Remember the brilliant wildlife experience I had on New Zealand’s Otago Peninsula? The one with all the penguins and sea lions? Well, while photographing a penguin on the beach that day, I’d met a few German travelers, and they invited me into their camper van for some tea. We hung out for a bit, shared some travel stories, had some laughs. Then we went on our merry ways and never saw each other again.
That is, until three and a half years later when I went to Brazil.
Axel had always kept in touch with me on Facebook, as we jetset to opposite ends of the earth. We followed each other’s adventures, exchanged travel advice, and wished each other happy holidays year after year. When he found out I was coming to Rio de Janeiro – the place he now calls home! – we made sure to meet up.
Our reunion kinda started like this, all smiles and sunshine:
And then it went kinda like this:
Bahhaha! I’m clearly the queen of ugly-scared-face (this one’s almost as bad as when that tiger scared the shit out of me in Buenos Aires)!
Axel and I had met up in Botafogo where I was staying in that fab penthouse I told you about. It was a gorgeous day so we went for a nice little walk past Botafogo beach, along Guanabara Bay and towards the Flamengo area. We had so much to catch up on! Both of us had done a significant amount of traveling since our brief encounter in New Zealand. Axel had since met a lovely Brazilian woman, married her and made Rio his home. While telling me the beautiful story of how they met, we ran into this tighty-whitey-clad fisherman:
Seriously. How cute is he? This guy had just caught a fish, literally as we were approaching. The fish was, in fact, still alive.
I did not know this.
The idiot that I am, I leaned in, all excited and curious, trying to touch it…”Ooh, what kind of fish is that?!”…when the fish started flip-flapping its freakish steel-bat-looking fins of death, choking on its last bit of life. Meanwhile, scaring the bejesus out of me as I screamed like a sissy.
I took a few seconds to catch my breath, and returned to my normal curious self. I got up close and personal with the tighty-whitey fisherman and his catch. He poked and prodded the creature a few times to assure me it was dead and that it would not attack me with its fins of steel (really, they looked capable of causing serious injury!) and we opened and closed its fins like an accordion. That was fun.
Obrigada, O Tighty-Whitey Fisherman!
And how perfect that we had Sugarloaf Mountain in all its glory as the backdrop to this little adventure. Axel really knew how to capture the moment. *LOVE*
I’m so pleased I got to see Axel. We’ve had no more than two hours of face time since we met in 2009, yet we’ve gotten to know each other pretty well. We’ve had fascinating conversations through Facebook about our travel philosophies, the nomad lifestyle, the conflict in Syria, Argentina’s corrupt government. When two people connect as travelers, the relationships can appear on the surface to be fleeting and shallow (and sometimes they are), but often times, such as this, they’re quite meaningful and can stick with you forever.
Axel, thank you for your friendship and for sharing a lovely afternoon with me in Rio!
