Justin-Klein.com – Life of a Traveling Programmer

Just a brief little thing I forgot to mention:

During our first sunny day in Rio, Peder, Dave and I found ourselves sipping coconut milk at a little kiosk by Ipanema Beach. The coasts of Rio are lined with such kiosks, selling beer, caipirinas, and coconuts.

After not long, an absolutely stunningly beautiful Brazilian woman came up and said “Hi, where are you from?”

She turned out to be a reporter for a Sao Paolo news channel who wanted a brief interview. I spoke on camera for a few minutes, snapped a photo or two, and we said goodbye.

A few minutes later the street vendors started coming by to pawn their wares. Continue reading »

A SUNNY day at the beach!! This photo was not taken during Carnaval; I was warned not to have a digital camera visible in public at that time (unless I wanted to lose it…)

Sorry for the deteriorating/poor quality of my writing. I’m emberassed. But traveling with two companions and constantly staying out until morning is making it very difficult to keep up with these posts, and I know I can’t allow myself to fall more than a day behind or else I’ll never manage to catch up. So typically I’ve been writing about 5 minutes at a time, pulling out my phone while I wait during each shower or email-check. Zero time for proofreading. I guess now you can see how much time I put into my normal posts – because the first draft generally reads a lot more like these 😉

When Dave, Peder and I were doing our daily(?) work-out, this guy came up and challenged me to a dip contest. I don’t think he’d planned on losing ; )

When I woke up in the apartment of a random British expat I’d met at the club in downtown, Rio, I had no idea what part of town I was in. I proceeded outside and asked a passer-by for the time. 7am. No way could I be bothered trying to bus home as tired as I was, so I jumped in a cab and gave him Silvia’s nearest intersection. He drove me about two blocks before letting me out and requesting 5 reais with an amused little smirk.

At least he was honest, because he probably could’ve driven me halfway around the city without my noticing 😛
Continue reading »

A rather amusing name for a cereal

The service in restaurants here is outstanding. The other day David and I went out for Pizza, and the instant we’d finish a slice the waiter would run over to place a new one in front of us. This type of service seems to be totally normal; they cut your steak for you and always keep your glass topped off.

Taking the metro downtown

But somehow anything that requires you to wait in line is LUDICROUSLY slow. I felt like I was going to explode the other day at a supermarket called Mundial, watching the checkout clerks scan a single item, yawn, scratch their arm, scan another item, say something to the next clerk, scan another item, stare blankly into space… Even something as simple as picking up a bottle of tylenol at the drug store will be an hour-long ordeal if there’s a single person in front of you. Very frustrating. Kind of reminds me of the Rite Aid near my gym in Encino 🙂
Continue reading »