Return from June Travels

The kids and I have been back in Brazil for about a week and a half. I have wanted to write an entry but just could not make myself do it. I have been exhausted after our whirlwind trip and have spent the past week and a half recovering from our vacation. Additionally, the kids had day camp last week and the weekend after we got back was a waste for me. I just can’t seem to sleep on planes very well regardless of what I do and I DO NOT function on little sleep. (As an aside – I even used a sleep mask and ear plugs this time but still only got about two hours of sleep. Two kids sleeping on me in a couch seat does not a good night sleep make!)

I am thinking of doing a quick reprise of our trip in a few posts with some pictures. To start off with, I will share our experience when we landed and then go backward from there.

While we were descending into Sao Paulo, BLP threw up all over herself and the seat. The flight attendant was still walking around, luckily, and got me a wet cloth to clean her up. That really started off a series of frustrating events. The next frustration was the immigration. As diplomats we go through a special line. The unfortunate part is that the man working that desk did not know how to deal with the diplomatic passport. I did not have my national ID on me and so I kept insisting that we were not residents since technically as diplomats and dependents we are still residents of the US (but he insisted that we were residents of Brazil). I am thankful that his superior came over and told him what to do and let me go to the bathroom to change BLP’s cloths. I was then hassled as I went through customs. I showed them my diplomatic passport but they still wanted to look in my bags. Now, when we were in Colombia, neither of these things happened. We simply showed our diplomatic passports and no one even questioned us at immigration or requested to look in our bags in customs. We sailed through the airport. Obviously, Sao Paulo has been a different story. Here is the conversation I had in customs:

Agents: “What is in your bags?”

Me: “Cloths. Toiletries. Shampoo and a bunch of other stuff I don’t know the name for in Portuguese.”

Agents: “Do you have any milk or meat?”

Me: “No, I don’t.” (Except, I kind of did. I forgot that I had three very large bricks of cheddar cheese.)

Agents: “Oh, you must have chocolate then, right?”

Me: “Yeah, sure, I have chocolate.” (I was not sure that I did actually have chocolate but it was possible.)

Me: “I also have dry food like cereal.”

Agents: “So you don’t have meat or milk?” (breaking into broken English due to exasperation.)

Me: “No meat. No milk.”

Agents: “You can go.”

I do feel a twinge of remorse that I may have lied but I promise that I did not remember having the cheese. I keep telling myself that it could have been the four large liquid laundry detergents bottles that they were confused about. I still feel a little guilty. Not only did I kind of lie but I was probably a little (ok – a lot) rude. I just did not think they should treat me that way. I had a diplomatic passport after all. What were they thinking!! It is kind of funny how special treatment and power goes to one’s head. My egalitarian self would never have thought those things five years ago. I felt like we all should obey the same rules but now I am trying to get around rules and demanding special treatment. Wow, how one adapts to new circumstances.

The positive part to this whole experience was that a friend’s driver picked us up. He was so kind and welcoming that I soon forgot the frustration and remembered what I love about Brazil!