Brazilian sayings #1: Sweet but hard!

/9 Comments/in

I was wandering through a market yesterday when I saw Rapadura for sale. I’m not 100% sure what the best translation of rapadura is – originally I thought I could just call it ‘raw sugar’, but now I’m not so sure. Well, as the saying goes, a picture is worth a thousand words and I’m sure you’d rather just look at the picture:

Raw sugar? Solid Muscovado? I don't know! Hard brown block of unrefined sugar seems a bit verbose. Let's just stick with rapadura shall we?

 

So you can see, it’s a solid block of unrefined sugar. This stuff was originally developed in the 16th century in either the Azores or the Canary Islands (thanks Wikipedia) as a way of conveniently transporting small amounts of sugar in hot, humid climates. It is made by crushing sugar cane and then boiling down the juice until it reaches a consistency that can be molded into blocks. But there is more to it than that.

Read more

Firestarters

/12 Comments/in ,

Recently, I have received a number of messages from people curious to hear more about the various plants I grow in my window boxes (you can’t prove that this is a lie, so let’s just go with it shall we?). I responded that surely not many people would be interested in my horticultural antics and anyway, how can I give this a spin that would make it anything to do with Rio specifically? They were quite insistent and said I’d think of something. Well, I am still a little dubious, but I’ve never been very good at saying no… (even to imaginary people)

Yesterday I was forced into doing a herbal harvest. I say ‘forced’ because things were getting quite out of hand. Not only were the basil plants turning into small trees, but the oregano was starting to strangle the roses and all the plants (apart from the poor roses) were starting to flower. Drastic action was required.

Ever wondered what a chive flower looks like? (of course you have...)

Read more

Milestones

/4 Comments/in

Ever had one of those moments when you realise you recently strolled obliviously through a milestone? Well, I just noticed yesterday that I have now 102 posts (103 if you include this one). There I was, waffling on about my bedroom walls and using that as a tenuous excuse to show you my photos of flowers, when I should actually have been playing a fanfare about the fact that I was writing my centurion post!

I believe that it is traditional to use an occasion such as this to do some big retrospective about what has changed since you wrote your first post, where you want to be this time next year, all that kind of stuff. I don’t know though – it strikes me as a little self-important. I will say that I have enjoyed writing this blog, it’s been really nice making contact with people (some I knew before from back home, others I’ve never met, but who hang out here with me in Blogland), and it’s kind of flattering that you guys can be bothered to come back and read what I have to say once in a while.

The presence of this is explained at the end of the post. Piqued your curiosity? Good, so read on.

Read more

(Nothing But) Flowers

/6 Comments/in

When I was 13 I painted the walls of my room alternately bright red and bright green. This wasn’t an act of adolescent rebellion (my Mum wasn’t bothered), I just thought it would look interesting. The inspiration behind this particular colour scheme was the cover of an album by David Byrne (former front-man of Talking Heads) named Rei Momo.

I saw those red circles on the bright green background and thought to myself "Yes, that colour-scheme will look great in my bedroom...".

 

Funny how things link up isn’t it? All those years ago, I loved this album but had no idea what ‘Rei Momo’ meant. Then 20 years later, after randomly settling in Brazil, I was writing a blog post about the oversize chairs on public transport in Brazil. I needed an image of a larger person sitting in one such chair and what did I find?

Read more

Dystopian Rainiverse

/6 Comments/in

After our New Year’s trip to the Coca Cola rivers of Ibitipoca, we arrived back late last night in pouring rain. Apart from a short period just as we arrived, it rained the whole time we were away. It is still raining now. The last few days reminded me of a short film I saw many years ago – a dystopian future world where it rained all day, every day without a break. Every seven years the sun would come out for just one hour, then the rain would restart. Through the magic of Google I have just discovered that the film was based on a short story by Ray Bradbury called All Summer in a Day (read it here or, if you have 30 minutes to kill, watch it here).

Taking photos of rain is not easy! I just hope I don’t have to wait 7 years to see the sun again…

 

Of course I’m being a little melodramatic here. We actually had a lovely time away in Minas Gerais and once I have a little time to sort through my photos I’ll tell you all about it. But for now I am going to continue being melodramatic. Or maybe I can drop the “melo”, because there was quite significant drama on the way home yesterday.

Read more