South America

I am being very brave...I am on my own again and am not feeling too stressed about it. I waved goodbye to the majority of the Dragoman group on Wednesday as they drove off on the next leg of the tour (up to Caracas), and said the final goodbye last night to my tent buddy Usch. I was, for the first time, not pleased to be on my own again. I really enjoyed being part of the Dragoman team, they were all cool interesting people (ok so there were some prats, but I´m trying to be sentimental here) who I will miss.

Today I caught a plane from Manaus to Belém, which is still in the north of Brasil but a lot further east (the fact that I had to get up at 2:45 this morning to get the plane may be contributing to my sentimental and slighly melencholy mood). I arrived here feeling rather tired and shell shocked and made the mistake of letting a taxi driver talk me out of getting a bus into town. When we got to my desired destination (the bus station) he charged me R$15 instead of the originally quoted R$5. This really pissed me off and encouraged me to decide that Belém was horrid and I was going to get out of here as soon as possible. I am therefore now booked on a bus leaving tonight at 8 for Sao Luis, a UNESCO world heritage site. I have spent the last 7 hours killing time before this bus and have, so far; spent over an hour in the post office, wondered aimlessly looking for lunch, bought a pineapple (for 25p) and had a manicure, pedicure and hair wash and blow dry (for GBP2.50). I now feel rather pampered and, as a bonus, only have one and a half hours left before my bus and what better way to spend it than sheltering from the threat of a huge thunderstorm telling you all about my current mental state

The people that I have met since the horrid taxi driver have all been really nice (just like almost every other Brasilian I have met) so now I feel that I should re-adjust my first impression of Belém. However the parts of it that I have seen make me think that it has even less charm than Manaus and this is not helpful to readjustment. It is really hard to describe what this city is like in a way that will suitably sum up it's character, I'll give it a go though. It is chaotic, dirty (ingrained dirt rather than floating rubbish), polluted, humid, hot, friendly and threatening. And I need a bigger vocabulary.

Last night I met a guy who has just come from this direction and he complained about so many people coming up to him all day asking for money. This was a surprise as I have not experienced this really in the month or so I have been in Brasil. I have decided that this is probably because the bloke has been hanging out in westerner's hangout spots and I have been travelling through parts of Brasil that see very few tourists (please note a hint of smugness here). I haven't experienced it today either, but maybe this has had something to do with the 'fuck-off-i'm-in-a-bad-mood' aura I was giving off earlier. Needless to say I am interested to see what the coast of Brasil will be like in comparison to the centre.

As you may have guessed I am not sorry to be leaving this interesting city...and getting some sleep on the bus. Fingers crossed that the dengue fever outbreak doesn't get me and I'll be able to tell you all about the fantastic tan I'm getting on the best beaches in South America...