Dont cry for me Argentina!!! Gente, ta certo que eu gostaria que a Argentina ganhasse, so que eh melhor garantir uma possivel derrota contra a Alemanha, que a gente inventa uma desculpa para suportar do que aguentar 4 anos de argentinos se achando...

an icon, for sure!

Eu, J� e Stella Artois em Covent Garden, Londres

O que é que Londres tem, Margarida?

Londres! Londres! Londres! Cheguei de lá ontem e tive um dia cheio de acontecimentos na cidade. Almoçei com o Corin, com quem eu trabalhava no One Aldwych e bati perna a tarde toda. Fui rever alguns cantos da cidade que me encantam e dar uma checada em algumas lojas que estao abrindo em Nova York para exportar o estilo cool de Londres para os americanos. Queria ver as tendências.

Me joguei na grama do Hyde Park. Estava um sol magnífico. Havia milhares de pessoas interessantes pelas ruas, gente louca, gente diferente, gente cosmopolita, gente de Londres. No final do dia me encontrei com a Jú Martins em Covent Garden com uma pint de Stella Artois na mao e bebemos muito vinho numa brasserie, batendo papo e dando risadas. Voltei para o hotel acabado e quando o telefone tocou para me acordar às 5 da manha e eu numa ressaca tremenda, queria cortar os pulsos pra nao ter que trabalhar no vôo de volta!

Voltei meio em marcha lenta com um australiano, um egípcio e uma chinesa louca na galley. Cheguei em casa e capotei. Acordei hoje, 12 horas depois meio em coma e com uma vontade de voltar a morar em Londres. Como sou volúvel, meu Deus!!!

Hoje passei a tarde no sofá, de papo com o Felipe, outra vez, e assistindo a um filme de Bollywood (Salaam Namaste) muito legal. Estamos os dois super dedicados à Bollywood. Conhecemos os artistas, as danças e passamos horas viajando na maionese, discutindo o que teríamos que fazer para conseguir uma ponta num dos filmes. E eu troquei o show da Ivete Sangalo ao Vivo em Salvador pela trilha sonora de um outro filme de Bollywood chamado Kal Ho Na Ho com o disco oficial de malhaçao. Acho que estou aqui em Dubai há muito tempo...

Amanha vai ter jogo do Brasil e vamos no World Trade Centre (aqui ainda tem) junto com outras centenas de brasileiros para assistir. Tem um 'gritômetro' igual aquele do Sílvio Santos, para medir a torcida mais barulhenta. A nossa está ganhando!

E a pergunta continua, para onde ir depois de Novembro, Margarida?

Decisoes e indecisoes, coisas da vida...

Estou em uma fase bem melancólica da minha vida. É uma fase que acontece em ciclos, às vezes demora para aparecer e quando aparece me deixa bem introspectivo, nostálgico e pensativo.

O vôo para Nova York foi bem tranqüilo. Na ida a maior parte dos passageiros dormiu, já que o vôo saiu aqui de Dubai às 2 da manha e tive tempo de ir até a cabine de comando e ficar de papo com os comandantes. Sobrevoamos parte da Rússia e Belarússia e vimos Minsk, a capital, bem direitinho. O mais bonito foi sobrevoar a costa da Suécia, quando eram umas 6 da manha em Estocolmo. Deu para ver toda a cidade lá de cima pois estava um dia bem claro. Consegui identificar até certas construçoes grandes como o estádio Globen e o castelo real na cidade velha. Me deu uma vontade de abrir a porta e pular de pára-quedas para passar o dia com a Lisa e com a Suzy. A partir de entao passei a ficar com saudades de todos meus amigos e de todas as coisas bacanas que já fizemos juntos.

Chegamos nos Estados Unidos de manha cedo. Um calor gostoso e dia de muito sol. Ao chegar no hotel em Garden City coloquei roupa de jogging e fui correr pela cidade. Mudei totalmente a minha impressao do lugar. Quando estive lá da vez passada fazia um frio do cao e eu estava podre de cansado, fora o acontecimento dentro do Starbucks. Desta vez, com o verao, todas as árvores estavam bem verdes, os jardins cheios de flores, pássaros e muita gente jovem na rua. Nao deixa de ser um vilarejo de ‘interior’ mas ao melhor estilo americano. Há muitas casonas com carros caros na garagem. As casas nao têm muros e parece tudo um cenário de filme de adolescentes na High School. Descobri um supermercado gourmet onde enchi a pança de coisas boas. Dormi com as janelas abertas escutando os sons da noite, vi bastante seriados, li o New York Times e vi o dia amanhecer. Tinha esquecido destes pequenos prazeres da vida.

Voltando a Dubai foi o reencontro com um calor sufocante e com os dias a fio sem ter nada para fazer. Tenho passado 3 horas por dia na academia (nao que esteja fazendo grandes efeitos) e durante a tarde fico em casa lendo, vendo filmes ou na Internet. O Felipe chegou de férias. Ele foi para Santorini e ontem passamos a tarde de papo furado na sala. Ontem no final do dia saiu a minha grade horária para Julho e nao é grande coisa. Ruim nao está mas claro que nao me deram o que eu gostaria de ter tido. Ao menos vou conhecer Glasgow na Escócia no verao.

Meu contrato com a Emirates vence no dia 11 de Novembro. Quanto mais perto deste dia estou, mais confuso fico. Nao gostaria de renovar o contrato. Quero ir embora mas nao sei direito para onde ir nem o que fazer. Por um lado é por ter muitas possibilidades. É como se estivesse no céu, decidindo em que corpo encarnar. Posso ficar aqui mais um tempo, fazendo que faço há três anos. Posso voltar para Barcelona ou Londres, posso tentar Berlim, quem sabe uma temporada em Paris ou comprar um apto em Sao Paulo. Nao sei, quanto mais penso, mais confuso fico! C’est la vie!

NY outra vez, ou quase...

na quarta feira vou outra vez para NY com a Emirates mas eh aquele voo de bosta, que fica em Garden City!!! Que medo!!!

Quem nao tem cao caca com gato! Estes ai nao sao brasileiros mas fazem bonito na torcida organisada aqui em Dubai!!!

Karen (de Curitiba), um liban�s fan�tico e a Ana Paula (do Rio) na tenda do Al Murooj Hotel para ver Brasil contra Australia! A grande pergunta da noite foi: Who the hell is Fred???

La Dolce Vita or I think I am moving to Italy

Today was Carrefour day. Yesterday was Zéfa day. Despite all that I cannot forget the beautiful week spent in Italy!

What is a Carrefour day? Well, when my fridge is empty and I start calling delivery food or stealing food from my flat mates’ cupboards it means it is time to put my strength together and make my way to Carrefour. Why do I hate a Carrefour day? Because it is expensive and I need to take a taxi in and out, plus carry all the shopping bags in my two arms all the way under a 45ºC heat! However today I decided to do it in style and went to the new Carrefour at the Mall of the Emirates. The famous mall, the biggest in the world outside of the USA and quite a trendy place. The Carrefour there is known to be the most modern in the world (all very Dubai, the biggest, the most modern, the better and so on). After shopping I roamed the mall with my supermarket trolley thinking how weird it is to go around a shopping mall with detergent and frozen chicken on a trolley. Once back at home I cooked a Brazilian steak with bell peppers and a fried egg. Now I am writing here waiting for the food to be processed in my intestines to be able to go to the gym with no indigestion.

And what is a Zéfa day? Well, cleaning the toilet, washing the dirty clothes, taking the uniform to the laundry, picking stuff from the carpet by hand (we have no vacuum cleaner) and I also changed the configuration of my room. Moved the bed and some furniture around, just out of boredom! The kitchen I don’t clean anymore because Mircea and Felipe leave it always in a desolate state so I decided to join them and be dirty!

Well, than what about Italy? I am in love with Italy!!! I love saying how much the Italians are a bit foolish and how they think Italy is the best in the world. I guess it is because it is true! The schedule was busy but amazingly nice!

Monday: after landing in Malpensa and getting to the hotel in downtown Milano, Andrew (a friend from South Africa who was on the flight) and I went to the Duomo to meet up with Annalisa, a great friend who used to work with me in Agilent, Barcelona. We met and had lots of mojitos before getting back to the Duomo to see the first part of the Italy-Ghana match! The square was full of people, Italian flags, horns, music… and I was with Annalisa after a year away! It was soooooo nice!!!

Tuesday: wake up early and decided to take the risk and fly to Napoli. We are not allowed to travel further than 50 miles from the hotel during a layover but half of the crew was going to Venice and a guy even went home to Slovakia so we said: what the hell and took a plane down south! Arriving in Napoli is fantastic, the city is beautiful and very colorful! Our hotel was in the Spaccanapoli, a pedestrian street that cuts through the whole city! I had to give up on my diet and eat pizza, drink wine and beer and have all the gelatti one can possibly stuff in!

Wednesday: from Napoli to Amalfi. I wanted to take the train but when we were leaving the hotel an old man said we must take the bus because it is cheaper, faster and goes through the beautiful countryside. We ended up following the man’s advice only to be stuck for 1h40min waiting for the bus, which arrived crammed with people and we could not buy a ticket inside, only in the tabaccheria. So we traveled without a ticket, standing up on the aisle, crammed amongst armpits, sweaty old ladies and dirty backpacks! For 3 hours!!! And we could not sit down and were shitting on our pants scared of the ticket controller. When we finally got to Amalfi a man asked for our tickets and I played the stupid tourist who could only speak English and wanted to buy a ticket from him. He lost his patience because I pretended not to understand him and left. But traveling for free was not worth it because I got so nervous during the 3 hours, thinking they would send me to the police station and so on that by the time the bus stopped all I could think of was going to the toilet!

Amalfi is one of those places in the world that one must see before dying! It is beautiful! Amazing views, little houses, blue ocean, good looking people, fantastic food! Difficult to explain the feeling! La dolce vita kind of thing…

Thursday: what a day! We left Amalfi by bus to Positano. Only 18 km but it took 40 minutes. The road is very narrow and sometimes two cars cannot pass at the same time. Can you imagine than 2 buses? Of course there was a lot of drama with drivers playing macho man. Positano is another one of those ‘the most amazing places in the world’. From Positano we took another bus to Sorrento and from there a train to Pompei! Visited some of the ruins in 45 minutes and got back on the train to Napoli airport. At the airport we managed to get the last two seats on the flight to Milan and just before getting on board the aircraft we were offloaded (taken out of the flight). They told us that two seats had broken down and since we were on stand by tickets there was no place for us. But the Alitalia lady than asked us if we did not mind sitting on the jumpseats with the crew. Of course not!!! But there was only 1 jumpseat. So I than came inside the cockpit, flying with the first officer and captain over Italy! It was GREAT!!! Once in Milan Andrew and I had another amazing dinner, a few more scoops of gelato and headed straight back to the hotel to sleep…

Friday: nothing lasts forever. Time to fly back to Dubai!

and now let's hope Brazil scores many goals against Australia!!!

It's so cool to be Italian!!

In front of the Vittorio Emanuelle galleries in Milan

Andrew, Annalisa and I having 'apperittivo' in Milan

Pompei, ruins and more ruins!

blue waters!

Spectacular views!

I LOVE gelatti!!!

Getting to Positano!

Italians call these Viagra Naturale!

these big lemos and typical from the Campania region of Italy and they make a drink called Limoncello!

Gallerie Umberto I, Napoli

Old Napoli, the Mediterranean and the Amalfi coast in the background!

Naples specialty: PIZZA!

flying Alitalia from Milano Linate to Napoli Capodicchino

The Duomo in Milan

Annalisa and I at the Duomo square in Milan watching Italy v Ghana!

ITALY

Quite a few boring days lately in Dubai. It is too hot to move outside so all I do is go to the gym, watch movies and lay at the pool. Not bad but it feels like an eternal holiday and that I should be doing something more productive with my life. Anyway, since we talk about eternal holidays, tomorrow I have a flight to Milan and because it is a new flight and it does not go out of Dubai every day I must stay in Italy for the whole week! Sounds just like paid holidays! So, here I go, Milano per una settimana! Will be back to Dubai on Friday night and promise an update on Saturday!

eh tetra, eh penta, eh HEXACAMPEAO!!!

Let's all enjoy the World Cup! Sheik Zayed Road - Dubai and the worldl's largest outdoor!

A typical day at work. Kasimira and Clara with me in the Business Class galley. EK725 DXB-DAR 04JUN06

The hotel is �ber-cool, with one of the nicest beds on the network. The Kilimanjaro Kempinski. And that is me, after the flight with the hedious blue uniform!

These poor shops look all the same in Nairobi, Dar es Salaam and Accra but we still buy the sculptures and love bargaining with the locals. Mwenge Market - Dar - Tanzania

Vicente and the girls. In front are Clara (Madrid) and Kasimira (Sofia). In the background are Billy (Bangkok) and Dania (Beirut). We all spent the whole allowance money buying the same old African paintings, bags, sculptures and so on! Mwenge Market - Dar - Tanzania

This is the mask that gave me the itchy stuff. Must have been worn by the whole African population before I decided to put it over my head! A lesson learned! Mwenge Market - Dar - Tanzania

DAR ES SALAAM

Had another one of those all night flights with early morning landing that will end up killing me. This time was Dar es Salaam (Tanzania) to Dubai. However I had a very nice stay there!

Since I was stuck at home the previous week watching all the Indian DVDs available and not being able to go out I was more than excited to be going to work again. Can you imagine how my brain was after watching 5 Bollywood movies and have Felipe listening to the soundtrack non-stop, plus all his Indian friends (which are very nice, by the way) were over all the time and he now has a book in English-Hindi to try to learn. Well, it can drive anyone crazy. So off I went to Tanzania!

The flight was a very usual flight but getting there is wonderful. The coast is so blue and we stay at the nicest hotel in town, brand new and cool. The money Emirates gave us, 107.000 Tanzanian Shillings was more than enough for drinks, room service and lots of shopping. For a change I went out with the crew and we had a really nice time buying local stuff. However I decided to play funny and wear an African mask that was for sale and got my neck and head all itchy! Still need to shower again to see if the thing goes away…

On the other hand, because I was still recovering from my ‘viral infection’ from the previous week (I still feel a bit ill) I had this urge to eat and ended up having French fries all the time. Also yesterday on the plane I had a small life crisis and ate up a whole box of Godiva chocolates! You know when you are struggling with yourself, trying to be healthy and avoid junk and end up stuffing you ass with chocolate!!! At least it was Godiva!

So here I am today, once again at home, with more African statues, baskets and stuff to carry home one day but great memories from a new country, Tanzania! Now it is time to get out of the room and go to the gym to burn out the Godiva, French fries and beer!

Mrs Kapoor

Depois de tomar dois copos de suco de laranja oferecidos antes do vôo levantar, comer a entrada vegetariana, meia baguete de pao de alho, o arroz biryani com pedaços de carneiro e a outra metade do pao de alho, regados a suco de manga e lamber os beiços com a torta de maça, seleçao de frutas com capuccino, Mrs Kapoor ainda teve energias para mandar meio bloco de Cheddar e Stilton com bolachas e um segundo capuccino. Esta foto foi tirada antes do aviao pousar em Heathrow, quando Mrs Kapoor, sem saber o que estava acontecendo nem porque, começou a sentir palpitaçoes. Claro que ela culpou a tripulaçao!

Antibiótico

Hoje acordei mal ainda. Fui à clinica da Emirates para ver um médico. Passei para o antibiótico. Na sala de espera me encontrei com minha vizinha, a Prianka, indiana, que também está há 4 dias doente. Ela pegou o vírus em Entebbe, Uganda. O meu foi em Nairobi, Quênia. Será uma versao africana de uma gripe do frango?

A propósito, o Mircea voltou da Coréia do Sul doente também! Viva este trabalho demente! É a receita para ficar louco. Preso em casa em Dubai quando nao dá nem para dar um passeio lá fora pois deve estar agora uns 45ºC. Se eu nao escrever amanha é porque me sufoquei com o travesseiro!