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Published: December 19th 2010
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Breakfast followed lunch en route from Sydney to Rio. Leaving at 11am on Monday morning, I arrived in Buenos Aires at 10am that day for a connecting flight to Rio flying over in the incredibly dense urban area of Sao Paulo. Exhausted, I was finally in Rio at around 8pm and took a shuttlebus from the airport through the city to Ipanema beach.
Rio is divided into two districts: Zona Norte, a more industrial, working class area and home to the Maracana stadium - the largest in the world, which is currently closed in preparation for the 2014 FIFA World Cup. The famed and beautiful city beaches are in Zona Sul, along with most of the iconic tourist attractions in Rio and Centro, the central business district.
After recovering, I did the mandatory city sightseeing. It started as a beaming hot day and I took the cable car up to the top of Sugarloaf, admiring the 360 view of the city, the beaches and the harbour. Despite staying a further six days in Rio, that was unfortunately the last time I would see the sun. By the time I had reached the world famous monument, Christ the Redeemer, cloud
and strong winds had begun to descend upon Rio. The gusts of wind were strong on the viewing platform and the view was partly obscured by cloud but I joined the paparazzi and took a few essential snaps of the big man himself and of the cityscape. One of the things I love most about Rio is that in so many places within the city, when you look up you can unexpectedly see the Christ monument peering back down.
Divisions between rich and poor in Rio were noticeable. Neighbouring upmarket Ipanema is an area called Leblon which has the highest property prices in all of South America. On the hillside only a 15 minute drive from Ipanema, which itself also has a favela, is the Rocinha favela which I visited on a tour. At the bottom of the favela each of us jumped on the back of a local´s motorcycle to transport us up the steep, winding road to the top of the favela. It was a thrilling ride weaving past oncoming traffic and overtaking a garbage truck before regrouping at the top, thankfully still in one piece.
We walked back down through the favela with our guide
who explained how the favela operates and when it was okay to take photos. She explained that the appeal of living in a favela is not only the free or cheap land, but access to free water and electricty with the amateur installation of pipes and wires that hijack the supply from the main source. A water tank was dotted on each roof and huge bundles of seemingly tangled electricty wires hung above the path. Living at the top of the favela is considered to be better as those at the bottom are unsuprisingly prone to water shortages and suffer the impact of landslides. The top of the favela is also where the drug dealers operate, keeping an eye over who enters and exits using teenaged boys, some with guns, positioned at various watching points. According to our guide, the current drug lord controlling Rocinha has managed to live to the ripe old age of 24. We walked passed some young boys, maybe about 7 or 8 years old, one who was proudly clutching a porn DVD and all who were desperate to pose for a photo, as long as they could check themselves out in the image afterwards. We
were also shown initiatives such as the child care centre and an art gallery - a proportion of the tour fee was donated to the funding these projects.
My experience of the nightlife in Rio was hit and miss. The hostel I was staying at was located in an alleyway with about eight or ten other small hostels which made meeting people to go out with in the evenings easy. The first night I went out we were a little clueless about venues and somehow managed to end up at a Copacabana beach facing bar where virtually all of the women seemed to be prostitutes, but it made for interesting people-watching. Another night a group of us circled the city after being given some recommendations only to return to a familiar gringo haunt around the corner from the hostel.
Every Friday night there is a street party held in a district called Lapa, and many people from the hostels were going. The street party covered a large area but we found a great spot on the famous Escadaria Selarón, the 200 or so steps from Lapa to Santa Teresa, tiled in a mosiac style by a Chilean artist
using over 2000 tiles from around the world. Here, the Caprinas were flowing and the locals, who know how to enjoy themselves, played guitar and sang until dawn. I have some doubts as to whether it is true, but I was told by a number of people that it is the only legal place to smoke pot in Brazil, specifically and bizarrelly on the steps from 8pm to midnight.
Other things I did in Rio: took a crazy tram ride to the quaint hillside suburb of Santa Teresa, took a ferry to Niteroi to see the Contemporary Art Museum although I found the structure of the building itself was a lot more interesting than the contents inside. Browsed the very touristy and overpriced´hippie´ market on a Sunday, rode a bike around the lagoa and along the beaches, wandered around the somewhat underwhelming Botanic Gardens. I wasn't aware of this before my trip to Brazil but there is a large Japanese population in Brazil mostly concentrated in Sao Paulo and this was reflected with a cute Japanese section in the gardens, and also with sushi and other Japanese food available in most of the buffets.
The local cuisine: Frequented
numerous "por kilo" weigh and pay buffet restaurants located all over the city serving Churasco style meats (charcoal grilled over an open fire on a skewer) salads, beans and sushi. Stumpled upon a street fruit market - my hands were filled with the sweetest samples of lychees, strawberries, watermelon, pineaple. Tried Acai Berry - an Amazonian fruit.
Next stop: Iguasu Falls
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