Santa Catarina

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I took a 20-hour bus ride - one of those eternally monotonous journeys from late afternoon, night and into rain the following morning - from Rio to Florianopolis on the island of Santa Catarina in southern Brazil. Motels along the highway on the outskirts of Rio had Swiss names: Motel St. Moritz, Motel Lugano. Curiously out of place at first in this tropical setting, but really no more curious than, say, the Flamingo Club in Thunder Bay (long since closed), or the Tropicana in Berlin.

We drove through shabby districts where dozens of kites fluttered in the sky like moths, past repair shops and walls covered in graffiti and Bob's Burgers with “Drive-Thru” written in English.

At noon the next day we came under heavy rain to Florianopolis and I caught a couple of local buses to the south end of the island. Here it's hardly developed so beaches are not crowded and amenities sparse. I stayed at a spartan hostel whose primary clients are surfers. But the weather didn't cooperate; it stayed rainy and windy for several days, which kept everyone indoors.

One day I went to the north end of the island to have a look and found it to be far more developed with things to do if it rains instead of just sitting in the hostel exchanging disappointed looks with frustrated surfers. The next day I packed my bag and shifted up to Canasvieiras for a few days. Narrow beach absolutely packed with people. Lots of Argentinians, of course, but plenty of Brazilians, too. It's summertime here, vacation time. Crowds of families sheltering under parasols, people playing paddleball and football (soccer) at the water's edge. Girls in bikinis, boys in boardies, young and old, Boteros and beauties. The human zoo on display.

Like the Maori in New Zealand, Brazilians love tattoos. Here they're not tribal designs but instead pictorial. Lots of butterflies and dolphins as well as other, more elaborate images. Often you'll also see the name of someone beloved written in cursive script on the underside of a forearm. Best to hope that the emotion and the relationship endure.

Brazilians also love to eat and they're endlessly porking it down by the forkful. I think there are so many overweight people here because every meal seems to come with rice and french fries and large portions of meat but not many vegetables. Fruit is widely available but I don't think it's consumed in great quantity, except for the national dish, acai (pronounced ah-SIGH). Acai is a relatively tasteless fruit that's pureed together with a more flavourful fruit, guarana to which they'll often add banana slices and top it with granola. Served cold, it's delicious.

At the end of my stay on Santa Catarina I went to Florianopolis, a city of about 600 000 people that straddles the mainland and the western edge of the island, which makes me think of Istanbul straddling Europe and Asia. It's a pleasant city densely packed with 12- and 14-storey condos and a few, low colonial buildings huddling in the shadow of the high-rises. They're brightly painted, often two-tone and add a lot of colour to the city.

You see clearly that this is a wealthier city in Brazil with no vague feeling of criminality lurking in the alleys. Here it's just island people going about their business. Joggers and walkers on the sidewalk that follows the seaside and cycling paths provide a sense of familiarity to me. But I can't stay as I have to catch a bus to Uruguay. Pity, because I think it's a city worth lingering in for a while.

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Comments

[William]

you're quite wrong...
well I think you're quite wrong about sayintg that there lots of fat people in Brazil cuz of rice.... lol you can't just tell something cuz you eat what tourists do and stuff like that... to really see what is like you'd have to live with a family or something