I did manage to have my Brazilian visa extended until mid-June but don’t count on me to report from Amazonas or a potential hitchhiking trip back to Canada. I’m not planning to travel for another three months and I’m sticking to the Nordeste.

Actually, I’m sticking to Maceió for now.

I toyed with the idea of taking the same route all the way back to Natal from Salvador, going through Aracaju, Maceió, Recife and João Pessoa.

I spent time in Aracaju again but then I stopped in Maceió.

Many Brazilian states started implementing new restrictions a couple of weeks ago. Beaches are (were?) closed for 15 days in João Pessoa, Natal followed suit. As for Recife, there’s a lockdown (i.e. essential businesses only) on weekends as well as a curfew—or maybe the curfew is in João Pessoa, it’s hard to keep track.

Maceió is moving to a more restrictive phase as well. We were at the “azul” (blue) stage, we’re back to the “fase amarela,” yellow stage. New restrictions don’t make life much harder, so far, so good. Alagoas is a smaller state and Maceió a relatively small city for Brazil with a population of just over a million. Hopefully just keeping things under control and using common sense will be enough to… what are we supposed to do, now, exactly? Flatten the curve? Keep case numbers to an acceptable level? Hang tight and wait for vaccine delivery to speed up?

I’m comfortable in Maceió. I like the city. It’s hot and sunny, pretty safe by Brazilian standards, very walkable, people are friendly and worse case scenario, it looks like I can still find food and shelter easily.

I almost felt the need to apologize when I confessed I may not explore more of Brazil this year.

“Enjoy Maceió, it beats pretty much any place right now,” Feng agreed.

“You can order coffee and sit down to enjoy it? You don’t have to be home by 6 p.m. and there are no lineups at the supermarket? Stay where you are!”, my mom advised.

“Well, I was stuck in a lineup at the supermarket tonight,” I admitted. “Not COVID-related, mind you, it’s just that there’s never any change in the register and either you accept a chocolate bar and forget about the 10 centavos the supermarket owes you, either you wait for a manager to locate a roll of coins somewhere. I took the chocolate bar, by the way.”

I’m not tired of Maceió yet and I’m not bored either. I go out during the day, work in the evening. I’m alone here but I don’t feel disconnected from the world because I talk to Feng and Mark every day with occasional chats or videocalls with friends as well.

Plus, I still have an escape game to beat and it keeps me busy—how the fuck do I go back to Canada with no planes, expensive quarantine requirements and travel bans pretty much everywhere stopovers are required.

I have no idea. Okay, I have ideas, but none of them are particularly safe, easy or doable. I poll my friends and family regularly, both because I value a fresh perspective and because I’m trying to see if things are getting better in Europe and Canada. But living in pandemic times is draining and pretty much everyone these days have a COVID-related problem so I don’t really expect help or sympathy.

Meanwhile, I’m tackling easier challenges—solving cultural “Brazilian mysteries,” getting better in Portuguese and figuring out whether I want fish or fish for dinner.

I’ll report on that, promise.