A night on the town

We said our goodbyes to Flavia´s parents and got picked up by Aline, a friend of Flavia´s that we met at her graduation party a couple nights before. We moved base camp. Aline showed us around her place which is on the 11th floor of this incredibly rich apartment building. Aline´s folks live in Sao Paulo so her and her brother (and us) get the house to ourselves (beside the maids). Aline had an appointment with her personal trainer, then german class, and then an english class so she left us and said we would see each other around 10.

margaret and i want to explore the city around her building so off we go. i think we made it no more than a couple blocks when we see this sweet outdoor restaraunt with bright yellow chairs and big signs that say BRAHMA. We casually look at each other, smile, and both take seats in these happy little bright yellow chairs and order ourselves a brahma.

at this restraunt, they put down this huge white sheet of paper (wasteful, i know) over the table so we decided to draw our favorite animals over a beer or two.

ashley´s favorite animals include: (in this order)
#1. the Barnacle
#2. the Marmot
#3. the Arctic Turn
#4. the Javalina

After drawing detailed pictures of each of our favorite animals, we´ve pretty much had 4 Brahmas at this point and are seriously cracking ourselves up with crazy animal planet stories. And then, Margaret says,`Ashley, when I get home, Im changing my Facebook status to that.` And then, it hit me. We both have a Facebook addiction. (Although Im not going to lie, better Facebook addiction than crack. Right?)

Right then, this was the conversation that ensued:
Ashley: Margaret, I think we should seriously limit our FB time.
Margaret: (as her eyes bulged out of her head a bit) Uh hem... yes, agreed.
Ashley: Im thinking about....
and then at the EXACT same time we said:
Ashley: 30 minutes a day
Margaret: once a week.

We´re laughing so hard at this point and I know for a fact we arent being the most quiet of tables at this outdoor restaraunt because this atrevido man says to us, `hey ladies, where ya´ll from?` I was shocking and said to Margaret as if this atrevido couldnt hear me, ´this man speaks the english!´ we invited him over to our table for some brahmas and french fries.

His name was Johnny Hall (which is my neighbors brothers name so that was wierd) from Mississippi and he works on an oil tanker off the coast of Brazil for 4 weeks at a time and then heads back home to the southern US. He also worked on oil rigs in Venezuala during the time that Chavez tried to overthrow the government in 1992. I picked his brain about oil rigs and the oil corporations and the life of living on an oil tanker and being away from home every other 4 weeks for the past 35 years of his life. If you want to know ANYTHING at all about the big oil industry, ask me. I probably know it now.

The three of us drank some more brahmas and then we drank some cachaça and we laughed and ate some delicious fish.

I went on about how I wished the world gave up exporting and importing goods because then each country or state or city, whatever the case may be, could be self sufficient and i could eat a ripe mango or avacado in alaska that was grown in alaska. He said I reminded him of the song Country Boy Cant Survive by Hank Williams Jr.

All of a sudden, Gee (Flavia´s brother) Lucas (a 2nd language english speaking friend), and Aline walked up to the table and just laughed at us. They said it was 11pm and they were worried about us since we failed to leave a note so they decided to come find us. Luckily, we only made it a couple blocks so they didnt have to look too far. They sat down and we all talked about our favorite animals over some beer. It was time for Johnny to go so thanks to him, Chevron paid for the entire tab.

As we´re sitting there, this creeper in this bright pink shirt that looks like a begger wanders over near our table and then all of a sudden his creeper fanny pack just happens to spill open next to Gee and Gee´s wallet just happens to fall out of his pocket at this very moment and Gee just happens to lose all his money, cards, and id. As this point, this pink shirt wearing creeper starts stuffing money into his fanny pack while Gees looking for all of his. This son-of-a-biznitch robbed Gee right there at that very moment and then denied it! For some reason, Gee just sat back down and let this fool walk off with his wallet and there was no WAY i was just going to let that happen so spitfire ashley gets up and runs over to the pink shirt wearing creeper, says something really mean to him in Portugese and then I just held out my hand like, `give me my freaking money you punta.` I didnt get any money out of that confrontation but at least I tried. So, I wandered back to my yellow chair disappointed in humanity.

AND THEN

we got the bill. and this place was about to charge us for 8 beers, a pack of cigs, and french fries. Well, let me fill you in a bit: all we ordered since Mr. McRich Chevron left the table were 4 beers and french fries. Why the heck did we get charged for so much more? So I get back up and go to the register and throw 1/2 my tab at him and explain there is no way i am paying for all of that. He said, ´you have to you ordered it´. long story short, i didnt pay for a thing. the cash register said he didnt want a problem, only happy customers so he ripped up the bill and we left.

then, we headed to this sweet beach spot and i ran around the beach being chased by pinching crabs and then went swimming in the dark.

we got dropped off and i fell asleep outside on the balcony for a good slumber only to wake up to an incredible view from the 11th story to the sunrise.

good morning! its going to be another beautiful day.