Testing the Rocket and Back Home!

Hey I am back home hope everything is going well with everyone. I have a collection of vids from Iguazu I still need to upload but I got a cool one showing the rockets I worked on for one of my projects.

Pika I mis you bro sad I didn't get to say good bye, much love RIP.

Last Week in Brazil :(

This is my last week in Brazil. I am finishing up the papers I need to get done and the last testing of the Rocket. We had our first real teat a few days back and everything worked perfectly. I am trying to get the video uploaded but its on Carlos video camera and he has to pull it off so I can upload it. This week I am tying up some loose ends. I have gone shopping for clothes, enjoyed different going away dinners, visited a research conference here in Brasilia and learning a few new dishes before getting to leave. I will do a full update when I get those videos. But over all everything is quite calm aside form the awesome rocket testing we are doing.

Maracana Stadium and Natal

So Gurgel woke up in time(5 hours later) and we decided to get some churrasco to celebrate us finishing the half-marathon. We went to a place called Blue star churrasqueria I think :/ either way the food was good thats all that matters. Luckily, this is also close to Maracana Stadium so we went to go see the soccer game. Maracana stadium was built from 1948-50 (yes in only two years!) and still remains the largest stadium in the world. It was built for the 1950 world cup and on the final match against Uruguay brazil lost 2-1 rofl rofl rofl its one of there biggest shames but the irony I think is quite funny.

(Maracana Stadium)

Just arrived to Natal boy is gorgeous the sun is out, the water is blue(and warm so I hear) and the sand is white. Well what am I doing here in Natal, you say! Two things one is I am going to visit the Agencia Espacial Brasileira to see what's going on hands on(this is also the launch site of the rocket I have been working on. more on that later) and two while I am here I may as well enjoy the beach :)

(AEB center in Natal)

The pousada I am staying at is really great I have a hammack, veranda, two beds(don't know why I need two) and all the regular stuff. I caught them at a discount as well. Normally when you are block from the beach it costs R$120+ but I got a deal for R$77 . Gurgel recommended them to me so everything worked out quite well.

(were I am staying)

I'll update more as what I'll do here but first I must swim!

(picture of the beach, took this before I wrote on my blog)

Finished the Half-Marathon!!!!!

Well I just got back from the half-marathon. It was great!!! So much fun and seeing the coast of Rio running along the beautiful beaches was well worth the trip here.

There was 17000+ people from all over the world at this event and getting to know some of them was a great experience.

I'll run through what happened. So yesterday Carlos and I horribly prepared for the Marathon by walking for three hours, staying up late to see the Brazil vs Argentina Game, not eating dinner since all the restaurants were closed by the time the game ended, drinking lots of water an hour before sleeping (had to pee all night like 6 times) and being bothered by a fly in our room. But in the end we still managed to exhaustedly wake up at 6 am to eat food and head to the marathon. During breakfast we noticed that 80% of the people there were also there for the marathon and we socialized till we finished eating. Then finally we were off to take the bus and get ready to run. :)

(us leaving our hotel)

so we made it just in time before the race began like. I'n my last post I am running for Marcus Gurgels brother therefore, I am a 53 year old man with an extra large shirt and an injured knee(thats why Marcus could not run).

(mob of people)

So the marathon began! and the giant mob of people slowly made there way through the gate. To begin we started at Sao Conrado one side was a beach the other a favela. Everyone from the favela was out cheering for us and dancing. It was a great way to motivate us through the first steps of our journey.

I took all the following pictures while running so apologies for the shaking. I deleted the ones that were to horrible. But I took a picture every kilometer we ran.

1 Km

The first kilometer was a piece of cake. Just enjoying the beautiful beach on my side.

2 km

Although I'm still feeling in tip top shape I come to the realization that there is still 19 to go and a km is actually pretty long. Oh well I'm already here hahaha. I then crank up my ipod and continue with our pace. Carlos and I had a goal of running this in 2.5 hours so we had to keep our pace at about 1km/6min.

3 km

Still feeling great! Its an incline but running 3 km is something I think anyone can do. we begin leaving the favela and toward the next beach. Still another 3 km until the next beach since we have to go around a mountain but so far the run has been beautiful.

4 km we start enter the city near the mountain and I realize I really need to go to the bathroom. I drank to much water right before. I start thinking of ways to go the bathroom while still maintaining my pace, dang I guess I'll just have to wait till its over. We crank up the pace a bit hopefully we can get there sooner.

Whats that! Our first water point. Thats the last thing I need to see, people drinking water and throwing it on themselves as I need to relieve myself. I then focus back on the race grab a water as I'm running (since I know I'll get thirsty) and keep going.

5 km (missed the picture of the 4th and 5th km mark came out of nowhere)

Doing good just enjoying the next beach. 5km is still nothing to difficult.

6 km

Things still doing good. I still need to relieve myself but I'm ignoring it and just pushing forward. During the first 5 km lots of people passed Carlos and I but now we begin seeing groups of those people. Seems like we are catching up.

7 km

We are now a third of the way there. Carlos and I(Marcus) are doing great. We reach another water point so I grab two waters power one down and refreshingly pour the other one over my head. The Leblon Beach air feels great and the sound of tides crashing against the shore is truly inspiring.

8 km

We start entering a city, more and more runners start falling behind us. It feels like we are cars as Carlos and I weave through the traffic of people. Still feeling 100% we pick up our pace just a bit.

9 km

Still weaving through people. But I notice a very artistic side walk made from Paraguayan rock.

We are now leaving Leblon and about to begin our run through Ipanema. Crowds are cheering, people are asking for high fives and some kids run with us for a bit on the side walk.

10 km

Another water stop. Once more looking past the fact I need to pee I grab two waters power one down and drench myself with the other.

10 km Also represents two milestones for me. One It means we are nearly half way there :) !!!! And two this is were I begin to leave my comfort zone for running. I am still feeling 100% but usually I don't run more than 10 km. I have ran/walked 50 km(was 97% dead after I did that though).

11 km

Still feeling good, just reached Ipanema. Keeping a strong pace.

13 km

This is when I begin focusing on the race. I miss a few distance markers but I'm just rocking out with my ipod and enjoying the run. Also this was a gatorade point so I got to power down two gatorades.

15 km

Now I begin to feel the race however, I am still feeling good. This really attractive girl, brunette with green eyes looks at me and cheers blowing me a kiss. Hahaha that was a great way to get energy. We then crank up the pace(thanks to the beautiful girl, can't look bad now can I?). Time to power to the finish!

16 km

Carlos and I are passing a lot of people. Although each kilometer seems longer than the last we know that there is only 7 km left. We have just finished running through Ipanema and are heading toward Copacabana. We can see the Sugar Loaf now.

18 km

We just ran past Copacabana and are headed toward Botofogo. We know we are almost done because this is were the Sugar Loaf is and we walked this yesterday only in the other direction.

20 km

We hit Flamengo beach, I am feeling the run in my calfs and I really need to pee.

We make it around the curve and Carlos and I know were are almost home free. Last km and we did it. I see the finish in the distance and begin to sprint. I am mostly a sprinter not distance runner so this felt comfortable to do(wasn't the best sprint because I was tired). I see the clock of the marathon, I can barely make out the time we are coming in. I increase my sprint and then.

FINISH!

Tiredly I look around seeing people stream in behind me. I sit down catch my breath.......Then the 53 year old man I am, took out his camera and shot a picture just as Carlos was coming in. Our time was 2:24:35 below our 2:30:00 we wanted. Our true time however, if we check our shoe sensors is around 2:10:00(took about 10 min of waiting for the crowd to move past the time sensor when we began) most likely. We will have to wait and see for our true time.

Carlos and I then grabbed a snack bag and gatorade. Returned out running time chip so we can get our true time by mail, called Ana and Valeria to tell them we finished.

Now

Carlos is asleep he is exhausted. I am working on my blog and getting ready to go watch a soccer game(If Carlos wakes up in time lol). Oh and I went to the bathroom. :)

Itiabu and RIO!

Sept. 4th
So before Carlos and I left Foz do Iguazu we decied to take a tour of Itaibu. The currently largest dam in the world and also the most efficient in terms of volume of water to power produced. To give you an idea of how big this the dam is and how much water goes through it visualize this. If you look at my pictures of the falls of Iguazu, then take the amount of water going through there. Now all that water fits in two turbine tubes of Itaibu! And Itaibu has 20 tubes!

(pic of the whole dam, tubes of the dam)

Quite impressive to see Itaibu and the engineering marvel it is.

So officially we can say we saw everything in Foz do Iguazu :) so now off to Rio!

Sept. 5th

Now in Rio Carlos and I got registered for the International Half Marathon of Rio. It's a marathon were you run 21km getting to see the coast of Rio and visit ever major beach.

I am Running as Marcus Gurgel Veras, Carlo's Brother. Unfortunately, his knee went bad and I wasn't registered so in the end I am running for him. The line was really long but we got our kit and began heading to Pao de Azucar.

(the line in :( actualy go's much farther back and loops 3 times inside the tent, me with my kit :) )

We had the great Idea of walking there and I think it took 3 hours hahahaha. But in the end we got there. I think we burned all our carb reserves for tomorrow but all in all it was a great walk.

(also stopped for coconut milk yum!)

To give you an Idea of how far we walked, if you take the map above of were we will run tomorrow and go from the finish till Urca it's a good idea. Pao de Acucar was quite cool nice view of the city and interesting to visit. Well now I need to get some rest for tomorrow so tchao tchao for now!

(view of city and us approaching Pao de Acucar)

Argentina Falls and Porto Canoas

September 3rd.

I decided to check out Argentina once more(the Swiss guy came as well), Last time I came to Argentina I saw the city but this time I wanted to see the falls from there side. Everyone I talked to told me that it was about 10 times better on the Argentinean side.

So I headed over there and when I got there I was blown away!!!! When I saw the Brazilian falls I could not believe them but the Argentinean side was at a whole new level of awesome! The power you hear and feel from the Devils Throat was unreal. You really learn to respect nature and the true power it has. I've provided a picture of the Devils throat but its NOTHING like seeing the real thing.

Another thing everyone recommended and told me I could not leave without trying was the boat tour. You not only see the falls up close but go through them. Epic Epic Epic boat trip.

Afterwards the swiss guy and I went to dinner in Argentina. The food there is so cheap and delicious :) we went to the fanciest place we could find. Ordered the best beef, empanadas and drinks and the total bill was 12 dollars a person! Everything in Argentina is just so cheap!

After dinner I went to another dinner hahaha but this was a special one. It was for the ECOS research conference I came to Foz do Iguazu for. It was the good bye dinner because all of the presentations were coming to an end. This I think was the best part of my experience here in Foz do Iguazu.

At around 7:45 a group of charter buses picked us (Gurgel, me and 200 other scientists) up to go to a restaurant called Porto Canoas. This restaurant is located right beside the top of the falls and your backdrop are the beautiful falls themselves.

(picture of back drop)

Even though the park closes at 6 they reopened it for all the guests of this conference and made an incredible buffet dinner with international food and deserts, live entertainment(show of many dances from brazil) and a walk through the falls at night. This was to see something that is rarely seen(since the park closes at 6). They call it a silver rainbow. This only occurs when there is a full moon(which there was) and what happens is light from the moon reflects off the mist of the water falls and creates a rainbow but since it's dark the rainbow has a majestic silver color to it. Truly a once in a life time moment(No pics sorry it was to dark none came out).

(quick shot of them making the food)

(The entertainment)

I have video of the falls in Argentina. One video is really cool because it's a wild snake hanging above my head only 3 feet away. But I'll upload all the pics and vid when I get to the lab in Brasilia. Next(tomorrow) I head to Rio for a marathon Gurgel and I are running for Brazilian independence :) tchao tchao for now!

Foz do Iguazu

Hey everyone I will do a full post as soon as I get back to Brasilia. This will include videos of testing the rocket it's really cool stuff.

For now I will keep it short just to let you know were I am and what I've seen. As some may know I am in Foz Do Iguazu for a research conference. Which is also a great reason to the the falls, visit Argentina and got to Paraguay.... Which is basically what I am doing :)

When I first got to Iguazu I was very late because I missed my first flight. There was a problem with the reservation but regardless I got here. The first thing I saw entering the motel was Gurgel with one sheet keeping him warm. I thinking wth how could he be warm its freezing and all he has is one sheet. Turns out so did I. I guess the blankets were stored near by but I didn't see them and Gurgel was to tired to get them when he first got to the hotel. So all night I slept freezing to my bed hahahaha

The next day I took a bus to the National Park to see the bird sanctuary and make my way to the falls as well. As some may know I love animals and I love visiting zoos. This sanctuary is a must see if your here in Iguazu. Very impressive selection including endangered birds. Don't get to near though because they may attack. I should know I was attacked by two toucans while visiting.

(one of the birds that attacked me)

I also went to a resturant for a really great burger, juice and, fries for only 6 dollars (i.e. about R$12) but the best part was they had floss in the bathroom :) I like keeping my teeth clean.

That day I had to get home early but so I planned for the falls today.

Today: Sept 1

I went to the falls I must say it was very impressive nothing like I have seen before. Left me both breathless and crazy wet. I also saw some animals crawling around that I snagged pics of will upload the video and all the pics when I get back for now here is a picture of the falls!

Also today I went to Argentina. Got to eat some of there beef and toured around the country all day. Great stuff :)

Also saw a store called Ramses :) :)

Uncle Visits, Oba and Finishing Project 1 the Rocket!

Uncle Visits:

My uncle Ernesto came to Brasilia for a research conference. He stayed at a really fancy hotel paid for by the embassy of a Brazil. It was actually him, Roger(co-worker of my uncle/friend of mine) and Robert( same as Roger). Although during this time I was extremly busy finishing up the Rocket project which I will get to later, I did manage to see him for dinner with the Gurgel family and lunch the next day before he left back to the USA. For dinner we all went to a really fancy indian restaurant. It had an ancient school oven and waiters serving you appetizers before you even ordered anything. It was really great to see him I missed my uncle and all my family a lot. He is like a father to me and best friend along with being one of my greatest motivation in academics and in life. Also without him I don't think I would have known about all the research opportunities in the UW or have met the people from UnB to do the research I'm doing here this summer.

Oba:

Before eating lunch with my uncle the day after eating dinner with him, Marcus picked me up and we went to a store called Oba(think of this as a "Top Foods" Brazilian style). Since most people in Brasilia live in apartments churrascos are not always easy to make. Because of this during the weekends Marcus comes here and buys meat that is being churrasco'd (if thats a word) and I must say it's impressive to see the quantity of meat Brazilians consume.

Finishing Project 1 the Rocket!:

Believe it or not this week has actually been really hectic. Aside from the two break to get food with my Uncle the entire week, weekend and beginning of this week. We had to finish the Rocket project for Gurgel and well I'll let the videos explain the rest.(this is also the main reason I have not updated)

They are broken down into stages of the projects completion.

Thursday August 6th

Beginning:

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

After Initial Testing:

Part 2

Friday August 7th

The Next Day:

Part 2

Tuesday August 11th

We put everything together but there was still one hardward bug Gago was working on and during the weekend I spent the entire time except eating lunch and dinner with my Uncle and the Gurgel Family working on a new labview code that could handle our protocol, not have buffer overrun issues and had graphs to look flashy. Then when It all worked on Sunday. The labview code got corrupt and I had to start anew :(

luckily, I had a previous old version of the code and now 5 days of experience with labview so it went faster.

Part 2

Part 3

What's left now is to put them in new steel boxes to create a faraday cage, aside from that we are done :)

Saborella, Police, Brasilia Zoo, Rodizio de Pizza, Andy Visits, and Impameri

Once again another short quick post I have many things I've been working on, turns out one of the workers in the rocket project didn't finish their part so I'm trying to get it done by the end of the week.

Saborella:

After many long car rides of Pi and Gagino fighting over what the best ice cream was, we finally settled to try both and figure it out ourselves. Pi said Saborella was the best, it is a small store that sells gellato italian style.

Police:

I got my first infraction in Brazil :(

Nothing serious, just that as a holder of a research visa I have to register with the police within my first 30 day and I was about a week late. So after paying the fines, I registered and went on with my day. One thing I'm worried about is that I can't leave the country without my Brazilian ID but with the new bill they passed that allows all illegals in Brazil to be citizens the processing agency has a lot of documents to process and the embassy told me my ID probably won't be done in time. I don't know how I feel about it because I am really loving Brazil but at the same time I need to graduate at the UW on time :/

Brasillia Zoo:

As most of you know I am a great fan of zoo's and biology in general. I was talking to my friend Renata who is a biologist in Brazil and we decided that taking a trip to the zoo was in order. I invited Gagino and met up with one of Renata's friends and got to know the Brasilia zoo.

There was actually an animal who only had one eye and it looked like he was born with it instead of loosing it in an accident.

Pizza:

Something I've been wanting to do is get all you can eat pizza(Rodizio de Pizza) Similar format to the churrasco I went to my first week in Brazil, red means stop and green means keep feeding me pizza. I went there with my lab mates and a few new friends. Nothing much to say except all you can eat pizza is great :)

Andy:

Andy Barr a good friend from the UW who was in Brazil as well. We had talked about him coming to Brasilia so I could show him around and we could hang out in this great city I've been calling home. One day while at the lab I got a call it went like this:

Unknown: Hey Ramses!

Ramses: Hey who's this?

Unknown: Andy! Hey, I found a plane ticket to Brasilia can I be there tomorrow?!

Ramses: Sweet ya! Call me when you get here!

So Andy came the next day and we made indian food and ate pizza to celebrate!

Impameri:

Andy and I were invited to Ipameri a small town 4 hours away from Brasilia to get some R&R for the first time in Brazil. That weekend was great! We ran 14km, ate lots of churrasco, taught the locals frisbee, watched a soccer game, learned how to make pao de quejo and farofa and watched Andy wax his mustache. Great times!

(Churrasco, Baking, and soccer)

(Andy Before and After Waxing)

We also found a DVD of Black Jesus:

Lastly, there was a wall made by students that had cartoons of current events going on around the world.

(Youtube would not let me upload this so I had to use the normal blogger)

Ferria:

Andy and I are planning to have a huge feast for everyone in the states with food we learned to make here in Brazil. Because of this Valeria took us to a market so we could learn what foods we needed to buy and to try more tastes of Brazil. When we got back home we also learned how to make Valerias Farofa the best Farofa in the world(in my opinion).

Andy Leaving:

Unfortunately, Andy had plans back in Sao Poalo so he had to go :( but it was a great time hanging out with him. Some of the guys at the lab said good bye and Marcus, Valeria, Andy and I had dinner then took him to the bus terminal.

(Marcus, Valeria, and Andy; Lua their dog, Lua's teeth, and our dessert)

(friends from lab, Taking Andy to Bus terminal)

Family Dinner:

The day after Andy left we had a family(well extended family) dinner. Like usual the food was great and the company was even better. :)