You know your a gringo in Brazil when....

You know your a Gringo in Brazil when you are standing at the corner of every nice restaurant trying to connect to WiFi. 

After 13 hours of travel I finally arrived in Rio de Janeiro this past Sunday. I arrived at 7:30 in the morning and was greeted by a taxi driver who had a sign with my name. It took about 45 minutes to get to Barra da Tijuca from the airport which was surprising because I was expecting close to a 2 hour drive. The taxi driver spoke English so he gave me a nice tour of Rio on the way and let me play with his shower.

I arrived at Connection Rio and was greeted by a closed door. I rang the bell and no one answered. I rang again and still no reply. I thought we might be at the wrong place, but some guy drove by and confirmed that this was indeed Connection Rio and told me to keep ringing because they were probably asleep. After a few minutes of incessant ringing someone hit a buzzer and the door swung open revealing some guy in boxers and the front yard that I had seen so many times in pictures (There was no guy in boxer in the pictures, just the pool and the beautiful view of Pedra da Gavea). The guy disappeared right away leaving me alone for the first 20 minutes to explore the house on my own. 

The view of Barra beach from Ship Rock

After discovering that my IPOD had been run over on the road in front of my house and borrowing someones ice cold water from the fridge, I was finally greeted by the house managers, Torryn and Nicole. It seems that there was a scheduling error and they weren't expecting me til tomorrow, which is why no one was there to answer the door. They showed me around the house and then took me with them to breakfast and a farmers market where I was able to get some fresh fruit and veggies. 

All in all it was a great first day, except for the devasting loss of my IPOD.