AK47's and flipflops
So my Rio contact Agent Calé used to live in the biggest favela in Rio, Rocinha. He still has lots of friends there, and took me to watch the Brazil v Ghana game on Tuesday. He told me not to take my camera with me so I don't have any pics, and I'm not sure I can do it justice with a brief description. It is, however, one of the most vibrant and friendly places I've been in a while. The fact that it is kept that way by gentlemen in shorts, flipflops and a variety of automatic weapons is just one of those things that makes Brazil a bit different from other places.
Sure there's poverty all around, but there are businesses and cafés and pet stores and machine shops and World Cup decorations and regular people doing regular things. Kids play football in the narrow streets, boys flirt with girls, mates play tricks on each other - although often with pretty powerful firecrackers, I noticed. Motorcycle taxis lurch around winding streets, darting between buses and shopping-bag-laden old women who don't bat an eyelid. I know this because we had to take a couple of them up and down the mountain Rocinha occupies (moto-taxis I mean, not grannies). Lots of people called out to Calé to say hi as we walked around, including the druglord kingpin of the neighbourhood, who was surrounded by chaps with the aforementioned weapons - I saw at least two AKs, an Uzi and what we call in gamer circles a BFG (first letter is for 'big', the third is for 'gun', you can guess the middle one) that I didn`t recognise. Yes this is pretty insane, but the real Brazilian cops who don't go into favelas are scarier-looking and smile less, which are likely both consequences of their being paid considerably less than their favela counterparts.
We watched the match under the corrugated iron awning of a tattoo parlour. There were about 30 people standing around watching the game - men and women of all ages and some very cute kiddies - all laughing and commenting on the players and enjoying themselves. Ronaldo's early goal set us up for a highly entertaining 85 minutes - each time Brazil scored, the whole crowd leapt to their feet and ran out into the street to make a joyous and almighty racket, only to dash straight back to their original postions as firecrackers went off all around. I was prepared for this by the third goal and sprinted out into the muddy street with everyone else. The tattoo guys also had a huge soundsystem that played a 'Brasiiiiiiiilllll!!!!' electronic jingle after each goal.
There's so much more but this is getting long. Buy me a drink sometime and I'll tell you the rest.
Sure there's poverty all around, but there are businesses and cafés and pet stores and machine shops and World Cup decorations and regular people doing regular things. Kids play football in the narrow streets, boys flirt with girls, mates play tricks on each other - although often with pretty powerful firecrackers, I noticed. Motorcycle taxis lurch around winding streets, darting between buses and shopping-bag-laden old women who don't bat an eyelid. I know this because we had to take a couple of them up and down the mountain Rocinha occupies (moto-taxis I mean, not grannies). Lots of people called out to Calé to say hi as we walked around, including the druglord kingpin of the neighbourhood, who was surrounded by chaps with the aforementioned weapons - I saw at least two AKs, an Uzi and what we call in gamer circles a BFG (first letter is for 'big', the third is for 'gun', you can guess the middle one) that I didn`t recognise. Yes this is pretty insane, but the real Brazilian cops who don't go into favelas are scarier-looking and smile less, which are likely both consequences of their being paid considerably less than their favela counterparts.
We watched the match under the corrugated iron awning of a tattoo parlour. There were about 30 people standing around watching the game - men and women of all ages and some very cute kiddies - all laughing and commenting on the players and enjoying themselves. Ronaldo's early goal set us up for a highly entertaining 85 minutes - each time Brazil scored, the whole crowd leapt to their feet and ran out into the street to make a joyous and almighty racket, only to dash straight back to their original postions as firecrackers went off all around. I was prepared for this by the third goal and sprinted out into the muddy street with everyone else. The tattoo guys also had a huge soundsystem that played a 'Brasiiiiiiiilllll!!!!' electronic jingle after each goal.
There's so much more but this is getting long. Buy me a drink sometime and I'll tell you the rest.
posted by James B. Martini | 12:13 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home