The First Day

My hotel room Rio - 8:30am

I wake up to a loud knock on my door. I reach from my bed and open it to see a girl standing there looking a little bewildered. For some reason I think that it’s a friend of Steve’s (my driver) so I gesture her in.

“Are you Mike?” she asks, “My name’s Catherine. I’m on your tour.”

Oh shit. I just got rid of the last lot last night and it’s already begun. Questions. Never-ending, over and over, often the exact same ones, all day every day 24 hours a day. As a tour leader you get to hate the sound of your own name. mike, mike, Mike, MIKE . That’s all I hear. When I get home I’m going to change my name to something that cannot be expressed verbally, like Prince. I’ll be the guy formally known as Mike.

Anyway, that’s what going through my head as she comes through the door. Then I see her flinch and I’m flung back into reality. I realize what she’s seeing: a big sunburned lump of an American lying on his bed in his underwear. Clothes, beer cans, papers, more beer cans, all strewn about the room. She asks a couple of quick questions and scurries as soon as she possibly can. Worst first impression ever.

My outgoing crew had a bit of a party down in Ipanema the night before and I didn’t actually get home until 4am or so. But I haul myself out of bed as I have a bit to do today to get ready for the upcoming tour. Also, I would like to catch Catherine before she goes to the nearest phone and inquires about cancellation costs with the Budget Expeditions tour office. Catherine is nowhere in sight, but I see Steve, my driver having breakfast. I chat with him for a bit and have a feed before returning to my room to get my macroing done.

macro v. (mak-row) To do anything on the computer, ie: write up passengers lists, room lists, do accounting, etc. The word was coined by my first driver who found it handy to have a comprehensive word to describe computer work, as anything involving a keyboard was completely beyond him.

I save everything on to my handy dandy little memory stick and take off down the street looking for an internet shop.

Walking down the street in Rio is nothing like walking down the street in the States. Here you don’t just step out on to the sidewalk, you emerge into interactive world. At home you walk from point A to point B as quick as you can with as little interaction as possible. Here people will happily spend 45 minutes talking with you even though you don’t speak their language. They know that their purpose in life is definitely not sitting quietly. All the time they’re ready to smile, ready to talk, ready to dance, ready to fuck. They live life with passion and spontaneity that Americans would find naïve and irreverent. But here they don’t care. On this street it’s all smiles and flesh. It’s not: if you’ve got it flaunt it. Here you flaunt whatever you’ve got. No time for Old and Ugly, everybody’s beautiful.

I print everything I need out for the pre departure meeting tonight and I go back to my room and write this. Right now I’m looking over this email and realizing that I should be on the beach.

Copacabana – 1:00pm

Speaking of smiles and flesh, you´ll never see so much of either than at Copacabana. The sun is strong, the sand is soft and the people are beautiful. Coming out of the subway a few blocks away I was instantly pounded by the heat. Eventually I made my way to the beach and picked my way though row after row of scantily clad beauties, their white smiles from their impossibly bronze skin. I sat for a couple of hours sipping on the beer and the view, occasionally jumping into the freshness of the Atlantic. As started to make my way back to the subway to go back to the hotel, I ran into Andrew, one of the passengers on my next trip. So I changed my my mind and took in another 45 minutes of the beach. I think Andrew will be somebody I get along with. English guy, works in IT and is also an aspiring writer. Likes to go out at night, but doesn´t drink in the day as it knocks him out.


Welcome meeting and night out – 5:00pm

This is it. I always feel tired before these meetings. The last 4 months weigh me down as I prepare to do it again. As I usher the 13 new people into the room, noting their slightly bewildered expressions and nervous smiles, I seem to take on a personality not quite my own. A little too eager and a little too enthusiastic. I´ve done enough of these meetings now that I can put myself on cruise control. This time I almost feel like I´m one of the passengers watching myself give this meeting. Despite this, the meeting goes well and I get a good impression of the crew. After about an hour and a half´s worth of explanation, people´s eyes start to cross and I realize that they´re not going to remember anything else I say, so I end the meeting.

As I´m walking out I spot Catherine. I smiled, and said, “Hey, sorry about this morning. I wasn´t really ready for you.”

She laughed and said, “That´s all right. I was going to tell you earlier that I didn´t recognize you with you clothes on.”

Later that night I take them out to dinner. Spectacular all you can eat buffet with a grill of almost any kind of tasty meat available and a surprisingly good selection of sushi. Afterwards, we go out to Lapa a neighborhood with good street parties and samba. We pretty much just hang out outside a samba club with blasting music, sip our drinks and get to know one another. Kate, one of the newbies, keeps pestering us to order tequila shots from one of the street vendors.

At about 2 or so we head back to the hotel. We have to leave the next morning at 8 am for Paraty, a beach town about 5 hours south. That´s it for today.