Another slice of the city

When thinking of coming to Rio, I wanted to volunteer some of my time at an organization, so I chose Dois Irmões, or Two Brother, an NGO that my Portuguese professor from San Diego State University is involved with, and named after the twin mountains that face the favela where the organization is located. I visited the space last Thursday and taught an English class this past Saturday to adults, whose reasons for wanting to learn English range from wanting to understand music and movies in the language to dreaming of becoming a tour guide in Rio de Janeiro, and also in their community of Rocinha.

These are the murals from the outside of the building. It is impossible to get a straight on pictures because the passageways between the buildings are so narrow.

The principal mission of i2i is education: reinforcement in basic subjects for young students who face an increasingly degenerating public education system, language classes for children and adults to provide them with work and other opportunities in the city and world at large, non traditional education in subjects like jewelry making, hip hop dance, capoeira to give alternatives to adults and children who might chose other...pasttimes.

i2i is located in the favela of Rocinha. The favelas in Brazil began in the 1920s when the coffee boom was failing. Agricultural workers facing more and more severe poverty began moving into the cities. However, the lack of money and skills forced them into peripheral areas. In Rio this generally means the hillsides. Families began constructing haphazard housing made of clapboard and corrugated tin. However, they were allowed to stay because of squatting laws in the country: 20 people constitutes a burgeoning community with rights to build, and after 2 years the community has rights to the land. Because new families move in, the direction of building is vertical, which can make the structures very unstable. Landslides in favelas during the rainy season are common even if the materials to construct have evolved into concrete blocks and mortar. Generally, the highest level is a patio, to hang wash or grow basic food plants. And if new family members arrive, a new level is built atop and a new patio constructed.

The size and sophistication of the favelas in Brazil have been increasing steadily during the last 100 or so years. Generally, favela communities are not recognized by the government, have no access to water, electricity, sewage, not to mention cable and internet. A hallmark of the areas I have seen is a canal that runs through the area filled with garbage and dirty water (I'm not sure if it's sewage or just wash-water run-off), and haphazard electricity lines running from the "incorporated" areas or recognized areas to the favelas. An ironic aspect of the favelas in Rio is that the hillside views make these areas prime real estate, especially the site of Rocinha close to Ipanema beach with views overlooking the ocean. However, as of now the government has no access or right to invade these areas to push out the residents to build for the rich...not yet. There is little faith here in honesty of Brazilian government.

Rocinha is a bit different from other favelas in Rio. It is the only favela with its own busline, which indicates at least partial recognition by the city government. It has electricity, sewage, clean water, garbage pick-up, and cable and internet. It is also the largest favela in all of Latin America.

Favelas are known for their violence, drug-trafficking, rogue economies, extreme poverty, and overall lack of hope and opportunity. Being able to work in Rocinha, however briefly, has helped disintegrate that stereotype for me. Within this community are people who dream for themselves and their children, work and study for a better future, refuse the work of narcotrafficking, and legitimize their existence and that of their family and friends.

Se chama Rio

I've finally escaped from the beach paradise to arrive in another beach paradise, but this one comes with a nasty reputation. That said, my experience in this town has been nothing but amazing. We (my friend Katerina and I) live in a beautiful neighborhood called Larangeiras, where apparently professors and whatnot live from the various universities here. It's safe and quaint with lots of little bars and shops to pick up an espresso and a pastry. And we're about a 1/2 hour walk to the beach (not the famous ones, granted, but beach nonetheless). This is the VIEW! Amazing. From the Flamengo beach. These mountains surround the whole coast here. Breathtaking! However, by living in this part of the city, we don't get a realistic view of what Rio is like. The discrepancy between the rich and the poor is stark here, and by living in Larangeiras we're largely protected from the violence--lucky for us--but kept in an upper-middle class bubble, completely ignorant of the happenings that appear in the news everyday, the reality that a great majority of the people who live here face everyday. Just as ever major city has it's rougher areas, Rio has it's worst. The question remains, how to know Rio without imposing myself, without being a spectator to a situation where people die violently everyday, without being a tourist to someone else's misfortune. I haven't worked that one out yet.

The real tourist attraction for both foreigners and Cariocas (people who are from Rio) alike is the Cristo Redentor, who sits atop a mountain and takes care of the city.The view from atop was really amazing, but the sky was hazy and a bit smoggy. I have a million pictures from atop the mountain but I held back when posting. There was so much to see: the curves of the neighborhoods around the mountains, the houses stacked up on the hills, all the various beaches that swing around the landscape, highways filled with millions of cars and people, the unnavigable maze of streets...Even the monkeys enjoy the view! Not sure how he got up this high, but vestiges of the rain forest climb up the hills as well. You can take a old cable-car train up the mountain and to see the lushness still existing in this huge metropolis is strange.Samba is a craze here. We went to a club called Democratus, an old dance hall that still has big samba parties. The space was enormous and beautiful. It's hard to see but 10 or so musicians lined up on stage sitting in chairs with little tables with bottles of water and played and sang their hearts out. The place got more and more packed until you could barely even dance. I can't really do it even if I have the whole dancefloor to myself. You have to move your feet faster than mine can, so I just faked it. No one noticed, I don't think!

Uncle Steve, this is for you. Some of the graffiti we see passing under the viaduct to get to the other side of the neighborhood. There's not as much respect for the art here as there was in Salvador. You can see that people paint over it, or around it, at times. But the work is cool. Realistically, the only thing I can read is from the one above: PAZ = PEACE.

Of course, another famous site here is the Copacabana beach, where we did a little sunbathing, ate super cheap seafood, and talked down a vendor into selling his Cristo Redentor sarong for R$10 instead of R$25. I've become quite the negotiator after all this time.

Someone had built this miniature replica of Rio out of sand, and even strung little cable cars that take you to the top of the mountain Pão de Açucar (Sweetbread--don't know), which is the left mountain in the background. We haven't done that yet, but I'll post those pictures when we do.

And the delicious tropical delight of fresh chilled coconut milk. Delicious!

Even paradise gets boring...

So, I´m back. Bittersweet. A carefree life of beach, surf, sand streets where you can either walk around in flipflops or just barefoot, no crime (except for the thief who stole my jeans off the laundry line), no violence...no reality. I´m actually looking forward to a dose of favela. I have no idea what has been going on in the world for the last two weeks, or if the world beyond the horizon of the Atlantic even exists anymore. Can someone please fill me in?This is our apartment that we rented for R$350, about $250 for the month, or for the 2 weeks that we stayed there. Two rooms: living room, dining room, part-kitchen, part-bedroom...

...and this is the formal bedroom, with our new model "floor closet". Very fancy.

This is the first meal Angélica and I prepared in our new home: beef, rice, salad, and patacones con salsa...

...which I couldn´t eat because I got a mild case of food poisoning.

And these are the chickens who woke us up every morning. Between their cock-a-doodle-doing (I´m not sure what that is in Portuguese), and samba musicians who practiced early, the loud neighbors with their reggae music, and the screaming children who lived next to us, it´s surprising we got any sleep at all. But that meant we got up early to head to the beach!

There are a ton of wild beach dogs who roam around the island. If you sit still long enough they´ll adopt you for a few hours and follow you around a bit. Here´s one who adopted us on the 4th beach, deserted and gorgeous, and then left us for others. Traitor!

But all good things come to an end. Our final despedida at the port with our malandro Morro friends Cação and Fernando.

Boa viagem e volte sempre!!