31/1 – Barbie dreams.

Went to the hippie market here in Ipanema the other Sunday (need to fit some touristy things in every now and then) and suddenly wished that I was 8 years old again. This old Brazilian lady was selling homemade Barbie dresses. Absolutely gorgeous creations for not even a fraction of the price you would pay for a commercialised one in a pink box. I just had to get one, but couldn’t really buy it for myself, could I? Used all my brain cells, which hadn’t melted in the heat yet, to try and think of someone who I know who plays with Barbie. Harder than I though actually but guess that’s the nature of being in your 30ies. Friends, and siblings of friends, are all too old and children of friends are still too young. After some 3 minutes and 12 seconds of thinking about it, I concluded that I had to buy it anyways, worst case I could just save if for a bunch of years until someone’s daughter turns Barbie-age. As soon as I got home, I sent some e-mails around and the mission was completed pretty quickly. Maja, 6 years, will be the (hopefully) happy owner of it. I’m quite sure she’s not one of my most frequent blog readers so won’t spoil anything for her birthday by writing it here.

As soon as I’d figured out whom to give the Barbie dress to, I was pretty fine with not being a child again. Lots of things are quite nice with being an adult. One of best ones is that you can eat anything you want, for any meal, at any time, and no one will tell you that you can’t have it. My favourite is popping corn for dinner.

29/1 – Invenção esplêndido.

For those of you who have never used top feed washing machines, I can strongly recommend to give it a try. Especially, if you normally lack the blue or white plastic baskets to carry your laundry from the washing machine to where you hang it up for drying. You know the frustration when you happen to drop a clean sock on the dirty concrete floor or even worse, when your white shirt falls on the newly mowed grass if you hang it outside during the summertime. That’s all history with top feed machines. Thanks to the magnificent construction, everything you put in the machine will come out tied together as a solid knot. As long as a long sleeved item or a pair of long socks is included, it’s a fail proof function of the machines. Once the washing is finished, all you have to do is grab a hold of a random piece of garment in there, pull it out and like magic, the rest of your clean laundry will be safely attached to survive the journey to the washing line.

27/1 – A different life.

It is not every day you meet a 35-year-old grandfather, who looks like 27 and never takes the greatest smile off his face. Put some music on and you won’t be able to stop him from dancing, moving and making jokes. I honestly don’t know what words to use to describe it, very mixed emotions and it puts a lot of things into a very different perspective.

25/1 – Mission Impossible.

Mission:
- Get some throwing practise done with a canoe polo ball. In the absence of the actual game canoe polo, anything that can possibly be linked to the sport is highly attractive to undersigned.

Setting and material:
- A desert, kite surfing beach strip with no wind, i.e. a desert beach strip. One Swedish blonde, one Norwegian, one Brazilian driver (who’s longing for a Formula 1 car, but that’s another story), two Brazilian kite surfing instructors and random Brazilians waiting for some wind.
- One canoe polo ball in fairly good condition and pretty clean still.

Execution:
- Caroline takes out the canoe polo ball and enthusiastically asks the Norwegian if he wants to do some throwing. He agrees, though slightly reluctant. The throwing starts, so far so good.
- The Brazilian driver comes along and joins the game, but commenting right away that it’s a bit strange to just stand there and throw a ball. Not to mention how weird the ball is...
- The two Brazilian kite surfing instructors suddenly see the ball, almost the size of a football (which apparently is close enough to them) and approach the throwing three.
- Like through telepathy and in a synchronized manner, the kite surfing guys and the driver manage to sneak in a foot here and there in the game. A bad throw on purpose which someone needs to save with a foot, a high throw which is easier to play with your head instead and before you know it, the Brazilians have turned the game into this juggling-a-football-in-a-ring kind of game.
- The rest of the activity continues as a football related game only.

Results:
- A dirty, worn out polo ball. Quite a shame but probably not a big deal since it seems like it won’t be used for throwing over here anyways.
- A new shape and colour of a right foot. Conclusion made, that it’s better to stick to the normal, more harmless, sports in the future, like canoe polo, water skiing, telemark skiing, kite surfing, sailing and surfi… sorry, salt water flushing of sinuses. The risk of getting injured when practising these extreme, action sports like football is way too big.

Conclusion:
- Find some Danes or Germans or something if you want to throw a ball. Americans or Aussies might work as well but need a different shape ball for that.
- Buy a football to keep as back-up and pull out once the game seems to transform into something involving your feet.
- Don’t bother trying to get the Brazilians to play any other games than football.

23/1 – Jane Fonda look-alikes or Caroline = judgemental^3.

For sure, the gym is a just as good place to watch people as the airport, if not even better. I’m in doubt if these posh gyms are my kind of thing though, I liked the totally worn out, bodybuilder/sports people one in Alkmaar a lot better. But paid a ridiculously high amount for joining the gym next door (back to the walk alone, late at night in the darkness kind of arguments when making the choice), so better make sure to use it to the max now. Amil packed up just before Christmas by the way, and I haven’t seen him since. He should probably have been able to push the prices a bit. At least his AC expenses would have been a lot less (read non-existing) compared to my gym of choice.

My only reason for going to a gym is to get some quality training done. Most of the times, to make sure the muscles I want to use for various sports don’t deteriorate. Over here, I’ve extended it to a few boxing sessions and these interesting fitness/weight training/body toning sessions as well. The latter is like entering a new and different world to me.

First of all, we’ve got the Hot Surf Dude Instructor. Surfing in the morning, spending the afternoons at the gym, a few cool tattoos and the general look of “I couldn’t care less what I look like, I just happen to be this hot anyways.” No further comments needed I think – you get the point. He is also in possession of the great skill of being able to make all the women in the group feel like he’s flirting and paying extra attention to just them. This can be very tricky to spot yourself during the actual session if you’re of the female gender, but the easier to pick up if you happen to arrive early and watch a few minutes of the session before yours.

In the very front of the group, about 53 cm from the mirrors, we’ll find Miss Perfect Bikini Babe. The most amazing picture perfect body with muscles and shapes the rest of us would only dream of. She’d normally be dressed in short tights and a strapless bikini top (I must have been massively mislead in a sports shop or by media or something regarding the sports-bra concept). Even though she must have spent numerous hours training to get that body, the main aim for going to the gym is not to train, but to use the mirrors. The trick to get the most mirror hours out of your visit is to participate in as many classes as possible, but to only do about one third of all the exercises in each session. The other two thirds of the time you can either just stand and look at yourself in the mirror with your hands on your hips, or stretch a little bit (while studying your stretching technique in the mirror) or simply just try different flexing poses to enjoy the view of yourself in the mirror even more. If you’ve participated in the session prior to the present one, you can skip all exercises during the first 15 minutes, since you’ve already warmed up in the previous session, to get even more quality mirror time.

Somewhere in the back row, we would have Mr Clever Shy Guy who totally got his tactics set up. What could be a better place to pick up girls than at the gym, in a class with females only? Of course, he’ll have a strong competitor in the Hot Surf Dude Instructor, but statistically with so many women around, he should have a good shot at someone still. He’s one of the more consistent participants with a nice and polite attitude to everyone else in the group.

Sadly enough, Mrs Skinny Raisin To Be would also be present most of the sessions. Probably only half the age she looks, but a lifetime of tanning can make wonders if you’re trying to disguise your young age. The dumbbells, her tiny arms are able to handle, have about the same weight as the total weight of gold in her ears, on her fingers and around her neck. The only part of her body with some volume is located some 35 cm below her eyes. Like so many other Brazilian women, she’s contributing to keeping the world’s back-up storage of Silicone in a safe place. I would recommend a nice restaurant with some hearty food for her on a Friday night instead of a gym session.

Then we’ve got Miss Outdoor Sports Nerd, a.k.a. Caroline. Not many bikinis, much jewellery or lip jobs to be seen on her. The characteristic outfit would instead be semi-baggy, ¾ length sports pants, worn-out indoor sports shoes (originating from a previous life as a sports shop assistant) and a stinky breathable t-shirt with some kind of canoe polo logo on the back. At the most, some mascara would still hang on to her eyelashes from a day at work and the t-shirt might have been replaced with a tank top. She can also be recognized by being out of sync with the rest of the participants since she seldom gets the verbal instructions, but need to watch and copy. (Really need to stop to blaming everything on the Portuguese language soon.)

We’ve also got this neon theme going on, as a general trend throughout the group. Neon tights, bright coloured tops with gigantic floral patterns, neon nail polish and huge earrings dangling half way to the shoulders. I can’t even figure out if these people are wearing the Jane Fonda look-alike outfits again or still. On the other hand, I’m normally a couple of years after everyone else when it comes to fashion, so it’s probably more likely that I’ve missed out on something. Better go and get my own neon stuff.
Mrs Former Body Builder is one of the leading fashion gurus within the neon and swimsuit-on-top-of-tights fashion in the group. She is also impressively strong and loads her body with all the weight belts there are.

And I've figured out why Brazilian women have the most amazing legs. If you spend 95% of your training sessions doing squats and “peeing dog” exercises, hour after hour after hour, I’m sure it would pay off. I’m still at the cannot-walk-for-a-week stage after those sessions…even though I use the tiniest weight belts there are.
Conveniently enough, they’ve also put an elevator the 7-storey gym. Good to know that the ones who go there merely to use the mirrors, hang out with their mates and check their e-mails don’t have to get sweaty or risk straining a muscle while doing so.

My new runners are on their way from the US. Thanks for your efforts Deep, much appreciated. I’ll be bouncing like a gazelle and quick as The Road Runner in my new black beauties….Beep Beep!

21/1 - Guess the fruit.

I’ll be impressed if someone who hasn’t seen it before manages to guess what it is. Well, I’m quite sure all of you have seen this kind of fruit before, but in northern Europe it doesn’t look even close to this. Smells the same though so easy to figure out what it is if you put your nose to it...but as far as I know that won’t transfer through the net…yet. Or might be my camera lacking that function... The Portuguese name is Maracujá and apparently there’s a purple and a yellow type. Think it’s the purple one you would see in Europe and Australia. It tastes beautiful, on ice cream, with pork, in juices, goes with anything almost.

18/1 - Darkness issues and gossip.

Ever since I got here, I’ve been told not to walk around by myself after sunset. This has turned out to make the planning for my runs around Lagoa a bit tricky. This stay away from the dark kind of thing gives me a nice choice between health or safety, i.e. cooler temperatures or daylight. To be back home before the sunset, I’ll have to stick to temperatures around 30°C or so, unless it’s raining. My body still seems to need some time to adapt to this (if it ever will) and last week the temperature decided to stay closer to 40°C most of the days even. So instead I’ve decided to seek shade indoor and become this gym freak. Have soon been through most of the different classes to check what they’re all about. Some excellent and some just ok and for an outdoor-non-fancy-training-clothes person like me, this is a totally new world - and a story by itself, so more about that another time.
Of course, there’s always the option of getting up at 5 am as well, and it would all be sorted. But as we’ve already concluded, my self-discipline is a bit too far from that level still.

Got some good gossip from my driver the other day. Apparently, he’d been driving Prince around for a few days in the mid-nineties. Accompanied by his manager, (or possibly life guard…the language barrier was a bit tough there for a while and my driver described the ‘manager’ as a huge Eddie Murphy looking kick-boxer…) Prince had enjoyed himself in Rio with nightclubs and seafood restaurants as main destinations. After a couple of more stories, I asked my driver if his famous client was as little as everyone says and the reply was instant. Instead of pushing his English skills, my driver simply held up his pinkie and laughed. I really hope he was referring to Prince’s height and general size and nothing else in a more literal meaning.

Since we’ve already visited the darkness subject, I might as well mention that I miss the darkness and for example being able to walk on the beach in evenings. When you drive past the harbour with all the boats and the beaches at night, it looks so pristine - so calm, totally empty and just very tempting. It would be so nice to just sit down on the beach, watch the waves and enjoy the peacefulness. But in this case I think I’ll choose to listen to the people around me right away and not do another umbrella mistake – the darkness is probably not a good place for a blonde in Rio.

15/1 -Kitchen equipment update.

The chopping board (the one and only) has now been moved into the same category as the scissors, cork screw and cup measure. Still haven’t found it…

13/1 – Jab, jab, hook and Världens Vackraste.

Yes, this is what I’ve been waiting for all along; a boxing class at a gym, which actually is a boxing class, with focus on the boxing, technique and combinations. No offence to Christian, I totally love his lunchtime box sessions back home. No one can make me train until so close to blackout like him, but it’s not really boxing, is it? Just great training and hard work, with some boxing every now and then. But this, this felt more like a real boxing class. Well, hard for me to say for sure really, since I’ve never been to one, but at least the Professor is a boxer. And luckily, not much verbal communication is needed for a box class, watch, copy and count to a maximum of eight – me like.

Made a sad conclusion the other day: I don’t like Gazpacho. At least not the watermelon version one I made myself out of a fraction of that gigantic green thing taking up half my fridge. If there’s anyone who loves Gazpacho, and has got a good recipe, with or without watermelon, please let me know. I would so want to be proved wrong because it sounds so nice – Gazpacho - what a name. That’s what I should eat on a summer’s day outside my red little house in Villvattnet, the village with the most beautiful name in the world. And it’s not only the name that’s beautiful, driving through it (next time I’ll stop for sure) is just magic and I honestly don’t think the word stress exists in the vocabulary in that part of Sweden. Anyone got a house for sale over there by the way? I could become inhabitant number 14.

Villvattnet - Världens Vackraste

11/1 – When in Brazil, do as the Brazi… sorry, Americans.

Couldn’t help it, had to try it. Just to check if it was like everywhere else – and it was.
Always nice when what you get matches your expectations. Even though the expectations might not be for a very extraordinary experience, you know what you’ll get, and you get just that. Ok coffee and big muffins. This time also some nice add-ons like AC and English speaking staff, which are on the plus side when in Rio.

Missed a great photo opportunity yesterday. Spite the thermometer showing closer to +40°C I decided to check out the beach for a little while in the afternoon. I was just reading along in my book when a little, pink, square kite suddenly hit me on my back. It was quickly pulled away and the boys some 20 metres away looked at each other and giggled. There were four of them and the youngest was one of the coolest kids I’ve seen. Hardly reaching to his brothers’ waists, board shorts down to his ankles and probably not older than 4 years old or so. But could he fly his kite or what? Almost needed binoculars to see it. Cool as and total control of his blue thing flying way up there. Think I need to buy a few of those Brazilian kites and give to someone’s children back home. Can’t remember ever having seen a kite in Sweden fly like that. I do remember hours of trying to get home made kites with newspaper bows on the tail to fly though. And the crashes with the same ones…

9/1 - What's that sound?

Swoosh, swoosh, swoosh – Ah, it’s just Caroline swooshing past on a kite board.

9/1 - Fridge reconstruction.

I'm lucky that I’m not allergic to anything. Thought I ordered a mango juice, but got a watermelon one instead. A very nice watermelon juice. So nice that I had to go and get my own gigantic watermelon. Had to rebuild the shelves in the fridge to make it fit, but mmm so nice.

8/1 – Aha!

As I mentioned in my very first posting, the Brazilian kitchens don’t seem to be equipped just the way I’m used to…or would expect them to be. But I have found out that five pair of scissors actually fills a purpose after all. Seems like you need to have five of them, to be able to find one of them at any one time. Most things in a kitchen seem to have a bit of a universal place of storage, where most people, irrespective of nationality and age, would put them away if they could choose. It’s not very often you find glasses in the bottom drawer, pots and pans on the top shelf in the overhead cupboard or the tea towels in the oven. However, scissors seem to be excluded from that (probably together with cork screws and cup measures). A pair of scissors can be placed pretty much anywhere in the kitchen; In any of the drawers, in the cleaning cupboard, beside the microwave, on the shelf with the mixer or on the tea towel hook for example. Their storage places can even be extended to outside the kitchen, like to a drawer in the bathroom or bedroom. Other possible places would be on the TV furniture, in the bookshelf in the living room, on the side table by the entrance and on the desk in the bedroom. Still haven’t found one in my closet, but on the other hand, I don’t think I've seen two of them in quite a while, so perhaps that’s the place to look.
As I’ve also mentioned before, I really appreciate having a maid making my bed and cleaning the flat and based on the scissor issue, I’ve concluded that it must be more than one person doing it. So it’s a little bit like having your mother in law visiting every day (according to people who’s actually got one), but in this case, different mother in laws every day.
Oh, one more thing. The dishwasher. Everyone says that if you ever get one, you never want to be without it again. Since I never had one, and don’t have one in my flat at home, I thought I’d try not to use the one over here to avoid getting used to having one. But, the one I’ve got in my Brazilian kitchen looks so weird and toyish that I had to try it. No water on the floor so that part went well. Regarding the actual dish washing, I guess almost clean is better than really dirty. And if you empty it soon enough after running it, the food left on the plates has at least softened up a bit, so a lot easier to get clean by hand…

5/1 – Master of Excuses.

If you could get a diploma or make a career in excuses, I would be at least a professor by now. My speciality and main focus of research would be excuses for not getting up in the morning to go for a run. I’ve already made some classifications within the field, in case someone suddenly would grant me some research money.

For example, we’ve got the Safety Excuses:
- The sun doesn’t rise until about 6 am. Since I need to be back home by then to have a shower and breakfast before going to work, it will be dark when I go for my run. Everyone has been telling me not to be outside by myself when it’s dark, so I’ll have to skip my run today.
- It might be cloudy outside and if it’s cloudy it might be raining. If it’s raining a thunderstorm might roll in and it’s probably not safe to run along a beach during a thunderstorm. So, I’ll have to skip my run today and stay in bed for another hour. (This one is preferably defined without looking out the window.)
- When there aren’t that many cars out in Rio, the ones that are on the road tend to ignore the traffic lights. Since I need to cross at two traffic lights to get to the beach, I’ll be running an increased risk to be hit by a car even if I cross when Mr. Green Man tells me to. Better go for a run when there are more cars out and skip the one this morning.

Then we’ve got the Lack of Sleep Excuses:
- It took me about 10 minutes longer to fall asleep last night and I easily get a cold if I’m lacking sleep. Since I don’t want to catch a cold, I better stay in bed and not get up for a run.
- An important meeting might have been scheduled for this morning, without me knowing about it. If I reduce my sleep with one hour, I might increase the risk of getting tired during that potential meeting and even be sitting there nodding. And that would come across as very unprofessional. Thus, no run today either.
- Only got 6 hours of sleep the night between Saturday and Sunday (or any other random days) so might be lacking sleep already without having noticed it. As a precaution I should cancel my run.
- I was training last night when it was really hot outside. Because of the heat I had to drink a lot of water. As a natural result of that, I had to get up in the middle of the night. I’ve thus slept less than I thought I would have and need to compensate for that and not go for a run.

The rest would be classified within the Just Weird Ones:
- I’ve planned to go training tonight and I’ve read a lot about people getting over trained. I wouldn’t want to risk that since if that happened I wouldn’t be able to train for months. Better skip the running today.
- If I go for a run I will be really hungry when I get back. If I eat just after training, my body will probably use the energy a lot faster than if I haven’t been running. I’ll thus risk getting hungry fairly soon again when I’m at work and will have to stay hungry until lunchtime. Since I get in a bad mood when I’m hungry, it’s probably better not to go for a run or my colleagues might get in a bad mood because I’m in a bad mood. And we wouldn’t want that, would we?
- I’ve planned to wear my black pants to work. Since they’re slightly too long, I will have to wear high heels with them. If I get up now and go for my run, my calves will be tired when I put my working clothes and shoes on and it’s probably not good to walk around in high heels if your calves are tired. Perhaps I’ll even get the cramps at work due to this. So I better skip the run today.

And so on and on and on… I have got plenty more and as you’ve already realized, all of them make total sense and can of course be supported by medical research (Dr. H. U. Mbug has written quite a few papers related to this subject). Think I would be struggling with my working hours as a professor though and I wouldn’t see my colleagues that much. This because I seem to be most creative between 5 and 5.30 am…and even more efficient on weekends with extended hours to 8 am.

Talking about professors, the quickest way of getting the title is probably to become a gym instructor and move to Brazil. At least it will say professor on your back when you’re walking around helping people at the flash gyms over here.

3/1 - “Kitesie não agua.”

Manuel: “Kitesie não agua, ok?” (No idea how to spell that ‘kitesie’ word, probably ‘kite’ + ‘a preposition I don’t know’ or so.)

Caroline: “Ok, don’t dip the kite in the water.”
2 min later.
Manuel: “Carolina, kitesie não agua, ok?”
Caroline: “Yup, I get it, don’t crash the kite into the water.”
After another 42 seconds approximately.
Manuel: “Carolina! Atenção, kitesie NÃO agua!
Caroline: “Yeah yeah, I get it, really. Keep the kite out of the water. Do NOT crash the kite into the water. I get it.”

And I did understand it the very first time. The kite should be in the air and not in the water – easy as that. It’s wasn’t really the theory part failing, and in this case, not even the communication part. It was the transfer from theory to practise that was the challenge. But after an hour of body dragging, a lost instructor’s t-shirt, a broken kite, a broken pair of sun glasses (instructor’s again) and sand scraped knees, the frequency of the kite hitting the water had definitely decreased. So all in all, probably quite an ok first lesson in kite surfing and a very relaxed afternoon at Lagoa de Araruama. Perfect set-up for kite surfing (so I’ve been told at least), a narrow sand strip out in the lagoon, creating a beginner’s windward side and a leeward side with no waves for the ones with a bit more control. Not too many kids playing in the water, just a family or two who suddenly decides to bring all their sunbathing chairs out in the water to sit in the most perfect kite surfing spot. Must be great to be so close to the action with boards swooshing past you, best view you can get. And best way to get unpopular as well.
Have been promised that they will bring a board out for me next time. Sweet. Looking forward to some nice “edge-getting-caught-in-the-water face plants” aka “full body whip lashes” for next time. And probably more kites in the water.


New Years in Rio was of course a memorable one. The rain did seize after all, at about 3 pm the last few drizzles seemed to give up. The sun never made it out but at least Copacabana wasn’t covered with black umbrellas instead of white shirts. Once again, colleagues and friends treated me with some nice food and drinks, this time in a flat just a block from the beach. Just before midnight we grabbed the fizzy stuff, glasses and a bunch of kids (the kids did belong to people at the party so not any random ones) and headed down to the beach. So, for the third time ever, I walked into a New Year with bare feet.

Have to admit, that Copacabana at midnight wasn’t as stunning and amazing as I might have hoped for though. Of course, it was great to be in the midst of all these happy people (didn’t count so don’t know if we ended up being 2 million or not, but there were a lot of us for sure) and of course the fireworks were good. Guess a bit of wind to clear the smoke would have helped a lot. Next time, I think I’ll try to get a boat sorted and squeeze in between the cruise ships in the bay.


So what’s the plan 2010? Any exciting New Years resolutions, anyone? I’m good at following up on them and put some pressure on you if you want to share them. Think I’ve got quite a boring standard list, like copied from a magazine somewhere; Get more training done, eat healthier, stress less, spend more time with friends and family, make new friends, send more post cards (yup, I still do that and that system still works even though it’s not used that frequently any more), what else? Oh, got these Brazil related things on the list as well, learn to surf, learn to kite surf and get that Portuguese going, can’t wait to start the lessons. Supposed to work as well I think…almost forgot. Seems like it’s going to be a busy year. Might have to skip the Samba classes.

January 2010 photos