Brazil

So we took a little trip to Brazil. And it was the coolest thing we've ever done. 

THE FOOD

One of my favorite things from the trip was the food. Everything was AMAZING!! I tried everything and loved almost everything. 

This is from a market in the shopping district in Campinas. We bought some super yummy mangos there. 

We stopped for lunch after a ton of shopping and ate these bread and chicken and cheese things. They have a name in Portuguese, but all I remembered about it was that it was delicious! 

Brazilians love their cookies. They are all similar to Oreo's, but like 100 times better with 100 different flavors. Every night we would go to the grocery store and stock up on our cookies. We bought flocco cookies in the first city we stayed in, right as we were leaving to another part of Brazil. Floccos are like sprinkles on steriods, and I freakin loved those flocco cookies. Like the best cookie ever and maybe it was because we hadn't eaten anything all day, but I loved those flocco cookies.  And then it was like Brazil was torturing me because we could never find the flocco cookies again. And we searched and searched EVERY single grocery store we found and never found them. I miss flocco cookies. 

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One of the many times were were lost we saw this guy on the side of the road selling caldo de cana and coconut milk. Caldo de cana is basically sugar cane juice. They have this little juicer machine in the back of the truck so when you come to get some they shove the sugar cane through the machine to get you fresh juice. We paired ours with lime and it was delish! Matt doesn't like the coconut milk, so I enjoyed it all. 

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We bought this papaya at a fruit stand and I was stoked to eat it! I've had papaya before from a can and really liked it. But this was disgusting. It tasted and smelled like stinky feet. It was super gross. I'm not sure if it was over ripe or something, but it was just one nasty piece of fruit.

We enjoyed the HUGE mangos. They were super stringy and kept getting caught in our teeth, but it was super delicious! 

I kept seeing these green oranges everywhere. And I figured they must be a hybrid orange or something, because they were green. Brazil can grow tons of amazing fruits we can't grow in the U.S. so why would they have green oranges? I asked Matt about it and he said the name translated into pear orange. I was stoked!! I was imagining it would look like an orange and taste like a pear, so cool! So we bought it and gave it a try. It turned out to just be a green orange. Tasted just like an orange, with no hint of pear. Bummer, I guess a pear/orange doesn't exist. 

Traditional lunch in Brazil. Rice and beans and salad and tons of other yummy goodies. Except for the beets, they really like beets. Come on Brazil, who even eats beets any more? (except for Matt, he loved them) They are super gross! 

THE PEOPLE

My most favorite thing about Brazil was the people. I've never met people so nice and accommodating!  The bad part was that none of them spoke English, so Matt was my translator the entire time we visited. Some of the families didn't understand that I couldn't understand or speak Portuguese. They thought that I could at least read their lips. So they would try to keep talking to me, and I would just sit there with a blank stare on my face. It was funny when Matt explained to them that the words aren't the same in English and Portuguese and that I couldn't read lips. 

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 The first night we got to Brazil we stayed with this family. They were all so nice! They took us around Campinas and we stayed up late playing tons of games. I totally dominated all the boys at a mean game of spoons. 

We went to this amazing pizza place and ate the best pizza of my life! The missionaries joined us as well. 

We went to church in Capivari, which is about 2 hours south of Sao Paulo. After church we had lunch with this family, and the sister missionaries (they were taking the picture). They cooked the most amazing food ever! 

When we move to Brazil we are going to live in Capivari. It was the cutest town ever with the nicest people. I loved everything about it! 

SITES

We went to a bunch of cool places while in Brazil! 

Inside a really neat church, Matt made me take a picture of him acting like he was praying. 

Campinas temple, if you look close you can see all the Elders from the MTC lined up at the door. It was cool talking to them and seeing where they were from.

Our cool rental car, the Fiat Mille. Probably the cheapest car I've ever seen. But we loved that little guy. Driving in Brazil was a totally different story and a complete nightmare. Never in my life have I seen such crazy drivers. I only had to drive once and I about peed my pants because I was freaking out. It was terrifying!  

Art work on Ilhabela island. Our snorkel instructors brother made all of it! 

We visited the M.A.S.P. (The Museum of Art Sao Paulo) It was on a postcard, so we figured it was going to be awesome! Plus there was a line of 50 people waiting for it to open. I guess we just aren't very cultured, because we were bored out of our minds and were the first ones to leave.

One of the prettiest beaches on the island. We went on a jeep tour and our tour guide took us to all the secret spots. 

We went to this waterfall with a natural water slide. I got eaten alive by a weirdo Brazilian mosquitos and I was terrified of piranhas being in the pond at the end  of the water slide, but it was awesome! It was a quite the thrill thinking you would be eaten alive! 

 

Beautiful sunsets on the island, Ilhabela. 

This picture recaps the entire trip, it was epic, amazing, goofy and the best thing ever. Gotta love Matt!