day 5

yesterday was a mission! woke up went to class for a bit and we were suppose to have a professor from the university talk to us. somewhat like a lecture/interview, but i guess she canceled. Another interesting thing that happened was we met five new brazilian students. I cannot remember all of their names but I can remember Luisa, Matthew, and Paola. They were super friendly and talked to us about their media and how people rely on the television more because people have television sets in their home instead of going outside to purchase a newspaper. Internet is more for the younger generation but it is slowly developing in the country.

Another interesting thing I forgot to mention was Brazil is going to be developed into three different states because it might be able to help them expand and with the economic issues, they will be able to grow and reconstruct their surroundings. After observing Belem, i feel very welcomed and the city might be crowded with the cars "having no respect" for the pedestrians is a major issue because people can be run over and accidents happen. Something that is very shocking for me is busses. Busses are ridiculously DANGEROUS! they definitely have no respect for anyone! they just cut people off whenever they feel like it because some of them either drive to slow or like most busses they have to stop and let people off.

We went to Basílica-Sanctuary of Our Lady of Nazareth and the church was beautiful! Isabella told us it was the biggest church in Belem :) I had a little prayer for my parents and my family, especially to my friends whom I am grateful to be with! Afterwards, Patrick was lucky to go pick up his luggage at the airport after four long depressing days! :( felt very bad for the guy because he had no clothes and we had to go to our FAVORITE STORE in Brazil called YAMADA! it is somewhat like a Walmart but two-levels and has produce, meat, etc. Very convenient to walk and purchase everything there, but the only thing is that it is super crowded and drivers are RUDE! like big time rude! if America was like this, i think there would be a lot of fights or people yelling and complaining like we do most of the time.

After the church, we went to walk around the area to explore and see what other stores there were. Interestingly, the bathing suits here are like thongs but thicker haha! I could not stop laughing because it was very funny! back at home people are used to super tight bikinis but not the bottoms because in brazil it is like a thick thong. I thought it was very amusing. Isabella told us about it and even she laughed. We saw Lucas looking at speedos! I assumed speedos are very common but I guess not :T after going to department stores, they did not have a variety of options for guys for swim trunks or pants type of beach gear. They had mostly speedos; therefore, we tried to get Patrick and force him to wear one! haha that was very enjoying. We went to lunch and we eat like what we eat mostly everyday, but the food in Belem, Brazil is FRESH and i mean FRESH like SUPER FRESH made early in the morning! They have sooo many options that I do not know where to start but my favorite of all times is the steamed bananas that are glazed! OHH YUMMY IN MY TUMMY! The buffets are sold by kilos [pounds] so about 1 kilo is a little over 1.5lbs i believe for 18-20 american dollars but the money in the brazil is called Reias, pronounced as Hi-us. [sorry for my spelling!]

We went to the Mineral Museum because most of Belem has the most minerals and this is where the minerals and the diamonds/ amethysts are found. The Mineral Museum doesn't have very much souvenirs like i wanted to purchase because everything in there is like hundreds of dollars! I doubt I can afford any of that! haha some of them were cute but still pricey! But Lucas told me to save my money for sunday!