On the Road to Find Out

After having been in Brazil for over three months I feel I have begun to understand its people a fair bit. Being able to speak fluent Portuguese would have been extremely helpful in getting to know them better though.

It has to be said that they are some of the friendliest people you’ll ever meet, especially in the cities where they constantly seem to be making up for the violence and crime that is so prevalent (here’s looking at you Rio and Sao Paulo).

Their attitude to the weather is a case in point. When it rains people just stay at home, even if they’re supposed to be at work (unless they are part of that horrible breed of office workers, in which case this might be out of their bounds). In Trindade it rained for around four days each week but never did I hear a Brazilian complain about it. The visitors complained a hell of a lot, but the Brazilians not. They just stayed in, did whatever needed doing round the house, or just sat around watching tv and getting quietly sloshed (this second one is the most common).

One thing I do miss though (and I think this is quite a personal thing) is the lack of a broad sense of humour. All jokes seem to revolve around taking the piss out of each other or making over-the-top innuendos. All good fun, but I do like something a bit more succinct; a play on words or some slight sarcasm. It is quite possible that the language barrier means I do miss out on much of this because either when it’s in Portuguese I am unaware of the craic or because translation from Portuguese to English does not do it justice.

Saying that there has been two moments of inspired genius from my time here. First being Juan’s comments when Sarah showed her a shirt she had bought; “is that one of those shirts you get free when you buy a bag of sweets.” A cheap shot, but the laughter that poured out of him, at his own words, made for any shortcomings in the actual joke. Plus, it was quite an unexpected hit. The second has to be Eli’s words of comfort to Felix after pulling something of a fatty bumbatty; “Well, you have to slay a few dragons to get to the princess.”

It makes me glad to be English when I think of all the ways I can mangle words, make strange similes and generally utter absolute nonsense, and yet have people still understand me. I would love to find out that this can happen in Portuguese, but I just can’t see how it could do it. Whenever it takes on foreign words it always makes them completely Portuguese. There really isn’t the flexibility to build in new sounds, or new clusters of sounds, which makes English such a fun language to speak. Imagine if Stanley Unwin had been Brazilian, it would have been a nightmare; he would have been extricated to the streets as some kind of clown.

Just to finish off, and seeing as I’m making so many comparisons I should say Brazil quite obviously wins. There is no way England can ever compete with the girls and beaches here, which is why I can quite honestly see myself in twenty years spouting gibberish on Ipanema beach, as I desperately try and get the best of these two very different countries.

I am still waiting for Sao Paulo to reveal itself to me.

After spending a further three days there I am none the wiser. This is supposedly the biggest city in South America, so you’d expect there to be a few things to excite a weary traveller, but I`m still waiting to find them.

On my last trip there I was trying to sort a few things out and decided to go for a bit of an amble near the centre. I didn’t realise this at the time, but Sao Paulo is not a city in which you can amble, that should be saved for the Yorkshire Dales it seems.

I was only three or four blocks from the centre when I noticed a restaurant offering meals for one Real. This is without doubt the cheapest meal deal I have ever seen. To get anything under seven Reais in Brazil is a miracle in itself, so to have a whole dish for just one is some kind of phenomenon (this equates to about 33p at the moment, normally it would be around 25p but the Pound is not my friend at the moment).

I took a closer look and realised that I had missed lunchtime.

There were around 5 or 6 ladies in pure white overalls cleaning down the room, itself pure white and rather large, with full pressure hoses. Whoever had been eating there wasn`t too bothered about the food going in their mouth it would seem.

I carried on walking and noticed two policemen pass me. Then a police car pulled up on the right, and a further couple of coppers passed me on the pavement. I suddenly realised that maybe this wasn’t a good area, but there was no way I was going back on myself.

I walked past a series of bars, heaving with drunk, one-toothed, silver-haired Brazilian men. It was only 1.30 in the afternoon. Then I came to my main challenge.

I could see the Estadio do Luz at the end of the street, a known bastion of safety. But first I would have to walk past a 200m stretch of road with delinquent, 100% toasted vagrants on one side and some of the most unlovable looking prostitutes on the other. I took a deep breath and went for it.

As I walked I couldn’t help but make a mental note of everything I had on me (100 Reais, 2 bank cards, camera, blue pants) and just hoped that I would get out of there with all of these still on my person.

I got through it, but not without feeling as perilous as I’ve only ever felt in one other place – the centre of Salvador. There is something about a strong Police presence in these situations that seems to encourage some of the edgiest environments possible, a real pressure cooker. Speaking to people later it became quite clear that – yes – this was the worst neighbourhood in Sao Paulo and – no – you should never walk through there on your own. I won’t make that mistake again.

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On the other side of the spectrum, I stayed in Vila Madalena for two of my days in Sao Paulo, which has to be described as one of the loveliest parts of the cities.

Every street is dedicated to a different product, including a whole row of 60s antique furniture, ethical goods, unbelievably expensive bars and too many clothes shops by half. Plus, the area used to be frequented by a whole bunch of hippies in the fifties with the main reminder of their presence in the street signs. Harmony, Sunflower and Wizard are all roads in this area.

Which means you can say that bar you really like is on the corner of Harmony and Wizard which really can’t be a bad thing!

The dream is back on! The S-Man has really pulled this one out of the hat and I have to say I couldn’t be happier for his contribution. In case anyone’s wondering exactly what it is I’m talking about, it is of course the mission to become a beekeeper in Argentina.

Quietly the plans have begun to reach daylight and sprout, which was seeming more and more unlikely each day that passed without contact from the S-Man (Nacho’s assertions that the S-Man walks to the calendar of ‘no man’ did not fill me with too much confidence). Plus, the guy never seemed to be able to get to grips with Shithead, and frankly, that makes me doubt his convictions. Which is why I am quite happy to have a name, Alcides Reschke, for a beekeeper living in Concordia who is going to show me exactly how Argentine honey is made. I say ‘Argentine’ honey because never before have I tasted anything quite so sweet. In its absence I’ve not even entertained eating a piece of toast in Brazil. Frankly guava jam just ain’t gonna cut it.

First I have to prove that I’m not allergic to bees. I’m pretty sure that I have at least one memory of being stung by a bee, so I think I should pass that one. Then I need to reach Concordia by 12th October. Seeing as I have to leave Brazil by the 9th, or get one hefty fine, this shouldn’t be a problem. I’m not too sure what I will be doing for accommodation right now, but I’m sure this will follow.

First time of asking, they had told us there was no way out of here by boat, so we were packing our bags, fitting everything into a collection of tightly-wound plastic bags. We would have to go back the way we came, by foot, through the hills, a three hour trek to Laranjeiras. Only trouble, this time the rain was coming down by the sackful and had been doing so for the past two days. What had previously been a difficult trail to follow in the sun would now more closely resemble a water slide. So when one of the locals came up from the beach to say that actually we would be able to get a boat, this felt something of a relief. The boat came in from one of the other beaches, it caught a big wave on the way into the shore and ploughed headfirst into the rock at the end of the beach. The driver thought this was hilarious.

We all hopped into the boat and waited for a break in the waves. Earlier that day, I thought we had lost one of the Swiss girls, Andrea. She had swum out during one of the calm spells only to suddenly be hit by three of the biggest waves I had ever seen. Each time one was about to hit her she had jumped through the wave, and each time I was almost surprised to see her head pop up again at the other side. Once she got close to the beach, I had to run over and pull her out, so tired were her arms after getting out of the waves.

We had to wait for about 15 big waves to pass before we got a quite spell. During that time the young London girl, Lucy, next to me was crying. Supposedly, she thought she was going to die. I was trying to be comforting but getting it all slightly wrong (“Hardly ever do fishermen ever die out there in the ocean. We would have to be really unlucky for it to happen to us.”) We eventually got our chance, and pushed the boat out into the ocean, the driver wasting no time in getting the motor going and moving us out of the danger zone before the next group of swells. By this time the rain had picked up and the sea seemed to be getting choppier by the minute, all of which was not helped by the fact our driver thought he was in a race (I presume his dinner was on the table). All we could see on the whole journey were outlines of the forested mountains in the distance, bloated grey skies and the sea shifting from side to side, up and down, with us placed in the middle.

The crying had stopped by the time we reached the other side, docking in the Laranjeiras condiminium, home to some of the wealthiest people in Brazil. We were ushered into a minibus and driven to the nearest bus stop, whizzing past an assortment of golf courses, health spas and general expensive decadence on the way. While we waited for ths bus, me and Betty, the other Swiss girl, played frisbee on a football field behind the stop. By the time it arrived we were both completely soaked and covered in mud. Next time I go to Punta Negra, I will be hoping for rain, but I feel somewhere inside I will be praying for rain. Who knew it could be so much fun?

So it seems I’ve made some kind of breakthrough. A website decided to publish something that I wrote and pay me for it. The article can be seen here:

http://matadornights.com/strange-fruit-a-guide-to-eating-in-brazil/

It should be noted though that they have edited the original to smithereens. All the bits that I though were quite amusing have been taken out, leaving the whole thing seeming a bit insipid. But worse of all, for some reason they have decided to plaster a gargantuan image of some sort of beef and bacon sandwich at the top. It has nothing whatsoever to do with the actual food mentioned, plus it makes an article which is supposed to be about various Brazilian delights seem, well, disgusting actually. At least I’m getting financial recompense.

I was going to write some more here but I believe the person before me must have tried to make a jam sandwich out of this keyboard because this sentence alone has taken at least five minutes to write!

Gold supplement, whey protein, guarana powder, natural energy booster, superfoods, green defense, monster mass, fish oil……..

Rio is a city obsessed with looking good. Supplements and stimulants are sold from every corner. After all, it just wouldn’t be possible to run along Copacabana, go to the gym and have that game of volleyball without a pure protein shake. There surely can’t be many cities where the locals spend more time on the beach than the tourists. Quite how they pull it off is a miracle. Maybe everyone is on the nightshift. Maybe they get time off when the sun comes out. Who would want to buy a mattress anyway when it’s this hot? So off we all go to the beach, to show off our toned abs, to take pictures of our new arse implants and to generally stare at everyone else. It’s not a bad life!

These guys know all about it: http://www.copacabanarunners.net/ipeak.html

Almost every newspaper I open has a one-page advert for Influenza. I think there’s better things to spend your money on.

It seems that swine flu is following me around. Every day I have seen more and more people wearing face masks. A teacher friend in Rio has been given the month off from work. She’s outraged. They want to make her work all Saturdays when she returns so that she won’t have lost any days. Apparently, there has been almost 200 deaths. Almost all of them occurring in the South of Brazil, where winter is definitely at its worst.

Of the deaths, only 16 have occurred in the state of Rio de Janeiro. Of which, most have been children or pregnant women. I think wearing a facemask on the street seems a little over-the-top. There are 15 million people living in Rio state. Surely the odds are against ever contracting it.

For the latest death toll visit here.

It’s my second stay in Rio and it seems only know that I am starting to understand it. Before, the favelas had always been a dark area, small clusters of activity existing on the landscape around the centre.  Their height above the city, their lack of roads and non-presence on any maps making them easy to dismiss. Their bad reputation also playing a big factor. But it’d be foolish to dismiss them. Over the past week I have been to 2 favelas. Favela Tavares Basto is one of the safest places in Rio. No gangsters. No guns. No smoking on the street. A deal has been struck with the Police and they maintain the status quo. I imagine this is where the older cops come to see out their years on the force. At the top of the favela is a club, my reason for going. It’s a jazz club (another sign that this isn’t your average favela; no booty beats here!).

View from The Maze, Catete

This venue has become quite famous for being featured in the video for Snoop Dogg – Beautiful. It’s naming as a favela surely something of a misnomer. There are as many middle-class people in this neighbourhood as poor.

Yesterday I went to Tabajaras with some friends. Another favela, this time with some of the normal problems that favelas face. Guns are drugs are quite prevalant. Walking through the streets can be quite intimidating, there are huge concrete walls surrounding many of the paths with houses overlooking you in all directions. But visiting with people who know the area makes all the difference. Everyone they see on the street knows their name and stops to chat. It takes about an hour to get to the house we’re trying to reach. Without distraction it would take 15 minutes to walk to this favela from my hostel in the centre of Copacabana, yet they couldn’t be further apart. On entering the favela I felt a lot safer. Copacabana is rife with homeless, people trying to sell you drugs and generally people eyeing you up for a lot longer than is really necessary. It’s a haven for tourists and so muggings happen all the time. The favela feels different, it is a home for a lot of people and isn’t just a place to fleece a few tourists.

That said, my plan to roam around the favelas on my own is still a long way off. I know no way near enough to ever realise that. However, my interest has been piqued. It seems like they get a bad name. All tourists stick to the main spots; Copacabana, Ipanema, the street parties in Lapa, and quite a few of them end up getting mugged. This is partly due to them being drunk and speaking English, wearing too much jewellery, carrying unnecessary cards and money and also a heavy dose of bad luck. The reputation of Rio as dangerous will always remain as tourists will keep on coming and keep on getting mugged in these very same places. As the people doing the muggings come from the favelas it is these barrios that seem to get the brunt of this reputation.

The only time people go into the favelas is through the organised tours or because they are doing some volunteering. The real nature of the favelas is generally hidden from the majority of the people. The shame that the Government feel towards them is remarkable. They take every opportunity to cover up their existence. When Michael Jackson was planning to film a video in Santa Marta, the Government did what they could to cancel it. They presumed that filming inside a favela would give Rio a bad name. It didn’t matter that the video was planning to show the favela as the vibrant community that it is or that the inhabitants were overcome with excitement at the fact that MJ was coming to their neighbourhood, they were just unhappy that it wasn’t going to be set on Ipanema beach or one of their other chosen tourist spots. Recently, they’ve been talking about building walls around some of the favelas to stop them from encroaching on some of the rainforest in the area, in what is surely just another method of trying to hide them from view.

Sometime this week I am hoping to visit Rocinha, a favela in the West of the city. It’s an extremely safe area, and is generally regarded as a great example of building a community.

I’m back in Rio, working in a hostel in Copacabana. It rains here, it rains ALL the time. I think England has a bad name.

My laptop is now fixed, but I’m beginning to think that thing was a curse. It felt pretty good the week it was broken, no need to think about work or getting anything done. I spent time with friends, on the beach, in hostels, in bars, I played guitar, and I read books. Plenty of them! And all of them, pretty special in their own way.

After reading The Aleph I now understand why Jorge Luis Borges is regarded as one of the greats. No-one writes about Life and Death like him; immortality, mythology, identity, is all documented here in astonishing brevity. The Zahir is my personal favourite from this book. To anyone who has ever played The Game, herein lies its secret.

Darkness At Noon (Arthur Koestler) is set behind the Iron Curtain. Rubashov has been arrested for political divergences and is slowly being worn down by the Government and the guards into pleading guilty to the crimes of which he did not commit. Ah, the joys of Communist Russia! But this book is ridiculously easy to read. The whole thing is set in Rubashov´s prison cell with his remembrances of the events leading up to his arrest the only divergences. It’s the writing of his mental condition as he constantly searches for the ethics behind the regime and his previous actions, and then trying to make peace with himself, which make this book so great.

I also read a collection of Luc Sante‘s writings (Kill All Your Darlings) for the New York Review and Village Voice among others (his piece on the blues, The Invention of the Blues, is surely one of the greatest pieces ever written on early blues) and Khaled Hosseini‘s Thousand Splendid Suns (a decent story made even more interesting by its backdrop in Afghanistan, and how its politics have evolved over the previous 30 years).

The hostel is 4 blocks from the beach. So far, I haven’t been in the sea once. Manilow never mentioned the rain.

For the past 6 weeks I had been growing a beard for absolutely no reason. If there was a reason it was laziness. But maybe there was more to it than that. I began to look for the answers. I eventually found some sheer wisdom from the great Graham Taylor himself (at the time he was discussing the increasing beardage of Roy Keane):

“I do think there is a psychological thing about people who grow beards for no reason.”

“People may laugh at this and say it is absolutely silly, but he changed his personality when that beard was grown. My wife will tell you the truth. When I saw the beard I told her there were problems. I do think there is a psychological problem when people grow beards for no reason. I can’t believe they do it.”

Not one to fly against the logic of Taylor´s thought, it was clear I had to do something about it. This was how bad it had got:

Psychological trauma can be seen all over that face. I can´t believe I let it get so bad. I decided the best way to take off the beard was to do it in stages, trying to imitate as many football managers as I could in the process. As it was I completely failed, my Bic was not up to the job and Souness´s hair was just to radiant. I had visions of a Rafa Benitez goatee, Sam Allardyce with Hitler moustache, the hi-tec visions of Gavin Peacock perched on my chin. Instead, I ended up with these:

Dave Navarro – Has a famous footballer ever had a beard like this? I´m not too sure, maybe it´s a bit too rock.

As much as I want to fight it, maybe there is a touch of Phil Brown in this moustache. Come to think of it, after Phil Brown grew that moustache, the Hull team did seem to completely capitulate last season. I think Taylor might have been on to something.

Chris Kamara

And there you have it. Next on the list is Socrates. I think this may take some serious work. Or maybe I should try what this guy did – Jon Dyer’s blog