Nick Thorsen's Brazil Experience - Aug. 11

The second day was a very exciting and eventful day. We started our day off with a great breakfast at our hotel here in Guaruja. The breakfast is very similar to our types of breakfasts in the U.S. except down here they also have some desserts for breakfast, so we helped ourselves to some chocolate cake and other pastries.

We then went to the beach and were treated to our first surf lessons ever. It was a great time. The instructors we had were really cool and they all wanted us to succeed at riding a wave. Some of us were surprisingly good at it right away and others it took awhile to get the hang of, but eventually all of us were able to stand up on the board.

Next, we continued with another great lunch at a restaurant down by the beach. After lunch we headed to the city of Santos. To get there we had to take a ferry. However, on this ferry people just drive their cars right onto it and you have the choice of either staying in the car or getting out and standing on the boat. So of course we got out and stood on the ferry and took some nice pictures.

The next part of our day was very exciting. We went to a school where Brazilian children try to learn English and we assisted them in their learning. We split into groups and all of them had some questions prepared for us. Their English was a lot better than we thought it was going to be. They understood a lot of what we said and they spoke it with no problem. It was very nice to interact with them and learn things about how their lives are here, and it seemed like they enjoyed learning about our lives back home also. They were enjoyable to talk to and it was a great experience for all of us.

Finally, we ended the night with our first game versus P. R. Grande (a semi-professional team or "club" team here in Brazil). It was a very exciting and intense game. We ended up winning 73 – 71. Everyone on our team contributed and played well. There were some younger fans there watching and enjoying what they were seeing. After the game, we gave each player on the other team a set of Penn State Behrend playing cards. They were thankful for our gift and a few of them spoke English and were very nice to talk to. Getting back on the bus many kids surrounded us and were telling us congratulations and some even wanted us to take pictures with them. We embraced all of the attention and tried making all of the kids happy. So all in all, day number two here in Brazil was a very adventurous and exciting day.