Curitiba

We woke up at 7:00 Am which Ari and Thomas said easily beat the earliest they’ve woken up over the course of the trip. We took our respective showers and partook in the mediocre breakfast which the hostel had provided. We ran outside found the first cab we could and rushed off to the train station. Our cab driver hopped out of the cab midway to grab his car stereo faceplate which was stored in the back of the car. I noticed he had a Brazilian Portuguese dictionary in the front of the dashboard. We paid the cab and rushed in to buy our train tickets for the Serra Verde Express a train that leaves from Curitiba and goes all the way to the coastal port city of Paranaguá. The train has three classes, and we chose to sit in the cheapest. We chugged along at a slow pace leaving the urban landscape for greener pastures, literally. We passed through rural farms, moving on to rushing rivers, crossing over teetering bridges, bisecting pitch black tunnels, and emerging upon stunning canyons and valleys all complimented by the frequent waterfall or banana tree. Ari ooed and awed at every turn mocking the magnificent views that after 3 hours can become a little tiresome. The highlight of the train ride was when a bushy-eyebrowed German tour leader chastisied the inexperienced trainee tour guide the train company had assigned our section of the train. We got off the train at the city of Morretes, bought the next bus ticket out of town and found the closest restaurant to grab some lunch. We paid 8 reais for steak and an all you can buffet which was lackluster in quality. We got on the bus and all took a well deserved power nap. I sat next to a friendly youthful mother and her adorable but cranky baby girl. I assisted her by placing her duffel bag in the overhead compartment of the bus, but erred when I ripped the edge extracting at the end of the ride. We got back to Curitiba, and wandered back to the hostel passing through the construction/ Christmas district of the city. We got to the hostel and asked for tips as to what there was to do in the city. The staff was unhelpful and acted as if they were bothered by the fact we were asking for information. They were incompetent throughout the entirety of our stay there, knew little about the city’s restaurants, bars and attractions. Not to mention I’ve never stayed at a duller, less youthful hostel in my travels. We left the hostel and found a busy promenade to spend the afternoon drinking beers out of steiners. We watched an untalented clown shout remarks at passerbys much to the dismay of the clients of the establishment and the passerbys themselves. He tried to sell us a DVD of his work which we promptly declined. After more or less than a hour we all came to the conclusion that Curitiba had one of the ugliest populations we’d seen to date. Ari went off to get a set of cards and when he returned we began to play rummy only to be told minutes into the game that playing cards was prohibited at the restaurant because it gave the impression that there was gambling going on. Just then behind us the crowd broke out into a sound which I had only since heard in middle school the taunting of a man attempting to convince a portly woman to eat an olive out of his hand. Check please! We went back to the hostel and Ari and I played backgammon in the park across the street. We quickly noticed that we were the only ones there who were not either smoking/rolling a joint, making out, or both. We got a cup of sugar cane juice. Ari and I walked around the shopping mall sipping on the cup and Ari convinced me to get an estimate on the price of Viagra for his Mexican co-worker. 12 dollars a pop! We got a mediocre but expensive dinner at the same mall, when we received a call from Mozar, a friend of one of my students. He invited us out that night to grab some drinks with two of his lady friends. We went back to the hostel and pre-gamed by shotgunning many a beer. (translation, we started getting drunk by poking a hole in a can of beer, popping the top and chugging the liquid out of the gaping hole.) We met up with the girls passing by hobos smoking crack in the street on the way to the bar. We had some laughs at the bar, after they closed we attempted to go to a gay friendly bar, but to no avail. Then we walked back to the girls’ apartment. It was more comfortable than any apartment I'd been to here in Brazil, which may have been facilitated by the fact they worked at Tok &Stok, the Brazilian IKEA. We remembered the election results may have been in and we checked on the outcome to be pleasantly surprised. We thought the Brazilians would have been keen to discuss the conclusion of the disputed historic election but they were too immersed in their country music DVD to even notice. We left the apartment but one of the Blond girls who Ari and I dubbed “The Joker” had made eyes at Thomas and we ended up ditching him. Ari tried to grab a few paintings as souvenirs but was caught in the act and had to return them. No hurt feelings. We left the apartment and Mozar ended dragging us around the empty town that evening looking for late night love. He convinced us to go to a seedy go-go club which included a drink. Ari got a great picture for his facebook profile. We eventually found our way home and Thomas was sound asleep with my computer turned on emanating the soft unmistakable sound of internet porn. We woke up the next day, at 11 AM for checkout and wondered if we had imagined that Obama truly won. We searched around for a sushi restaurant which the guidebook had recommended, resisting cheaper unhealthier alternatives along the way. We got some bento boxes and or a la carte buffet. After lunch we took the unique bus system of Curitiba to go and get our bus tickets to Rio leaving that evening. Thomas forced me to call my newfound friend Mozar to get the number of the blond girl from the night before. We got the number and went off to find where the Joker worked. As Thomas worked his magic Ari and I drank away our lonely misery. Thomas somehow set up a date with the girl and we went off to play pool to kill time before she got off work for the date. We went and played some pool and Thomas went off to meet his date and Ari and I went off to have our own romantic evening. We got some tapioca as the rain started to fall, and then found a unique local bar that served great pork roast sandwiches and the local delicacy of carne de onça, jaguar meat. (not really jaguar meat) it was basically uncooked raw beef served on an open slice of white bread topped off by sliced green onion. It was interesting. We went back to the hostel, collected our belongings and waited for Thomas to arrive. He arrived 15 minutes late with his hair out of place and a smirk on his face. We caught the bus with a little time to spare thanks to our hard of hearing taxi driver who was either messing with me or needed aids when he incorrectly repeated destinations after I told him where we wanted to go. We got on the road and left Curitiba but not before I saw the first corpse I'd ever seen in my life. The lifeless covered body of a pedestrian who had been hit by a car.