I’m still in Porto Alegre, and am finding it very difficult to communicate with people — Portuguese sounds very different from Spanish (to me at least), and although I have a few basic phrases written down, I have no idea how to pronounce them properly. My usable vocabulary currently consists of 3 expressions: “abrogado,” which means “thankyou,” “tchau,” which means “ciao,” and “bom dia,” which is pronounced “bom jia” and means something like “good day” or “good morning.”
I also have a cold, but failed to buy any decongestant at the chemist because I couldn’t communicate with the pharmacist!
I’m off to the airport now, to try and get a ticket to somewhere warmer where I can shake off my cold.