My flight to Brazil takes off on a Wednesday evening at 10:10 pm. It is operated by the Brazilian airline TAM Linhas Aéreas which I haven't heard of until I booked the flight ticket. The flight attendants on board speak mainly Portuguese. Although I have attended a beginner's course a couple of years ago, I soon realize that my language skills are extremely bad, and to make matters worse, Brazilian Portuguese is fairly hard for me to understand. The flight arrives on schedule at 6:05am at Aeroporto Internacional de São Paulo. My luggage is ready to be picked up in no time at all. I buy two cans of coke in the exit area before I look out for the bus stop. A rental car is a luxury I cannot afford. I have been told by the travel agent that the bus network is well developed in most parts of the area, so I'm confident to get along without a car. …show more content…
Getting to Botucatu will take a bit more than four hours. It is a medium-sized town in the north-west of Sao Paulo and the place where the adoption agency that brought me to England is located. I look out of the window and observe my surroundings. The first half an hour I can see the booming city of Sao Paulo, an endless panorama of skyscrapers, apartment towers and slums. The streets are packed with vehicles and the sidewalks are full of people. The large contrast between rich and poor is obvious and undeniable. I am unprepared for these overwhelming impressions. I realize that I was exclusively thinking of my Brazilian family background since I decided to come here and didn't even try to imagine how this journey will be like. When the bus leaves the city, I am glad to catch sight of woods and meadows instead of a concrete jungle. The rest of the drive is comparatively unexciting and I am even asleep for a