Monday 26 February 2007

Going Loco in Pelourinho


I do believe we've become nocturnal. We have spent six full nights on the sauce, crawling in and waking up later each day, missing the bizarre cheese, fruit & cake breakfast by hours. Some days our bodies were running on beer and meat alone. I'm not convinced about the nutritional value of this diet, though there is plenty of vitamin C in the limes in a Caiprinia.

Several locals and guesthouse owners tried to dissuade us from visiting Salvador’s old town, Pelourinho – claiming it was dirty and dangerous. But not only has everywhere we’ve seen in Brazil fit that bill, the old LP spoke otherwise. Promises of colourful dilapidated colonial buildings and old squares hung in the air and we taxi’d over. Brazilian driving is amusing: lanes are irrelevant, fares are negotiable, safe driving is a no no and as a consequence of car jacking at traffic lights, red lights are optional.

We hop out at the bottom of the Pelourino hill and climb the steep cobbles to Placa de Pelourinho, footed by a giant colonial church and surrounded by bright, cheerfully coloured two-story buildings. They are in surprisingly good shape, and looking their best dressed in carnaval drapes. Pelourinho has been given world heritage status by Unesco, or whoever tell people their old towns are nice, and they’re given dosh to maintain and restore. Granted it is dirty and perhaps as dangerous as anywhere else, but it’s fantastic. We know instantly this is where it’s at and aimlessly saunter along pretty side streets with the milling multitude, past crumbling pillared villas, ancient lichen-spotted libraries and art nouveau fountains.

Interesting boutique shops line the streets selling brightly coloured capoeira trousers and Amazonian beaded jewellery. Drums, brass and the smells of cooking float on the breeze. Old folk sit in doorways, capoeira dancers flex for ‘donations’ and kids play chase. It feels exactly like I imagine Cuba to be, but on a hill and surrounded by favela.

James, Zesh and I settle into in a restaurant on the main square for a traditional Brazilian meal. The Carne do Sol for three, Victorian iron furniture and a bottle of Brazilian Reisling on ice make us feel awful refined. The service is comedically awful, as it's real busy and Brazilians are chillers by nature. A bad mix, but we got a great steak. In the middle of the meal, we hear drums coming up the street and following a dressed-up donkey emerge a bunch of kids and adults in carnaval costumes dancing in front of a drumming band.

As the evening settles in we reunite with our friends Sian & Chiara at their busy Pelourinho hostel. The five of us hit the streets to soak up the night time build-up. The streets heave with a mix of mild danger and happy colourful people; sweaty backpackers search for the cheapest meals, excitable children run rings round their parents, old ladies proudly don African garb and followers of Ghandi in white show off their with their towel hats. Various drumming bands & their brass sections begin their circuits, starting and stopping around the old narrow streets. We purchase capetas, evil strong fruit blended cocktails (mine a seedy passion fruit selection) that act like a ground to air missile, knocking you out of the sky before you realize what happened.

Pelourinho hides many unknown gems. Walking up streets you hear distant live music, poke your head through an innocent doorway to what appears a restaurant or residential dwelling, and you are ushered through into a tiny square packed with diners and a band thrashing out native rhythms with loads of cowbell. It’s James’ last night and we almost accidentally end up eating in the flashest restaurant in town. Ornamental lights hang from high ceilings and oils of naked ladies hang from the smoky green walls. We share good chat, tasty wine and random coconutty dishes as the drumming bands pass beneath the open shutters.

Enjoying a few beers in the yellow plastic skol chairs in the main square we are accosted by giddy kids on the next table armed with foam squirting canisters. James, with his inner child never far from the surface, rolls off and comes back with a can himself and we start a minor foam war, until parents get foamed and surrounding tables get mad so we wander off chuckling like teenagers.

Salsa drummers pass and tickle our fancy so we join the dancers behind and follow them for hours. Sydney, a black guy with funky knotted hair, leads the dancers, with entertaining choreographed moves, and in hindsight, we probably resembled the cast of the MJ’s Thriller video. We dance all the way round the circuit, stopping only for fresh chilled cevesa, and at the final square where we climb up onto the empty Military Police platform and dance with a bunch of kids. Finally, we roll back to Barra pleased with ourselves for finding this incredible place.

The next day, James jets off smoothly and Zesh and I nurse ourselves through minor hangovers. We sweat out most of the boozy toxins dancing the night before. Before long, we’re back with the girls in Pelourinho eating fine food and dancing hard again with a crowd from the girls hostel and Sydney and his mate, who appears to have modeled his hair on a birds nest. In another random square throwing a gay fiesta we ramp up the foam war with a bunch of street kids. Everyone has a can and white foamy hair, and before long our squeaky faces feel like they’ve shrunk. I fill phonebox receivers with foam. Sydney teaches us some Hippy Hop moves and an old can collector joins us and tries to get us all playing the ‘air viola’. Down the hill another massive sprawling street party knocks out rubbish Drum & Bass, so I sample the weird deep fried snacks. It seems you can make anything taste good if you deep fry it. Arriving back and the hostel as dawn rolls in, I hang my wringing wet shirt on the line & hit the air-con hay.

Over the next few nights we purchase the worlds most expensive T-shirts for the Fatboy Slim, DJ Marky & Layo & Bushwaka bloco in Barra and dance our ass off in the biggest bloco of the carnaval. Back in Pelorounho the next night, Sian, Chiara, Zesh and I visit Mr Syndeys house in the borderline favela outside Pelourinho. Before we go through the broken door complete with sleeping guard dog he informs us it’s a bit ‘hippy’. We pass darkened corridors with people slumped on chairs in corners, pass chipboard partitioned walls with double padlocked doors cut into them, climb creaky stairs up three floors and Sydney unlocks his padlocked door. Inside his box room we settle on the thin mattress and thin rotting floor, the girls translate for us and we listen to a scratchy live Bobby Marley tape. His roof is literally the tiles, and his window is a hole in the wall. Taped up magazine posters of Bob Marley and pinned up sarongs cover the grafitti’d walls. A ladies thong hangs above his bed. He plays us a bit of the ‘Hippy Hop’ he’s working on with his favela friends, which he hopes to release under ‘Musica Favela’ - a good name. As a cockroach scuttles by he informs us that up to a hundred people live in this former mansion house, generally with 3 to 5 people in each tiny room. He also tells me he wants to swap hair with me, which was nice. Apparently people of the favela want spiky blonde hair. I ask if he wants to trade his ripped 6-pack for my belly. Later he tells me my hair makes me look like a duck. Changed tune much? I don’t know. After this fantastic experience – seeing a 23 year olds room - we all push on to Pelourinho, grab a late bite and dance some more. If I’m not careful, all this exercise might make me fit.

The next day the monsoon rain as the roads turn to rivers and I grab at Taxi to the bus station, thoroughly content after an ace time in Salvador. Solo travel begins here – both an exciting & disconcerting feeling. En route to the nightbus to Lencois (in the Chapada Diamantina National park) I see two dudes storm by on a motorbike wearing tiger masks. This place rocks.


Barnaboo
Mozzy bite count: 0 [It’s disappointing to see they still don’t like my blood]
Mental Jukebox - THAT DAMN CACHASA SONG!!

The Salvador Carnaval


At Pousada La Villa Francaise we chop a stack of limes with the Swiss army knife & squeeze them into teacups laden with ice. In goes a healthy double of suspect rum (2 quid a litre and featuring a cheery pirate on the label). A splash of coke & we're back in a card game of shithead. We're charging ourselves up for another mission down the Salvador carnaval, down the Barra strip. It helps to borderline inebriated on arrival cos it's a full on mental place, in many ways a shade grating on the nerves to arrive sober. Allow me to explain...

There are several major and many minor carnavals in Brazil during February. Rio is home to the globally most famous, with glorious costume displays and popular national musicians singing atop articulated soundsystems. This is where the tourists go to take photos. In minor cities are the underdog circuits, such as in Porto Seguro (see the blog 3) and Outo Tempo, an ancient town north of Rio. These hold friendly approachable events awash with various incantations of cachasa cocktails, the uniquitous local sugar cane spirit. Meanwhile, on the Bahian coast a thousand odd K's north of Rio, is Salvador, the locals (and backpackers) carnaval. Salvador hosts an altogether more musical festival, in three city areas, the old town, the Barra beach strip and Campo Grande. As people come from all around the country and world to drink, sweat and crush in the various carnavals, they act as an a melting pot for exotic colds and viri.

We settle into our guesthouse a five minute walk from the Barra circuit, considered by most locals to be the best part of Salvador's carnaval, and spend four l o n g evenings dancing like men on fire behind articulated 'Bloco' sound systems. It is difficult to describe the madness of the main drag. But try imagining taking 3000 sweaty hedonists out of a nightclub & dropping then inside a rope-cordoned off rectangle, drop a 16 wheeled articulated lorry built out of speakers, and put a live 20-piece band on top. That's a bloco, and each partygoer inside pays a small local fortune for the T-shirt to gain entry (from 50 pounds upwards per night). Now shuffle all that lot down a 6km beach road at 2km/hr for 8 hours, surrounded by thousands upon thousands of bouncing nutcases packing the streets and hanging out of balconies and elevated viewing platforms (camaroches). Finally, add about 15 more blocos. It's a somewhat chaotic event. We're advised to take nothing stealable bar beer money (35p a beer), as being that rammed it's hard to tell who's hands are in your pockets. James & I thought later that, as a pickpocket deterrent, one would be wise filling ones pockets with razor blades or hot pasties. Zesh said all we had to loose was our dignity, which we generally lost by the 4am stagger home.

Apparently over a million out of towners and rock up in Salvador at this time of year, and the million odd locals either come out to play, or figure out some way to rinse the visitors of their cash. Guesthouses prices bust through the roof, restaurants crank up all their prices, and everyone and their kids go to the supermarket to buy crate upon crate of beer to sell on at a premium.

Apparently Skol, considered a top beer in Brazil, produce 20 million extra cans of cervesa for consumption at Brazilian Carnavals. Most of which seem available on the Salvador circuit from 15 year-old Brazilian entrepreneurs with their polystyrene iceboxes. These help wash down the ropey cuts of smoky BBQ street meat you find every 5 steps. In between you'll find loads of hawker grub: tasty pear-shaped breaded potato & chicken blobs, burnt cheese on a stick, trays of tiny boiled eggs and hot dog stalls competing to see how many weird toppings they can offer. You want crisps, carrot, dried onions & tomato ragu on't dog? You got it. What doesn't kill you makes you stronger. The sidestreets, strung with lines of lightbulbs & stalls, smell fabulous. At least until you pass the portaloos or any borderline secluded wall upon which men can slash.

The problem is that, like at home, too much beer = fighting drunks. The Cachasa in caiprinias on the other hand makes happy drunks, with samba rhythm, until eventually, and almost totally unpredictably, your legs are stolen from under you. Because of the teaming mass of wasted revelers, punctuated by more pickpockets than you'll find in all of Manchester, there are loads military police about. These draconian law enforcers stomp about single file, looking hot & bothered in numbered bullet proof flack jackets, heavy brown shirts & trousers and riot helmets. The most interesting thing is that they pretty much get to carry their favorite weapon of choice, excluding firearm in case it gets swiped. Most choose the standard baton, others bring their largest hunting knife (tied on with rope) but most carry baseball bats, in hand and ready to bat.

These fellas (and occasionally ladies) command respect and the packed crowds part like the red sea whenever they arrive. Should they happen to rock up behind you without your noticing, you're forcefully shoved aside. These dudes mean business, are everywhere, and from the looks of it, can smell trouble. We saw several disconcerting acts of police brutality during evenings in Barra, and lets just say the militia don't hold back. 6 giants with sticks seem an efficient means to dispel disorder. Once wrongdoers have been suitably duffed up, they're put in painful armholds & paraded to the MP HQ to discuss bribes.

Some nights we danced in the rain and others in a 28 degree sauna. Every night we arrived back at the pousada with mysterious marks, stains and mud over all our clothing. The combo of mud, rain & leather sandals dyed my feet bright orange, a new look I suspect will be big in 2008. The streets are filth, covered in plastic bottles, cups, mud and beer cans. Though the very poor crush and collect the cans to sell to recycling places for a ridiculous pittance. I believe they get one Reil (25p) per hundred cans. Salvador is massively poor, mainly just a sprawling tumble-down favela, and many locals scratch an arduous living.

Traditional blue and white strings of beads, with an African tribal backstory, are sold and worn by all as they bring good luck. Zesh & I get a few, and I find they rip out my chest hair - not good when you only have 14 hairs to start with. James couldn't seem to stop himself, and the crazy foo bought so many carnaval necklaces he ended up looking a bit like Mr T from the A-Team.

If anything, the thing that let down the Barra side of the Salvador Carnaval was the music. Ironic considering it's the musical festival. Every Bloco had a massive polished band uptop, lead singer strutting at the front or hanging off the side. But they all seemed to play pretty cack 'Soca' music, bassless, brass heavy and real samey. At Notting Hill carnival every bloco plays different tuneys. Here there is one song, which I believe is called 'Cachasa', that is so nationally popular and infuriatingly catchy, that every bloco played it. That said, once we almost got a handle on who was playing on which bloco, we found a ska reggae truck & danced our asses off in full carnaval getup: beads, garlands, sweatbands and skol Bandanas. A look I doubt will be big in 2008.

While the Barra run was definitely a full-on experience, in our imaginations we had thought the carnaval to be more following drummers & fancy dressers around old streets. Like the impromptu street party we happened upon in old Rio - which as it happens, is exactly what we found when we hit Salvador's old town, Pelourinho...


Barnaby
Beard state: kept to blade one on the beardy trimmer to allow the baldy crap bits time to catch up.
Mental Jukebox: ‘All Night Long’ by Lionel Richie

Monday 19 February 2007

The Night Bus To Salvador


Settling into the business class back row seats of the night bus to Salvador, things look good. The chairs are huge - wide bucket seats that recline almost horizontally & have soft fold down footrests - and this is in second class. I imagine first class at the front to have Playstations & pole dancers. There isn't a steerage class. Tonight Matthew, we are the great unwashed. Each of our seats has a blanket & headphones in a sealed bag and gratis espresso & water available at the rear. Emergency exits are located here, here and here.

We were warned they like to crank up the AC on these flush buses. They do, but fortunately we've donned troosers & have spare tops. The only downside we can see so far is that we're next to the bog, which while bearble with the door closed, lets out an almighty honk when the door is used. Another minus is that it's Feb 14th - Valentine's Day - and I'm sat on the back row with a beardy man.

When the movie fires up it's nice to see it's been poorly dubbed into Portuguese, and that only one of my headphones work. Close but nae cigar. While I could do with the linguistic practice, I settle into finishing up my James Bond 'novel'.

Meanwhile, it seems the bus has two speeds. Real slow and lethally fast. A caravan of buses seem to form on the road to Salvador, and trundle along for 20 minutes to pull into any empty bus station for a 30 minute cig break. No wonder this journey takes 12 hours. I say that till we break free of the pack and old drive drops a cog & tears off. Jesus. All of a sudden, in the darkness of the bus I watch my demise appear to unfold before me. This man must have had a few too many redbulls. The fear of the bus being hijacked at gunpoint by bandits is quickly replaced for a very real fear of rolling off the half finished road off a cliff or into a forest. I ponder if saving 40 quid on a 12 hour night bus instead of a 2 hour flight was really worth my life? How much is life worth? Probably at least 55 bob. Shame on the 1st class passengers. They have paid more to get dead first and to soften the impact for us.

I generally find the only way to survive mental bus trips is to force oneself to sleep. But when it's so scary you've got to sleep it's also generally too scary to sleep. Catch 22. Furthermore, as soon as I'm halfway off, drive smashes over crater in the muddy road and sends Zesh sprawling into the armrest dividing us, which spears him into a comedic spastic fit, delivering me a good slapping. While this doesn't help my drifting off, I do finally managed to board the bus to the land of nod, and have all sorts of vivid dreams about natural disasters & getting slapped.

As I'm cuffed back into consciousness at 6am I get my first sights of Salvador. It appears to be a gently rolling hilly landscape covered, literally every square meter, in unorganised favela housing. Not the worst tin-roof-in-a-rubbish-dump shantys, but home made brick and concrete half-finished stained buildings. They look a little like the pretty whitewash Greek island houses weird sleazy uncle. They roll as far as the eye can see and for a good two more hours before we his the equally ugly, if higher rise centre. I'm later informed that the locals joke that Salvador is three nice bits swallowed up in one ever growing favela.

This is where we've come to party. Carnival 2007. Let the mayhem ensue...

Barnaboo

Current state of beard: Patchy - perhaps this was a bad idea...
Mental jukebox: 'Samba Magic' by Basement Jaxx
To see all my photos so far: http://www.flickr.com/photos/barnabyaldrick

Friday 16 February 2007

Warm Rain (Porto Seguro, Brazil)


We touch down like a dropped pancake into Porto Seguro, hop in a taxi & head to a cheeky little pousada (guesthouse) hidden away in a shopping centre. So begins our first taste of economy class, at least comparative to the aircon bday minibar fun of Rio. A suspect ceiling fan with built-in harsh white bulb wobbles in it's hinges. Thin sandpaper bog roll & a shower with all sorts of colourful bare wires hanging loose above it. But it's a clean triple room with a locking door in a little palm tree oasis, surrounded by hammocks. Joanna, our ace but very-non-english-speaking host leaves our key (look out for the photo of it...) & leaves us to it. It's late. We're tired. We crank up the fan & set down our bags & heads.

Then the car alarm begins. Then the car alarm continues... for several long hours. Some faceless voice tries to shout it down in angry Portuguese. Occasionally it sounds like the car battery begins to fail, & give up, only to fire up afresh with renewed verve. Finally I drift off in spite of the noise making a note to put earplugs & valium on the shopping list. Meanwhile, in the wings, an army of mosquitoes with their knifes & forks select their targets...

The next morning we awake refreshed & fortunately it seems either I have generally unappetizing blood or James & Zesh have tastier blood. Either way, I'm clean and they have been made into a feast. Unlucky boys. Perhaps my A Rhesus Positive isn't to the Brazilian Mosquito's taste. Not that I'm offended.

We shower up (with no electoshock casualties) & decide to have a butchers up the coast. After about 2 miles stroll through the gentle surf, past and awful lot of nothing and a full-size beached colonial galleon, we duck into a beach bar & put away a few beers. 600ml Skols, in at 70p a pop - happy days. They play mediocre salsa covers of Beatles songs that sound a bit like the tune you get when you hit demo on a casio keyboard.

A few dips in the sea later we stroll on, to the new soundtrack of waves & air cooled beach buggies screaming down the coastal road. It seems we're drifting into travel time. A lot of conversations seem to go 'What's the date today?' '...the 12th I think'. 'I thought it was the 13th'. 'Does that make it Monday?' 'Yeah'. 'Cool'.

Another mile down the beach we look back at Porto Seguro & note that the sky has turned a teal blue-grey colour. In front of our eyes the sky overhead darkens and all of a sudden it looks like dusk. Out to sea the sky churns and the rain on the horizon billows like a net curtain in a breeze. The rain begins spitting on us and Zesh ducks for cover in the nearest restaurant. Jim & I stand arms outstretched as the witness to the growing onslaught. It's only warm rain. The raindrops grow until they set the sand into a dance. The view turns to mist and the temperature noticeably drops. We do a little rain dance ourselves as a thank you for the show & dash for cover. Locals and gringos laughingly huddle together under a dripping roof, watching the lightening & hearing the thunder direct overhead while some Latin rhythms unfold from a wet speaker. An old couple slow-dance tenderly under cover and warm my heart.

That night the power to the town kept sporadically going out. The first time it went down Jimbo and I were in an arcade in the middle of doing wicked on 'House of the dead 1'. Later it seemed the whole town went down, and shopkeepers stood in their doorways with candles chattering and generally keeping the light fingered criminal collective out. We ate in mall running on a dodgy generator and I ordered an excitingly named dish which turned out to be three leathery steaks and chips. Every time the generator cut out and we were plunged into darkness I gave Jims baldy heed a slap.

Over the next few days, when it wasn't raining, we explored this charming coastal town with its colourful shops, and the 15th century Portuguese colonial old town up on the hill, where we watched a geezer make chocolate from coco beans. He made me try a raw bean (grim) and the pounded, sieved, sugared end product (yum). When it was raining, we'd lounge in giant hammocks, play endless games of shithead with flimsy cards and catch cockroaches under glasses. James staged some unimpressive gladiatorial bouts such as 'REASONABLY BIG COCKROACH vs WINGED ANT'. While the ant held its own, they we're really game. Zesh'd also play how many mozzies he can squash in one handclap. So far the record is two, but I'll keep you in the loop.

We also met our first bunch of travelers, an Aussie couple (Stafford & Lydia) & two sound Spanish speaking brit ladies (welsh Sian & Kiara from Jersey). We laugh the evening away trying to teach them the basic rules of shithead over two bottles of bacardi black, coke & a nuffty fresh limes. Stafford creates a new nickname for Mr Willcocks... 'cocksmoker', which I hope will stick. Around midnight and on the girls recommendation we sack in cards & skip down to the Passarela do Alcool (Alcohol walkway) for blended cocktails at Wilma’s Capeta shack. I order something with lots of x's in it's name which excellent & sherberty. Z gets some suspect strong chocolate drink & Jim orders a capeta, which contains guarana, coco powder, cinnamon condensed milk & booze. All in all, tasty stuff, and a bargain for a quid. Pokey too. After sinking these we drop by a tequila bar for caipirovskas & the girls spend the rest of the night driving the toilets. We head back, tuck the casualties into bed & get the cards out for several more games of shithead... this time with Leeds rules.


Barns

Current state of beard: still patchy
Mental jukebox: The Boys are Back in Town
To see all my photos so far: http://www.flickr.com/photos/barnabyaldrick
5 day forcast: 33, 32, 33, 36, 33 celsius

Keeping it Rio (Rio De Janeiro, Brazil)


Rio De Janeiro, Brazil. One of the world's top five most dangerous cities. Not one person discuses Rio without a note of caution. On day one we went to the bank ¬iced a guard packing double magnums and standing behind six foot high built-in bullet-proof shield. The old Lonely Planet goes on like a broken record about not wearing, flashing or carrying unnecessary valuables. This has unfortunately meant even wearing the £4 calculator watch I bought specially was out the window & using my camera was restricted mostly to touristical spots where the dedicated 'Tourist Police' keep it real safe.

But in spite of this Rio hardly felt that dangerous or oppressive. A healthy degree of paranoia & vigilance is essential in all new and exotic pastures. Only out with spending money for the day we got up to all sorts of quality stuff. We partied late into the night at an edgy street party in the crumbling former mansions of the Lapa district, putting away too many potent 3 Brazilian Reil (75p) Caiprinia cocktails. We also hung with the local 'it crowd' at various unimpressive generic hiphop clubs. We ate at possibly the most random pay-by-weight churrasarie restaurant, where you stack your plate from a buffet & set it on scales before you eat. We also drank iced Brahma's on Ipaneama beach as the sun set & the locals came out to play volleyball & keepy-up. During the days, when we weren't turning into prunes in the hotel sauna, we did the cablecar up sugarloaf mountain & drove up to the Christ Redeemer statue trips, both of which have awe inspiring panoramic vistas of Rio's inlets & misty hills - keeping it real pretty.

Rio's really got a lot going for it. No less than 37 baking hot white sandy beaches for the mad dogs and Englishmen to choose from. Hundreds of mint condition colourful VW campervans rumble round, converted into pickups, buses, drinks stalls & bedrooms. Shops sell 12 packs of Brahma beer for just 8 Brazilian Reils (under two quid). Street hawkers pimp fresh coconuts & cinnamony churros crunchy doughnuts. Plus you can buy cans of Lime 'Ice Tea Goodness' and cheetos crisps. I proper love cheetos. After many a eurohike caravan holiday, they're as much a holiday flavour as the smell of suncream. Plus you get free 'super tattoos'! In two bags we got 8 tattoos! Get in. The drink of choice here to wash down these tasty crisps is either Brahma or, amusingly enough, Skol. Perhaps one of England's worst beverages. A tramp juice in the same league as special brew. But over here, served from the chiller, it tastes real nice & is cheap cheap cheap, which keeps it Reil good value.

Rio has also surprised me as being so clean and modern. While there are the omnipresent favelas, clinging to and usually on the very doorstep of better off areas, the cars are new & a huge force of bright orange uniformed street sweepers sweep up leaves & rubbish - generally keeping it real clean.

The food's been interesting too. While it seemed for a while that apart from suffering a little indigestion, man can live off beer, burgers and crisps alone. Though I've seen supersize me, so we've thrown ourselves into Rio cuisine & eaten all manner of strange black pig stews, giant seafood platters, traditional Fejiodas, random weigh your plate buffets & mediocre Brazilian style pizzas (which the waiters insist on serving in individual slices). Most food is served with a tin of what looks like car oil. Plus, one night we bought some real cheap and surprisingly tasty smoked cheese off a tramp, which was keeping it real economical.

While airports were being closed back home due to snow, we perched on the 13th floor roof garden in 36 degrees, splitting time between burning on the decking, swimming in the chilled pool & sweating out cachasa toxins in the Sauna. There was also a gym, but it may surpirse y'all that I never saw inside it. From the roof we watched fantastic panoramic sunsets over the copacabana district and out to sea. In the morning a huge buffet of fresh fruit, crepes & various sausagy friedness was served with intense coffee & loads of obscure fruit juices (cashew juice anyone?). The fresh juice was unsweetened proper freshly squashed exotic fruit goodness, not from concentrate, which is what it's all about... keeping it real tasty.

One day we decided to visit the Santa Teresa district of Rio. An area of dilapidated elegance. We hopped in a taxi, whose driver seemed confident he knew the square we wanted to visit, but after asking for directions twice it turned out our man was clueless. So we jumped out in the middle of Santa Teresa, on the Bonde tram line, by some colourful bars & shops with loitering bystanders. Literally a minute later, the tiny archaic yellow tram rolled round the corner packed with fancy dressed revelers playing brass instruments. People dressed in wigs, Viking hats, cross dresses, nappys. Following the tram were about 200 dancing drinking nutters. The tram pulled to a hault pretty much bang in front of us & a random impromptu street party began! We grabbed a couple of chopps (small cool beers) & bemusedly joined the fun for an hour or so, when the tram finally trundled on. From there we took a stroll up towards the square we were looking for, admiring the crumbling decadence and grabbed a bite to eat from a list of undecipherable Portuguese dishes. Point & hope. Keep it real random.

After a few days toasting in baking sunshine, churning black clouds rolled in and the heavens opened. Fat warm rain turned the streets to rivers & beat the sandy beaches into a pebble dash. We became a bit hotel bound, splitting time between spraying the bathroom roof with the bday and learning various fruity swearwords from the subtitles of '48 Hours' (staring Eddie Murphy). My Portuguese is coming along nicely. I'm informed they don't use the letters W or Y. Which seems to keep it real complicated when then they say James' surname, Willcocks. 'Veeeeelcokz'.

On our last day in Rio we get a taxi to the airport to bounce up the coast to Puerto Seguro, and to try & take our eyes off the crazy rain soaked traffic we race through, we spend a moment reflecting on how it's gonna be a bit less four star from here on. Rio's yellow taxis motor about like mentalists, carving two lane roads into four or more and screaming up into any available space. It's a white knuckle ride of perpetual fear, and I generally ended up stamping out a size 9 brake pedal in the passenger footwell. But where else in the world is getting a taxi any different? The same happens in Leeds. Taxis the world around - keeping it real dangerous.

Anyhoos, we're off to Porto Seguro next, a relaxed little town in Southern Bahia state. Then it's onto Salvador, where the carnival goes balistic. So from the whitest, most overdressed man on Copacabana beach, I bid thee well,


Barns

Current state of beard: patchy
Mental jukebox: Girl from Ipanema
To see all my photos so far: http://www.flickr.com/photos/barnabyaldrick

Thursday 8 February 2007

Coca cabaaaaaana (Leeds, England > Rio De Janeiro, Brazil)

People!

Last time I travelled I got piles. Not the requiring-an-ice-pillow type setup, but piles all the same. That's the lasting feature of my 03 globetrot. A pretty crappy feature to be left with, if you take my meaning. You may think it's a 'crap' subject on which to kick the blog off, but purile is my bag. Might be wise to get used to it. Beside I've decided to hope for more from this trip - a tapeworm or aemebic dysentry perhaps. Something with anecdotal & weight loss value. That way I'll roll back home all lean & washboard buff. It's all gonna be about unhygenic food for me. Noshing out on leftovers off the floor round the back of some bins & getting chronic diarreohea is gonna be the next Atkins. You heard it here first folks.

Anyways, let me introduce myself: I'm Barnaby Aldrick & this is my Travel Blog & website. I'm a Leeds based uk photographer & have decided to take 3 months to ramble around and about South America. I've never written a blog before, but feel I must continue to embrace technological communicatory advances, so instead of sending account-clogging spam a lot, I'm going to be writing these badboys & hitting you cats with an occasional email once in a while to inform you of blog updates. So - our tale begins in the charming northern metropolis of Leeds...

Leeds - London: I almost began this exotic mission by missing the bus to London. It seems I hardly need BA cabin crew to cancel my trip, when I can so easily do it myself. But I made it with seconds to spare & no time to buy lunch. For the first time in perhaps a month, I finally stopped giving it headless chicken & could just sit vacantly and gently fart my way to Rio. No more scooting about town in any spare minute to buy £4 calculator watches with flat batteries, comparing prices of travel towels & travel adaptors. It's been 1am stops & 6am starts for a bit long & before I knew it I was flippin the Z's. That was all very nice until for some reason I began waking myself up by biting my tongue real hard. I did this like three times over & I assure you there are nicer ways to drift back from nod... I believe on the top ten worth ways to wake up list, a subconscious violent molar clamp down is 2nd only to sleepwalking over exposed live electical cable.

Those that know me may know about my, shall we say, 'fallable' short term memory. I have a habit of putting important travel documents into the back of seats & absently watching them sail / fly / drive off. But I rolled into London and noted to myself that hadn't left any tickets, bags or clothing, and began to feel rather smug that I'd not forgotten anything. Typical then that it hit me that I'd forgot to pack the one thing that makes my camera go, the camera battery charger. That's the way to kick off a photographic 'business' trip! I manage to print & chop out currency coverters, email scans of soon expiring coach cards to myself & find out my blood type, but forget the charger. Good work fella. With an obscure camera battery charger to find in a county where I can only say 'good day' & 'thank you', there's a chance the photos page on this site may remain empty...

London - Heathrow: After a cheeky cwaaafee & a BLT on the NX032 we were amusingly informed by our sarky heathrow bus driver, that the bog is a bog, not a smoking room, & has a sensitive cig smoke detector which cuts the engine, sending us all careening to our doom. I never knew this smoke deterrent, and on reflection, could be a slight oversight slash opportunity if you're on a roundbout or ragging down an autobahn with a suicidal smoker...

I like the more obscure end of exteme sports. Sky diving is all good, but I prefer extreme ironing - while you're wearing the clothes or extreme washing up - with bleach or acid. Today began an extreme heating excerise, to push my body from cold to hot in a real short space of time. I was shuddering & puffing consensation as I scraped ice off me car this morning and in 15 hours I'll be in the 35C Rio sweatbox. I'm sure you could go cold hot faster, in a turkish bath perhaps, but you wouldn't end up in Saaahf America.

I do love to travel. Exploring pastures new, seeinng new & crazy stuff and being forced into direct experience are my bag. In his autobiographical book 'Travels' Michael Crichton once wrote:

'Often I feel I go to some distant region f the worl to be reminded of who I really am. There is no mystery of why this should be so. Stripped of your usual surroundings, your friends, your daily routines, your fridge full of food, your wardrobe full of clothes - with all this taken away you are forced into direct experience. Such direct experience inevitably makes you aware of who it is having that experience. It's not always comfortable, but it's always invogorating.'

Man's onto something there. A ship is safe in the harbour, but that's not what ships were built for. And to discover new oceans, you need courage to leave shight of the shore. But enough No Fear poster quotes... I just wanted to inform y'all what I get out of travel.

On the heathrow tube I ended up chatting to this 60 yr oldie lady off to uganda or kenya, & we had a pleasant bitch about BA cabin crew. Later I bumped into her again & she'd had a member of staff do her boarding pass before queing & started chatting about free upgrades - & she'd had loads. Then I spotted the dog collar & cross on a chain getup. *Lightbulb* Note to self: wear a vicar fancy dress set for a cheeky bump to business. Happy days.

I'm not sure many of you know, but I've got mental jukebox. It's mental cos it subconsciously crossreferences lyrics with current experiences & pulls up a tune. At this stage I couldn't shake Janis Joplins 'leaving on a jetplane'. At least it's a good tune. Better than something by take that. I'll keep you informed of musical updates. Who needs and iPod eh?

Heathrow - Rio: So I met my bwais, James & Zesh at the airport. We're gonna be checking the Brazilian carnavale out for a few weeks together. They're me lions from minor anarchic childhood days. As we wander the check-in queues a cheerful BA geezer we told we were off to the Brazilian carnavale warned us to watch out for carnaval he-shes. He basically said that if they've got their baps out for all to witness & are real proud of em, they generally have the spuds & banger. Or at least once did. Good advice. We've also been warned to drink beer from a supplied straw, as rats aparently love nothing better than to piss all over beer crates. More reason to go caiprinia's all the way really...

I love free drinks on planes. 'Drink sir?' '...yes my good lady, I'd like two bottles of bubbly wot ain't babysham. By the way, not striking today, cos the old staff get more tea breaks than you or something?'. One of my friends back home & his mates drank an entire plane dry of lager on a teneriffe flight. I thought it'd be amusing to try & raise that bar, but we play a reasonably respectable card. Apparently, one of my boys informs me, alcohol affects you 4 times as much at atmosphere. Garcon-more wine please.

In flight, I sat with listening to my bbc portuese cd, learning to count. Porty is like a weird hybrid of english & french, with some mystery sounds the english generally can't say. Let's just say it might be a while before I'm at bingo there... But I have learnt to say 'My name is Luis Coreia, I am married', which may help keep the ladyboys at bay.

Seatbelt lights bing on. 527mph ground speed. Mini Jd bottles make you feel like a giant. A good movie (the Illusionist) with bad sound and small picture has been watched. Some patchy sleep caught. Watch 2 hours back. Obligatory holes poked the in the sickbag. A perfect landing. Doors disarmed and BOOM - into the toasty sweatbox that is Rio.

Rio: My first impressions of Rio airport was the fact that 80% of the airport vehicles were good-condition old school VW camervans. I remember my photographic stallmate Del telling me they still make new Campers & Beetles in Brazil. They're everywhere. Good call.

In the bazing sun we flag our ride. 'Taxi! To our 4 star mini bar in Cococabana, obrigardo', humming the old jukebox selection: Manillo's 'Cocacabana' all the way. Just need to find Lola, apparently she was a showgirl, with a floral hair getup.

So once we'd checked in, we find our AC triple has a fridge full of Brama beer & snacks (do they already know us?). From our 8th-floor vertigo inducing balcony complete with dangerously low balcony, we can see the copacabana beach down the road. There's a phone in the bog & bday that can hit the roof. On the actual hotel roof there's a pool, jacuzzi, sauna and a gym. Ne bad at all, we thought. But I doubt I'm gonna see the inside of the gym.

Another observation is that Rio appears to have a real big sky. Not sure if there's any scientific grounding for it, but it seems pretty mac daddy.

Which reminds me! The 1st food we voted to sample in Brazil was a MacDonalds. Believe me, the irony isn't lost, travelling so far to eat the same lardy rabbish, but I like to sample Maccers regional variations. I had a cunningly named McNifico which, it may surprise you, didn't quite live up to expectations. Later on, somewhat out of the zone from 48 hrs nae kip, we dug out a traditional Brazilian Feijoada restaurant. It's a traditional massive black bean & salted suspect pork parts dish with shredded garlic kale, some chili fire water & deep-fried flour blobs. From a list of various pork related parts you could choose ears, trotters & fatty belly pork. But when in Rio, do as the cariochas do. (By the way, Rio citizens call themselves cariochas and rate themselves rather, even claiming that God is from Rio)

Anyhoos I'll leave you there for now. I will be in touch to cheerfully (and more than likely wordfully) gloat about some new blog I've just writed about meeting Padington Bears' old Peruvian schoolmates in deepest Brazilian rainforest...

I've set two targets for this trip:
i) to clock up my a half centenary of countries by my return. I've visited 43 so far. Not sure what colour that makes my carbon footprint, but I doubt it's green. Might have to join a commune or plant some trees at some stage.

ii) to grow a beardy! This is as much for your amusement as anything, as I've notouriously patchy facial hair. The boys I'm with are head shaving beard growers, especially Zesh who has been able to grow a full ZZ top in a mere afternoon since he was 15. Jim took a beard trim earlier & now our sink won't drain.

So I don't yet have any photos to unveil & pimp on my new & fancy website, but they'll be up as soon as I have the nerve to flash my kit, so to speak, in this notouriously dangerous city.

Reet, we're off to play spot the smallest thong on Ipanema Beach, so for now I bid y'all well.

Take it sleazy. Good bile. Cheery ho. All the breast. Smell you later. Etc.

Peace, love & big skies

Barnaby

E: barnsyard@hotmail.com

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