Sometime in the night, I can hardly open my glued eyes, a rather obese Brazilian woman forces herself into the empty seat next to me, armed with two very heavy looking bags, which she squeezes onto the floor between her seat and the front backrest and, after loud discussions with her companions, goes to rest with all kinds of strange noises.
I suspect the worst, but the good woman doesn't make a sound for the rest of the journey, and so I continue to sleep.
Glimmer at the pitch-black sky
The first gray glimmers at the pitch-black sky are unmistakable signs that the morning will not be long in coming.
It's only five o'clock, however, so there are still a few hours left. The legs feel a little stiff in the meantime, not to mention my favorite knee.
But not a soul moves, so I decide with a pleasant sigh to surrender to sleep again.
Around seven it gets restless, not only because the stewardess is about to serve breakfast, but because everyone is waking up. The sun has risen in the meantime and the electronic display shows an outside temperature of 28 degrees again.
The so-called Desayuno consists of a coffee (good), a cracker (well) and something sweet with a chocolate coating (horrible). The Brazilian lady also emerges out of her delirium.
Bom Dia.
A rather confusing conversation
We arrive barely half an hour late Porto Alegre, and I quickly find a taxi and let myself be driven to my hotel, which this time actually exists.
The older lady at the reception only speaks Brazilian, which results in a rather confused conversation, but not the last, as we shall see. My knowledge of Portuguese, which I acquired in Portugal, does not seem to meet with great understanding, and so - once again - we communicate with hands and feet, a lot of laughs and grins and everything that can help.
After all, I have a whole apartment to myself, a huge bed, a second bed in the anteroom, a kitchen, a large bathroom with a modern shower and everything else. The difference to last night couldn't be bigger.
And a table on which I can finally write properly without my fingers and hands going numb and my back starting to hurt. The overdue shower shows once again that it's the little things that make life really beautiful.
Where am I?
After a two-hour recovery sleep, from which I wake up with a heavy head, it is time for a first exploration of the city.
As it turns out, the street not far from the hotel leads directly to the old town, where people step on each other's feet. Millions of people, it seems, almost like in ...?
Where did I end up? Is that Delhi or anywhere else in India?
The mood is cheerful, relaxed, you hear a lot of laughter and see happy faces.
Nice. Like it a lot.
Porto Alegre
The metropolis of Porto Alegre (Portuguese friendly port) is not only one of the largest cities in the country, it is also the capital of the state of Rio Grande do Sul.
I would have to speak up about the beauty of the city, its cultural hotspots, its climate and its political integration into the complicated structure of this strange country.
But I don't want to, there is relevant information on Wikipedia and elsewhere.
I want to - at least a little bit - immerse myself in people's lives - as far as that is possible. I want to feel how they tick. But can you do that in such a short time?
But I take it easy, sit down in a restaurant where nobody understands me and vice versa, and let the city work its magic on me.
The expression on the faces is relaxed, cheerful, touching in a strange way in all the stresslessness. People seem to love life and enjoy it. I take my time while the strong coffee is doing its wonders and I start to think.
Stories to faces
I love attributing stories to faces. Whether they are true in the slightest is irrelevant. They give me a structure, and so unknown faces slowly develop into exciting CVs.
This rather pimped up lady, whose clothes are more worn than she would like them to be, her walk is upright and dignified. What secret does she hold? Is she the wife of a former copper baron (I don't know if there is such a thing in this area) who lost all his money during the financial crisis? Has he started drinking, is he depressed in his new home, which has only three small rooms instead of a hundred? And his wife, unbroken and full of courage, does she now carry the responsibility on her shoulders without losing her pride?
Or this old man, moving laboriously forward with the help of sticks of unequal length, what life lies behind him? Has it been a series of inevitable shocks that have brought him to this day, to this miserable walk? But wait, the smile on his face tells another story, a happier one. Or does it? Is everything completely different? Exactly the opposite?
Time goes by and suddenly I notice that people seem a lot less strange to me. That they are not very different from everyone else.
That's good to know.
Steakhouse
The evening comes quickly and it actually starts raining. While I hurry through the ozone laden air in search of a restaurant, a real cloudburst descends. However, the water seems to evaporate as fast as it hits the ground.
I finally end up in a small restaurant not far from my hotel, where I am confronted for the first time with the typical Brazilian way of buffet selection. There is no menu, you line up at the buffet and serve yourself according to the principle of all-you-can-eat or you let the waiter know what you would like to eat.
The older man who serves me realizes my helplessness and lovingly takes care of the foreign idiot. In any case, the meat filled empanada is a revelation, but I couldn't have asked for a real traditional one Steakhouse where the legendary meat dishes of the area are for sale?
Maybe tomorrow.
The rest is easily told, because sooner or later you always pay the toll for nights on the bus or plane, and while a gruesome, typically Brazilian telenovella is playing in the background, I slowly sink in ...
Mileage: 994
Matching Song: Dubokaj - Ocean of Air
And here the journey continues ...
