While my sister was here, we took a trip to Tiradentes. I have to admit, that I much prefer Tiradentes to Ouro Preto, especially with children. I would definitely recommend a visit to Ouro Preto (it's closer to Belo Horizonte), but for a longer stay, I'd have to go with Tiradentes.
Here's how I planned our trip: I get about 50 emails a day from things called Groupalia, Savemail, Peixe Urbana, City Best and CidadeOff that offer discounts and coupons on anything from Hotels/Pousadas, trips to France, Spy Cameras, Sensual Photography (?!?), and Cellulite removal. Really. I tried to use one these discounts to book a room at a Pousada, but of course they don't work during Ferias (vacations). But the website for the Pousada looked nice, and they actually responded to an email, so I decided to go with them. It was called Pousada Fazendinha de Minas, or "Little Farm Pousada." I rented a car with Via Facil, which did NOT respond to emails, but we rented them before when we went to Ouro Preto and Jabuticaba in December. They seem to have good rates, they ask for a lot of things on their "application" for rental, but they don't need a Brazilian Driver's License (I still don't have one, and if you want to know why, you can read here--yikes!). On a beautiful Friday morning, and the kids first day of vacation (it started late because of the teacher's strike back in March), we loaded up our little rented Fiat, and headed out of town. Driving to Tiradentes is pretty easy (for Brazil): the directions aren't too difficult, and it's pretty well labeled. We stopped for a picnic lunch by this little church on the road after we exited from Conganhas (Alto Maranhão)?
There was a cemetery across the street...
...but there wasn't anything interesting there. The Church was closed (not sure if there was anything worth seeing). But it was a convenient place to stop.
We drove another hour or so, and had no problems following signs towards Tiradentes. But it got a little strange as we approached Tiradentes--about 2 miles before the city, the road turns to cobblestone! It felt like we were going the wrong way, and there was NO traffic. It was a little eerie. But then all of the sudden we rolled into town, full of restaurants, cute little shops selling local artwork and crafts, and horses. Lots of horses. Horses pulling carts. Shetland ponies. Horses with pink saddles.
Our pousada was about a 5 minute drive from the central praca, and a 20 minute walk. This was a good thing in my opinion, because I think we heard less traffic, and less noise. Also, the property was a little bit larger, and it was true to it's name: it had ducks, roosters, geese, chickens, peacocks, dogs and 2 horses. There was a koi pond and "fishing" poles (long bamboo sticks that you could poke into the water or use to poke your little sister). There was a pool table and Foosball. There were lots of pretty trees, flowers and a little playground. A GREAT place for kids!
We got settled, and then walked into town.
I'll have to make another post, because the last 3 times I've tried to write, I've gotten an error message, and now what I wrote has disappeared into cyberspace...
We have lived in Brazil for 18 months and 4 days. In that time, I confess that I have NEVER knowingly recycled. For those of you who know me from my former life in the states, this is quite a shock. I grew up in the Pacific Northwest. I lived in Eugene Oregon for 4 years. I was very disciplined about recycling, I reused things, took cloth bags to the grocery store, bought recycled clothes, composted, and saved the salmon. I was the picture of environmental conscientiousness and a little bit high and mighty about my recycling ways.
And then I moved to Brazil.
The funny thing is that Brazil has something like a 96% success rate for recycling aluminum cans. But I just couldn't figure out how to do it. I saw the coleta selectiva (recycling) trucks in our neighborhood. I saw big, strange looking "bins" on the Contorno for collecting recycling (hard to take a bag of beer bottles there when you don't have a car). And some of the grocery stores have areas where you can recycle. But we didn't have much space in our apartment. But the big thing was the garbage collecting in our building. In the garage/basement, there were 3 barrels, labeled "glass" and "paper" and "cans." But they were always just full of trash. And the nice ladies who cleaned the common areas of our old apartment would just take all the trash out there and put it out on the street (that's where you put your trash for collecting here). So, it felt kinda pointless. But the thing that didn't make me feel so horrible, and made me feel like my environmental soul was not going straight to hell was knowing that there were people that would look for my cans and bottles and cardboard in the trash. There are people who make their living digging through the trash. Not a great way to make money, but they have found a way to make it.
But now that we are in our new place, I made it a priority to figure out how to recycle. We have outdoor space, so I can store our stuff out there. There is actually a recycling bin in our building too! Though I found out that we can't use it because it gets too full in the weeks time between pick ups. But I learned that recycling day is Tuesday, and all I need to do is just put my stuff out on the curb. Voilá! And I can sleep better at night, knowing that I'm doing "my part."
I'm still recovering from July (moving, my sister's visit, trip to Tiradentes, the kid's winter vacation). So, I'm borrowing content from my sister's reviews on Trip Advisor--we went to the Mercado Central and the Hippie Fair, and click away to read what she has to say. You can also look at her other adventures--she's quite a world traveler. Enjoy
Holy cow. I'm pooped. But we're in our new place. The kids are stoked. I'm surrounded by boxes. We didn't get our oven (it was supposed to be delivered today), and the desk doesn't fit in the apartment (or at least thru the door to the bedrooms). And hiring the movers was a challenge (one quit on the job after an hour of doing practically nothing). But we are here.
Looking forward to waking up without the sounds of construction at 7 am.
Proud mama has to brag about the kids, their wonderful wonderful school, and the amazing Festa Junina that we had on Saturday. The kids planned for MONTHS for the day, studying about the São Francisco River, learning about myths, practicing music, making art projects and researching. It was a fun day, and when I have time to breathe after moving (it's going to happen!), I'll write more. But for now, you can read about it here (in Portuguese).
Today was not my favorite day. In fact, this week has been a bit exhausting and exasperating. As I mentioned, we're moving. We were all prepared to turn in the contract and get the keys on Tuesday. But, it turns out that we had to get all the signatures verified at Cartórios. From what I've heard (please correct me if I'm wrong, fellow bloggers) Cartórios came into existence due to some political shenanigans. If I remember correctly, some friend of someone in power had a kind of notary business and did a favor for said person in power. To return the favor a law was passed that made it necessary to register signatures to make sure that they are valid. And thus the Cartório business was created. It seems as if any time you have an official document, you have to take it to the Cartório where the signature is registered, and they compare the two signatures to make sure they are the same. Essentially it's just another step in the bureaucracy that exists here. I'm sure these kinds of things exist in the states (I'm having flashbacks to signing our mortgage documents, and how inconvenient it was and how we had to do it in a certain time period, and so on and so forth). But wherever in the world you have to deal with these kind of extra steps, dare I say, unnecessary silly official procedures, it is a big pain.
My hubby went to go get the keys on Tuesday, and found out that we had to check 5 signatures. Great. Thankfully he was able to get 3 of the signatures done on Wednesday, even though he had to work two shifts for a recording session (not the normal schedule, nor the normal demands). My job was to figure out how to check the other two signatures, belonging to a couple, some friends of ours. I called the husband first at about 10 am, and he couldn't really tell me where the cartório was located, just in Nova Lima, close the hospital. He made it sound like it was really obvious where it was, and I should have no problems finding it. He was going to look up the info and get back to me. Meanwhile, I did probably 20 different google searches and I found 4 different places, but I couldn't figure out which one it was. He never called me back, so I called him (no answer). I called his home (not there). Then I called his wife, who did answer but she was driving (it's illegal to drive and talk on the cell phone) and rushing to the hospital because of an emergency!!
Ay!
Thankfully, the emergency room visit was short and everybody came out okay. But while they were at the hospital, I spent another hour searching the internet for the possible location of this Cartório, and “looked” around using Google street view. The next morning I called the husband yet again to ask if he could pick between the 2 options that I thought I had narrowed it down to. Was it by Mangabeiras Pizza? Yes! Finally, an address. It only took me 22 hours.
Meanwhile, we had to go the Policia Federal. I think I will save this saga for another post. Because there’s only so much Brazil craziness you can handle at a time. Trust me.
Between visits to the Policia Federal on Thursday, I made a trip to the Cartório. Found it, no problem. Took my number, waited my turn, went to pay. But hold on just a minute, it can’t be that easy. They could only find the signature for the husband, but not the wife. I call the wife, and it turns out her ID number (CPF) was missing a digit. I go back to the counter and ask them to look her up under the correct ID number, and making sure they were spelling her name correctly. No luck. I call the wife back again. She was certain that she was registered there, but if not, she was also registered someplace in central on Rua Bahia and at another place on a street that began with the letter “G.”
Do you see the theme here?
I am not a happy camper. I ask her if she can talk to the lady at the counter at the current cartório. I go back in and hold up the cell phone, but the lady holds up her hands in the universal sign for “get that thing away from me.” She’s not allowed to talk to anyone on the phone. I ask to speak to the manager. Several times. The manager appears. He can’t talk to the owner of the signature on the cell phone because it’s not allowed (no phone calls). I ask him what happened to my friend’s signature, did they lose it? He is insulted that I would even suggest that, and says that she is not registered there. But she says she is. We go back and forth. He looks again. It’s not there.
Then, my friend (still waiting on the cell phone) says that maybe she didn’t register there.
AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!
So I ask here where she is registered, and she tells me that it’s someplace off of so and so street and so and so street. “Do you know the address?”
No.
“Can you remember the name of the street?"
No.
But you could go to that area and ask around.
Really??!! Me, a foreigner, with a horrible accent and lousy Portuguese, walking around downtown Belo Horizonte looking for some location about which she really has only a vague idea.
I call my husband, who works in the area she is talking about, and he tells me that there are at least 3 cartórios in this area.
AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!
I went home, found the name of the street that starts with a “G.” I call her back and ask for ANYTHING to help me find the cartório on Rua Goías, landmarks, stores. ANYTHING. “It’s by a newspaper stand, a banco do journais.” Just like every other store in downtown. “And there is a bookstore on the corner.” Great.
Then we go back to the Policia federal, but of course we don’t get done until HOURS after we start. We rush the kids to school (they were super late), rush home to get some paperwork, rush downtown to the general area of the cartório, and by a miracle, I find it. But of course there is a line of 15 people, and there is no way that we are going to get out of there before the rental agency closes. So, I wait in line, finally get her signature verified and almost cry with joy because this whole drama is over. Oh, but then I remember that I still have to get the keys.
Thankfully I had no problems this morning getting to the rental agency, paying the fire insurance, and getting the keys. And I even did it with 2 kids in tow.
Only 4 days after we were supposed to. Now, to make the new apartment habitable...
Over the Corpus Christi holiday, we took a trip to the Zoo with our friends Corinne and Kevin. Matt went with his parents and the kids back in December, but it was on my last day of work, so I didn't get to go. But of course the kids wouldn't miss another opportunity to visit! I double checked to make sure that it was really open and called (3277-7363). This website had helpful info (it's in Portuguese). It cost R$7 per car, and R$4 per person over the age of 7. This was the holiday price; normally it's less, and on Tuesday's it's free! I would recommend going to Portaria 2 (gate number 2) for easier access to the animals and parking. Here's how to get there by bus:
From Centro, you can connect with bus numbers 4403A or S53. Here's a map
I was very impressed with the zoo. There were lots of people there because it was a holiday, but it wasn't crazy busy. You can bring a picnic lunch (like we did) and eat it in any of the many grassy, shaded areas. You can also buy food there, but I was told it was not very good, and not so cheap. We saw elephants, a rhino, giraffes, lions, a sleeping tiger, turtles, monkeys, gorillas, some really cool snakes, and lots and lots of birds. There is a nice aquarium (so I've heard), but we decided not to try to squeeze it in. There's also a cool looking butterfly pavilion, but it's only open on Tuesdays and Saturdays, and during certain hours. We had a fun time!
Turtles--this is for you mom! Sebastian and buddy Kevin The kiddos on a Popsicle break.
Belo Horizonte (pronounced bell-oh oar-ee-zonch) is the the 3rd largest city in Brazil and is almost completely unknown to the outside world.
How to contact me
I can't promise that I will respond quickly, and I can't promise that I will have the answers to your questions, but if you'd like to reach me, you can email me at srkelz (at) gmail (dot) com.
