Vacation!

I suppose technically neither Jay nor I are on vacation, but being in the States is close enough for me! Jay had to stay back in Manaus, but I flew to NYC a few days ago to spend some quality time with my girlfriends before heading off to Virginia. I had an amazing time in New York seeing friends, going out to eat, shopping a bit, and running errands. It felt great to be back in the states right away, and while I do miss my friends and Jay in Brasil, I am very happy to be here now. As much as I like speaking portuguese, there is just something comforting about being able to say what you want when you want without having to think too hard.
Anyway, I am currently in beautiful Virginia to play in the Castleton Music Festival with Maestro Lorin Maazel. I knew this was going to be something special when I saw the limo waiting at the bus station to drive us to the festival. Definitely got off to a great start! It only got better when we arrived to see what an amazing part of the country this is located in. We're surrounded by big trees, the Blue Ridge mountains in the Shenandoah Valley, fresh water creeks and lakes, and lots of animals. So far I've already seen a fox, raccoon, and deer on the roads, and llamas, goats, zebra, zonkey!, horses, and cows on farms. I left my camera in NYC so I don't have evidence of the natural beauty all around me here (or the zonkey) except using my computer's camera, but when I get it back, I will post some better pics.

Our house surrounded by gardens

Hard to tell, but that is the lake

Out on one the many porches here

We start our rehearsals tomorrow, and I am looking forward to playing with everyone here. The people I have met have all been very nice and down to earth. I'm staying in someone's guest house with other musicians, and my housemates are all cool. Our house is situated on a dirt road with its own lake, trails, and a tennis court from what I hear. I haven't had much time to explore yet, but I plan on exploring tomorrow on a run around here.
The only slightly unfortunate aspect of this place so far is the high temps- 100 degrees today- and high humidity- 85%. Good thing the last year in Manaus has prepared me for it!

Festa Junina

The month of June is a really fun time here in Brasil thanks to the Festa Junina. It's a traditional party popular throughout the country, especially the northeast, and pays homage to three Saints that have holidays this month. It involves dressing up in character as cowboys/country-folk, dancing quadrilha (think square dancing), having a bonfire, and eating traditional foods. Since it's actually winter down here and most places are cold, traditional food includes hot things like quentão, a warmed wine or cachaça with ginger, cinnamon, and orange rind, many foods made of corn like canjica or corn bread, and lots of sweets and desserts. 

To make sure everything was ready for our festa, the girls had a pre-party get together to make the proper decorations- a fake fire since it's already hot enough here and bandeiras, little colored flags cut from tissue paper and hung from a string. Besides the decorations, we had typical country music playing during the night. 

Almost everyone showed up in a costume, and since everyone brought a typical food (I confess- I made Ghiradelli brownies from the States that were the first thing gone), we had tons and tons of food. 

Table full of food

The hostess and me in costume

After we all stuffed ourselves on various cakes, vatapá, rice, pão de queijo, and salgados, we gathered around to start the quadrilha. Everyone partnered up and followed the directions shouted from the leader. We had some familiar do-si-do moments along with some new moves-  for example, "chuva" where you raise your hands above your head to imitate rain falling. We danced around the roof laughing our heads off for several songs, and I have to say that the Americanos impressed the Brasileiros with our moves :)

I know it's blurry, but 

that is Jay dancing in the middle!

All of us on the roof

We were unfortunately kicked off the roof after our hoedown by the building manager (party pooper!!!) and moved the party down to her apartment. Of course the fun continued despite the manager, and we played another traditional game inside, BINGO! Almost everyone ended up winning by the time we finished, and we all got cute little presents to take home. 

I won!! 

This was a super fun and very memorable experience for us both. The atmosphere was part carnival-part hoedown, and you know you can't go wrong with that!!

Copa do Mundo!!

Brasilians certainly do not take their futebol lightly. The sidewalks have been painted in yellow and green stripes for weeks, every other car has Brasilian flags flying, and there are even new murals in the middle of many roads showing their pride. People really get excited for the World Cup and spare no expense here! 

The excitement is actually quite contagious, and Jay and I had so much fun watching Brasil's first game against South Korea. We went to our neighbor's place to watch the game and share some tasty Brasilian food amongst friends. Everyone was forewarned not to bother going if they weren't interested in really watching the game! The funny thing to us was how disappointed everyone was when there were no goals in the whole first half of the game, and how quickly they got disinterested. As a lifelong Arizona fan, Jay had no trouble maintaining his faith in the team no matter how boring it seemed. Luckily the second half went much better, and everyone's spirits were lifted after Brasil scored 2 goals. There was lots of jumping and shouting and fireworks and horn honking during and after the game. I can't even imagine how crazy it's gonna get as the Copa do Mundo progresses! I'll keep you posted.... 

and Go USA!!! 

  

My First Race

I've had quite a few "firsts" since moving to Manaus, but the one I am most proud of is running in my first 10 km race. My good friend Debora and I have been diligently going to the gym since the fall, and I can safely say that all the effort has paid off for us. Sunday morning we completed our first race, and now we can't wait to do another!

We found out about the race on Tuesday night, and I immediately ran 10 km on the treadmill (for the first time although I've been running for 45-60 mins 3x week for more than a month). I ran everyday this week to prepare for Sunday and did another 10 km run on Friday afternoon. My goal was to finish in one hour, but once I got out on the road I thought maybe just having a goal of not stopping at all would be more attainable. It was 100 degrees at 8:30 in the morning when we started and you can imagine how humid it is here in the rainforest. Plus on top of the hot sun and lack of shade on the route, there were so many hills! 

To make a long story short, I finished in 52 minutes and achieved both of my goals. It was a difficult run to be sure, but totally worth the effort. It was such a fun atmosphere there, too, with all the different sorts of runners and who doesn't love free watermelon on a hot day?! 

Before the Corrida Rustica

Debora, Marcelo (trainer at our gym), and me after the race

We did it!!!!

Opera, Manaus-Style

The XIV Amazonas Festival de Opera has officially finished!!! We played our last opera of the season, Lo Schiavo by J. Carlos Gomes, last Sunday, and it was done true Manaus-style... which means it was a big ol' production! 

Just like the huge show at Christmas, there were hundreds of people involved in this production. The orchestra played inside the Teatro Amazonas on stage with the full chorus behind us. Maestro Malheiro conducted us live while huge monitors of him outside the theater led the singers. There were also gigantic screens set-up outside to show the main action on stage with portuguese sub-titles. The entire side of the theater, and then some, was used as a stage for the singers, dancers, actors, children, and animals, and there were chairs throughout the whole area for the crowd.  

Jay came to see the opera and did a good job documenting it with pictures....

You can see the festive atmosphere before we started, 

complete with cotton candy!

The stage is lined in red and one of those monitors faces 

the singers (the conductor) and one faces the public.

A cool part of the opera with fireworks 

on top of the Teatro.

Lots of actors portraying the natives on stage 

while others climb the sides of the Teatro.

Normally the orchestra is stuck in the pit and has no idea or view of what the singers are doing on stage. Fortunately for us this time, they brought in a big flat-screen tv for us to see the action. It was actually kind of distracting because it was hard to focus on the conductor when there was a tv a few feet beside him, but it was nice to know what was happening in the opera. It was especially funny to watch the reaction of one of the lead singers singing an aria while riding a horse who preferred to trot instead of walk at that moment. He continued to sing perfectly, but I can only imagine what must have been going through his mind! 

Jay and I both walked away from this performance amazed that a city in the middle of the Amazon can produce such a large-scale, well-made production, and I am grateful to have been a part of it! But even more grateful to know we are done with operas for another year :)