I won't dwell too much on our last night in Brazil. It started in the hostel with our new Slovenian, American and Belgian friends. They were all really nice and a good laugh, the atmosphere was great. Then we progressed onto a sadly unimpassioned samba bar in Lapa, and it was a gay bar which didn't help. Then we went to Leblon to a club which the Germans said they were going to. It was horrible. The most un-Brazilian end to the trip imaginable, full of tourists, R+B and hookers. It would obvously be hypocritical of me to hold a grudge against other travellers trying to enjoy themselves, but when us gringos start to fill a room it just becomes a facile, sterile pulling pit. Rob made an effort to get involved whilst Renaud and I just stared, incredulous, at the mess we found ourselves in.
It really was a shame to leave Rio and Brazil like this; the only Brazilians I spoke to all night were two girls, at least one of whom was a prostitute trying to pick me up. Also I can't believe that the last piece of Brazilian fruit (one of the consistent treats of the tour) that I had was the slightly cachaca splashed, sullen abacaixi caipirinha that cost some ridiculous amount. Still it was good to see the Berlin guys, who will be invaluable friends over there. Also the night illustrated again just how lucky we were to experience the real Rio in the samba bars of the weekend. At half five we bussed, silently, through the now dimly lit streets, occasionally glimpsing the orange sunrise and silhoutted palm trees through beach-leading avenues.
Renaud helped us to the last, asking locals and bus operators to help us to the Rodoviaria. Then it was off to SP on a coach, two metros, one fejoida + cafezinho and one bus later we were at Guarulhos Airport and now I'm sat writing on a jet over Minas Gerais, wondering just what has happened in the last month and a half, how I'm going to get to Lisbon to meet my family and just what I've learnt from this trip.
Firstly I can't believe how lucky we have been, through the chance encounters we have consistently benefitted from. Without them we would probably have struggled to get anywhere near so much out of our trip, this assumption is backed up by what I have gleaned from talking to other non-Portuguese speaking Brits overe here. Have to give special mention here to Renaud, Ceci, Leia, Joanna, Jamie, Alex and Rafa, all of whom I am looking forward to seeing again. They have all opened my eyes to the world really, in some way or another.
Looking up at a map of Brazil, which the plane is slowly, unavoidably leaving behind, I'm struck by just how far we have travelled in the past six weeks. The country is just so big, and all so full of life. Every step of the journey has been accompanied by a barrage of extremes, from the Amazon in the North through to the sparser North-East, and back down to the South. The waterfalls dotted all around the country are an illustration of this, everywhere nature is is just teeming, forceful, bursting with life. Each giant, crawling bug reminds you of this, as does every jungle you see in the middle or edge of a city somewhere.
It is also reflected in the unrestrained exuberance of the people here. Life is great so live and love it. I don't want to ignore the problems and poverty that Brazil also contains but I can only describe what I have seen, not a second-hand horror story from someone else. In the entire time we were there a little kid tried to pick my pocket once, and as ungratifying a scene as that was in the wonder context of things its nothing. So I won't take home this brush with streetcrime in Salvador, the vagrancy of the big cities, Sao Paulo especially, aren't at the forefront of my mind either.
Instead I'll take home the amicable joy from young and old, rich and poor, that met us every step of the way. The people are happy because they're allowed to be, its encouraged. This isn't a country where lifestyle choices are banned, where law-abiding citizens are constantly watched and restricted in the off-chance they might do something, where doing anything seems to be made as elongated and bureaucracy filled as it possibly could be. This is a country where whole towns go out to free parties in the street, where if you feel like doing something that doesn't affect someone else you just do it, where freedom reigns, where essentially life and all its nuances is tailored to let you just enjoy yourself as much as possible. Thats why its so different from home and that is what has struck us over and over again, people here all understand this and are willing to help as well. Maybe its a weather thing.
I know I have a romantic, maybe naive, and only slightly informed opinion but this is just how I see it. Even the negative repercussions of this freedom; driving recklessly or drunkenly down any part of the road to littering or pissing wherever you like are not really anything to get worked up about. We have a phrase 'salt of the earth' for people that can be applied to virtually nobody in our own island anymore. It perfectly fits the prosaic, accomodating, industrious character of Brazil, particularly more rural parts.
And everywhere you look there is more, and still more.
Now I'm trying to finish this journal off in a remote part of Frankfurt Airport, where I am sat waiting for tomorrow morning and another adventure, this time to meet my parents in Pedragao, Portugal. The rhythm of Rio, the fierce heat of the North-East coast, the journeys through the roads/treks, the wild thick hum of the tropical Amazon jungle, all my friends along the way (Rob left to Manchester a few hours ago) have suddenly evaporated into memories, or rather I have and they're all still the same, just going and going. From not being able to imagine leaving Brazil, and just as I was becoming accustomed to the culture and lifestyle, I'm back in Europe; cold, impersonal and colourless by comparison.
And how can I sum up all these experiences of a country, a continent really, in words? Brazil defies quantification, its too big, too otherly. I'm just lucky that I can close my eyes and suddenly see Sao Paulo, towering and stretching beyond the limits of any sensible city, or see the thick jungle and absorb its sounds and pure atmosphere, see the hundreds of thousands of years of recycled life continuing and, despite the threats to it, thriving there, see the dust, heat, vegetation and friendly faces that filled our journey to Sao Luis, see the colourful ambient colonial delapidation amongst the carnival in that amazing city, see the purity that stretches eternally through Marahenses, see the beaches, the beauty and the seclusion of the North-East, see the pretty hubbub of Olinda, see Salvador and all i ts mighty character, see Rio and its enchanting, captivating charm, and all the way inbetween recall the journeys, flying along beaches, crawling along in coaches and laughing all the way, unable to contend with the quantity and variety of contrast that Brazil hurls at you so just enjoying it whilst we could.
If you've enjoyed reading this then save up and visit yourself, for much longer, and see for yourself all the bits that I didn't, couldn't find words for, and all of those that I barely did justice to. I know I will.
Sean Roberts, 30th August 08
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