It's a small world afterall.

It's a small world and I have proof. It's not the Walt Disney production "It's a small world" but it might as well be, with the beaches and experiences in Rio de Janeiro. Today as posted earlier, TimeIrado saw Christ the Redeemer and Sugarloaf Mountain and then it was off to the third most famous (maybe the most famous) attraction in Rio, the beaches. I may have shared my travelling strategy with many of you already, but I will break it into detail for those that have not. Traditionally, I always fly or travel with one of my Ohio State tee shirts on. This serves multiple purposes including showing my Buckeye Pride (they won again today!) and also signaling to those traveling that I am a Buckeye. It gets a reaction everytime, both good or bad. Buckeye fans typically come over and say hi and non Buckeye fans typically make some sort of comment that we can all laugh at due to their insecurity with their favorite university team. One of the things I enjoy is being able to network and meet new people. In an aiport or hotel bar, or just passing by on the street, I have found this is one of my best methods to strike up a coversation.

Today was no different. Travelling this morning to Christ the Redeemer, I met some U.S. Marines and one of them made a comment about my tee shirt saying go Bucks, another made a comment which was the opposite of Go Bucks that I cannot type on my kid friendly blog. When returning from our travels, I headed to the Executive Lounge with Ryan and Katie, where we met some American businessmen. One of them made a comment that he was from Wisconsin and I apologized to him for beating them last weekend in football. We had a good conversation for a few minutes and one of the other guys from Buffalo ended up going to the beach with us this afternoon. When we headead to the beach I decided to keep my OSU shirt on from the hotel to the beach to put a little Buckeye pride on the beach. While walking by a nearby restaurant, I heard O-H. I responded with the customary I-O (it spells Ohio for you Michigan fans!) and stopped to say hello. He introduced himself as Steve from Southern Ohio, who was in Rio for business. I asked where he was from in Southern Ohio beacuse I grew up in South Central Ohio (not South Central LA where the gangs are). It turns out, he went to a nearby high school and one of his best friends and I played basketball together on a traveling team growing up. He met us at the beach after his drinks and we may head out to see the Rio nightlife with he and a few other of our new friends. Another older couple overheard us talking on the beach about Ohio and it turns out that the gentleman who is here on a Mission Trip but stopped at the beach with his wife, grew up an hour east of Columbus in Cambridge. Again these are real events, and not made up like the Disney version. These type of occurences happen all of the time when travelling, so my point for telling my secrets is so you can put it to the test, because it really is a small world!

O-H-I-O is global. (Stock photo from Google)