June 23, 2006
Haircut
Mom dragged me to this fancy haircut place, people wanted to see pictures, so here are pictures of my hair, ooo the excitement!!!
hopefully I'll have time to make some actual posts soon...
June 02, 2006
Day 3: Brazil
Days 1 and 2 were filled with travel. I drove down to Texas at 11am on Wednesday. I made it there and was able to play trains with Kyle, and help him build a track. I have to play some more when I "get back from the airport". John took me to the airport, and got to drive my car there and back. He had to fill up on gas on the return trip though, haha, sucker!!! Just Kidding!!!
At the airport, AA filled in my flight schedule from Miami to Brazil, it wasn't in their system (though I was only flying AA from Dallas to Miami). They looked over my entry visa, and the guy was orginally worried that I hadn't used in within 90 days, so it was invalid. I had to point out the poorly stamped entry and exit marks from Brazil. Then I headed to my plan and made it to Miami. It was delayed some, not much, and not that it mattered, as I had a 10 hour layover. I thought, nice, now it's only 9 hours... nope, ended up being nearly 12 hours. I slept on the floor in the Miami airport. Not for long periods of time though. I also did some Bible reading and writing. Then I got my tickets from Varig, and they did the same thing with the entry Visa, only this time I had to point, becase she didn't speak a whole lot of English. I managed to get some Burger King for breakfast. The flight that was meant to take off at 9:00 didn't until about 11:30.
I made it to Rio de Janiro, Brazil at 8:00pm local time (6:00pm our time, they don't do daylight savings,s o now only 2 hour time difference). I had been told that one of Igor's friends would be waiting at the airport. He was going to help get me on the bus to Belo Horizonte. A bus you ask? Well, my orginal flight plans had me for a 21 hour layover in Rio, so I decided to up the time. The best option was the Bus, because I could sleep on it and it would only cost 25 to 35 US dollars. Well, to my wonderful suprise, when I walked through customs, it wasn't a "he" waiting for me, but Leia! She had tricked me with just saying "Igor's friend". It was a good suprise, though I'm sure I didn't look my best, nor smelled it, with so many hours of travel. Another funny thing is, the customs people didn't even look twice at my entry visa.
We rode the bus to Belo Horizonte, and it was great to see Leia again, and to hug her, and to kiss her. We got to ride on the 2nd level of the bus, and man o man, was it a curvy ride. The road goes through mountains, so it isn't a straight path, and it takes about 6 or 7 hours. The bus we were planning on taking was sold out, so we had to get a later one, at 11:30pm. We arrived in Belo about 7am, and then took a local bus to Joyce Meyer's, where I got to see all the people I met on my last trip.
Leia and I then went to go get some breakfast about 8am. It was interesting meal, and they serve milk warm there (see Mom, I drank some milk, and no, it wasn't goats milk or anything). Then we went back to Joyce Meyer's, and Roane, Lester's wife, was there. This was who's house I am staying at. She took me to the house, and I got to take a shower and then a nap for about 2 or 3 hours.
Lester let Leia off work early, and brought her to the house were we had lunch. It was good food. Then Lester went back to work, and Leia and I went for a walk to a nearby lake. It was very beautiful, and we got to talk quite a bit while we sat and watched birds. It's winter here right now, and "quite cold", supposidly colder than it has been in a long time. Let me tell you, I was just freezing at the 70 degree tempature!! I think it might have even gotten as cold as 65 tonight.
After Lester and Roane got off work, we went and ate dinner at TGI Fridays, and then watched DaVinci Code. It has been a great day, and now I go to sleep. I am waking up tomorrow and I will get to sit in on Leia's music class and hear her sing.
Ciao.