Flamengo, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil: 30 degrees, hot, Sunny and beautiful blue skies; a beautiful day.
Just a simple light exercise in the morning at the park. On the way back, I stopped by the Portuguese bakers and, while having two coffees, I wrote two journal entries. A good start to a Sunday. Nalva is working today, so it is just Yasmin and me.
Yesterday we tidied the desk, threw away a lot of items we no longer need, and reorganised the space. It is now a healthy, clean, and organised area for me to work and for Yasmin to study.
I made some coffee at home the old way by boiling water and pouring it through the filter with coffee. In Copacabana, I used a percolator; it was good, but doing it by hand is better. I filmed a part and sent the video to Jim, the owner of the café in England, and a copy to Julie, to provoke them.
I was planning to take Yasmin out for lunch, but instead of spending more money, which I have already spent a lot of this month and considering that restaurant food has increased significantly in the seven months I have been away; I looked in the fridge and realised I could make the kind of healthy, comfort food I used to prepare for her when I lived in Copacabana.
I miss having my own place where I can do whatever I want, whenever I want. Alternatively, I could stay in Rio and rent somewhere, or more likely, I would go back to England and rent a place near my mother. Renting a small place in England will be a bit more expensive than here.
The cost of living is quite high in England, with plenty of extra taxes and so on, and, of course, not forgetting the exchange rate, so I need everything set up correctly to earn in pounds. Earning in Brazilian Reais and paying my living expenses in British pounds will be quite challenging.
When I arrived in England at the end of November 2023, the exchange rate was 6.1 to 1, with 1 pound sterling equaling 6.1. Now, it is 7 Reais to 1 pound; the Real has devalued too much over the short period of six months, quite similar to the terrible, incompetent governments we currently have in Brazil.
Lula and his government are a shit, completely incompetent.
For Yasmin’s lunch, I prepared a kind of bruschetta base with toasted bread, topped with a salad and small pieces of lightly cooked medium-rare steak, garnished with an egg and a small portion of chips. The plate was seasoned with a little salt, pepper, olive oil, and balsamic vinegar, and I also placed a small dollop of mayonnaise to the side of the salad, in case she wanted. When Yasmin was small, she did not like black beans or mayonnaise, but now she enjoys both.
In the afternoon, the three of us—Yasmin, Perola, and I—went for a walk. Now that she is working, she will only be off tomorrow. He asked me tonight to talk more about what she had told me yesterday. I shared my opinions and points of view, assuring her that, in terms of love and support, nothing would change. She thanked me for it, and I told her that there was no need to thank me—just to be good, happy, and do her best in life.
However, I’m not feeling very confident right now. I lack a positive view of myself; I have many doubts about myself, my life, Julie, Brazil, and everything else at the moment. I realise that the shock of returning to Brazil has affected me deeply, but my situation, as it stands, has long been troubling me.
Even though my circumstances are much better than before, they still aren’t ideal. I am dissatisfied with them, and I know I need to keep making changes, more than I already have. We are all stuck on a never-ending hamster wheel; we can’t stop walking, running, or moving, and sometimes it feels like we’ve gained no ground, even though we have.
Julie and I have talked a lot; everything seems fine on the surface, but deep down, I am unhappy. It’s clearer to me that one reason I suddenly bought a ticket to Brazil was to distance myself from her somewhat.
While I was in England, I felt that I was not in a truly healthy relationship, possibly because I was living with my mother. She declared war simply because I had a girlfriend, but also because Julie’s situation was complicated, not entirely clear, and not just because she was going through a divorce.
I felt uncertain whether she genuinely wanted me as a partner or was willing to have me as one. In a way, I sensed I was just digging a deeper hole for myself, but I also don’t know if returning to Brazil was the right decision. It was what I did and what my intuition told me to do. Whether it was the best or the worst choice I made, only time will tell.
We are always roughing up our feathers to make changes, shedding the old ones to make space for the new ones to grow.
In bed by 11 p.m.
Thank you.
Thanks for reading this blog post. Please explore my other posts and share your thoughts in the comments section.
Richard
