Competition Over

The last week or so has flown by without me realising eg. I was totting up how many nights we'd stayed at the hotel in Boituva and I thought it was 9 but it was in fact 16, I'm struggling knowing what month it is let alone the date or the day of the week. So we're now back in Sao Paulo for a couple of days, catching up with admin and getting the essentials in while we're still in civilisation (I'm thinking that an island of 2800 total population won't have many shopping malls...?)

The world parachuting championships in Boituva is now complete, there were 17 teams in just the class Rob was competitng in so a really good turn out especially given the last minute change of venue. After much to-ing and fro-ing between the DZs the competition finally ran from the new DZ, Jame's place, so new in fact that much of it was still a building site. The poor guys working out by the swoop pond laying fresh turf, only to have it ploughed up by the guys washing the speed off their downwind landings.

As it is apt to do around any skydiving activity, the weather took a turn for the worst the weekend before the comp. with high winds followed by some poor visibility at altitude (not so much cloud as smog). Still the competition managed to proceed with only a couple more hiccups. With just three lifts (plane fulls of jumpers) to go to complete round 5 the owner of the planes grounded them until he received payment for the competition. After much debate, fuelled not least by the Bank of the organisers in Brasilia being on strike the planes were finally released and airborne again. After that one of the french teams appealed against the way round 2 had been scored. The jury agreed to a rejudge and the new scores resulted in 1st, 2nd and 3rd places for the french teams in freefly. This was much to the anger of the USA, Oz and Brazilian teams who then appealed to have the decision reversed, to no avail and hence all wore red noses to the final award ceremony.

The rejudge had little effect on our guys placement in the competition with them unfortunately coming in last by just 0.1 points, a bitter pill to swallow, especially after two busts in round 2 saw them dropping 4 points which would have seen them another 4 places up the board. The guys all made me proud though, rising above the great disappointment they must have been feeling and congratulating the other teams in the competition, showing greater sportsmanship therefore maybe than many of the teams at the top.

Following the comp. , (the weather again brilliantly bright and sunny,) alot of the guys, Dan, Jim and Bec included, headed off to Rio to experience some of the beaches and nightlife for which Brazil is famed. Unfortunately with just these two days until we fly onward we didn't feel we had the time, so made the tough decision to relax in Sao Paulo for a couple of days instead.

So lasting memories of Brazil... bizarre ones - crisps that are bright yellow but when they touch saliva turn bright blue (how many e numbers?), soft squidgy toilet seats, a full range of pastries, bread and potato pears that all contain either cheese, chicken and cheese or mince and cheddar cheese that is liquid even at room temperature, yak. A killer drink cachaca (fire water) drunk neat or as a caipirinha with crushedice, lime and sugar. Incredibly cheap buffets of food where you pile stuff on our plate then get it weighed, at the DZ that usually cost R$5 for a full plate, thats £1 to you or me! If you're in the city go for a traditional BBQ meal, help yourself salad bar like I've never seen and then waiters constantly coming round with skewers full of the most tender tasty meat that they will carve right in front of you. Oh and of course, most of all, the people, friendly and helpful like I've never met anywhere before.