I broke down and bought....a suit.

A Brazilian bathing suit to be exact. I have a friend I met here. Her son goes to Ohio State, so you know they are intelligent people. He is quoted as saying "in the US you need to open the suit to see the cheeks. In Brazil, you need to open the cheeks to see the suit." And this is very true. Old women, young, large, small, doesn't matter. The suit is drink coaster size. Mine, however, is actually tastefully covering for a Brazilian bikini. Which means it actually covers half of my butt. Not sure yet if I will be comfortable wearing it or not, but I bought it anyway.

It is a real stretch for me if you think about it. I mean I have been wearing the Midwest Mommy suit for, how old is my first born? About eleven years. For those of you who do not know what a Midwest Mommy suit is it consists of a tankini top with a miniskirt bottom. These are great if you forget to shave before you head to the lake by the way. And in essence my bottom is white as a baby's butt since it has not seen the sun in those eleven years. So part of the reason I don't think I will be comfortable wearing it is that if I get a sun burn I will not be able to sit down for two weeks. We are heading into the summer season though, and I will be laughed off the beach if I even try to wear my usual. Hopefully my children won't laugh at my new bathing suit though. I could just hear them laughing and saying, "I can see mom's butt!" I have a feeling it would be worse than people staring at me being too covered.

Movies in Brazil

Going to the movies is Brazil is very interesting. First thing is you get assigned seating. That is right! You get to pick your seats. So you go and buy the tickets early enough you can get the best seats, then you can show up 5 minutes before the movie starts. And no one sits in seats they did not buy. The US needs to adopt this, but I don't think it will ever fly. Have you ever been to a concert or a ball game where someone is sitting in your seats? It is a pain to get them to move. Then, it is really dark and no one is using their cell phones or chatting. I really like going to the movies here. Plus, the HD surround sound is way better than in the States.

We have been to the movies twice since we have been in Brazil. We first saw Airbender, I think the week after we got here. We could not understand much Portuguese since it was a dubbed movie. However, we did not have too hard of a time figuring out what was going on because the action and acting helped a lot. Today we saw the first installment of the last Harry Potter movie. The movie theater website said it had subtitles. But when we got there they told us it was dubbed. Great. Even in English some of the British accents and coloquialism (if that is a word) are difficult to understand. But Harry Potter in Portuguese? I will have no idea what is going on. But, to my amazement I could follow about 75% of the conversations! Yey! I am getting way better at understanding. And Ricardo got just about all of it. So we were able to explain to the boys the parts they could not figure out. We had a really good time. And the best part is that Cinemark's Saturday matinee movie at 3 pm is R$4 per adult and R$2 per child. So we saw Harry Potter for R$12 ($7 US dollars) total! How awesome is that! Do you think the US will adopt that? We could all be so lucky!

Things I will need...

Well, we have 5 days before we head back to the States. (We are too excited to sleep!) My husband was there about two weeks ago and he said it will be a shock to our systems when we hear English everywhere. Well, we are flying into Miami, so that will not be the case. But we will be heading right off to Houston where, wait a minute, that will not be the case either. Well, we will be at my mom's house first, so we will hear English there. And my brother swearing at the Halo video games because he dies. My boys have learned some interesting words from him. Thank you bro!

I have started making a list of everything that I want to bring back with me. And the list is extensive. I think I need to bring a giant empty suitcase for everything. I told my husband that I need to stock up on a bunch of Cheerios. But his comment was that the boxes were bulky and took up too much space and that I could live without them. Excuse me? What did you say? I sorry, I cannot hear you. My ears are not working properly and you sound really muffled. I did not understand a word you said.

What are some of the things on the list? Glad you asked, thank you. I need swiffers, oven bags, slow cooker bags, hair product that Ricardo likes, printer ink, allergy meds that are too expensive to buy here, shampoo, again too expensive, gym shoes for the boys, again too expensive. I now understand the foreigners in Sawgrass Mills Mall in South Florida who come through with a large empty suitcase. They shop and fill it up. Try US$150 for boys gym shoes here that I can get in the States for $40. Makes a huge difference when you add it all up. I also need duct tape. Yes, this is a strange item to put on the list. But did you know you can not find it here? I need to talk to 3M because they would make a killing here just with the cars alone!

I also need to make room for everything that I bought and had shipped to my mom and sister and mother-in-law. Thank you for being a storage unit for me! Plus Christmas presents. Actually, maybe I need two giant empty suitcases.....?

Then my boys have made a list of what they want in the States. This list consists of Abuela's cooking (do not comment please on my cooking skills), walking Doodle's dog, making a tent with Abuelo, and going to get Mexican food with their grandparents. I think they have very good priorities. Because I don't think Ricardo will let me fill more suitcases...

Where are all of the ducks?

I noticed the other day that there are no ducks here. We have very few birds as well. Maybe some of the smaller ones and a few pigeons are running around. They are all probably all in the Amazon Rainforest anyway. But I do not see ducks. This is interesting to me. Coming from Minnesota where there are mallards and such everywhere in the summer (along with geese and their poop, but I don't miss that at all. Those geese are mean and the poop messy.) The ducks would waddle along the backyard heading to the pond. They were so cute, even the ducklings tagging along behind. We would go to the pond with a loaf of bread and feed them in the summer when the boys were little.

Then the ugly ducks, and I do mean ugly ducks, in Florida. They would waddle across the road and you have to stop because it is actually illegal to hit them. They liked to sit on Abuelo's fence and poop on his patio. It was fun chasing them away. But still them waddling along the yard was kind of cute, well their walk anyway.

Then you get here and nothing. My husband says they are on the golf courses all of the time. But I do not golf, nor do I ever want to. But I miss the birds chirping in the mornings, and the ducks waddling by. Maybe Brazil has intelligent ducks, which is a euphemism I know. But what if it is true? They all congregate on the golf course because they are safe there. No one is going to eat them. But if they were about town, I bet they would be served up as the daily special at the sidewalk grills (people standing on the street corner with a table, food and a grill, literally). I am going to assume this is true and look forward to the day when I can see ducks expressing their freedom to waddle down the street safely.