from door to door

it's the last day in Germany and I'm packing the last things in my suitcase and getting ready for a 24-hour trip to Rio de Janeiro. After visiting family and taking care of some last minute things, I went to Darmstadt to see my brother and have a quick meal before heading to Frankfurt airport. Check-in, passport control, security check, walk to the gate. At the gate, I already see the first signs of the Olympics in Rio. The Mongolian team is flying with us to Brazil. I quickly sent a picture to the German volunteers' WhatsApp group and got ready for boarding. For some reason, many people stood in line and completely ignored the fact that 1. the gate staff had already asked people twice to use the second counter and 2. there was no reason for most people to stand in line (#herdmentality). On the plane, I received a WhatsApp message: 'hey... what seat do you have, I'm also flying with Condor' - 'K13' - 'ok, I have k30'. It turned out that Julia was also a German volunteer. After a peaceful flight in tight seats with mediocre food and Toy Story 3, we landed in Rio 1 hour earlier than usual. There, after some back and forth at immigration, Florian and his girlfriend went to the baggage claim with us. Florian and Julia also knew each other through a friend who was also coming soon. Anyway, we all had to wait first, so we sat in one of the waiting halls of the airport and watched the sun rise slowly. Our group kept getting bigger after about 1 hour of chatting about the safety in Rio and our plans. It turned out that I will be going to the city with Florian and his girlfriend, while the others will fly to the Iguazu Falls (they were now four people). Through my broken Portuguese conversation with a few local Olympic volunteers, I found out that Uber is probably the best solution for transportation. So I quickly downloaded and signed up for the Uber app and off we went. Next stop: Cidade do Samba.