They Won't Steal Your Liver...But You Might Need a New One

I arrived in Salvador after over 24 hours of travel and went directly to bed even though it was early afternoon. I slept a few hours and was aroused by Erik as the sun was setting. He and Meghan (a friend from Google) had arranged for us to get into an all inclusive camarote-- an exclusive box on the Carnival circuit where you ahve a great view of the bands as they slowly pass by on giant trucks. After all the horror stories of pick pockets, suffocating crowds, and gringos being kidnapped so their organs could be harvested, spending my first night at Carnival in the lap of luxury was a welcome surprise. As I mentioned, we had a great view of the bands, plentiful food all night, bathrooms with sinks and toilet paper, a masseur, and an open bar. Now, given the beers on the street cost about 55¢ an open bar doesn't seem all that exciting--the booze is practically free everywhere. But this place had hard alcohol too, so having only gotten five hours of sleep in the last 48 hours, I thought it would be nice to have a mixed drink of some sort with coke in it was my best bet for the night, even if it was watered down. I ordered a burbun and coke and expected something that was 50% ice, 40% coke, and 10% whiskey. They gave me a 12 oz. glass with three ice cubes, and filled it to the brim with Johnnie Walker, no coke. They clearly wanted my liver to fail! I grabbed an extra glass, obtained a can of coke, poured half of the whiskey into the new glass, filled both glasses with coke, and happily double fisted my drinks.

The rest of the evening was fantastic. The music was great, we met some fun and interesting people, and didn't get to bed until dawn.