This year I'm trying out spending the end of the year's celebrations with, and only with, brazilians.
I will cut short on my fears about the ongoing of Christmas in a brazilian family, me, a french girl hard hit from the yearly I-miss-my-family-it's-december, and a real fan of the french Christmas dinner that lasts at least 3 hours sitting down before opening the gifts with the lights of the candles and then going to sleep in your warm bed with a big sweater, because it's december so it just makes sense.
After all the expactation stress, and with 40°C outside, it is with a feeling of mid-august that I take the train with my roommy, the 23rd of december (so definitely not august). Destination: Mendes, small town inside the state of Rio de Janeiro, accessible of many ways but none of them easy, usually taking one bus, two trains, one other scary bus (in between montains) and fifteen minutes walking.
After a long fight between my beloved roommies as to which family would get me over Christmas (I'm very popular ;) ), it is decided: the 24th at Nayara's until midnight, after midnight at Paula's and the 25th at Paula's with Nayara.
After hours of food preparations (the entire day actually) at Paula's, we go in the afternoon to the family house where they will celebrate Christmas. We enjoy a bit the pool, yes it is Christmas and I am sweating in swimsuit, it doesn't make any sense and it disturbs me a lot!
In the late afternoon I go at Nayara's. This house as well is all filled up with any possible kind of food. We go enjoy a little bit the only room with AC before daring to stay in the warmth of the rest of the house. The family starts arriving, the buffet is ready, everybody starts eating. With the slight difference that everybody does not have to sit at the same table nor eat on the same rythm and that we forget about champagne or wine, here we drink cold beer for Christmas!
Midnight rings, we exchange gifts, wish a merry Christmas to each other and are off to Paula's place.
Same ritual there, we exchange gifts and then try and eat a few of those delicious and numerous sweets, without really succeeding though, considering all the food eaten prior. The music is getting louder, a few samba steps are being danced on carnaval music, we laugh, we are outside, it is warm, the full moon and the stars are shining.
Christmas in Brazil is Christmas in shorts and short sleeves shirt, definitely happy to have cut the awefully long hair that was on my head a few months earlier.
The next day will be more calm. The women are tanning around the pool, chatting and laughing all day, fresh beer keeps being drank obviously. Because by 40°C, tepid water isn't the nicest, very fresh beer and fresh pineapple caipirinhas are much better!
(Very) early the 26th, it is time to go back to Rio. I leave asside the adventure of the way back, it finally will have taken us four hours and a half to make the 120 kilometers that separate the two towns.
After a whole day running between my mom's birthday, the preparation of Nayara's birthday in the evening, the laundry and the suitcase to get ready for the next morning, the saturday is going by way too fast and sunday morning, way too early, Paula and I are off for a three hours bus ride to the north of the state, Buzios, a beach town dedicated to Brigitte Bardot (not even kidding). Her statue faces the sea (well, her statue of her with 25 years of age), an avenue has her name, hairdressers and stylists use the itinials BB, the small theater plays french movies and is called... Brigitte Bardot ! The woman is a myth for a lot of brazilians in the region, to the point that a lot of them assume she is dead, poor one!
Anyway, enough with BB's myth, we have one week to apreciate wonderful beaches under a very heavy sun. Only problem is that turism is at it's highest and since a few years it became a bit complicated to find a piece of sand to put down your towel without having to pay for a R$30 combo chair/table/umbrella...
On New Year's eve, everybody in Brazil is in white. Well actually there is a color code: yellow = hope for money, red = hope for love, white = hope for peace .....
So after a few homemade caipirinhas, and a quick dinner, we are off at 11pm to a big beach where we will be able to celebrate as should be, all in white and flip flops (and this is quite cool !). Midnight, fireworks are on, they are not the most exquisit but at least we don't have to deal with Copacabana's crowd. Midnight, comes one thing I wasn't ready for. Here, we don't only hug, we take the time to tell each other how much they mean. Brazilians are really confortable with sharing out loud their feelings, and as much as this kind of traditions is really cool, for a french not used to say out loud everything she feels for her friends, it is a bit weird. I am now a bit scared about my birthday, because they do the same on this kind of occasions, and generally it goes with a few tears...
So, after the emotions and a bit of dancing in the sand, I go by the sea with Paula. The moon that night was absolutely beautiful, as big as a blood moon and all orange. We jump over the traditionnal seven waves to get some luck, and I then can't help but lie on the sand. Between the noise of the sea, the music and the party going on hard behind me, it's quite incredible to be here, in my light dress and flip flops, on the first of the year, with above me the Three Marias (constellation of the southern hemisphere, three stars ligned up, about the equivalent for them of our Big Dipper).
Jumping the seven good luck waves.
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