We’ve had a lot of programmed events the last couple of days here in
The main reason that we were able to be here in
CUFA is a self-sufficient organization that has made so many tremendous strides in the community that the Department of Labor and Tourism partners with them to provide programs and training in Break Dancing, Grafitti, Basketball (street ball), DJ’ing, Audiovisual and Theater.
Well everyone, it looks like we’ve made it to our last stop on the tour. I couldn’t think of a better way to end a great tour than in Rio! This is a place that I’ve heard so much about and it’s great to finally be here. We arrived Sunday evening and everyone was so tired that we just got dinner and called a night.
Mondays are days off for us, so we decided to get some sightseeing in. As we were riding from the airport our host, Victor Tamm, suggested that we at least check out two of the city’s attractions – Cristo Redenter (Christ the Redeemer) and Sugarloaf. We took him up on his offer and had a great time! Here are some pics from the day!
Oh wait! Before we begin. I was about to brush my teeth and saw this bottle of water:
So uh, you replace the comma with a period, divide the number by about 1.6 or so (because the dollar is continuing to weaken), and there you have it!…. an $11.04 bottle of water! I later found out that we are staying in arguably the best hotel in Rio.
Since it was night when we arrived, I couldn’t really see the area that we were staying in. I could smell and hear the water but I couldn’t see it. When I woke up I was able to see this from my hotel room:
Check out the vid from a perforamance in Santa Cruz. We solicited some audience participation on this one!
You know,
These are the young ladies that organized our coming and all of the events here in
I know I have a very interesting name, but it baffles me sometime how people screw up the spelling of it. I was told that the press had a copy of our press release, yet my name was still misspelled as “Demonsterius”:
We had to leave at
It never fails that we seem to meet the nicest, most appreciative people in the smaller cities and they love the fact that there are contemporary hip hop artists willing to share with them. The bigger cities always have an opportunity to see performances but in the smaller cities, most artists never go there or the people can’t afford to get where the entertainment is. So thanks once again JALC on behalf of the many faces you’ll never get to meet first hand! It also never fails that everyone wants to hang out when the show is over. In most situations we can, but there are many situations where an early flight will prevent us from doing so.
If you guys checked out the previous post, then you know that we had a very long last day in Quito! We had a concert, a workshop and two planes to catch to get us to La Paz Bolivia. This is the place that I was most nervous about because of all of the “horror” stories I’ve heard concerning altitude sickness. You know, it’s funny that whenever you speak about something you haven’t experienced before, most people feel obligated to tell you the worst case scenario first. I guess it just goes to show how people gravitate towards negative before they do positive. I’m going to try and be more conscious of how I speak from now on. Maybe it’ll catch on!
We arrived at the airport a little after midnight and were greeted by law enforcement officials in riot gear. Everyone wondered what was going on, but it turns out that the transportation industry was on the eve of a 24 hour strike for better working conditions and service. The law enforcement had been sent to protect the city in case the people retaliated. It turned out that this act of solidarity crippled most of the immediate surrounding areas of our hotel, but not the city center where our hotel was located. Our one and only workshop was canceled because of safety concerns and because the students would have no way to get to the school. I was very saddened because the workshops are were we get to interact most with the people of the country, but I am understanding of the situation.
Here are some pictures of the city center from my hotel room:
This “day off” in the hotel was much needed because we all were still trying to adjust to the altitude. Small tasks like taking a few stairs or walking down the street take your breath away. Even at nights it’s hard to sleep because you keep waking up with the feeling that you can’t breathe. The thin air also causes food to take more time to digest and it causes your body to dehydrate really easily. We had to eat light meals and drink water very frequently. Another interesting thing is that we felt trembles from the earthquake in Chile. That was my first time experiencing something like that so it was a weird feeling for me.
I just wanted to share some pictures from the last day we spent in Quito. This was a long day because we had a TV performance, a concert, a workshop and we had to catch two planes from Quito to Lima, Peru and from Lima to La Paz, Bolivia. Pics from the TV performance:
So, I think I’ve finally figured it out… Springfield is in Ecuador!
In keeping with all of the birthday events, we were on our day off and wanted to take some pictures of the city. Our driver suggest that we go to the Teleferiqo. All we knew was that it was highly elevated so that we could get a nice panoramic view of Quito. When we arrived, we noticed that there was a ski lift that takes you much higher than any car could drive. Now, Quito is about 9,500 feet above sea level and it turns out that this ski lift would have us over 13,000 feet above sea level, which is higher than La Paz, which is the highest capital in the world! The altitude was one thing, but the altitude sickness was another. I was really interested in trying it, but also a little scared. I think Marc was the only one that wasn’t a little afraid (or maybe he was just acting like he wasn’t).
I ended up facing the incline, so the whole time I’m just thinking about how slow the ski lift is moving and how high we are from the ground. At one point we were so high that we could see the tops of other mountains. We looked to our left and saw the airport… then we saw that we were higher than the planes as they were taking off and landing. This is really when I realized that what I was doing was extremely crazy!
Two out of the four band members will be celebrating a birthday during the tour. Marc’s birthday is on the same day as our last show in Brazil and my birthday was yesterday! This marks the first year that I’ve spent a birthday away from home, but it actually turned out great. The guys in the band made sure that I enjoyed myself and we’ll do the same for Marc in about a week!
Move over New York City… Move over Los Angeles… There is a city that would overwhelm the both of them. That city is Quito, Ecuador. We drove from Riobamba to Quito in about three and a half hours. Of course I fell asleep almost immediately, but I was awake for about 45 minutes and was able to take a picture of Cotopaxi:
Cotopaxi is the world’s highest active volcano. Ha, now I know this is a bad picture but work with me on this. If you look and see the bright white area (snow) below the clouds you are looking at about the halfway point of the volcano. The clouds hid the volcano from me. I was a little upset, but I’m over it now.
Quito lies in the Andean mountains just below another active volcano called Mount Pichincha. Being that we are still in a mountainous region of the world, we are now about 9300 feet above sea level. The altitude sickness was really starting to mess with me, but just taking it easy has made a world of difference.
Check out just one small section of Quito:
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