A new concept of time

When we started our paperwork to obtain the Brazilian visa, we noticed the people at the Embassy took their time while doing their work and that should have been a sign as to how people see and handle time here.

Our first dinner was at the hotel. We were tired and hungry, but also excited and ignorant of how things work here. Alan was the hungriest, so we asked the waiter to bring his dinner first, asap because he had not had a hearty lunch. We waited, talking about the trip, our first impressions, we talked some more. Fernando had gone to work and he wanted to take a shower, but we were waiting for the food, so he figured he'd go after dinner. We waited some more. And yet more. We asked about our food and got an "almost ready" answer. After f o r t y - f i v e l o o o n g minutes, he decided to rush upstairs and take a quick shower, asking us to start without him. It was getting late. Everyone around us was talking, no rush, it didn't matter if it was a Wednesday night either... We were running out of talking themes...

Fernando came back and our dinner was delivered 5 minutes later, a good hour later. (Alan's express only took 50 minutes...). the food better be good, and it was, but "the [time] price" was too high!

To be considered legal here, one must report to the police Department, something we had to do today. Leo, the company driver, picked us up at 8:30 am and took us to the first place, some government office where we were able to correct Eric's visa (24 days to 24 months) and my mom's name on my papers. Of course we waited in line, but were lucky enough to get out of there around 11:30. Then we met Fernando at the other post to continue the process, which we thought would take another 2, maybe 3 hours, since it was a 'low movement week'. We took numbers 377-378-379 and went to have lunch while the driver waited there.

Fernando waited some more with us until about 1:30, when he decided he had to leave to a meeting.

We waited, chatted, played, read, finished my sudoku booklet, and yet the numbering system was still on number 371, the same number we had seen since we arrived!!! When I asked why, they told me the government workers went out to lunch...

at 3:05 our number, 377 finally came up!!! We went through the process and came back "home", arriving here at 4:30 pm, barely 8 hours after we had left!

Patience is tested frequently here.