New Year’s Eve

My wife told me she got me something for New Year’s Eve. My heart sank because I know it’s going to be crowded and noisy in Brazil. They say we will be able to see the fireworks from our apartment in the Lakeside complex. Great. Luckily Rusty seems yo have got over his fear of fireworks  

I was a trooper for Christmas being sociable and everything, stuff that stresses me out…so Layne got me a present.

But in order to be old farts tonight yesterday we had to go out and get supplies and shopping in Brazil is always an adventure.

Street life is always colorful in Brazil especially because the daily banalities look exotic to outsiders like us. 

Supermarkets are superficially similar like this Carrefour, a French chain all over Argentina Brazil and French Guyana. Below you see decidedly Brazilian options “ingredients for Feijoada” (“faish-oh-ada”). 

We had fish stew in Manaus and honestly it wasn’t fantastic. This lot has tons of olives, de-boned  Pigs trotters in brine and some pickled peppers. Not a stew for me. Or you can try slabs of salt cod: 

Layne was targeting her list while I was wandering around looking for weird stuff. 

Manioc flour, every Brazilian loves this stuff. 

Avocado potato ketchup and mustard flavor. Sounds like a train wreck in that bag but Layne had no intention of satisfying my curiosity. 

The exotic meat section was a let down unfortunately. One half was banal old duck breast while the other half was frozen ostrich steaks. Yup, that’s exotic. 

And then we had to get some booze. We haven’t been drinking at all lately but tonight is the opportunity for some cultural investigation. Champagne red wine and brandy all from our host country. We shall see how they taste, report to follow. 

Layne has found Whole Foods in Brasilia; really it’s a massive fruit and vegetable store with half a supermarket thrown in. 

Some stuff is easily recognized like ice cream and yoghurt and Brasil nuts (“Pará nuts” here as that apparently is where they grow) but some fruit you study on Google and hope for the best. 

I told Layne I’d found the fountain of youth but she wasn’t amused. 

With all that it probably tastes terrible and Layne will get the last laugh. 

For some reason yoghurt in Brazil is hard to find in pints or quarts and is mostly sold in Toby three ounce containers filled with sugary sweet syrup vaguely reminiscent of yoghurt.  This place had Greek yoghurt at ten  bucks a pint so that wouldn’t work for us. Pack yoghurt in your suitcases if you come to Brazil. We mostly drink kefir as a sort of substitute.  

Whole Foods Brasilia style. 

This must be an upscale neighborhood not least because there was a very complete modern health food store next door. 

Now we are loaded for the holiday the plan is to hunker down walk Rusty and drink. And eat. And nap. Another fine day in retirement. 

May your 2026 be more normal than the year just concluded.