This girl goes to Ipanema...

I don't know what triggered my mood for some brazillian music. Maybe it was after hearing Bebel Gilberto croon "life could be so nice.." as I entered the mall full of colourful people who all look so contented, they could rightfully fit the mood for the music video of the song if I were to magically make a video camera appear in my hands and record their lingering smiles and potentially permanent perkiness...it seemed like the sparse crowd was floating in slow motion at half-speed.

So I impulsively indulged in some bossa nova...like ice cream, it felt so good. It's thursday night, the moon is full, the breeze is cool and for a few minutes I exhale in contentment and walk through the mall again in my mind...those smiles, so infectious...the feel-good calm, so delicious.

And listening to all this brazillian music is making me lust to travel to brazil one day...dance to some samba in Rio, one day..one day..

It's just a phase...I'm sure pretty soon I'll be craving for some electronica hip hop when I step into the sushi shop tomorrow or something...But bossa nova will definitely be something I will turn back to when I get old and realize my weary bones cannot do popping and locking anymore, I will be grooving dawdling the two-steps with my arthritic limbs and my aged husband (if he's not in a wheelchair already) will dance with me. (He'll just have to cheer by the sidelines if he's in a wheelchair)

Here are some tracks I've dipped myself into like strawberry into chocolate fondue...Irresistable. Enjoy...

Am I the only one who thinks that Lisa Hannigan should marry Damien Rice and make a choir full of their babies?

And did you know that Bossa Nova means New Wave in Portuguese? And Nouvelle Vague - that's New Wave in French. Ha! We learn new things (and songs) everyday...

Bossa Nova all started in Brazil in the late 50s. I'm not an expert at the genre so that's as far as a history I will give you about Brazilian music.

But if you wanna learn more about it...listen to this podcast: Gilles Peterson in Brasil: Bossa Nova.

And of course the roots of the Bossa Nova comes from the Samba and if you're curious about Samba, here's another insightful podcast. You know what they say,

"Those who don't know how to make samba, make food, those who don't know how to make food, play football."