The eternal question: which one wins?
Bear or lion? Stockholm or Gothenburg? Helsinki or Turku? London or Paris? The members of our group have made their choice and votes are in for São Paulo versus Rio de Janeiro: 100% victory for Rio! Now, I can only speak for 50% of the members but it didn't seem like a tough call.
SP is just another big city with plenty of stuff that all cities provide: stores, people, clubs, cafes, restaurants, etc. RJ on the other hand has a unique location and is surrounded by beautiful beaches, magnificent hills and a calm network of islands. Add a dozen jungle-like parks and all other normal benefits of city atmosphere to that and it's tough to beat. In my book anyway.
Prices in Rio are highest I've encountered in Latin America so far, but there are still affordable options available if you look hard enough, or if you're lucky enough to be recommended a good place like we were. We stayed in Stone on the Beach hostel which is a nice place only two blocks from the Copacabana beach. 
The dorm beds there are 25 reais (12€), but since we were looking for a double room and they were all taken, they closed up a 6-bed dorm with a bathroom just for us, for only 70 reais (32€) per night.
Just one thing to know, don't choose this place if you're planning to sleep on Thu, Fri or Sat nights - it's right next to a club! This might lead to general crankyness and your face turning into a raisin the following day, inspite of the view.
Besides walking on Rios numerous beaches for hours enjoying both sunshine and our avocado sandwiches, we took a local transport boat
(read: a sunset cruise)
to Paqueta island for 4,5 reais (2€) one way to stroll around in the total peacefullness of this quiet village just one hour away for the Rio city centre.
Taking a cable car to the top of the Sugarloaf mountain, Pão de Açúcar, (44 reais, 20€) in Urca gives you brilliant views and quite unexpectedly also a chance to see some wildlife, like geckos and monkeys, that unfortunately beat us in hide-and-seek though.
From there you can take a direct bus heading to Leblon and get off to chill (with the turtles) at the Botanical Gardens where guided tours are included in the 6 reais (3€) entrance.
Another unimportant detail to anyone NOT considering ever going to Rio is that Terminal Rodoviaria is quite a bit away from the main long distance bus station Rodoviaria - so if you want to get to another city, don't get off on the first one like we did.If you end up in there, you won't find delicious coconuts (3R, 1,5€ each) full of cold coconut juice anywhere, like in most other places in Rio.
When you get to the main bus station, look out for childishly behaving judges which this sign warns of:
Football madness
If the football world cup would take place in Brazil or if it was time for the final where Brazil faces it's arch enemy Argentina, I'd understand. But what at times I do have a hard time getting is that the madness started here a week before the world cup even began: every store from hairdressers to supermarkets decorated their ceilings, windows and aisles with anything green and yellow (balloons, flags, pieces of paper, you name it), clothes stores made sure their mannequins only wore these two colours, Brazilian flags were hang out from all apartment windows and car antennas, and house owners would make sure even the street in front of their home was wired with green and yellow pieces of paper hanging above the heads of all passers-by.
Knowing this, it shouldn't have surprised me that when Brazil had its first cup match against North Korea all stores and offices closed 1,5 hours before so that people could get home (read:to their home street) to watch it. Then street cafes and bars were filled with people blowing into their horns dressed in Brazilian colours from top to toe. And we are not talking about only young men here; EVERYONE from 80-year-old grannies to teenage girls were there! On this sunny day, when no-one had to work after 2pm, the beaches were completely abandoned – unless there was a flatscreen around, of course. People stopped to watch the game in hotel receptions, beauty salons, supermarkets, constructions sites, and this is the staff I'm talking about. When Brazil scored there was no way of not knowing about it; the noise made your ears ring for another half an hour no matter if you were on the streets or indoors.
WAIT - what happened to Ilha Grande...?
It sank. No, well not exactly, but at times it felt like it was going to if the rain didn't stop soon.
Maybe it was the bad cold, the rain, the ridiculously high prices, the noisy gang of English monkeys or just my bad attitude, but I wasn't convinced.
Maybe if we'd had more energy to hike around the island, more money to take boat tours or warmer weather for snorkeling...
But they did have Finnish ice cream. Or at least a specialised shop selling homemade ice cream that they called Finnish, even the sign said 'jäätelö'. The guy behind the counter said he was new and couldn't quite explain what makes Finnish chocolate flavour different from regular chocolate, and he didn't have a clue what I meant when asking for salty liquorice flavour.
From Rio we took a night bus to Presidente Prudente (15h, 148 reais, 67€). Not because we had heard there was something to see there, but just to cut the long trip to Campo Grande into two bits, the second part taking 7h (42 reais, 19€). For some strange reason this even made the journey 15 reais cheaper and getting away from all other tourists was pretty sweet too. 
Getting away from touristic prices meant that quite simple but very filling all-you-can-eat buffets were available both for lunch and for dinner for under 5 reais (2€) and a 0,75l bottle of beer and a vodka-coke long drink where I could choose the amount of vodka myself was together 6 reais (2,5€).
Skol works as a beer brand but I'm not sure how the fruit juice Skinka would do in Sweden (skål is Swedish for cheers, skinka means ham)
Muito legal, obrigada!
Somehow not knowing Portuguese doesn't seem to bother me as much as before. I can get by in Spanish and share my thoughts and feelings in Swedish now. Having at least one person you can really talk to makes all the difference. Even if he would be a relatively quiet Swede who doesn't talk (back either) that much ;P
My warmest regards to his mother, one of my most devoted readers, there on the other side of the screen!
