Up and Over!

Friday November 26th.

This morning I went with Kristian to open his two shops at the mall. I bought some blank dvd's there to burn copies of my photos so I can send them home.

After lunch with his parents, we went to a Costco like store called Maxi's. Apparently it's owned by Walmart. There Kristian bought supplies and drinks for his shops. Then we went back to the mall, so he could deliver the supplies, buy some more stuff in the supermarket and I could talk to his travel agent friend, Magnum, and buy a ticket from Foz to Rio for Monday.

That's when I had my visit with Santa. Kristian explained to him that I was from the northern hemisphere and that I was finding it funny to be seeing Christmas stuff when I was wearing shorts. He was very obliging and let me pose with him. Notice the drink he is drinking. It's a small cup that a lot of South America people fill with a herb and then pour hot water over it. They drink it through a straw that filters out the pieces of herb. They then refill it and pass it to a friend who has a drink. It's a very social drink. It can be either a hot or cold drink.

While at the mall we ran into Luis and he set up the helicopter ride over the falls. The pictures speak for themselves. Amazingly beautiful view and maybe it helps you see the size and shape of the whole area. If you look about the middle of the top of the horizontal picture you can see one of the trails out to the edge of the falls. It's on the Argentinian side.

This evening we went to visit Bruno's daughter Doreen, in the hospital where she had just delivered her son Philip. There were about ten relatives there to see her. Only two or three people were allowed up at a time, so we waited our turn in the lobby. I quite liked the lady, but didn't really know why I should go up. However, when Murilo and Marizette went up they took me too. I was the only one who brought a camera, so I took some pictures of the them with the new baby, and some of the new mom. When I got back to the lobby I showed the photos to some of the other people there. The father's dad, saw them and was very disappointed that I didn't get in any of the photos! So he took me back upstairs for another photo shoot and made me pose with Philip!! I told Doreen that in a couple of months they will be looking at the photos and say "who is that guy posing with our kid?"

Then to kill a bit of time we took Bernardo to Brazil street to see some of the Christmas lights.

After that, I took Murilo, Marizette, Kristian, Karolyne, Bernardo, Luis, Alice and Luigi out for dinner as a thank you for the hospitality I have received since arriving here last week. We went to a restaurant called Fogo Dourado which serves the Brazillian type barbeque called churrascaria. Most of the food is served buffet style and as you are eating that the waiters come around with skewers of meat right off the grill. They asked if you wanted some and then cut off a slice for you. This way the meat is always hot and brought to you in small pieces. They served various cuts of beef, pork, including ribs, lamb, sausage and chicken hearts. All delicious. And the chicken hearts were great. We had a good time eating and drinking a few beers.

Then home for a cup of tea and bedtime.