Everyday Life Brazil II - Gym

 Off we go on our second daily life adventure.   Today our journey starts at the academia or gym.  With beaches being such a huge past time for Brazilians, you can imagine there are gyms on almost every corner.  Some of the gyms are smaller and some of them larger. Your work out experience can pretty much be what you want it to be.  My gym is only blocks from our apartment and so an easy three minute walk and you are there.  Olympicia Acadamia.  With a small number of parking spots along the street and like many businesses in the city,  it is located in a residential area.  When I enter the gym I am greeted by the front

desk staff and welcomed (in Portuguese of course).  I have paid my fee and through the turn gate I go, down the hall and turn left.  The gym is two levels with weights and machines on the bottom and cardio on the upper level.  My trainer (who's price is included in the membership) has a small area in the corner with files where they have written up a routine for the day.   I guess you can say the experience includes all the same thoughts, feelings and smells found in gyms in the states.  OK, maybe not as much smell as the gym is open air with walls that don't quite connect to the ceiling leaving a four foot opening around the
 top allowing the daily breezes to flow through.  The interesting difference with

 this gym is there is an Olympic size pool where swimmers practice their strokes for hours each day.  I am truly amazed as they drift from one end of the pool to the other for literally hours,  perfecting the particular stroke they are working on. Olypicia Acadamia's claim to fame is that they have trained swimmers who have metaled in the Para-Olympics and Pan American Para Games representing Brazil.  I held off on writing this post hoping to write a little about one of the swimmers great medals in London but he had a poor showing so no medals this time around.  I have gained admiration for these athletes as they train day in and day out swimming for hours at a time.  As for me,  it is back to the gym and hoping to stay in some sort of shape as I age gracefully.  They gym is the gym no matter where you are it sure is nice to have time for it.