Carnaval Day 1

To put it simply, the madness started off on the right foot yesterday. After another lazy afternoon at post 12, Dylan and Bruno invited Krystal and I to a bloco party in Flamengo. His friend Carlos, nicknamed Coque due to a coka-cola addiction, drove us all and Vargas to another person's house in Botafoga to meet more people. Vargas was already drunk when we found him and was wearing the ugliest shirt ever which made him more hilarious than usual.

For whatever reason the first thing Brazilians learn in English class is how to say 'the book is on the table' which has made for a good go-to joke during all of these portuguese-english drunken shouting sessions. When we got to Botafogo we met some more of Bruno's friends who are all secretly Jewish and even more secretly huge stoners and alcoholics who love to say 'the book is on the table'. We all drank some Southern Comfort whiskey in honor of the birthday girl because Dylan from Tennessee while some random Italian guy made sandwiches in the kitchen. Vargas filled an empty 2 liter Matte Leão bottle with whiskey, rum and vodka which turned out to look exactly the color of matte and we were off. On the walk over to the metro station Bruno and I realized we hadn't eaten anything that day so we stopped at a grocery store where he introduced us to more random friends and scored some ice and cups for Vargas's jungle juice.

We finally all hopped on the subway which led us to Flamengo where the bloco was already in full swing. We were greeted by a shower of confetti and a million sweaty bodies wearing weird costumes. As I predicted, people had brought their kids to this crazy shit and Krystal even got a picture of someone breast feeding in the street. The procession ended at a street corner with a million people smoking and socializing at a gas station which is just as safe and controlled as it sounds. We all realized we had to use the restroom and drink water and somehow we ended up drinking cachaça saki at a Japanese restaurant that also served macaroni. Bruno's drunken entourage ordered an all you can eat sushi deal and the check ended up being $R440! Vargas accidentally ate an entire spoonful of wasabi and then everyone freaked out and started jumping in cabs to get home.

Did I forget to mention I saw a man that literally had a shirt that said '52% rich 48% sexy'????