A Brazilian Virus

Something has been spreading around Brazil, and over 3.5 million people have been affected. I thought I'd write about it before it's gone.

It's a virus...a video virus.

Viral videos aren't limited to the English-speaking world. Oh no. This one was made in one of the northeastern cities of Brazil. I think Recife.

I've official heard this song played in passing cars, blocos, and clubs. While the lyrics are hilariously innocent, the dance is what gets me.

LYRICS

Hey, do you wanna drink?

I don't wanna.

Why not?

I just don't.

Do you wanna smoke?

Uh-uh.

Why not?

I'm not going

I don't wanna

I can't

My wife won't let me

I'm not going

I don't wanna

Okay, so the English translation doesn't quite have the same ring to it.

Obama

Brahma is a Brazilian beer. And this is a bar. Get it? God I love a good pun.

This banner, among many signs (including the ones flapping behind planes at the beach) are all over town. The Brazilian people have all eyes on the US president.

I have a obscure connection when it comes to Barack Obama and Brazil.

On November 4th, 2008 I was with my cousin Alex on a rainy night in Rio. Between the TV's static screen and the Internet going in and out of connection, our hearts were pounding waiting for the election results.

I remember creating hypothetical situations in my mind of a country run by John McCain. How the world would react. What the Globo headlines would say the next morning. It was a tense evening.

Finally our minds were at peace. Barack Obama was announced the winner of the 2008 popular vote of the United States of America.

I saved the newspaper the next day, simple titled: OBAMA!!!

Two and a half years later he is making his first visit to South America, starting in the very same city. He arrives today.

But things have been complicated.

He is to meet with the Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff today. Then tomorrow, he was scheduled to tour the City of God (one of the favelas enduring pacificifation) and eventually give a speech to the Rio public at the Cinelândia plaza downtown.

I was surprised to hear he would be making an appearance at Cinelândia--a very public square surrounded on each side by main roads and skyscrapers. Nonetheless, I was excited and I began planning how early I would arrive.

A few days ago, the Brazilian government announced the cancellation of this speech. They gave no explanation and reported how he would instead speak inside the Municipal Theater. Who will be in attendance is still unclear.

The disappointment traveled through Rio almost as fast as the news of his arrival.

Although many Brazilians have mixed sentiments about the US and Obama's politics, the hope and cultural equality that he symbolizes is at the core of Brazilian hearts.

The cancelled speech and unclear plans are not a good start to his first South American visit, but we all know what Obama's good at: talking. I'm anxious to see what he says and how it is received.

In the mean time, I'm gonna go get an Obrahma and enjoy the sun.

Cabelo Horizonte

The minifro gets old--real old.

It was time for a cut.

Normally, the metro station escalator transports people onto the hot asphault like a Krispy Kreme conveyor belt. But after weeks of ceaseless rain, it's a careful, tedious transition. It's more like walking around Soviet Russia after the Cold War. Only instead of landmines, you have to tiptoe around muddy pee-puddles. Post-drizzle downtown is a repulsive realm.

I'm not more than 2 streets from my class when I get the text. "Luis would liked to cancel class." Ignoring the conjugation error, I go to my contingency plan--haircut!

Hopping over a blueish-grey pond and what looks like a rat's tail, I arrive at a salon.

In Portuguese, the word for hair is cabelo. Mysteriously, the word for hairdresser is cabeleireiro. That's 2 eiros! Why does it get 2 eiros?

I find the perfect cabeleireireireiro--an unassuming little spot run by two grey-haired men in their 60's.

After sitting in silence for the trim, I reach to sneak a picture of my stylist when he pulls out a straight razor. I've never had anyone put a blade against my skin, so I decide not to risk it and I slide the camera back in my teaching bag.

For some reason, I had always thought straight razors wouldn't work on me. Like my skin was somehow more fragile than everyone else's and the barber would pop it like a tomato sauce-filled balloon. I was wrong.

The man moved with enough precision and skill to sculpt a porcelain doll. By the end, my head felt like it had been in the hands of a hair God. Haircules. Okay, a hair demigod.

Okay, Rio. Enough rain. My scalp is ready for some sun.

vocabulaRIO

MWAH!

Flower love. Well...just a kiss.

In Portuguese, the hummingbird is known as a Beija-Flor.

beija - kiss

flor - flower

Too bad we'll never know what hummingbirds are actually doing so close to flowers. One of science's mysteries. I like to think they're whispering little axioms.

"Fortune has a fickle heart and a slow memory." flapflapflapflapflap

Beija-Flor is also the name of a Samba school in Nilópolis--a neighborhood tucked far away in Rio's north zone. The Hummingbird school won this year's Carnaval at the Sambodromo.

The final decision was in on Wednesday. This is no doubt the most coveted award throughout all competitions in Rio, including the Carioca Cup of futebol (sorry Ronaldinho and Flamengo friends).

Guess which Samba school rehearsal I attended before Carnaval this year. That's right, Beija-Flor. My friends and I took the hour bus ride over to their quadra and spent all night partying and dancing to their samba.

Congratulations, Hummingbird.

Carnaval Dia Um

Carmelitas. The first of many blocos.

Gettin off the bus up the hill. Party's already in full swing.

Endless amounts of sweet views.

In Santa Teresa one side of the street is lined with a giant stone wall and the other's got a steep incline. Getting there early is the only way to get a spot along the railing--a must for the best view.

Ellen can't avoid these dudes, even up here.

That big doll-woman is Carmelitas. She's responsible for this madness.

And we walk back down.

Onto the next...

360 Botafogo Beach

OK, so the view's really only 180°.

The address is 360.

360 Praia de Botafogo #1204.

(don't send me anything)

I found a place for the next month. And because Carnaval has basically already started, I had to settle for sharing a room with a lady name Monica.

She is a self-help author and a Dynamic Holotherapist (I still have yet to figure out what that is). I think it has something to do with stalking people online, because she spends most her day on Facebook--or as Brazilians pronounce it, "Facey-Bookey". She's probably reading my blog right now. Too bad she can't read English. Sucker.

The room's good enough for now. It consists of a big mattress, a fragile shelving thingy, and all my shit in the corner. Perfect for stumbling home after a day full of beer, parades and beaches.

At the end of the month, the apartment search is back on. All the tourist's should be gone by then, so it shouldn't be a problem.

But now it's time to party. And my friend, Briana's comin on Wednesday. YEEEEE!

Frio de Janeiro

It's cold waking up on a rock 2,755 feet above sea level.

I'll start from the beginning.

It's Saturday afternoon. Macela and I are leaving a bloco in Ipanema.

Macela: "Do you want to go on a midnight hike with me and some friends?"

Bob: "Do we have time to meet up with Luiz after?" It's Luiz's birthday and he's going to Lapa.

Macela: "Well...not really. it's gonna have to be one or the other."

Bob: "Alright, well let me call Luiz to say happy birthday."

That was the only information I was given about this hike. Granted, my Portuguese is still pretty bad and Macela could very well have given me a lot more details...but still. I still blame my ill-preparedness on her.

We meet up with Ellen, Priscilla, and about 5 other people around midnight and head over to the other meeting spot. (I should explain that in Rio, a lot of time is spent on meeting up.)

While we wait, it is only natural for one of the dudes to go buy a bottle of vodka and a bottle of coke for us to kill by the time the rest of the group shows up.

Just as the last drop of Smirnoff is gulped down, the others show up. I call them the others because they are just that. A seriously athletic group equipped with ropes, hiking boots, sleeping bags (that's when I found out we were sleeping up there), headlamps and other camping gadgets. Wow, I thought, these Brazilians really go all out.

Little did I know (and again, I blame Macela) the others would be the only prepared ones.

Here's the crew:

The trek begins. The path gets narrower and narrower, steeper and steeper. At first, little branches in the trail are the only obstacles. Then come the unseeable boulders, bridges, ridges, holes in the ground...and it just keeps going.

About an hour in, I'm dripping with sweat. Ellen's shouting and singing devolves into sporadic comments and eventually silence. The others are kind enough to spread themselves out so the almost-sober half have some light. The moon is now barely visible through the forest trees. We're nearing the top...so it seems.

2 hours go by as we finally reach a scenic view. I catch my breath, have some water and look out over Barra de Tijuca. It's a stunning coastline, though not as beautiful as the other side of the hill. I scope out the area, almost certain that our sleeping spot is somewhere near. That's when someone points up. That's right, up. Not at a 45 degree angle...but straight up. It's a huge rock face. The peak of Rio. I wasn't ready for this.

A few moments later we reach the Carrasqueira--a 50 foot rock wall. In the moonlight, it looks like the side of an apartment building. The guy with the rope goes up first with his headlight and throws down the line. The rest of the others space themselves as the first person goes up. Ellen is convinced that the fun level has bottomed out, and is content with not going up. "C'mon Elle, just do it," I say. It's funny how you can convince someone else and yourself at the same time.

One by one everyone goes up. Some slower than others. We're told not to use the rope. Apparently, it's only a safety tool. It's my turn. In high school, my friend Matt and I used to go climbing all the time in Malibu canyon. Sure we had climbing shoes and a crash pad, but I felt confident. It only took one glance down to scare me shitless. Without the others and their flashlights on their heads I would've fallen to my death. No doubt about it. But I survive. And the trail becomes a trail again.

At about 3:30 we reach the top. The temperature drops about 10 degrees. 20 to 30 other people are already on the giant flat rock. Sleeping bags sprawled out. Music blaring from an ipod or something. I walk to the other side of the rock to see the real view. It's amazing. It might be 4 in the morning, but Rio is not asleep. The mountains, beaches, clouds, streets, cars, lakes. It's like God made this place so that people could see the world from his eyes for a day.

After an hour of admiring the peak, everyone gets a few hours of sleep before the morning descent. Macela redeems herself by packing an extra blanket and some sandwiches.

I wake up to this.

And this.

And this.

Absolutely a beauty. If I had known I would be waking up in the most beautiful spot on earth I would've brought something to leave there...you know so if I ever had a bad day I would know that something of mine was at that place. I brought nothing, but I'll always have the memory.

Going back down is a pleasure cruise:

The daytime version of the Carrasqueira is a fun adrenaline rush. Not a death climb of blackness.

Can you imagine climbing that shit at night?

We get to the bottom around 10AM. My legs, scraped and sore, will forever be jealous of my eyes. But that's just the life of a leg, isn't it? Doing all the work and getting none of the spoils. Let's take this moment to thank legs, all legs, for taking it all in strides.

The Rock...

...and the crew that conquered it.

I'd say the adventure was a team effort. After all, there's no I in Bras l.

Back to work on Monday. Life it good.