Maceió, Alagoas, Brasil

I arrived here on Monday evening after a 6-hour bus rise from João Pessoa, during which I amused myself by taking photos of the fingers of the young woman sitting in front of me. She slung them both behind her head and I found the nail polish and the different configurations of her fingers interesting.

Go ahead, say it! I am weird.

We pulled into the station at 4:20 and I realized that I missed tourist information by 20 minutes. A woman in a shop gave me a map and I took a cab to the Ponto Verde area. For the 25 minutes that I spent in the cab, the driver flipped the bonnet five times to remove a little tube from the filter area and suck on it with all his might. I was annoyed.

He barely pulled into a hotel and I was more annoyed because I felt he went to that hotel because he couldn't trust his car to go any further. When they told me R$70, without hesitation I picked up my backpack and walked out.

My mom always said that when I got angry I wanted the world to know. In such situations, I use body language to show that I am insulted.

Found a pousada whose name my brain will not retain. The moment I entered room number 4, I started killing mosquitos. It cost R$35 or R$45, I forget. That night I turned on the noisy air conditioning for two reasons: to drown out the Chinese torture of the constant drip...drip...drip of the toilet and so that I could cover myself like a mummy to ward off the mosquitoes. They would have to filter my blood through the sheets.

I survived the night quite well and must say I was surprised at the quality of the breakfast served. It came with the cost of the room, as is common in Brasil.

I then went off in search of tourist information. I met and talked with Elisabeth, whose picture I wanted to take the moment I saw her face. We spoke in English. More about her later.

She directed me to another office across the street, where they helped me get a room at the Hotel Paraíso das Aguas.

I walked back to the pousada, got a cab, and went to the new hotel on Avenida Gouveia. Neither on entering, nor on departing, did the driver do as much as move a finger to help me with two backpacks and two plastic bags.

I handed him R$5 for a trip that cost R$3.80. He sat there, playing solitaire with a wad of money, hoping that I would walk away. But I didn't. I said to him in plain English:

"You didn't do shit to help me. Give me one Real."

He didn't need a translator.

Imagine sitting on his ass and expecting a 32% tip!

PBB