived at the airport in Rio, I stopped in the restroom, and as I was drying my hands, a young American woman asked me whether I was American. When I said yes, she asked me whether people had warned me about the crime in Rio, that it was a dangerous place and I'd better be really, really careful. I told her not really, and she said that several people in the states had told her that. One person even told her that if she wore any rings out in public, she could get her fingers cut off by thieves.

I didn't lose any fingers.

From the moment we sought help at the airport for transportation to our hotel, the cariocas (the local name for natives of Rio) were nothing but kind, friendly, and helpful. The employees at our hotel, the Royal Tulip, upgraded our room to a suite with an ocean view and arranged tours for us; they also gave us good tips and advice for traveling by taxi and subway and attending a soccer match.

View from our hotel room balcony

First glimpse of the view

A giant, beautiful breakfast buffet was included in the price of the room, and the breakfast room and deck also had an ocean view. The hotel had a reserved area at the beach with towels, chairs, tables, and umbrellas for our use, as well as an attendant to help set it up and guard our belongings if we went for a stroll or to the water.

My love on our first visit to the beach

Looking back at our hotel from the beach

Harvey really wanted to go to a soccer match in Maracana Stadium, the location of the 2014 World Cup Final and the 2016 Olympic opening and closing ceremonies. I definitely wanted to have the experience of attending a Brazilian soccer match, but I was nervous--I had heard how raucous the crowds could be, and one tour guide told us that if we wore the wrong colors to a soccer match, we could be killed. Killed! But we spoke to the people in our hotel, and they suggested we take a taxi and didn't seem to be concerned for our safety. So we took the taxi, arrived about an hour and a half before the game, and everything was calm. The stadium even had workers stationed outside giving information and direction to those arriving. We got our tickets, went inside, found our seats, and enjoyed the match and the experience! There was a loud section, but it was up higher in the seats in the corner, away from where we sat. (My brother told me they put those fans there intentionally to keep them from throwing things on the field.) There was cheering and yelling around us as well, but it was controlled and no worse than the yelling at a college football game.

Just a couple happy soccer fans

Every time we asked for help getting a taxi or finding a restaurant, people went out of their way to help us. The hospitality of the cariocas enriched our Rio experience.

The weather. Our summertime is Brazil's winter, so we were there during their cool season. But cool season in Brazil is like spring or a mild summer here--lows in the sixties and seventies and highs in the eighties. It was sunny and cool and beautiful. We sat on the beach, and in the shade of our umbrella, we were chilly. Also the ocean water was ice cold, so there was no swimming for us. We got our feet and legs wet, but we couldn't go any farther in.

Enjoying the lovely weather at the hotel pool

Sunbathing turtles at the Botanical Garden

The language. We got to use Portuguese again for the first time in ten years. We loved being immersed again in that language, and it came back to us pretty well. It was fun to see it on signs and hear it spoken and use it to get around.

The beach experience. Photos of the beach are beautiful, but there's more to it than what you see. We chose a hotel that was not on the main beaches with their strips of hotels, shops, and restaurants (Copacabana, Ipanema, Leblon) but on the quieter, more isolated beach of Sao Conrado, known as a landing spot for hang-gliders. During the week it was not crowded, and we enjoyed that peacefulness.

Watching the beachgoers from our balcony

View to the north

View to the south

We watched men play foot-volleyball, a form of volleyball where you don't use your hands. We drank coconut water.

Sipping coconut water

Yum!

We saw barely-there swimwear, from Speedos to bikinis to thongs. Lots of thongs. Especially on Sunday, the most crowded day on the beach. Wherever I looked, someone's bum was there. And it seemed no one was too old or too young or too out of shape to wear one. Which made me not so self-conscious about my body! Which I'm thankful for, because the less I worried about that, the more I was free to enjoy the experience.

Soaking up the sun with almost every inch of their skin

The food. There are all kinds of food in Rio. But Harvey is not an adventurous eater (not by choice, anyway), so we mostly stuck to the familiar: Italian food, burgers, seafood, sushi. The first night we ate at a little Italian restaurant in the mall behind the hotel; we sat on the deck and ate our steak and pasta and creme brûlée by candlelight.

First dinner out in Rio

After we went to the soccer match, we rode the subway to the Ipanema area and found a Japanese restaurant where we had sushi and yakisoba.

Our late-night sushi run

Another night we stopped at a cafe on Copacabana beach with live music, where we had steak and shrimp. The pinnacle of our dining out in Rio was the churrascaria, where we ate our last night in Rio. Not only do waiters bring out hefty skewers of meat from which they carve portions onto your plate; they offer a giant buffet of salads, vegetables, breads, and other dishes to accompany the meat. Delicious!

I seem to be all smiles when I'm eating.

But my favorite food experience of our visit was the hotel's daily breakfast buffet. The spread included eggs, breads, meats, and cheeses; fruit, cereal, and yogurt; fresh-squeezed juices; and a station where chefs made omelets to order. Each morning we filled our plates and took them to the outdoor dining area with a view of the ocean and enjoyed our food and tea (for Harvey) and coffee (for me). I loved it.

Cafe da manha with a view

The freedom. One thing you'll notice about our photos is the absence of children. Our families in Oklahoma were graciously willing to babysit so Harvey and I could go on this adventure on our own and enjoy each other without distractions. I recognize that many couples are not able to do this, so I'm extremely grateful for the opportunity. Of course I love my children, and being with them brings joy and satisfaction, but there is such a feeling of calm and relief to have a break from constantly being concerned about and caring for the needs of the little ones I'm responsible for. We could stay out late and sleep late. We could eat what we wanted (and when we wanted). We could have sustained conversations or sit around and say nothing at all for hours at a time. We could focus on each other, and we did. I love Harvey, and I like Harvey, and I'm happy with him after twenty-two years of being together.

On Sugar Loaf Mountain

At Urca, on the way down from Sugar Loaf

At Tijuca National Park

At the Botanical Garden

The guide for our tour of the Botanical Garden and Tijuca Rainforest told us there are two kinds of cariocas. Those who are born in Rio are called cariocas da gema, which means cariocas from the yolk. But there are also cariocas da clara, cariocas from the white, and those are people who weren't born in Rio, but they love it. I hope Harvey and I can now be considered cariocas da clara, not natives of Rio but lovers of Rio. We felt right at home there. And I hope one day (maybe after fifteen more years of marriage) we will return.