Brazilian Hell

I´ve been complaining recently that all I´ve been doing at work is reading, reading, reading, then today my ´supervisor´, lets call her that for argument´s sake, informed me she will be taking ONE MONTH´S leave as of the first of May. This means I will be in charge of anything and everything environment related, how on earth am I not going to screw this up? At least it will be a welcome respite from the endless reading. I just hope that the knowledge I´ve been cramming my mind with over the past two weeks has actually been absorbed.

My boss told me a story this morning about ´The Brazilian Hell´, in which a man chooses to live in Brazilian hell instead of, for example, American or Swiss hell, because in Brazil the generators don´t work to heat hell and the man who usually turns the spit on which we are eternally roasted is having a day off. I have lately been suffering in this Brazilian hell. On Sunday we were supposed to have rugby training in the evening, however only 2 of us showed up - me and another English girl. An hour and a half later a third girl turned up, an hour and a half! Needless to say we didn´t have training. Yesterday I didn´t come to work so that I could begin the application process to get my CPF (social security number required to do practically anything). I took a long metro and bus journey plus a half hour walk to the office where I have to apply for my título de eleitor (electoral registration), necessary to apply for a CPF. On arrival at the office I discovered that there had been a powercut and all work for the day had been halted. My afternoon today will be taken up by that same journey...this time in torrential rain. Once I get my título de eleitor I can apply for the CPF, that process takes up to 2 weeks, once I get my CPF I can apply for my Carteira de Trabalho (work permit), another 2 week process, as well as open a bank account. After all that I can finally get paid. Ok, so it´s not exactly hell but it´s mighty frustrating.