More stuff about the Brazilians

There is an abundance of VW camper vans, kombis and beetles, thats thanks to the fact that Brasil is one of the last places in the world where they still make them. So loads of people have them, and it is almost too much for Lee and I. They are so cool and we are definitely going to get another one. They are so common, the kombis, that they are used as an alternative to buses here in Santa Teresa and Rio almost like Hi-Ace vans in Lanka. Though much cooler.

Other thing is that Brasilians love their tattoos. They are covered in them and some are plain tacky and others quite insanely large and grotesque, few are very cool. On the subject of tattoos and body art, they also love covering their walls and buildings in art. There is an abundance of graffiti in Rio, and the difference is these guys are so very good. The colours, precision and creativity will put most to shame but it is very different to the stencil graffiti we saw so much of in Argentina. That too would put many to shame. Click here for photos of some graffiti we managed to capture.

The weather plus numerous coconut trees make Brasil reminiscent of Lanka, not to mention the many bird calls in the morning though slightly more exotic. The fruit is so varied and tropical, back to papau, mangoes, guava, passion fruit etc and then so many weird ones from the Amazon like acai, caca and tucupi to name a few. All very different and they use them in their cuisine as sauces for their meat. I also dicovered passion fruit caiparinhas last night. Mm. Thankfully there is no end of thambili here and whats funny is that on most main roads and in the financial district there are coco water stalls selling ice cold thambili, its cold cause they break open the coconut into a sort of cooler that then filters the water through a tap. Yummy on a hot day.

So the g-string legend is true, they are everywhere on both young tanned bodies of the lively girls and on the rather flabbier older wrinkly ladies too. But what is unfortunate is the fact that the men here - wear tight speedo like trunks! Yes they do! they are smaller than underwear but are not teeny - they are just absolutely gross. And should not be allowed, they even wear them while surfing. But supposedly you are weird if you do NOT wear them. Hah.