There are little monkeys in the tree in front of my apartment...

This past weekend I went to Arembepe a small city about an hour north of Salvador. When we arrived, Arembepe was in the midst of it's own Carnaval celebration but fortunately we weren't there for that and quickly made our way to the beach.
The beach in Arembepe is beautiful and according to Lonely Planet it's not even that great of the beach. We walked all the way down maybe 10 or 15 minutes until we got to a small village titled "Aldeia Hippie." Apparently in the 60's Janis Joplin and Mick Jagger kicked it there. Once there we got a little room facing the ocean and then promptly headed out to get some food. All of the food places in the village were closed except one called "Janis Joplin Cafe" or something like that. The guy that ran it was a true character with big long dreadlocks and big long personality. Apparently he hung out with Janis Joplin when she was there and they also had a small love affair. I question the last part.

We had originally set out to have fish but ended up having rice, beans and eggs which we pretended was fish. After dinner the popsicle man came around and all of the babies running around got popsicles, so we got popisicles too. I had been holding off on the popsicle thing because the way they do it here, the vendor just puts all of the popsicles in a cooler without a wrapper or anything and then pulls them out when people want to buy them. The whole thing is a little questionable but I threw all caution to the wind and got one. Note to everyone: The popsicles are delicious and amazing. Even if you get sick, I think it's worth it.

To end the day we swam in a river (this is discouraged by Lonely Planet) which was extremely warm from the sun and beautiful. And then I slept from maybe 8pm until the morning. Big day.

Other than my weekend trip, I've been mostly going to school and hanging out. After all of the scheduling drama I'm in some good classes which I should be getting credit for. One is a sculpture class and the other is a sort of boring but sort of interesting class on visual theory.I guess I mostly love that she has slides that follow her lecture. Great for note taking.
I'm also enjoying that most of my classes are at the art school which is close by and fulfills my long lived desire to go to art school but only for a short while. Can you say having my cake and eating it too?

To end this post I will tell you about my Portuguese professor who is 28 with braces and a Winnie the Poo planner. Oh, and a name that is "Sabrina." That's really all.
She can't remember my name for the life of her and our interactions are sort of like:

Sabrina: "E voce, Kimberly?" Direct translation: And you, Kimberly (Kimberly is another Black girl in our class)
Me: "Bimbola..."
Sabrina: *doesn't hear me and continues on to the next person*


Besides that Salvador is great. It's getting easier and easier.


Bimbola