This place turned out to be, in fact, really beautiful. First day I took a couple of local buses and rode out to a beach way north of the centre, which was great because I got to see the local shopping mall and hang out on a beach that was virtually deserted. Munched on some prawns and read the Easter edition of The New Yorker, which was my last piece of readable material. Still no sighting of fellow travelers, but in the evening I agreed to go for a drink with the only other guy under 50 at my pousada, a 25 year-old Brazilian, who quickly turned out to be a raving lunatic. He talked at me for about 3 hours in very fast Portuguese, and what I managed to determine was that he definitely has ADD and lacks any social skills to speak of. It also transpired that he is a spoiled only child, has been married to a cocaine addict, has been locked up in prison for two years (god knows why) and that his best "friends" are neo-nazis and/or Al Quaeda members. After a while all I knew I had to get rid of him quickly, he scared me slightly, especially after he told me that he has been doing karate for 15 years. (He was way scarier than Dieter, the German "artist" who gave me a new-age massage in Lençois, which involved a lot of energy massaging, and me having to stare at his hideous sci-fi-esque paintings on the walls...) Anyway, I did get rid of him, no harm done, but the following day I was sneaking in and out of the pousada like a thief so that he would not hear me.

Yesterday I went on an organized trip to the tropical beaches south of the city, some of which were much more crowded and touristic - beautiful nonetheless. Thousands of coconut trees lining the beaches, white sand and all that. Chatted to the two Argentinean couples who were also on the trip and had some more local food. In the evening, I decided to go out and get an ice cream and then take refuge in my room with only one of the many, highly entertaining, Brazilian soap operas. Instead, I spent my entire evening with the owner of the ice cream stand, a very cute thirtysomething guy with one arm, his mother, a feisty 60-ish lady, who lives in Golders Green in London, and his 86 year-old grandmother. The guy chatted me up in English because he spotted me as a foreigner, and when we established that I had been living very close to her mother´s place in London for some time everyone got really excited and we just kept drinking beer after beer and talking all night. Two other thirtysomething friends also joined us and it was great fun. The apropos of the celebrations was Mother´s Day, and the four generation of mothers and sons/daughters were all so naturally loving and warm with each other without being annoying that I wanted to cry, I envied them so much. Never found out why the cute guy, Kiko, only had one arm but they told me some crazy stories about the origins of capoeira, samba Brazilian music, and more, and I got the number of the mom, Nidia, a very sophisticated, cool lady, for me to call her when I am back in Rio at the end of the month (they are all from there originally). The grandmother was the coolest of course, she did not say much, but stayed up all night drinking and singing like the rest of them. She reminded me of my own grandmother, Lili, who died 8 years ago when she was 86, with the main difference being that my grandmother used to talk all the time...

Anyway, it was one of the most interesting and fun evenings I have had so far, they all found me very charming (well, of course) and it was a good surprise and a nice way to spend my last night here. Things always turn out better if you expect very little, right?