And The 2016 Olympic City Is...Rio de Janeiro!

And The 2016 Olympic City Is...Rio de Janeiro!

It's time to break out the Mardi Gras beads and barely-there bustiers and learn how to spell "Rio de Janeiro" without hesitating, because Rio is indeed the host city of the 2016 Olympic Games. All this morning and early afternoon, the world was glued to their TVs and Twitter as the Olympic Committee first heard final pleas from the delegations from Chicago (Prez Obama was there), Rio, Tokyo and Madrid and then announced their decision in favor of the first Olympics to be held in South America. While people rush
, While people rush onto Copacabana and Ipanema beaches to celebrate, we can already imagine the tour operators and airlines brainstorming their deals for travel to Brazil in 2016 and even these next few years as the city strengthen its infrastructure and emerges as a true hot destination. Stories featuring Rio—and we're guilty of this too—haven't always had the most positive, alluring subjects, especially since Rio is home to ninja gangsters and flesh-eating Caiman lizards. But it's expected that with this huge win, the city will take major steps to clean up their slums and crime and, in turn, their image and tourist safety. After all, Rio is also host to other good things aside from the Olympics; offhand, we think of "tall and tan and young and lovely" girls in bikinis, a bike sharing program, and Tutti-Frutti hats a la Carmen Miranda. And that's good enough for us to take a second glance, so long as there remains the promise of cool caipirinhas. Related Stories: ,,,,,,