Bicicleta de Bambu RAGE!

This bamboo bike has been giving all of us so much stress but here is the progress we have made thus far! We are nearly done with the bike so we are all excited even though stressed :D

Zero Zero and Exotic Plants

Boa noite~

On Saturday night following our day at the island we met up with one of our PUC friends, Filipe, and went out to a club called Zero Zero (00). It was a very high end club but we all had so much fun--we ended our nights around 4 in the morning! Dancing was fantastic and we danced our hearts out that night. I think Marianne and Jen were the star dancers of the night. The boys attempted to practice their Portuguese as they met many beautiful girls at the club.

The following day we went to see Dr. Ghavami and tour the Jardim Botanical Gardens, which are located right in his neighborhood. Since Dr. Ghavami is so knowledgeable we learned a lot about each and every plant in the gardens, especially the bamboo. I could not finish the entire gardens tour so Marianne, Jen, and I sat at the cafe and had some pao de queijo and pao de batata to revive ourselves for the rest of the night. I bought an Acai berry necklace from the Jardim Botanical shop to support their efforts of conserving and educating the world about the importance of plants!

Tchau, tchau!

Tchau, Rio! (just for a day)

Boa noite~

Hoje we all decided to take a break from the busy city of Rio and ride a ferry out to Ilha Paqueta'. Our trip in the morning began with a bus ride to Centro aka downtown Rio. Bhavna would have been so proud of us since we made it to Centro and back out of Centro safely with no problems. Downtown Rio is very much like downtown Pittsburgh--alive on the days and dead on the weeknights as well as the weekends. People are generally warned to stay out of downtown Rio on the weekends and on weeknights but we were just fine :D I think being in a group of people always helps. The six of us make up a pretty large group so I was comfortable with traveling downtown--plus hopefully my Portuguese wasn't too awful that they knew we were Americans!

The first thing we noticed when we began our boat ride was the haze around Rio de Janeiro--you can see it in the photos above. The haze was gray and hovering just above all the taller buildings that we could see from the coast. Looks like a pollution and salt water vapor mixture to me. We all realized we were inhaling all of that during our stay so it was good to get away for a couple of hours! The cloud of pollution evoked me to think of "sustainability" and the rest of the developed world. Brazil is considered a developing country so it has yet to reach the potential of all the developed powers in this world. I think destruction of our environment is always a part of the process to become a developed country but I always ponder why? We can all be a developed world by saving our planet instead..don't we digress if we continue to deplete what we have left on this Earth? I don't know--these were just some thoughts running through my head.

When we finally got to the island the first thing I smelt was horse poo poo and pee pee!! Yucky. The island has a lot of horse drawn carriages and bicycles that many people can rent--Jen, Preston, Marianne and I decided to go by foot. Chad and Oren rented a bicycle for two and rode it around one half of the island. They went off to do their own thing for the day.

I enjoyed walking around and taking many photos and just absorbing the nature that the island offered. The skies were clear and the sun was warm. Near the port we noticed a lot of polluted water and dead fish so the smell wasn't so nice but on the other side of the port the island was quite beautiful and the waters were calm and tranquil. I loved our time there very much. Near sunset, I returned on the ferry with a decadent and warm chocolate filled churro to travel back to Rio with my mates.

Tchau, tchau~

Bicicleta de Bambu

Boa noite todo,

So here we are in Rio de Janeiro the marvelous city and we are building a bicycle of a beautiful, sustainable material called BAMBU (that is how they spell it here in Brasil). The bicycle is only in its very early stages but by next Monday we plan to have most of the frame at least bolted together. The bicycle itself will still have many steel pieces but the main frame is made from bamboo. I am expecting a lot of differences from our original design but we will have to work our way around it. Oh, the beauty of engineering.

I have noticed some tension rising within the group due to different agreements on how to approach various problems we encounter. We all come back to the hotel so tired from arguing and building and I feel especially tired because I have to use my Portuguese to help everyone out in lab since they have no previous study of the language. I am so wiped. By the end of this trip I know I will have learned a lot of teamwork values as well the importance of always practicing my patience.

More of the bicicleta de bambu will be coming soon.


Ate'~~

O meu Deus

Ola',

Today, Thursday, dia dez e seis do Junho morning we went up Corcovado to see the redeemer. Cristo Redentor translates as Christ of the Redeemer and it is located within the Tiajuca Rainforest on the peak of a mountain called Corcovado. The views from the top were amazing and the tram up to the top of the mountain was a gorgeous ride. SO MANY TOURISTS. That is all I would like to say about that day. After seeing the Christ and taking many many many pictures we went back to PUC to continue our bamboo bicycle, which is coming along quite well! We have till June 27th to finish the bike so wish us luck!

Ate' amanha~~

"Embora, embora!"

The 5 hour drive south of Rio to Cambury was tiring but it was filled with beautiful scenery of the coast of South America. I sat next to Diego, one of Dr. Ghavami's master's students and we talked for most of the commute; I learned more Portuguese and he learned more English so it was a nice compromise. He is from Colombia so his primary language is Spanish although his Portuguese is perfect! To get to Cambury from where we were staying at our cabin was about a 10 minute drive and then a 3km walk downhill to the community. My bum bum hurts from walking down hill for so long. 

When we got to Cambury, Eduardo, the main manager of the bamboo community center began the tour and description of the structural aspects of the building. Our purpose was to assess the community center after it was built by Belgian architects (www.bamboostic.be) nine years ago for the good of the Cambury community. The center was in beautiful shape and we learned a lot about how the community uses it's local resources to harvest, treat, and build with the bamboo. Marcelo, our tour guide was super excited to be at Cambury and hear about everything that the community has done with bamboo--I think he was more excited than all of us haha. 

Overall the trip was very good and very eye-opening of the local and rural culture of Brazil, specifically in the context of bamboo! Hooray for bamboo :D

Tchau, tchau~~

Feliz Dia dos Namorados from Rio!

Boa noite,

Desculpe for not writing the blog in a couple of days! Today, June 12th is the Valentine's Day of Brazil and sadly I am not with my namorado so I can't really celebrate. We saw so many Brazilian couples just making out so that was interesting... Anyways, on Thursday, dia 9 de Junho we returned to PUC-Rio for finalizations to our design for our bamboo bicycle. The day at the university was a long couple of hours with lots of arguing and changing our design and generally lots of frustration, but we got it all together by the end of the day. Thursday was a very low key day with no serious sight seeing but it was nice to slow down for a bit after the overwhelming past few days. On Friday we spent time at PUC again and then we came back to the hotel for a late lunch (3:45pm ish--yes, that is Brazilian time). Following lunch I went to purchase a small purse from a store called "Jelly". The store is awesome--shoes and handbags, my two favorite accessories. The purse is so cute! I love it. It fits everything I need inside without the purse being too bulgy. Friday night was super fun. We all went out with Bhavna's Brazilian friend, Tati, to Rio Scenarium in Lapa. It was a LONG night of samba and drinking yummy caiparinhas. My feet were killing me the next day from my heels. Brazilians are amazing dancers--they can dance all through the night! I think they actually do party till 6 am...

Yesterday was a very long, relaxing day at the beach in the beautiful sun and there I practiced my Portuguese skills and bought two pairs of earrings as well as four bracelets from the local vendors. Nothing too exciting--just trying my best to be a carioca, haha.

Today was a very busy Valentine's day. We went to Santa Teresa to meet up with Joao, one of Dr. Ghavami's doctoral students, to cut bamboo at his workshop for our bamboo bicycle. The commute itself was about one and a half hours! We took what is called the "Bonde" up into Santa Teresa and got a beautiful vista of Rio de Janeiro and a glimpse of the "favelas". The bonde was super squeaky along the tracks...I thought I was going to go deaf. Bhavna described the neighborhood as a "sad beauty" which I think fit the scenery of Santa Teresa perfectly. The graffiti along all the beautiful antique French style homes really made it a different feel for the neighborhood. I really enjoy the graffiti in Brazil. To me, it's like a message of emotion from the Brazilians facing poverty or hardships in Rio. When we finally got to Joao's workshop, which is a part of his home (pretty awesome), we met his mother and father and we cut all the bamboo to make not one, but two bicycles out of bamboo. Dr. Ghavami has high expectations for us Pitt students.

Afterwards we met up with Dr. Ghavami in Lagoa and he showed us Lagoa and told us the entire history. It was a nice 3 hours of our day, haha. I do not think Dr. Ghavami has a sense of time at all but I really enjoy being around him and listening to everything he knows about Rio, bamboo, Persia, life, etc.  Now, on Sundays all of Rio is outside either walking, biking, running, drinking coffee, or eating out...our two hour walk from his apartment all the way back to our hotel was very scenic and full of learning experiences of the Brazilian culture. We ended our night at the Hippie Fair of Rio--translated as Hippie Feira. The Hippie Fair had stalls and stalls and stalls of hand made jewelry, woodwork, clothing, paintings, etc. I fell in love with the feira and we plan to go next Sunday to catch more of the stalls before sunset.

Tomorrow morning we are off to Camburi (5 hours south of Rio) at 7:00am in the morning. I best be off now to get some shut-eye.

Ate' logo~