No Clothes Please I'm British

Keeping Cool at Cachoeira da Queda

Too hot.  Can't breathe.  Can't move.  Can't write.  (Did you even miss me?)

Wish you lot in the Northern hemisphere would stop complaining about how cold you are up there.  At least you can just keep adding thermal layers.  Once we're naked, that's it.  That's all we can do, and so that's exactly what we do do.

A few weeks ago I got into the habit of jumping straight out of bed in the morning and into a bikini.  By day four, while untangling a cold, sandy, damp bikini from the bucket and spade in the previous day's beach bag,  I realised I don't have enough beachwear for that habit.  So, I just gave up on apparel altogether.

Mr Becoming has been having a fit at my constant state of undress, convinced there are men climbing trees in the park opposite with telescopes, looking in at me.  He screams 'the shutters are wide open' and expects me to hit the floor.   I suppress the urge to nonchalantly stride up to the window and strike a pose for the peeping toms.  I try to respect his desire to protect my modesty, even though we both know I don't really have any to protect.

Anyway, the only thing that beats getting naked in this heat, is getting wet.  (No, not like that.  Way too hot for anything more than a toe-rub.  Forget it!)  I have a couple of friends with pools but they are currently about as warm and delicious as a urine sample.  There's the sea, obviously, but my favorite way to really chill is to go up to the Parque de Tijuca and swim in one of the natural waterfalls in the forest.

We've been spending the mornings at Cahoeira da Queda, a waterfall surrounded by lush tropical forest.  The water is wonderfully icy and can can even provoke a welcome case of goosebumps, and there is a stony shallow pool where the kids can chase butterflies and collect tadpoles.  (We have adopted four at various stages of metamorphoses though we have no idea what they are...I'm just waiting to have a poisonous tree frog leap into my cereal bowl)

Finally, the most authentically Brazilian way to keep cool in this heat is to take a multiple cold showers a day.  Mr Becoming often takes a shower when he gets up, when he goes to bed and at least once in between.  Until I moved to Rio I was perplexed by this obsession with personal hygiene, but now I'm beginning to see where it comes from, and am beginning to adopt to the incessant showering habit myself.   If nothing else, it's the one place cool enough to allow a toe-rub to get out of hand...