PART 10 – SOA GABRIEL DO CACHEOIERA

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The taxi ride from the port at Camanaus to Soa Gabriel took about 20-30 minutes, and the scenery was spectacular. The tropical landscape surrounding the houses and farms that we passed on our way by, reminded me of some ritzy, luxurious tropical paradise, like a cross between Miami and Costa Rica. The vegetation was just so… so naked, so fresh, so absolutely luscious. Soa Gabriel Do Cacheoira was situated on a breath taking part of the Rio Negro, not filled exactly with “cacheoiras” (waterfalls), as the name implies, but rather dozens and dozen of small islands, rocks, and raging rapids, with gorgeous towering mountains in the background, and large, pristine, white beaches bordering the shores of the dividing river. The mountains seemed unusually placed, like God’s last decorating touch, because they were just plopped beneath the heavens, surrounded by thick jungle situated behind the raging black and deep orange waters. As we started to enter the small city, I couldn’t help but be impressed at how clean and “modern”, the small shops and stores looked. The small city of 100, 000 people or so had just about everything you could ask for, and I couldn’t help but feel myself measuring if I could live in this tropical little paradise (no worries, a small place like this could never hold me down for long).

So downtown Soa Gabriel, which is where Regi’s aunt lived, was not too big. The sun had set by the time the cab dropped us on the street. We turned a couple corners and walked to the end of a dark street to encounter placid looking guard dogs. Regi was weary of the dogs and didn’t want to go forward fearing they were vicious. -but they looked so cute and placid!! Awww… common Regi, look at their little puppy wuppy faces… what are they going to do… no… ok fine we will wait. As luck would have it, Regi’s uncle was walking up the street not but one minute later. He was on his way home (the brother of Regi’s aunt, Diva, and he also lived with her, both of which were Regi’s mothers’ siblings).

Titio! (uncle) Oi! Sou eu, seu sobrino, Regenaldo. (It’s your me, your nephew, Regenaldo). Regi went up to him, and gave him a big hug, happy and excited to see him. However, his uncle didn’t recognize him at first, and it took a few minutes for him to warm up to us (it was a little strange). We told him we were passing through for a couple days and came to visit. His uncle went into the house and called out his aunt Diva.

“Oh Regi!!, she was happy to see him, and even though her voice was faint, her eyes almost filled with tears. So far from what I had seen, the aboriginal people I had met so far didn’t seem to show their emotions really. I’m not sure why, maybe because life was always hard and so they kept things private…

Diva said we could go with her son, Carlos, and stay at his place and that we would talk more in the morning. She apologized in advance, saying that the accommodations at her son’s place were very modest, and she didn’t lie. I found the abruptness of the visit a little odd, but later found out that it was because she wasn’t feeling well, and also liked to use the evening hours as religious time to converse with god.

We went to Carlo’s place who was the sole caretaker of his 3-year old daughter. Her mother had several children and lived next door, but utterly refused to raise her just because she didn’t feel like it. Sadly enough it was not uncommon here for mothers to abandon their children, a behavior I had never really seen before, and one I could certainly not comprehend.

Carlos’s place consisted of a small wooden hut divided into his room, the “living room” where we hung our hammocks to sleep, the wood-be kitchen that contained nothing (not even a stove), only a chair and table, and a “bathroom”. Well the so-called bathroom was the only part of the place that I found VERY icky. It was dark and full of holes in the floor, with an old dirty toilet bowl that had no seat, and just like in Bolivia, no running water, so you had to fill a bucket of water from the shower that was located almost directly above the toilet, and pour the water into the toilet to “flush” it. This was not my first experience with toilets or bathrooms like this, but even Regi thought this one was pretty bad. I suppose it was better than his aunt’s house that had absolutely no bathroom to speak of, and so they just tried not to go, and when they had to they would pee underneath the house (as it was on stilts due to flooding that was common in the region). Number 2 was more of mystery… I think they went to use the toilet in nearby restaurants, as there were no bushes or forest nearby to speak of (being “down town” and all). The way the “shower” at Carlos’ place functioned was a little funny. It was a pipe that stuck out of the wall with a piece of plastic shoved into it to keep the water from running out; it worked by pulling out the piece of plastic out and letting the water flow out, which it did with such force that I needed help to put it back in when done showering (and I showered with my flip flops on and using my flashlight, cause there was no light). In fact there were two light bulb socket hanging from the “ceiling” by wires, but only one light bulb and no switches, so light in the house functioned by grabbing the light bulb and screwing it in (carefully as not to electrocute yourself on the free wires), and to turn it off, grabbing a towel or something and unscrewing the bulb. Also, it was probably better that there was no food in the “house” as it probably made for slightly LESS cockroaches (there were still one or two a day). Also funny, was the “security” of the house was a bent nail that you we turned to keep the door shut. In order to “lock” the door when leaving, we would open the window (that was a wooden board located in the door- there are no glass windows here, no point) and reach through its broken screen and turn the nail. Voila!

To tell the truth I had absolutely no problem staying there, and in fact was grateful for the hospitality, except it would have been nice for there to be some kind of “door” to the bathroom. Also, I was a slightly worried about my stuff, because despite Sao Gabriel being a really small town, it had become increasingly dangerous in the last 4 years; it was but only a week before our arrival that a group of young teens beat a security guard to death in order to rob him and have fun, but I didn’t really let it bother me that much.

So after getting situated, we went for a nice walk around town. We hadn’t got a change to eat dinner so when I saw someone eating what looked like to be a bowl of ACAI at MacDragon’s restaurant, I nearly died with glee. YES! But in actual fact, the ACAI was even better that I could have ever imagined, or hoped, or prayed for. It was the best I’ve ever had!! They uniquely BLENDED banana, guarana, and peanuts, in addition to the regular mix of stuff. It was fanfuckintastic, and I had one EVERY day from then on (when in the city, of course), and the bonus was I could watch my novella while eating it.

Afterwards we hit a bar, but only to play pool - I hadn’t touched a beer in days, and we decided we weren’t going to drink on the trip. We played five games on the tiny table and I won 3 of them. I jumped with glee, and being the gracious winner that I am, I rubbed it in endlessly into Regi’s face. Hehehe. We finished around midnight and pooped I flopped into my hammock. I had trouble sleeping that night, maybe between the drips and drops of water leaking, or the light from the neighbor’s porch, or maybe because I slept all day on the boat, who knows. I froze at dawn, as I think the temperature dropped to a bone-chilling 22 degrees that night. Nonetheless, I liked the way my hammock hung, I was utterly comfy...

I woke a little late the next day, maybe 8 am, and we headed to the river to bath and do laundry, a little nicer than the “shower” in the “bathroom”, and being natives, it had become our custom to do so anyways.

It was funny cause I forgot my bathing suit so I had to bath in my bras and undies but oh well.

Very soon the heat of the day rose. WOW!! We were now smack along the equator and it was AT LEAST 40 degrees, and more in the BRIGHT, HOT, BURNING, SUN. I spent most of the day in the shelter of shade, but even so, around 10 am you could feel the power of the sun start to grow, and grow, and I honestly had a fear to go out for passing out and dying or something. -and this having already been accustomed to high heat and humidity back in Tupe and Manaus.

After our bath we went and had breakfast with Diva. It was nice to watch the family catch up. We stayed for lunch, and hid there until the sun started to give a little mercy around 3-4 pm. Then Regi’s cousin, Daniel, 15, super nice guy, offered to give us the full tour of the city. However, it was still so hot that we decided to head to the beach first for a swim and we spent so much time in the water that that was about all we managed to do that afternoon. Lol. The paper white beach with deep orange-black water was one of the most beautiful I had ever seen, only comparable to the scene at Canaima park in Venezuela. There were rapids, islands, and mountains with misty jungle on the other side. The current was fast and strong, and made swimming a little challenging and scary, but fun. Plus Daniel told us where to go in order to avoid certain death.

On the way back we checked tour prices to climb the nearby Pico de Nublina (the highest mountain in Brazil), but unfortunately the crazy guy wanted like 2000 bucks a head, so we said forget it.

Anyways, we went back to town, had dinner and went to bed. That night I was so pooped I literally passed out in my hammock frozen still. I didn’t even use my pillow or blankets or flinch until I woke in the exact same position the next morning. It was fantastic, and honestly one of the BEST sleeps of my life! In fact, I could never remember passing out like that in my life (maybe I had as a child…).

The next morning I woke to the strong sound of pounding rain. It was pouring buckets, and slamming down all over the cabin. There was no point in getting up. We had no food and no reason to go out into the cold rain, so I lay there motionless savoring the sound of the rain, and after my shower spent the next hour or so reading Gabriel Garcia Marquez. Finally the rain gave way, and my craving for coffee awoke, so off we went to Diva’s for breakfast.

We were suppose to go into the jungle that day but seeing as how it seemed that it would rain all afternoon, we made plans with Regi’s uncle to go early the next morning. We were going to a piece of land that he owned and so he needed to show us the way. You see even though the jungle was really raw, and mostly unused here, the majority of it was owned, so we were lucky Regi’s family owned a good piece of it for us to camp on. We spent the rest of the day hanging out at Diva’s. Later I went to the gym to work out and it was fantastic!! I did about 30 minutes on the treadmill and an hour of weights - so refreshing! After shopping for provisions (food), and a nice cool shower, I relaxed having my delicious ACAI at MacDragon’s before going to bed.

Tomorrow was going to be a big day. We were going into the jungle…. Yay!

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