So not only is the semester over, so is the World Cup...

but, apparently (at least, this is what everyone has told me) I can still cheer for Portugal since "Portugal is pretty much the same thing." I have a feeling that if Portugal didn't speak Portuguese, the Brazilians wouldn't give a damn about Portugal. Actually, I'm 100% positive of that.
So anyway, yes the World Cup has sadly ended for Brazil after a 0x1 loss to gay France. It was horrible and everyone was saying that they hadn't seen Brazil play that bad since the '98 finals against... France. Further reinforcing the idea of Brazilians that France has just paid off Brazil twice to lose. I guess it's easy to accept the money when federal minimum wage in this country is R$320 ($142US/per month, that's right... $4.73US per day.) But if you're Ronaldinho making $35million off that big Barcelona contract, then not only would you think you'd turn down the money and try to win the World Cup, you'd also get your mouth fixed.
So I'm just gonna cheer for Portugal now. I can't believe I was right about three out of four predictions, but the one I was wrong about was the stupid Brazil vs. France match. So my new predictions are...
Germany beats Italy
Portugal beats France

3rd place - Italy beats France
Final - Germany beats Portugal

So right now I am just waiting around to get out of Curitiba. I did go to Rebecca's house yesterday to watch the game. We had some good pizza (one thing I'm gonna miss about Brazil. Pizza in the US sucks compared to this stuff), some costela (beef ribs), I had some whiskey (holy hell was that strong), a few Kaisers (mmm, beer), and some dessert pizza. I played pool with the guys (rules here are a lot different than US rules, so much so that I don't even know how to explain them or I would, they also just call it "snooker" here), then I played some pool with Becca and her sister Keren. I met her parents and her brother also.
Everyone was really cool, it was awesome meeting her family and her sister seemed really awesome and smart and all that good stuff. Her brother was cool, kinda reminded me of me when I was 15, only longer hair and about 6 feet tall and 230 pounds playing football. Definitely looking forward to meeting back up with Becca and her sister on the 15th in Belo Horizonte.

Anyway I talked to Caio today and he told me about some stuff he has planned for when I'm out there in São Paulo again. I'll be there for a week hanging out with him and his peepz. He told me that on Friday the 7th we're gonna go to three different concerts, so hopefully I have enough money for all that jive. Then on Saturday, we're going to Guarujá Beach, probably an hour or so from São Paulo. Caio also has high-speed internet at his house so I should be able to put up a lot of pictures from my time there. I'm going to try to go to Carandiru again and get inside the prison itself. I still remember your name, Roberto. But there should be some good shows to go to, the beach will be nice, maybe I'll get to go to a sweet bar and watch Portugal lose to Germany in the World Cup.
Also, I've been thinking about some of the things I want to do while in Rio, so here is a short list of those things. Like I said, I'll be staying on Ipanema Beach. Okay, the list:
Visit the Corcovada (big Jesus), go to a soccer game at Maracanã, take a high through Tijuca Forest, visit all the famous beaches, go to the Botanical Gardens, and the best thing of all... HANG GLIDING! That will probably be some scary ass shit but how often do you get the chance to fly? Not in a plane, by the way. It costs something like $80, but the instructor there has made more than 9000 flights, and you get to fly over Tijuca Forest and over all the sites and beaches. All of those things should keep me occupied. I'd go to a favela but
a) I don't want to go by myself
b) I'm not keen on the idea of "favela safaris" as they're called
I'm going to try to go to Candelária and visit the site of the massacre that happened there, but if it's in an equally bad area I probably won't go.
I can't wait to be in Rio though, I'll be there by myself for a few days so that should be nice. I need to look into where I'm gonna stay in Belo Horizonte and the other places because I haven't looked into that yet.

Anyway, this update is big enough. My next update will be on Tuesday night, the night before I leave for São Paulo. After that, it will just be pictures and the like.
Peace out everyone, have a great couple days ahead of you.