Hello! I hope that everyone is doing well. If you did not know, I am currently in Salvador, Brazil studying abroad with SIT. Here I am studying public health, race, and human rights. I left my house at 9 AM on February 26 and began my exciting journey! I was (and still am) excited for the opportunity to go to Brazil and explore the concept of public health in another culture.
Overall, all of my actual traveling from Houston to Brazil went really well until I arrived in Sao Paulo, Brazil. I was supposed to catch a plane from Sao Paulo to take me to Salvador, but because of the long line at customs and some issues with my visa it took me longer than expected. Needless to say I was unable to make my flight to Salvador on time and was moved to another flight that flew out three hours later. The actual part of missing my flight did not bother me, instead what made this tough was that absolutely no English was spoken in the airport...only Portuguese! Yikes! I quickly realized that I was not in Texas anymore! This would not have been an issue if the gate and boarding number were printed on the ticket, but for some reason in Sao Paulo they do things a little different. Basically you wait about 10 minutes until your flight leaves and then it is announced on a PA system what gate you are supposed to go to...of course in Portuguese. Again, not an issue if I knew what they were saying. So to overcome this communication gap I would go from seat to seat in the airport and creepily/stalkishly look at other people's tickets that were sitting next to me until I saw that they were headed to Salvador as well. After about switching seats 8 times I found a couple that were headed to Salvador! For the next 2 hours I would just follow them around the airport in the most CIA agent way possible. If they left to get coffee, I would be right behind them after about 30 seconds. Same thing when they went to get lunch, take a walk around the wing of the airport, and finally when they headed to board the airplane. I made it on the right flight and could actually breathe! Finally, after 26 hours of flight I made it to Salvador and met the other 18 students that would be doing the same program as me.
Over the course of this week we are all having just basic orientation. Included in this orientation we begin discussing Brazil, the culture, people, and also the topics of public health, race, and human rights. Also, we are being placed into our appropriate classes for Portuguese (yay beginner level for me!), and just getting to know one another. Saturday we get to meet our host family (VERY EXCITED), and we will be spending the next 8 weeks with them!
So far I absolutely love Brazil and can't wait to share my stories with you on this blog...internet permitting. If I don't blog for a little while please don't worry. Internet connection is very hard to come by here and our access is very limited.
Until next time just remember....you only live once!
Tchau!!
