I had to get up early to catch my flight to Iguazu. The airport was very busy, but thanks to a very helpful attendant I found myself in a short line and made my flight without any problems. Well, not quite right. I almost missed the flight because the gate was changed in the very last moment and the announcement was only in Portuguese. I recognized somebody who had checked in for the same flight walking to a different gate and just followed him and was just fine. The landing in Curitiba was a little rough, bt well ... we made it. It was strange. I basically had to "leave" the airport completely and go back through security again, no way to stay inside for my connecting flight. At 2:00 pm we landed in Foz do Iguazu .... it was really hot there (32 degrees, over 90 Fahrenheit) ... my driver was there to pick me up and bring me to the hotel. The hotel was quite good (especially considering the rate of $ 25). My room was a little moist and moldy, but I was able to change it the next morning and then everything was fine. The staff was very helpful.
After I had settled into the room I went to explore the city, just to find out that there was really not much to explore. It is a very modern and clean city, but nothing was really appealing. The oldest buildings were from the 60's. I went to dinner to a churascaria called "Bufola Branco" which was highly recommended in my travel guide. I have to admit that I was a little disappointed by the quality of the meat. Since it was not very busy the did not have a great selection of fresh meat coming, but cooked a small quantity until it was bone dry .... later when the place got more busy the meat quality improved, so it is hard to tell how good the place actually is. Afterwards I updated my blog and then watched a little CNN. They had a big 9/11 memorial broadcast going. They also broadcasted the speech of Georg Bush ... or should I say the "reading"? This guy has no compassion. His speech was all about terrorism, making big historical comparisons with World War II (Hiroshima) and other examples were the US "prevailed" (his favorite word) against all odds. No mentioning of peace, of reaching out ..... only fight, fight, fight.
It was really hard to watch the footing of 9/11 .... the attack, people jumping out the windows in their desperation, the towers coming down, people looking for missing relatives, .... horrible .... it brought back many sad memories..... Jeez and it was already 5 years ago.
After I had settled into the room I went to explore the city, just to find out that there was really not much to explore. It is a very modern and clean city, but nothing was really appealing. The oldest buildings were from the 60's. I went to dinner to a churascaria called "Bufola Branco" which was highly recommended in my travel guide. I have to admit that I was a little disappointed by the quality of the meat. Since it was not very busy the did not have a great selection of fresh meat coming, but cooked a small quantity until it was bone dry .... later when the place got more busy the meat quality improved, so it is hard to tell how good the place actually is. Afterwards I updated my blog and then watched a little CNN. They had a big 9/11 memorial broadcast going. They also broadcasted the speech of Georg Bush ... or should I say the "reading"? This guy has no compassion. His speech was all about terrorism, making big historical comparisons with World War II (Hiroshima) and other examples were the US "prevailed" (his favorite word) against all odds. No mentioning of peace, of reaching out ..... only fight, fight, fight.
It was really hard to watch the footing of 9/11 .... the attack, people jumping out the windows in their desperation, the towers coming down, people looking for missing relatives, .... horrible .... it brought back many sad memories..... Jeez and it was already 5 years ago.
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