Y2K Update
5 december 2000
Once again, I apologize for my long silence but we have been far away from computers for at least a week. I find that getting to the Internet is much easier when we are staying in hotels but we rarely do now.
In Rio (after we were bounced from the yacht club) we stayed in a gas station for a couple of days. You must know by now that this is not as bad as it sounds. Gas stations in Brazil usually have bathrooms with showers, a restaurant for dinner and breakfast, and will let us spend the night there for free. This one was an exception to the rule. We actually were in a parking lot adjoining a gas station. It was located between 2 very large traffic arteries through Rio so it was very noisy. One night, however, there was a concert right across the street and we could just open the doors to enjoy a wonderful band which played until about 1 am. At first I could have sworn it was Lew Rawls, but, wait! He's singing in Portuguese! Whoever he was, he was great and so was his band. At any rate, the parking lot at the filling station had the huge benefit of being right in downtown Rio so it made sightseeing very convenient.
The subway station was just across the street so we hopped the Metro to get around. We spent several hours in the beautiful museum. There was an exhibit of Baroque religious art on and, I must say, was the most affecting museum display I've ever seen. We think that it meant different things to us than to the Brazilians but I believe it affected us all. For instance, one of the first rooms of many that we encountered had ancient religious statues scattered throughout a room full of sawed-off tree trunks. Music was playing throughout the room - on one hand, the chants of the indigenous people, on the other the Gregorian chants of the Church. The Brazilians said that it symbolized the arrival of the Portuguese and the Church in Brazil. To us, the overwhelming feeling was that the forest had been chopped down (and continues to be so) to build churches and that the voices of the natives were drowned out by the Gregorian chant. This display was huge - at least 10 different rooms to go through - and I believe that the symbolism in every case meant different things to us than it meant to them. Some rooms were filled with paper poppies - purple in one room and bright yellow in another - as a background for the art. In one room a clear plexiglass floor had been created and, below your feet was an unbelievable display of Church wealth - bejewelled gold crowns, altar pieces, goblets, etc. A king's ransom in gold. The Brazilian interpretation was that we were floating between heaven and earth - an extraterrestrial feeling. All in all, a breathtaking museum experience. (I might add that Tyler and Shay spent the day body-surfing on Ipanema Beach. And a good time was had by all.)
Because Tyler has family and friends coming to Ushuaia for Christmas and New Years, we have come to the conclusion that we must push on ahead of the rest of Caravana. They will be staying on in Brazil a little longer and then detouring through Paraguay and Uruguay on the way into Argentina. We dilly-dallied on the beach a little long and now must move along. We fervently hope that after the New Year, our paths will cross again and we may be able to travel together all the way to Ecuador. However, since they plan to ship back to the States from Ecuador and not drive from Panama, their schedule is somewhat more flexible. We do hope it pans out, however, as we had a really wonderful time together.
We are planning to see Foz do Iguacu today and, I suspect, tomorrow. With any luck, I'll be able to spend some more time writing tomorrow.
Jeanne
