deartraveller

Dear Érica,

In what concerns Christmas everything is arranged! Lapland will be our destination with all the snow and reindeer that crossed your mind and all the hot chocolate with marshmallows that we can drink. Our parents (plus Gabriel's and Robert's, I suppose) will meet us there two days before the Christmas Eve and will leave after the New Year party (with which my mother is strangely excited, but maybe is just because she misses me).

I'm completely restored from the cold and I've got to admit that Gabriel was an impeccable gentleman during these days that passed, the sum-up of our week couldn't be more especific and fun. (except for that part of the chicken soup! ... but ultimately it was an unforgettable week.)

Well, on this week before Christmas you know how travelling becomes exhausting with all the human traffic blocking the airports due to the Christmas vacations. So, I decided to choose a, very far from Dubai, place to know and where I could regain my strenght. With this said I gladly present you: The Hawaiin Island.

That's right, I also heard that Bruno Mars was going to give a concert here and since his ancestry is Hawaiian he, every once in a while, returns home and throws a smaller concert, with one of the most amazing sunsets I've ever seen as background on a beautiful black sand beach.

And these days where filled with the most amazing activities! Can you believe that I went swimming with a manta ray? Not to speak of the Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, in which I bearly set foot (wasn't for Gabriel's persistence), but at the end I loved it.

The next activities are for you to laugh a little: I played the Golf Capital of Hawaii (and I actually did very good, according to a gentleman who appeared to be one or two years above is 100th birthday) and I dived into the waterfalls on the Hamakua Coast, gotta tell you that it's the most unpleasent thing in the world. The water falls with such strength that its very hard to stand under it. Gabriel however didn´t had a hard time doing it, so there where 20 minutes of relax for me, napping under the sun, and of pure fun to him, you should have saw him, more happy then a baby laughing!!

Beside this we also saw the tallest sea mountain in the world at more than 33,000 feet called Maunakea and skied on the snow-capped mountaintops, (see, I don't always go to only warm places).

Well this was my latest adventur, I'm looking forward to Christmas and the New Year's Eve .

Farewell and see you soon,

lots of love,

Sara.

Dear Sara,

Gabriel told me everything about your time in Dubai, I can’t believe you got sick, bad luck! I hope you are all better now, it would be a shame to stop this journey due to a nasty cold!

Funny you mentioned the Chinese New Year because, guess where I am? China! I came here exactly because of the festivities of the New Year, but, as I got here, I remembered that they only celebrate New Year in February this year! I guess bad luck as pointed both of us as targets. However, this was no reason to stop us from enjoying this fabulous country.

China is the most populated and fast developing country in the world, it’s unbelievable how crammed with people the major cities are! Actually that confusion was the only thing I disliked about this week, especially because we don’t know a thing about the Chinese language (it is so difficult asking for directions!); but as soon as me and Robert got out of the city, we got a whole new perspective!

China hosts eight monuments which are included on the UNESCO World Heritage List and many national parks. We started by visiting the one that separates the country from the rest of the world: the Great Wall of China! Did you know that it is the only monument in the world that can be seen from space? It was built to protect the northern borders of the country against invaders. At this point, Robert challenged me to a race across the entire wall, which I obviously gave up after an hour…

We also visited the biggest museum of Chinese tea, in Hangzhou, the Yonghe Temple, the Temple of Heaven, in Beijing, the Saint Sophia Cathedral, in Harbin and the Forbidden City, which was the Chinese imperial palace from the Ming Dynasty to the end of the Qing Dynasty. The Terracotta Army is one of the most interesting things to learn about: it is a group of warriors and horses sculptures depicting the armies of Qin Shi Huang, the first Empeor of China. They were built and buried with the emperor to protect him in the afterlife.

China is also famous for the Buddhist religion and there is this giant sculpture called the Leshan Giant Buddha, which is incredible! We spent a day at a Buddhist temple too, where monks live. We took some yoga lessons and I almost achieved nirvana!

I won’t even tell you about the Chinese food! If you think China Town in New York was a nightmare regarding culinary, can you image the real deal? I know Gabriel and Robert say we are too picky, but c’mon… Everyone would be if they were used to Portuguese food, right? Nevertheless, I survived…

Today, our last day, we visited a natural park that shelters pandas due to the risk of extinction. They are such cute animals (giant… but adorable)!

What an excellant idea you had! Robert and I will be thrilled to meet you for Christmas, just name when and where!

I miss you so much!

Lots of love,

Érica

Dear Érica,

Today it's me, Gabriel, who's writing to you.

Sarah is, has you may have already noticed, recovering from a bitter-sweet week.

I thought that you probably would get worried for not receiving the 'weekly' e-mail, so I decided to sum up our last seven days to you. 

As we arrived to our hotel Burj Al Arab (yes the seven stars one, I'll explain it in a minute) Sarah got a constipation due to a horrible air conditioner provided by our plain and the (incredibly hot) heat of our destination, Dubai.

I signed up on a contest that had as main prize an amazing one week stay at Burj Al Arab (with full board basis) and, against all odds, I won it! So after receiving the amazing news and, since after New York's craziness I needed a calm, and mostly silent, place to rest my ears, I invited Sarah to come with me.

The first place that we visited, before she even noticed she was almost burning with fever, was the Burj Khalifa, the tallest building in the world! The Burj has an outdoor observation deck, named At the Top on the 124th floor and allowed us to immediately surrender to the beauty of Dubai's long and white beaches. In fact we found ourselves so surrendered that we could not resist to think that 9 o'clock was not a late hour to take a swim and thanks to the warm water her temperature dropped down a bit, enough for us to enjoy a 2 hours swim, and then head back to the hotel to have a dinner cooked by angel-like hands, 200 meters above the sea level.

By night I 'forced' her to finnaly use the thermometer, you know how she is: 'I'm fine', shivering and more red than those boots you girls bought, ten minutes before, and three blocks away from the Chicago musical, and that was when she realized that it would be better for her to enjoy the luxuries of the hotel during the next couple of days.

During that time I could not let her miss some of Dubais's most astonishing places to visit, so I spent those days with a camera on my hand and the sunscreen on the other. For three days, every night I turned the camera to the television to see my amateur short films with her as she took massive doses of chicken soup. If you someday get sick, I can send you the videos that feature:

- The Dubai Fountains, in which I took a kind of semi illegal dive;

- The sky, I went skydiving and it was a life time experience!;

- The Dolphin Bay (that she loved, but a place in which I've entered by accident, so we can keep this part on a 'need to know' basis)

- The Dubai's Desert Conservation Reserve, that I had to face alone, because Sarah's health only allowed her to go until the Assawan Spa that day.

After three days of walking around like a mad turist, recording every detail, Sarah finnaly decided that she was ready to the Wild Wadi Water Park, and what a bless that park was, on the hottest day of the year, all that water practically saved us from a severe case of dehydration (well not Sarah, she was more than filled with chicken soup), but I think you'll agree that with 23 water rides and a fake thunderstorm we could not die that day!!

At last, but not least, we visited the The Lost Chambers Aquarium, in Atlantis, in which we saw underwater mazes and tunnels of the atlantean civilization while encountering sharks, eels, seahorses, and piranhas. There were more than 15 marine life exhibits but we only went to the touch tank and the interactive Aquatheatre show.

By night we went to the Arabian souk (market) and Sarah bought you a souvenir that she says that you will love, although she was laughing a lot. I didn´t got the chance to see it, but I got the pleasant chance of being informed that your friend Robert will spend some time with us. My father as just reached the necessary miles (on air, flying on a plain) to be offered a trip at his choice and he offered it to me. So, why don't you both come to Dubai ? Or what about Lapland ? It's almost Christmas.

Sarah sends you a lot of kisses and says that she's dying to know more about Robert ... you girls ... I just don't get it ...

Well, hope to hear from you soon!

Gabriel

P.S.: The hotel was rehearsing the chinese New Year, it's the year of the Dragon!

P.P.S.: P.S. added by Sarah, but if she read the rest of the e-mail, it was very nice to meet you Érica.

Dear Sara,

I couldn’t have loved our week in New York anymore! The art, the fashion, the yellow cabs… It was all so exciting! It’s the city that never sleeps and we sure didn’t!

Remember all the giant buildings? How we felt so small next to them? I still can’t breathe when I think of the amazing view from the top of the Empire State Building: that shimmering skyline just blew my mind! I would have stayed a lot longer up there if you were not afraid of heights or that the King Kong showed up to kidnap you and take you to the top.

And what of our walks down the Central Park with coffee in our right hand and Vogue on the other? That’s how I describe a perfect morning! Everything in that city is just amazing: we started the day by visiting one of the museums – The Metropolitan, MoMa or the Natural History museum – drank coffee on the Met steps, went up one of the buildings like the Rockefeller Center, had lunch on Times Square and rushed to get the next cab down to Soho where we “shop ‘till we drop”!

There is so much to see! One could stay there for a whole year and still don’t know everything about the Big Apple! The Statue of Liberty is overwhelming! Did you know it was a gift to the United States from the people of France? The female figure represents Libertas, the Roman goddess of freedom. It was a welcoming signal to immigrants that arrived to Ellis Island in the past.

The funniest thing is that we recognized all the places from movies and series! Wall Street? Remember the bull statue? I still can’t believe we took a picture holding its “intimate” parts! Well, as they say, it gives good luck with money and business! And it better give, I think I have a huge financial problem now that I blew my month’s allowance shopping on the Fifth Avenue! Although the even more serious problem is that, as soon as we get home, I’ll have to build a bigger closet! One like Carrie’s in Sex and the City would do just fine (of course in order for that to happen my sister’s room would have to be kind of destroyed, but I have no doubt she will agree after I give her the Louboutin shoes I bought her!).

Despite all this, I still think the best was the end of the day, after dinner, on Broadway! Every night a different musical… that’s how my life should be all year long! Spider Man, Mamma Mia, Chicago… We were driving Gabriel mad with all the singing!

Speaking of other things, you won’t believe what happened earlier! Remember Robert, that British guy we met at the Carolina Herrera fashion show? Today, I saw him again; we split a taxi to the airport and discovered we were going on the same flight, which was late, so we went to Harlem for a last tour. Turns out he had been studying for two years in New York, and just finished his degree in economics. I told him about my “journey with no destination” and guess what? I have a new travel buddy!

I wish you had come to Harlem with us! We went to a church with the most amazing gospel group ever! You would have loved it!

I’ll meet you soon somewhere on this big world! Miss you already!

With love,

Érica.

(Here is Robert in our next destination, I'll tell all about it soon!)