Saturday morning I went to the Rodoviaria to take the 7 am bus to Aracaju. I thought these would Greyhound type buses. far from it. I had bought executive tickets, meaning the bus was air conditioned, but it was more than that. It was a big double decker bus. Its passenger entrance was in the middle rather than the front. The seats were similar to La-Z-Boy Chairs and reclined to almost horizontal. Bottled water and coffee were available free of charge on the bus and an attendant came around serving them to the passengers. It seemed quite luxurious.
Arriving in Aracaju around 11:30 am, I found a nice but inexpensive hotel in a beach area called Atalaia. I called the LE lady and left a message for her with her service, then I went out exploring. The Beach was IMMENSE and beautiful. Aracaju is similar to Recife in that both cities are situated at the mouths of rivers, both their downtowns are located on the river's north shore, and both their beach areas are located on the river's south shore, except Aracaju is much smaller than Recife. Standing at the north end of the beach looking south, I could see nothing but sand halfway to the horizon. The view was breathtaking. I didn't see any barracas because the beach is too big and wide for them. The beachside road has many nice restaurants on it but the shore is a good trek away, possibly up to 3 football fields at low tide. Mobile vendors serve the the beachgoers close to the shore. But there is sand from the shore right up to the Beira Mar. I went downtown to look around and have something to eat. There I discovered what happens during Carnaval. EVERYTHING SHUTS DOWN!!!! Everywhere I went in the downtown/waterfront area, stores and restaurants were either closed or closing. I was lucky to find an open restaurant on a small street called Rua 24 Horas!
I returned to the hotel in the late afternoon but found to message from the LE lady. I found a nearby Internet cafe and sent her a message. I was starting to get nervous. Eventually she returned my calls around 7:30 pm and came to my hotel to pick me up around 8:00 pm. She was 23 and not as attractive in person as in her picture. However, her picture made her look gorgeous, in person she was still pretty. She spoke with a pronounced northeast accent and had some sort of lisp, both of which made it difficult to understand her. On top of that she spoke very fast. I was constantly asking her to speak slower to me. The parade has started around 5 pm that afternoon so it was in full swing when we arrived at her parent's place. They lived on the third floor of an 11 story apartment building and their front balcony overlooked the parade route. She introduced me to her parents, the little girl she has unofficially adopted, her cousins and their families. The very loud music from the trios (performance platforms pulled to 18 wheel trucks) outside made conversation next to impossible. Pre-Caju lasts for 4 days, from Thursday through Sunday. The family had been partying for 2 days already and it showed. One relative or another was always napping on the sofa or resting in the TV room. On the balcony, most of them, especially the children, were jumping, dancing, and singing. This went on until 5 am. We did again on Sunday until around 2 am. I got an hour's rest before getting my 5 am bus back to Salvador.
The partying of Pre-Caju completely overshadowed our meeting, and a further complication was that her family didn't know about LE and she asked me to participate in a cover story she concocted to explain how we met. We had ZERO conversations with relationship themes and I learned next to nothing about her as a person. As much as I enjoyed Pre-Caju, the visit was an overall disappointment. Pre-Caju deserves its own post.
