9am
I don't think there could be a more appropriate photo to say goodbye to João Pessoa... I got a negative vibe from this city the moment I stepped foot here, this didn't change until the moment I went to sleep in the night, and I still feel the same negative vibes now, as I am about to leave. Who knows? Maybe one day I will be back, and maybe then I will see the city through different eyes. Until then, though, I won't be the city's biggest promoter, I won't be advising people to include João Pessoa in their Brazil itinerary... By the way, yesterday I wrote about that... lethally boring/depressing/monotonous white/grey sky I can't stand, the one that makes me want to take my virtual vacuum cleaner out and sweep everything off the sky. That's the sky, in this photo...
2:30pm
I'm at Olinda alright, but my comment on my first impressions from the town can wait. On the bus from João Pessoa to Recife, I was sitting next to a young Brazilian woman, in her early 30s. Not really good-good looking, but sweet, she is one of those people who start talking and just... keep talking, even when they realize that you are not really from around here, and you don't really speak the language. And not only that. She kept talking fast, even when I would ask her to... slow down, so I could keep track of what she was saying (I don't speak Portuguese, but I understand a pretty good deal of it). Nope... She would slow down for a sentence or so, and then she would step on it again. At some point I just gave up, I stopped trying to follow what she was saying, I just enjoyed the... sound of it. I love how Portuguese sounds, I LOVE it, and, well, there are worse things in life than having a sweet looking young Brazilian woman talk to you in her sweet voice non stop for almost three hours...
2:45
From Recife's bus station you can catch the Metro and go downtown. This is what I did. As the train started moving, a weird looking guy in his 40s approached me. I could tell he was either nuts or really-really drank. He started asking where I'm from, I played it fool, as if I understood nothing, he kept on asking, and at some point I just mumbled "Grecia". Oh boy, I made his day!... For some reason he found it (in his nuts-y case or in his drank state) really-really amusing, and after he announced(!) it in loud voice to the whole wagon (which made me turn red out of embarrassment because suddenly everyone turned to us, and... eeeehm, I don't handle attention that well...), he turned to me again and asked me in a really insisting way to say something to him in Greek(!).
4pm
All this time, there were a couple of ladies in their 50s that were looking at us, and every now and then one of them would make me a signal as if telling me not to take him seriously and not worry. They would even tell this guy to leave me alone, stop bagging me, but no, he had found something/someone to keep him busy until the end of the line (downtown Recife). He never got to hear me talk in Greek, because one of the ladies distracted him, he forgot all about it, but turned to me again and "advised" me to be very careful in Recife, making gestures with his hands that someone could cut my throat with a knife(!).
4:20
That's when one of the ladies came to me, dragged me by the hand and made me sit next to her. She was one of those... big figures, you know, "big" women, with lots of spare kilos, if you know what I mean, the kind of woman who makes a perfect grandma', perfect to run and hide behind her big body when you do something naughty and you have your mother, all furious, chasing after you to spank your butt... A station later, the nuts/drank guy got off. People came close to us and started commenting on this guy and how he had been harassing "bonitinho" me (aaaaaah, if only they knew real me...). "Bonitinho" is "little bonito", and I caught the word coming from this lady's lips, because I had found it weeks before coming to Brazil in some Pitty (http://www.pitty.com.br/) song (Máscara - Ninguém merece ser só mais um bonitinho). She kept telling everyone how nice I had been not provoking this guy, and... I don't know, seemed to me that a big deal was being done out of nothing, really...
5pm
It's not like this guy had tried anything... I don't know... A young boy and girl came and said hi, asked my name (tried to start off a conversation but turned out "what is your name", and "pleased to meet you" was all the English they knew), we reached the end of the line, and the... big fuss was continued, with the lady and other people going to some security guy, telling him what had happened just a while ago. I'm telling you, I don't know, this all thing just looked... too much to me. Then again, maybe it is my natural naivety, maybe this lady and the others were right to have gotten that worried, maybe I am the blind one who fails to see a danger when one appears... Anyhow, a young guy who spoke a little English walked me to the place where I could catch a bus to nearby Olinda. He said I should make it to Recife some time during their Carnival, said I would be welcomed to stay at his place if I ever come to Recife again during the Carnival. He made sure I stood at the right bus stop, having asked half a dozen people to make sure which corner was the right one, and only then he left.
5:20
This whole incident has made me feel a certain... warmth, I think this is the right word. People on the waggon were very warm (it was even sweet looking at some of them trying to "protect" me from this nutcase who was so amused by the fact that I am Greek), this guy who walked me to the bus stop was great, really friendly, and locals at the bus stop were great too. A young woman who got on the same bus with me, even volunteered to keep an eye and make sure to wave at me when we'd reach my Olinda stop. So she did. On the bus to Olinda I kept thinking that I should have worked more on Portuguese, it is a real pity to be in this country, with so warm people, and not be able to have a decent conversation... And it's not the locals' fault that they don't speak English... I am the one who came here, I am the one who should have learned more than just the very-very basics of the local lingo... (As I'm writing these lines, early December, I am already in the middle of learning Spanish, as I dream of "escaping" to South America in 9-10 months from today, quitting my job and spending a good deal of time in all Spanish speaking South American countries).
7:20
Olinda... The fact that I reached the end of this entry and only now I take the time to share my first impressions, must be telling you something... It's all about expectations, if you ask me. You read stuff about a place, you are given the impression that you are going to lose your mind when you step foot there, you are getting prepared to see a really dreamy place, you make it a must in your itinerary, and then... then you reach this place, and no matter how "cute" it is, it is way below your expectations, so your overall impressions are somehow marred. It's that... when you are expecting to get an A+ and you get "only" a B+, this B+ looks very "little", no matter if it is thaaaaat close to A. If, on the other hand, you have low expectations, you are expecting a C- and you get a B+, then this B+ looks like A++, exactly because you are that pleasantly surprised. Don't get me wrong, Olinda is "cute", it has this slightly (heavily, actually)... rundown feeling/elegance which makes it kind of... atmospheric, but if you come here driven by expressions like "colonial gem" (this is how it's described in my Lonely Planet), then, if you have already been to unbelievably beautiful little towns in Portuguese country side, Olinda looks... rather overrated. Of course, I may well be wrong...
7:30
Go three photos back and you will see on the right a line of "benches" (this is how we call them in Greek, I don't think it's the right word in English, but anyhow, I mean small "shops", selling either souvenirs or food). This is one of those, the one that seemed to have the juiciest skewers. Once again, I feel stupid not to have learned some real Portuguese before coming here... The guy who runs it starts off the usual conversation, the "where are you from?" one, up to here I can handle it in Portuguese, we talk a little about the country, and then says the girl you see in the photo wants to get married (he was just kidding). I foolishly try to keep the joke rolling by saying that I myself could marry her if she wanted me, and... that's it, that's when my Portuguese run to a halt, my close to non existent vocabulary fails me, and... it's annoying... being with people who look very friendly, are in a joking mood, and you have a bunch of things to say, only... not in their language... It's annoying being unable to transform thoughts in words, in a language everyone around can understand. I bet everyone reading these lines have found him/herself in a similar situation, at least once...
All in all, it was a... nice day. Olinda didn't blow me away, didn't sweep me off my feet, but it's still "cute", and thanks to that drank guy on the train I got to experience a situation I didn't expect, a bonus one, that only made me like the people of Recife, enjoying their... solidarity once the whole "incident" (hardly one) was over. Tomorrow morning I am taking the city bus to Boa Viagem, some coastal suburb of Recife, south of the city's centre. But not before having another stroll here, hopefully under clear sky (my wish was meant to come true...).
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