Year 11 - No.171 - March 2000
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CARNAVAL THE DAY THE WORLD SAMBAED IN RIO
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BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
Cover The world is a samba school Yankee artist David de Hilster is a Renaissance man with a myriad of interests, who discusses physics while painting street scenes, who composes, sings and dances while working on computer programming. So, when David, who founded SambaLa samba school in Long Beach, California, announced four years ago that he wanted to organize a group from escolas de samba from around the world that would present themselves in the 2000 Rio Carnaval, few people said it was a crazy idea. Everybody knew, however, that that was a crazy idea. Now, that the unthinkable project has come to fruition and that the Unidos do Mundo (United of the World) sambaed their way into the hearts of Brazilians and the rest of the world, David took stock of the whole project and prepared for Brazzil an account of the extraordinary adventure and the guts (besides money and persistence) it took to put it all together. More than once the whole undertaking seemed doomed, but thanks to the enthusiasm of hundreds of gringos who saved their money for years to go to Rio and hundreds of Brazilians who joined in the unprecedented effort, Unidos do Mundo showed how samba has become an international passion. More than that, the Rio Carnaval adventure shows that faith and perseverance can make miracles, can move the world to Rio's sambodromo and in turn move the world with joy and emotion. As you might know, Brazzil is a very small operation: one person and some volunteers who help as and when they can. The magazine is coming out almost two months late and I'm sorry for that. I don't see me catching up soon, but rest assured that the content is fresh and you will get all the issues you've paid for. Thanks and all the best. R.M. Send mail to: P.O. Box 50536 - Los Angeles, CA 90050-0536 Ads/Editorial: (323) 255-8062 Subscrip.: (323) 255-4953 Fax: (323) 257-3487 Brazzil on line: http://www.brazzil.com E-mail: brazzilŠbrazzil.com Publisher and Editor: Rodney Mello Assistant Editor: Leda Bittencourt Art&Design Director: Marina Yoshie (marinayoshie@hotmail.com) Entertainment Editors: Sam & Harriet Robbins Book Review: Bondo Wyszpolski Music Editor: Bruce Gilman Brazil Bureau Chief: Marta Alvim E-mail: mltdalvim@yahoo.com TIME TO RENEW? Sorry, we don't send reminders. Look at the label to know when your subscription ends.
BRAZZIL (ISSN 1091-868X) is published monthly by Brazzil 2039 N. Ave. 52, Los Angeles, CA, 90042-1024.Periodicals Postage rate paid at Los Angeles, CA. Single copy sold for $2. One year subscription for 12 issues is $3 (three dollars) in the U.S., $15 in Canada and Mexico, and $18 in all other countries. No back issues sold. Allow 5 to 7 weeks to receive your first issue. You may quote from or reprint any of the contents with proper copyright credit. Editorial submissions are welcome. Include a SASE (self addressed and stamped envelope) if you want your material mailed back. Brazzil assumes no responsibility for any claims made by its advertisers. The Library of Congress ISSN: 1524-4997 POST MASTER : Send address changes to BRAllIL P.O. Box 50536 - Los Angeles, CA - 90050-0536
WWW. BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
Contents II
Job Market
Minimum raise.
21
Politics Reform, now or never
22
Impressions Rules of engagement in Brazil
24
Behavior The day I learned what Camaval means
21
Short St ry "Eleicties in Quiboco" by Dioclecio Luz
33
Travel
Classy Santa Catarina
37
Adventure
Exploring the Amazon
41 43 54
Folklore Music
Songs our kids sing
The electronic genius of Suba
Behavior
Gays, 100 years ago
Ilepartaments 09 Rapidinhas 10 letters 49 Cultural Pulse 51 Classifieds 52 That's Brazilian
.COM 5
So Minimal Traditionally, the government uses May I (Labor Day in Brazil) to announce the annual correction for the minimum wage. The announcement this year, due to a political struggle among the government's allies who raised the flag of a more substar tial increase, was anticipated by a few weeks. But the frustration for those who benefit from the raise wasn't smaller than in previous years. The new minimum, which is in force since April 3, is 151 reais ($84) a month. The increase was a mere R$15 a month, representing a gain of less than 9 dollars "It's low, it's low," Labor Minister, Francisco DorneLes himself, admitted. In gill another move to steal some thunder from the opposition, the Cardoso administration announced that from now on state governors will have the power to decide on minimum wages for their states and there will be no upper limit to this increase. Labor Minister, Francisco Dornelles, in an attempt to simplify that complex issue and in order to lessen the burden for the President, placed on the governors' shoulders the responsibility to raise minimum wages above the federal in"The President," said Dornelles, "grants the governors the power to adopt the state . President Cardoso minimum wage they choose. If the governor decides that the salary in his state can be R$500 ($280), it will be R$500. If he can give R$1.000 ($560) he will give R$1.000." Everybody knows, however, that such numbers presented by the minister are just a rhetoric game, since the economic situation of most states would not allow any largesse at all. Dornelles neverle less warned governors that they will need to take the initiative and informed that laws governing this matter will not be allowed on election years. The main beneficiaries ot the minimum wage increase will be the 12 million retirees and pensioners from the INSS (Institut° Nacional do Seguro Social-Social Security National Institute). And where is the money for the raise coming from? There was money on the budget reserved for an increase, but it was assumed that the minimum would go up to 143 reais ($79) and not to R$151 (84) as it ended up happening. The senate President, Antonio Carlos Magalhaes, a government ally who defended the adoption of a minimum that would correspond to $100 (roughly R$ 180) didn't seem too upset that he couldn't prevail. "That was not the ideal solution." he said, but it was the possible one. The various leaderships and the President had to overcome opposition inside the government itself." "I will not allow Brazil to lose its way," declared President Fernando Henrique Cardoso, a little before the increase was announced. "This is the moment to show courage," he added, urging his allies in congress to go along with his administration. "I ask the allied basis to back me up and 1 will insist on getting this backing." During the two-hour meeting that the President held with his cabinet, Finance Minister Pedro Malan used the occasion to announce a recovery of the Brazilian economy and forecasted a 4-percent growth in the economy this year. Said the minister, "We have turned a page and we will consolidate this new trend this year. The President is taking a mature and responsible decision from the fiscal point of view." Antonio Carlos Magalhaes According to the government, the R$15 increase rep"Ar- P. resents an Ii percent raise. Not as much as that, said Dornelles, for whom the real gain was a more modest 5.08 percent. Not as much as that, corrected the experts at Dieese (Departamento Intersindical de Estatistica e Estudos SOcio-Economicos—Inter-Lin ion Department for Statistics and Socioeconomic Studies). According to them, the raise was a mere 3.3 percent above the inflation rate of 7.5 percent, which occurred between April 1999 and April 2000.
BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
Organized over the Internet, gringo sambistas from 19 countries invaded the Sambadrome in Rio in celebration of Brazil's 500 years. They created the Unidos do Mundo escolas de samba. With the gringos parading in the avenue, the question became not whether or not they could samba, but whether or not they could actually become Brazilian. DAVID DE HILSTER
BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
This article is dedicated to everyone who made this dream come true and who made samba history. I reached the painted line in the Sambadrome that says "final" and the documentary film crew approached, camera rolling. "So, how was it?" they asked. Yes, I thought, how was it? How was it after four years ofdreaming and fighting for something and to have it come true? Was it a success? At the moment I had many mixed feelings. One side ofme said it was a great success, but the other side remembered the long journey to this point that was full of melancholy and uncertainty FVORID, up to the very end. ONE With a few weeks behind me now, I realize that it was a super success. Yet it Se11001 wasn't just my dream or success anymore. It was that of Alessandra Pirotelli, who worked 11/2 years full time on the project in Rio getting the Brazilian government and the League of Samba Schools to accept the project while getting money, people, and places for it to take place. It was that of her husband Ricardo Pavdo and hundreds of Brazilians who poured their heart and soul into the design and implementation of the parade. It was that of hundreds of gringo sambistas who saved their money for months and years and traveled many thousands ofmiles putting their trust in a project that had no model in the history of samba. It became that ofmillions of Brazilians in Brazil who saw the historic event on television and tens of thousands in person in the Sambadrome—all embracing the idea that samba schools truly existed outside of Braziland that there are gringo sambistas. Yet I saw something incredible happen along the way. The question we all asked in the beginning "could gringos samba?", had changed to "can gringos become Brazilian?" The answer took me by surprise. In fact, the question not only took me by surprise, but only appeared one day before the event itself. Adjustments, Adjustments, Adjustments. Alessandra Pirotelli took on the project late 1998 and was the other person who made the dream a reality. For the project to be a success, the gringo sambistas and the Brazilian sambistas in Rio had to work together. Alessandra and I had the same vision for the project and we worked together like old friends sending e-mail back and forth at a frenzied pitch discussing our ideas, dreams, and worries about making this project a reality. We struggled over many issues: price, format, the samba enredo song to name a few. People close to us struggled alongside. My wife Doris constantly argued with me about the important issues as well as did Alessandra's husband. It was a battle of mind and heart and more often than not someone went away unsatisfied. The first obstacle was price. How do we price something that has no model, that must be coordinated worldwide, and work in a country whose economy is as volatile as a jealous Latin lover? At first the price was too high. Alessandra worked wonders to lower the price without knowing how she was going to pay the League of Samba Schools for the right to parade (tens of thousands of dollars), pay the people to make costumes, the float, people to push the car, etc, etc, etc. After all, gringo sambistas like their Brazilian counterparts don't have very much money, so the price had to be attractive. And to top it off, we had to collect money from all points of the globe via the Internet. The second obstacle was format. How many gringos would come? Fifty? One thousand? How could we assure stability without knowing how many people were coming? And all this with a budget? This is absolute madness! At first, I wanted to have different samba schools come together but remain separate. Alessandra suggested one samba school that united the whole world. It made sense. We couldn't guarantee that schools would come in force. Most likely we would get a few from many schools for the first year (that is what indeed happened). She also sugvested adding Brazilians in the mix to provide stability and to fill in the variable number of gringos that would end up in the event. 8
With this all in mind, the name of the school came very naturally: Unidos do Mundo (United World). We had a format that would work with 50 or 1000 gringos. The third obstacle was really created by my attempt to get gringo samba composers to compose the song for Unidos do Mundo. After all, it was only right that a foreign sambista write the song for our foreign school. I started the contest for the song in 1998 and it ended early 1999. This turned out to be a very hotly debated subject among the international sambista community and among myself, Alessandra, and our spouses. Very few candidates were submitted for the samba song during that period and of those candidates, none were quite up to standard I have come to know during the years from the better gringo composers. To remedy the problem, we decided to allow the sambistas around the world to vote via the 0 Internet on several options on the samba song for Unidos do Mundo. We made this decision only months before the actual event and time was running short. The choices were: (1) to go with one of the candidates submitted knowing that they were weak, (2) to allow for a composer from Brazil to work with one of the samba songs and to make it better, or (3) to get a guest composer like Martinho da Vila to compose a new song for the school. It turns out that Doris and Ricardo (our spouses) both were against Martinho or any non-gringo writing the samba theme song, but Alessandra and I disagreed on grounds of marketing. Putting Martinho, Alessandra argued would bring much needed publicity to the project. I agreed as did eventually Doris. I don't know if Ricardo finally agreed, but to make sure that we did not make the final decision, I put it to a vote on the Internet. As it turned out, the option with Martinho as the composer won with a clear majority of votes. Martinho ended up agreeing to write the song and indeed brought well-needed publicity to the event in Brazil. Other adjustments we made included eliminating worldwide tryouts for the bateria and dancers. There simply was not the money and time to travel the world to pick sambistas for the event. So a smaller version ofthe same idea was born: Alessandra would travel to two places before the event to stimulate interest: in this case, Los Angeles and Portugal. Our Carnaval for our samba school was in September and she would travel to Portugal shortly after that. Her trip to visit our modest Carnaval turned out to be very important for the emotional well-being of the project. Virtual to Real I was visiting the dozens of peopl e spending sleepless nights before Carnaval, preparing the costumes for our parade in Long Beach, California, near Los Angeles. We had invaded the house of a friend who had nothing to do with samba and who ended up during the course ofthe weeklong invasion, making us dinner and even sitting down and helping hand sew a costume. In the middle of the day before our Carnaval, Alessandra was arriving. I was afraid to meet her face-to-face. I'm not sure why. Maybe it was because virtual communication doesn't let one judge someone by their appearance. Maybe our appearances would turn each of us offl I heard she arrived at our barracdo (literally "big tent") and was heading my way. When we finally met, it was very nice to touch the person you had only talked with virtually over the Internet and telephone. Her physical beauty matched the beautiful person I had met over a year ago over the Internet. We were now real friends! I then became nervous knowing that she was going to see our modest parade and school the next day. When she asked me if we had a bateria (drum corps), I was shocked. I said "of course !"Just days before, I was at the national headquarters of Varig Airlines, a Brazilian sponsor for our project, and heard someone say, "Don't expect much there in Long Beach on Sunday". That also shocked me. Heck, we work all year, have a bateria of40 people and more, have costumes that we make ourselves that are very beautiful, and a samba song we write and sing in Portuguese and English. I was BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
travel agent Dagmar Sabat had gotten us one free ticket in trade shocked, but nevertheless concerned. That night! was up until 3:30 in the morning working on last for getting a group of our people to fly Varig, and managed a minute preparations for our Carnaval and got up at 7 am to pick discount for Doris, myself, and the extra ticket for our Rei Momo up a van, fill it with our instruments (all on my own), and receive ("Bear" as we call him) who needed two seats because ofhis kingly the portable toilets, booth tents, sound equipment, and inspec- size. We got to the airport and we boarded the plane. Rei Momo tors at the Carnaval site. I would have to sing by m ysel f that day had ticket 17A anc I had 17C. Seat 17B was left for overflow. But and my voice was hoarse. Alessandra, our sponsors, and thousands ofpeople started to when we arrived a. the seats, the armrest in between the two king arrive and Doris and myselfbecame extremely busy. I didn't have seats did not lift up! In fact, they were the only seats on the plane much time to dedicate to Alessandra and felt bad that I had no where the armrests did not lift up! Some very nice Brazilians money to even pay a hotel for her. All my money was tied up in behind us switched seats with us to that we could lift up the armrest an event that I hoped would loose less than $1000 that year. As and seat our king comfortably. We were on our way. we got closer to parade time, the event was extremely crowded. Whirlwind Tour We had more than double the number of people from the year before, putting our estimates at six to ten thousand people for the When we got to Rio, Bear and I settled down in a friend's entire day. I went to the beginning of the short parade route and got the sound equipment ready. I got my microphone and we house, and then went to meet Alessandra at their barracdo (the place where they were making costumes). There ,we met started the bateria. The parade was on! Alessandra and all the people who I had three microphones in my hand were involved with the school. We from television stations and a documen were very tired, only having slept tary film crew and was singing in English Rei Momo three hours during our flight. This is and Portuguese, sometimes getting mixed where I truly have a difficult time reup a bit because ofbeing so tired. Part way "Bear", Unidos do Mundo's own Rei omo membering what day we did and down the avenue, the speakers on the (from SambaLa Samba School) literall owes when. We simply did not stop. truck began to fall, so I jumped up and his life to Brazilians although until Rio 000 & We went to Beija-Flor's barratried adjusting them, all the time singing cito where all the floats were stored the song.! looked next to me and who was ' Samba, had never stepped foot in Braz At the beginning of World War II, Bear's and where there was a meeting of all there but my wife Doris. The two people father was an officer on a merchant oil nker. the presidents ofthe great schools— who put the entire event on are the ones During a trip down to South America, is ship Beija-Flor, Mangueira, Viradouro, up in the truck doing the dirty work. became one of the first ships to be torpe oed by Mocidade, etc. We were there to do At that moment, I realized what it was a German submarine. Only three men s rvived publicity for Unidos do Mundo. like to be a president or a samba singer in the sinking, one of who was Bear's fat -r who Beija-Flor after all was helping a samba school outside of Brazil. No was badly burnt and drifted at sea for ays. sponsor the event. We made our way president's office. No president's salary. Miraculously, Brazilians fishing boa found through a thick crowd, meeting No rest before Carnaval to pamper your them and took them to Rio de Janeiro. There, people. One ofmy favorites to meet voice. Just pure madness. But we were Bear's father was nursed back to healt by the was Neguinho da Beija-Flor. He is bound to keep things going no matter Brazilians. During his stay there, he wat ed the considered to be one of the best what. We are after all, on the front lines spectacular Carnaval from his window. L ttle did samba singers in Brazil today and of the new frontier of samba: gringo he know that his unborn son would some ay not meeting him was a great honor. We samba. only be King of Brazilian Carnaval in •s Antalked briefly and of course! took a As I sang and paraded, I saw many geles, but the first ever gringo Rei M mo in picture with him.! couldn't imagine important people in the community: the history to parade during Carnaval in o. singing with him in the SambaBrazilian consul, sponsors, VIP guests, drome. It was a personal dream all smiling and bouncing to the beat of come true. He was very kind and samba. I didn't see Alessandra. We made our way to the stage and with a hoarse voice I continued to s i ng— gentle. We contin ed making our way through the crowds, around a total of an hour and a half. Samba11—that's the name of our the great floats th t towered to the ceilings ofthis vast warehouse. samba school—put on a great show and the Carnaval with the' Important samb people were everywhere. Bear, our Re Momo, was a "big" success with the waiters. other bands for the rest of the day was a great success. Only afterwards I met Alessandra and got to talk with her Waiters were co stantly moving about trying to feed the popuabout impressions of our parade and samba school. It was then lation in the hal but with little success. It seems that during that she revealed to me that along the avenue as the bateria passed Carnaval, most p ople are always eating something delicious and by, 50 or more ritmistas (percussionists) strong playing tightly hunger does not eem to be a problem. The moment they discovand with rehearsed breaks, that she cried. She shed real tears. She ered our Rei Mo o and his kingly appetite, they became very saw for the first time something she didn't expect to see—some- animated and ha py. Bear was not shy in sampling everything thing that Brazil would see in the year 2000 in the Sambadrome: multiple times u til even he had his fill. Finally, we et some of the presidents of the major samba real sambistas from a foreign country that had heart, soul, and the schools who wer there to choose the judges for the Sainbadrome. swing of a real Brazilian samba school. We had several important meetings after our Carnaval about Right before the private meeting started, we were on our way the event in Rio. But after our parade and Alessandra' s reaction, leaving what was atthat moment, the most important samba meetI knew that the trip had not been only for meetings. The moment ing on the plane Next we app ared at what was to be our quadra or practice she revealed to me that she had been moved to tears to see our modest 150 person samba school parading that day, I knew the area or "quad". quadra is where a samba school gets together trip's purpose had a greater significance. Alessandra now knew to play, dance, d rehearse for their parade. There, Bear was that Brazilian samba truly did exist outside of Brazil and that the introduced and e gave a speech that I translated for the public. project would be a success. Now we just had to convince the Next, I spoke a d talked about the project and our vision and gringos and the Brazilians ofthis. And more than that, we had to thanked everyo e involved with the project. And from the moment before an during regular Carnaval, we were constantly earn their trust. It had all come done to faith. Faith in that what Alessandra being filmed, vi eotaped, recorded, and photographed by journalists, docume tary film crews, and television. We were the and I were doing would make samba history. spokespeople w o represented all the gringo sambistas that had come and were •tarting to arrive in Brazil. Taxicab drivers, The First Steps doorman, and p ple on the street would recognize us and even A journey always starts with a first step. And in this case, the thank us for our 'wonderful" project. We were very exhausted steps for me were big ones. King-sized in fact. My first goal in but happy with e reception. Alessandra had just done an incredthe actual journey to Brazil was to get our King Momo (Rei ible job on mar eting the event. Momo) onto a plane and to Rio before Carnaval. Our incredible BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
Gringos Arrive
English. He whispered to me, "Are you the guy who organized all the schools on the Internet?" At that point I got a bit nervous Slowly, day by day, gringos from around the world began to not knowing who he was or how he got into the private booth. I arrive. It was very strange to have someone come up to me who didn't answer the question directly and was more concerned about I did not know by face, but who knew me by face and by name. removing this funny character before something weird happened. "Hi, I'm Thomas from Sweden!" "Hi, you don't know me, but Luckily, some of Alessandra's team saw him and started asking l am from Chile. Thanks for your him questions. As they approached, he work." I was truly astounded by whispered again to me "hey, tell them! am the power of the Internet and its with you or they will throw me out." At that reach around the world. point I really got scared and turned around Some encounters were very and walked away as the Brazilians apspecial. One in particular I proached him. They took him out and! tried wanted to meet was Krzysztof to ignore the incident. from Poland. It was only two At that point I not only realized that the years before that I received an eInternet is a powerful tool where recognition mail from a lone Pole who loved is worldwide, but that I was no longer sitsamba and wanted to start a group ting safely at home behind my computer in Poland but did not know how screen and the virtual world of samba that to go about it. I told him to do I had helped create. I was now in full public what I knew best: make a Webview and vulnerable. Sure, I'm no rock star, page on the Internet. "Then but even on the opening day it was strange what?" he asked. "Sit back and to have so many people know so much about Porta Bandeira was Finnish wait," I said. A few years later I me without ever having met me. Heck, I was got a photo from him showing — just a computer geek trying to use the him and others playing samba along the side of the road in the Internet to organize samba. I never thought country. I laughed a lot because being from a gringo samba school, of the vulnerability I was creating for myself. I immediately understood. Another intruder made her way into the booth, but this one You see, all samba schools outside of Brazil have the same was a young beautiful Brazilian woman. Now that is not as bad problem: noise. I bought a decibel meter and once measured the I thought! But I must remember: I'm a married sambista, I'm a loudness of our percussion or bateria as they call it in Brazil: 125 married sambista! She too was escorted away. My second decibels. That is just between the loudest rock band and a jet "groupie" was somewhat more positive but I did become more engine at close range. Imperio do Papagaio of Finland actually attentive to my surroundings. plays in a bomb shelter below ground so not to perturb their One thing I remember was watching the Brazilian crew cleanneighbors during practice sessions! Another group in New York ing and decorating the space. It was going so slowly at times for practices in Central Park. Krzysztof was experiencing the same the "American" inside of me that I would help now and then to thing with his group and was forced to‘play out in the country by speed things up. I was not used to seeing workers sweeping rugs the side of a road. with brooms while standing next to a vacuum cleaner. I helped On the Sunday ofCarnaval, we all met at the Rio Othon Hotel remove some of the stadium seats to clean underneath and took and ! finally met this Pole. A shy, kind man with glasses came note at to the care at which the holes were made. Alessandra was up to me and simply said: "I'm Krzysztof'. I yelled: "Krzysz- standing next to me and I looked at her tired face (she was only tof!!!", and we hugged. ! got tears itimy eyes. ! asked, "How's sleeping a few hours each night) and I gave her a concerned smile. the group?" "20 and growing" he replied. He added, "The Internet I walked up to her and pointed out the holes in the floor. The chair really works!" It was a wonderful moment that I will always holes looked as if they were hacked out by a very large blind remember. chicken. Some were double punched, some where square, some One by one, Alessandra and I greeted these pioneers who were triangle, and some were the round shape they were supposed saved their hard-earned money, and put trust in Alessandra and to be. She sort of shrugged her shoulders saying "I know, this is I and our crazy idea. We all hugged and talked to one another with Brazil!" I hugged her and said "I don't envy you. I had the easy a wonderful feeling of kinship, knowing we all loved samba and job!" She smiled and continued working. had much in common to share. Truly, putting together a samba school and event in Brazil in Little did I know that this ideal moment would not last long. less than 80 days seemed like an impossible task given all the The road to success was less than a week away, and soon I found obstacles one finds in a third world country. But Alessandra was it was not all paved with gold. One person from our group who pulling it off. She was dead tired even a week before, but she had just joined our group in Los Angeles wanted out ofthe project somehow kept going. on the first day. That was hard. This was in part a business and we had to treat it as such at times. But it was still emotionally hard Parading with the Big School for me. There were many other incidents on the first day that showed I had arranged for two people from SambaLa (our school) to us that things would not be as easy as they looked. It is only natural parade with Be ij a-Flor. Alessandra is the daughter-in-law of the that with so many different cultures together, there were bound president of Beij a-Flor, so it was easy for her to arrange costumes to be misunderstanding and differences of opinions. to purchase so that these two could parade on Monday in the Sambadrome. Unidos do Mundo was purposely scheduled to Carnaval parade on the Saturday ofthe Champions in part to give the gringos time to enjoy the regular Carnaval of Rio. These two wanted to Almost all the gringos headed that day for the Sambadrome experience what it was like to parade in a BIG school. for the two days of the top schools parading on Sunday and On the day ofthe parade,!found out a big surprise: Alessandra Monday. Rei Momo ("Bear") and! got to watch the groups that had also arranged a costume for me! I was really surprised, exshowed up before the special group that paraded on Saturday. Two pecting to go home and try and catch up on some sleep, not even schools from this group would rise to the ranks ofthe big schools, bothering to watch on TV. Now! was going to parade for the first so this was a very important parade. Bear and I were virtually alone time with a big school! I went home and rested a few hours before on the bleacher side while Alessandra and her crew were prepar- getting onto the subway with the hundreds of others traveling to ing the space for Unidos do Mundo's VIP guests a week later. Bear the Sambadrome to meet up with the two people I arranged to and !felt like celebrities with the stadium and private booths all parade with Beija-Flor. I got off the wrong exit and ended up full except for ours. People were looking at us trying to figure out walking what seemed like kilometers to find them. After a while, who we were. all the costumes started looking the same to me.! got lost several While watching the parade, all of a sudden I felt someone next times among the tens of thousands of parade participants and to me and I got a funny feeling inside. The guy looked like a student passed our group two times before finding my fellow paraders. traveler with messed up hair and clothes and he spoke to me in When I got there, I had no shoes and my hat was all broken. 10
BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
I ran around trying to find shoes which I finally arranged with a director. I then found a piece of string on the ground and used American jeitinho (or cleverness) to fix the hat. It was around 3 AM and extremely humid and our costumes where uncomfortably hot! We were covered with several layers of costume and clothes including our head and a wig. We looked like 17th century French royalty. The costumes were gorgeous, but they were hot, hot, hot. We got in lines with eight people with each and all holding hands. Monica, myself, and Ross (all from our school) were all together ready to parade. We found out that right in front of us was the guy that all of Brazil was talking about: the guy parading in all 14 special groups to break the world record. This was his second to the last school. The press was on top of him constantly filming and taking his picture. At least for this time, I was anonymous and could enjoy myself with my friends. As we entered the stadium, the parade was in full force. Beij aFlor is supposedly the richest samba school in the world and it showed. The costumes, the floats, even the song were incredible. As I entered the Sambadrome, I paid special attention to Neguinho da Beija-Flor who was singing as we passed. I imagined singing with him the coming Saturday. Now he was involved with his own struggle: to make Beija-Florthe champion. He had to sing his best and that he did. It was only in November that he found out that samba schools existed outside of Brazil. He was very surprised about that. So much so, that he insisted that he help out with Unidos do Mundo.. He was not asked to participate nor was he paid. He took it on with his own heart. That was to happen again and again during this project. I danced, I sang, practicing my voice on the avenida (avenue). My voice was strong and ready. Somehow when I sang in the Sambadrome, my voice was stronger. It was indeed a special place. Brazilians around me started to look at me funny when I sang and yelled just like apuxador(a singer of samba). I wasproud to be a gringo sambista and it showed! Monica and Ross too were doing theirthing. They both danced some samba as did I. It was very hot, the cameras were constantly on the guy in front of us breaking the world record for parading, but we sang and danced without any great notice. And every time a camera was in view, I looked into it, hoping to be seen. I was practicing for Saturday. ' I constantly looked up into the stands to see if1 could find the gringo sambista group. They were all together in the stands and some ofthem knew Monica and Ross were parading. As we neared the end of the parade route, I was almost fainting with heat exhaustion. But somehow, I kept turning in the direction ofthe crowd and using my height, I kept waving as if to someone. And then, my eyes met with our mestre-sala, Byrant from SambaLi. He jumped up and waved as did the entire group. It was like having family recognize you. It was great! I turned to Monica and Ross and pointed and we all waved. Shortly though, it was all over and we were in a cab going home being heat exhausted and tired from the wonderful experience.
they really had tim to sit and look atthe song in detail. They would learn it later, but irst, they had to know what they were singing and the meaning 'ehind it. This is where began to see my role forming as international coordinator. I kn w what! was to be in their shoes and adjusted accordingly. Ale sandra and I became very confident in each other's intuitions bout the event with my role being the eyes, ears, and hearts ofthe a ingos. This proved to be very important in the coming days. Ve important indeed. We then hea d to dinner. We were in an enormous space. The place was ca led Fundicao Progresso and was a theater art space right down own, next to the famous Lapa trolley cars and the conical mod Cathedral. After eating, we made our way down into the qu dra where hundreds of our Brazilian counterparts who made u hal f ofthe samba school were gathering. With so little time, ma y positions that had to be rehearsed and choreographed wer done by Brazilians. There was roughly one Brazilian for eac gringo and tonight they were to integrate. The bateria as on stage while the groups of dancers were sent to their resp ctive order in a parade. But because quadras are square and no like a long street like the Sambadrome, rehearsals in Brazilians.ba schools go around in circles. The order of the groups were anged on the floor. The gringo group that was in the spotlight t s night were the sambista dancers. Could they dance samba??? Paying You Dues
I must digres here. For herein starts the tale of the gringo sambista. It turn out that the Brazilians were scared of the gringos. Not because they would be better sambistas. No chance of that. But they we e scared of whether the gringos would be able to do any samba tall. There were enough Brazilians to fill in all the functions nee ed in case the gringos wouldpagar o mico ("pay the monkey", ro ghly translated as making a fool of oneself). I experienced this myself a week earlier. When! first a ived on the Wednesday before Carnaval, I did not sing right a ay. The director of the school, Ricardo Pavlo (Alessandra' s h band) and Walter, a puxador from Mocidade, were on stage at • ur quadra and were singing the samba song. They sort of ign • red me awhile, giving me the Brazilian signal that they wanted he singing to be done right. When I was finally given a microph ne, the microphone was very low and I had to have a strong vo cc to be heard. I didn't dare ask the sound guy to raise the soun . out of respect. After all, wha was Ito demand anything. Two days later, I did a show at a shopp ng mall to advertise Unidos do Mundo and was the announcer. I lso sang with Walter who sang as principal with me tagging alon . That evening,! sang with him at the rehearsal more as an equal having gotten to know him through conversation. But I still d'd not earn my spot. The Wednes ay after Camaval, the first day of rehearsal for Unidos do Mun • o, Walter was not there and I found myself as the principal. That evening,! asked the cavaquinho player from CapriWednesday, March 8, 2000 chosos to play the samba enredo in my key, so I could sing comfortably After the days of street bands, the and for a longer time. He obliged Sambadrome, and sight-seeing, we and that turned out to be very good finally met to go to our first formal for me. I sang over two-and-a-half meeting and practice. We were treated hours as principal singer with a to a lecture on the history of Carnaval short break. I sang harmony and at the place where we were to call our even threw in the phrase "I love own "quadra" or quad. Some people you" to add a touch ofgringo. When who arrived early were already familI was through, the Brazilians all iar with the place and for others, this came up and shook my hand and was the first time. We met in a small said, "Good job, puxador" (samba auditorium and listened to several singer). That night,!proved myself speakers. I then was asked to get the to the Brazilians that I could hold gringos singing the samba enredo by my own as a samba singer. learned Martinho da Vila. But being a gringo Alessandra animates the audience my place. And! knew that the grinsambista myself, I knew that few gos coming to Rio were going to people at this point could sing the have to do the same. song. The song was launched on the Internet less than a month before Back to We dnesday, March 8, 2000 the event and most gringo sambistas had not even heard it. So I decided to go through the song line by line and translate it and Back on day one, the Brazilians were busy integrating the explain its meaning. I knew that for most, this was the first time BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
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gringos with the Brazilians. The most crucial group to integrate were the sambista dancers. There were about fourteen female gringo dancers and two males. They were paraded around in circles, and told to dance their best. They were told only some of them would make the position of sambista. A sambista in the Sambadrome is a place of high honor. Only the best dancers are allowed to be in that position. There were two other important positions: rainha (queen) and madrinha (head dancer). But for these were decided that no contest would be held. They would eliminate some ofthe gringo sambistas this night. As they paraded around and around, each gringo sambista did their best trying to outdance the other. They were in a frenzy and at the same time scared that they would be cut. Finally, they came to the stage to find out who would be the gringo sambistas to parade in the Sambadrome. Each one was presented by name and the audience clapped for each one. And then came the decision from Alessandra: "Because we think you all are very good, we have decided to include all of you as passistas!". At that moment, they all became very, very happy. The bateria played and they all danced with a happiness that could only be described in their dance. The passistas had passed the test. They earned their place. Thursday, March 9, 2000
My first indication that something was going very wrong was when some gringo samba dancers came by to complain. They said that they expected workshops each day and were not getting what they had paid for. They stood around waiting fora class that never happened. They said they were not sure that they wanted to continue with the project. I understood their frustration and immediately went to Alessandra with the news. She immediately started trying to solve the problem by planning changes for the following day. As the practice began to wind down, the other bomb dropped. Outside waiting for me were a dozen or so people from the gringo bateria. I was told how that many ofthem did not play at all that day and were very upset, some in tears. Those who had brought their lastruments got to play. Those who were aggress* got to play by muscling their way to a drum. But many did not play the entire night. Again, I listened 10 their complaints and they were right to be upset. I iinmediately went again to Alessandra and told her welad an immediate crisis we had to fix right away or there would be no parade on Saturday. She immediately dropped everything and I explained what was happening. It turned out that this day, Thursday March 9,2000, was the day everything went wrong. I relaxed that day because I was worried about my voice and did not check with the gringos to see that they were happy. That was not normal. After all,!am the international coordinator. I did not do my job. Alessandra also neglected the gringos. She was busy with other things and did not check. Each night, Ricardo her husband had taken care ofthe rehearsals, but he was gone and did not look after the gringos. We were supposed to have workshop classes, but it rained and the Sambadrome had to be painted. The teachers for the planned workshops in the Sambadrome went one way and we went another. The gringos ended up at a practice that was supposed to be only for Brazilians and directors did not expect us to be there and ignored us. Alessandra and I got very depressed. Two workshop days had passed and there was only one more day before the parade and the gringos were wanting to pull out of the event. Alessandra was exhausted. I was exhausted. Doris my wife and the show director at Our samba school in California had arrived that day and she was tired from shows she did in Los Angeles during Carnaval there. We all talked aboutswhat to do. Doris and Alessandra said "we can turn the projecttaround". "Tomorrow we can turn the emotional state around from negative to positive." I was depressed and less optimistic. The two Brazilians had faith. The gringo did not. Later! would understand all this. But at this point, I was very depressed.
On Thursday before the day of champions (March 9,2000), we all met at the Rio Othon Hotel at 2 PM fora field trip to BeijaFlor samba school. After that, we were to head to the Sambadrome for rehearsals there. We boarded the buses for the hour-long journey to Ni lopol is, a city that is north of Rio' s Guanabara Bay. On the way, the bus drivers got lost. The gringos at first found this amusing asking how a reputable travel company could hire professional bus drivers who did not know the way to such a famous destination at Beija-Flor. "Don't they use maps in Brazil?", they asked. Some Brazilians laughed. This simple inconvenience would turn out to be the beginning of culture differences that were to grow to a pitched frenzy that night. The two buses finally arrived late at Beija-Flor and we were treated to a number of talks about samba schools and the spirit of Carnaval. We toured the grounds of Beija-Flor and we were told of the community work that schools performed in their cities. The gringos were taught how to open their souls and hearts to the world as they paraded. It was a wonderful start to the day Friday, March1 0, 2000 of workshops. Then came some more cultural annoyances. Due to the rains, the president ofthe League of Samba Schools I didn't wantto go to the Rio Othon, not after last night.! didn't in Rio decided that the Sambadrome became unsightly and that want to confront thegringo rebellion. But I knew I had to go. We it needed a new coat of paint. So our trip to the Sambadrome was supposedly had theproblems solved and the gringos attitudes canceled. Most gringos did not think much about this at the time would turn around btu:lay:I knew I had to go eventually and face since they had no idea why they would go to the Sambadrome them. But I was exhausted and my strength to confront the combefore the day of the parade. We ate dinner and then headed back plaints was quickly leaving me. Maybe Doris and Alessandra were to our quadra in downtown Rio and were given an impromptu right and a good night's sleep would quiet them down some.! had tour of the city to kill the time we were supposed to be at the to go. I started this whole thing, so I couldn't quit now. Sambadrome rehearsing. That is when the gringos started grumgot there a bic, later accompanied by Doris. I was very bling. "If I wanted a sight-seeing tour, I would have taken the worried, but I did net let her know it. As we got there by taxi, I Love-Boat to Carnaval." "I came to learn samba, not to see the got out and started wtilking around. The gringos were there in force sights of Rio at night in the dark." The gringos were getting and!kept moving around hoping no one would stop and talk with restless. I could feel the tension and frustration growing. It wasn't me. A couple ofpeop)e talked with me, but there was not the same a good time to paint the Sambadrome I thought. enthusiasm I had seen during the first few days. Finally, the When we finally got back to our quadra, the sambistas were gringos that were most upset came up and started complaining very anxious to learn what they needed to know to parade in the about the first two days and how they were not doing "workshops". Sambadrome. The place was full of Brazilians who were prac- I really began to hate that word: "workshop". What a horrible ticing for the parade. That night, the director Ricardo Pavao was word. away busily working on some of the components in the parade. They told me that on the flyer they were sent a year ago that Alessandra was also very busy doing the same and was away from a workshop was planned for all three days and that two days were practice area. I was exhausted from everything and was not sing- gone with no workshop. I tried explaining to them that the first ing that night in order to conserve my voice for Saturday. Instead day was "integration" arid that for Brazilians, this WAS a workof paying the needed attention to the gringos, I walked around, shop. They did not see that. Another cultural conflict. I also relaxing, letting the practice continue. Everything seemed in explained that the rains had changed our direction yesterday and order. But it was not. that we and the teachers for the workshop ended up in different BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
, places. They still were not satisfied. After what scemed to be an eternity, we managed to turn I tried various times to explain to them what had happened, around and we w re at least moving again. We passed the same but there was not much I could do to fix the past. I only hoped places for what s emed the hundredth time and I went back into that today would change their minds. deep depression, ow on the last day before the big event, we were Doris turned to me and asked if she could talk to everyone on so lost that we w re going to have to go back home. One more the buses before we headed out to Beija-Flor and "real" work- day without a wo kshop. The project was doomed! thought. But shops. Being so emotionally and physically exhausted,! agreed then something appened that I never would have expected. with pleasure. "Please talk to them. I have no more strength left." Something that f r me, was the defining moment ofthe entire trip. After all, they always ended coming to me because! was the guy A Brazilian urned to everyone and said: "Let's sing our who got them into this project and! was ultimately responsible. song!" He starte • to beat the back ofthe bus seat and began singing the song that artinho da Vila had so carefully and lovingly Doris was shielded from that exposure until now. Doris entered the buses and talked with them. I was oblivi- written. ous to what happened. But when I found out many days later what she said and what happened inside, the importance of what she Meu amor, eu prazer, viajei para te ver did became enormous in helping save the spirit of the project. Singrei os m res tal qual navegante de Sagres Cruzei os ar s como o genial Santos Dumont (Thanks, Doris! •' -) Doris came off the second bus and said "David, let's go". I Vou Carnavi lizar, corn a bandeira brasileira followed her willingly and we got on the bus for the hour ride to Vou confrat izar, no desfile das campeeis Beija-Flor. On the way there,! continued my depression.! looked Eu vim cant r, eu vim dancar, e me exibir outside the window, watching the Brazilian buildings go by Mais sei que s sambistas desfilam, nao é so para se diver& thinking to myself "Wow, I made it all the way to the day before Eu te amo, e te amo, eu te amo Brasil the event and it has become a failure." For four years! fought with E vim deseja muitas felicidades no ano dois mil what seemed to be an eternal optimism. When! had no one in Rio Ouvindo bo s sambas a tua cultura entendi E em qualqu r pals quando posso eu falo por ti to do the project with only one year, six months to the event, I still fought on with a blind faith that it would all work out. Já contei tu historia atraves dos teus sambas enredos Yet at this moment, my emotions and physical state collapsed Sou a Unido do Mundo e samba para mim jci nao tern mais into a deep despair. I imagined a couple dozen gringos joining segredo the 400 Brazilians and the parade going on with all the Brazilians watching wondering where were all the gringos we promMy love, m pleasure, I traveled to see you. I sailed the as like those sacred navigators ised would be here. I imagined instead of hunOreds of positive I cruised the skies like the genius Santos Dumont messengers of Unidos do Mundo that I would send hundreds of negative messengers to Spread the news of disaster to the entire I will do Ca aval, with the Brazilian flag world and that the project would be viewed as a failure. I have I will frate ize in the parade of champions to admit that at this very low moment I told myself: "David, at I came to si g, I came to dance and show off But! know ambistas parade, it's not just to have fun least you tried." Doris, noticing that I was sad, took my hand and asked, "Are I love you, I love you, I love you Brazil I came to wi h you happy birthday in the year 2000 you ok?" I told her that! was very depressed but did not tell her I thought the project would be a failure. I was still too proud to Hearing yo samba, I came to know your culture And in wha ver country! am in, I try to talk about you give up even though my hope was lost. She patted my hand and I already ha e told your history through your samba songs said, "David, everything will be alright. The spirit of this group I am United World Samba School and for me samba is no will turn around today. You will see." I heard her words, but did mystery not believe them. I composed mysel f and tried to get myself back to reality. On I looked aro nd and everyone, I mean everyone, was singing the way, some Brazilians who came from other countries accompanyingtheir gringo spouses and sambistas began to sing and play the song. They ang as if they were soldiers marching off to die their drums. There were only a few people participating. The spirit in battle. They ound themselves in an unfamiliar land in the was still pretty grim. We were going to turn the spirit around! No middle of a war nd the only way to lift their spirits was to sing. I got a lump in y throat. I could not sing. It was not my turn to more problems right? Wrong. We got lost again. I couldn't believe it. After getting lost the day before, we got sing. It was the s. I was the general and the moment I thought even more lost today. Even the gringos began saying "didn't we that my troops ere going to abandon me, they all began singing pass this same house three times already?" The answer was yes. to lift their spir ts. I held back y tears and got my video camera. I wanted to I let the bus driver ask about five people directions before! started to get really upset. "Jeese!", I said. "I can't believe these people capture this mo ent. A moment ofmelancholy where happiness can't get directions to the most famous place in their city!' "Que and sadness ca e together. A moment! could have never prelast four years! struggled to make this project pals é esse?" ("What kind of country is this?" I quoted from a dicted during song). I went up front and sarcastically asked, "Are we lost?". The a reality. I nev saw it coming. At that mo ent I saw and captured on video, gringos becomguide responded, "We took a wrong turn here, then there, but we ing a bit like Brazilians. They are close. We just have to keep asking so that we were collectively suffering the don't get lost even more". Satisfied that! had made same frustrations that Brazilians it clear that I was concerned about the service, I live day in and day out. They were turned around and headed back to my seat. "We lost, in a situation from which there Dave?" they asked. I just signaled to them with the was no escape. They were not traditional thumbs up and headed back to my seat. from here and did not understand I knew at that point two things: (1), we were the system, but they all shared REALLY lost, (2) we couldn't make them get there two things in common: they were any faster no matter how we tried. We were in Braall experiencing Brazil like Brazil. This is another cultural difference. We continzilians, and most importantly, ued to ask directions every street block until we got they had samba to raise their spirto a dead end road where we had to turnaround. That Alessandra, president of its. process took us 15 minutes. I was really mad now. Unidos do Mundo I then began to feel my spirRight when we had to show the gringos that everyits being lifted by those who had thing was in order, the chaos became almost unbearcame along on this crazy journey able. We were over an hour late and we were only showing the gringos more incompetence. Right when we had to and who had s ent the last day complaining to me about it. Again I mu t digress... turn the spirit from positive to negative, we get so lost that arrival Days later found out what Doris had said and what had that same day was becoming questionable.! smiled in quiet frushappened in t morning on the buses when she talked to the tration and sat down again. BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
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"troops". She later revealed to me that she had gone into each bus and said (and I paraphrase): "Look. I know things are not going as you thought they would. I know you are upset about many things. But you have come this far. David and Alessandra have worked very hard to get us to the place where we can show Brazil that gringos can samba. Are we going to give up now? Are we going to show them that we are going to give up right before our time in the sun? No way! Let's show them that we can do samba outside ofBrazil. Are you with me?" Doris told me that both buses clapped and cheered. She gave the old General Patton speech and it worked. It is hard for me to know how to thank her for what she did. She later told me say that she found the strength by looking back at how Alessandra and I had worked to get to this point, and could not let it die just one day before it was to come true. We humans need each other for sure. I needed her that day.
that our intentions were always good and that communication was everything. I told her I was a bit worried about opening up the discussion to the gringos about the difficulties of yesterday. She told me that she had some news that I could tell the gringos. I listened intently to her and then went to my speech. I was my turn to face the participants. I had no idea what to expect. I just hoped it would turn out positively. "Did you like the teachers from today?" The bateria motioned yes. "They will go with you back to Rio as will all the of drums, and you are to take the stage. The stage, the quadra, and the school are yours. Unidos do Mundo is a gringo samba school. Yes, the Brazilians The ma ster of the bateria and the gringos Gringo Bateria will be there but they are there only to help you. The Two nights before, the gringo samba dancers school is yours." proved that they could samba well enough to dance in the There was only silence. But the stares and emotions were so Sambadrome. Now it was the bateria's turn. Seven players and thick that they could be cut with a knife. People looked at me and directors from Beija-Flor's bateria were on hand with a truck full at each other thinking. I believe they were thinking of all the of drums from Imperio do Tuiuti. Each drummer got the drum suffering and struggling and work and money it took to get themthey wanted to play in the parade. No one was without a drum. selves to where they were today. They were upset, yes, very upset Each gringo was given a drum, a strap, and a stick and were and they had the right. But as they sat silently, they began shakcarefully and politely treated. The samba dancers had one male ing their heads in quiet agreement. They could not cheer or laugh. and one female teacher to teach them samba moves that they could They were still in a state of melancholy. A state of happiness and learn quickly, which they did. Everyone was given the attention sadness and anger and delight all at once. Their feelings again were they wanted. Hopefully, we were making up for the attention we very Brazilian.! sense this having spent three years of my life in did not give them the night before. Rio and knowing the feeling. The Brazilians lined up the gringos in the parking lot ofBeijaThe gringos not only could play and dance samba, they could Flor to get them to play and march while playing. Of course, all in some important way, feel Brazilian. the gringo drummers had a lot of experience with this, but the "Let's go then!" I said and people slowly got up and headed Brazilians did not know. In fact, they didn't know if they could for the buses. One person I passed when going to the busses— play, let alone play and march at the same time. They spent a lot a person who was very upset from the night before—seemed to of time talking and explaining before they started the gringos sum up their feelings in one simple word: "Thanks". I think that playing. Yet, the gringos were restless to play. Finally, after was one of the sweetest "thanks" I ever heard. delaying a good 45 minutes, the directors gave the calls to play. The leader called, the gringos answered. The leaders called again, The Last Rehearsal the gringos answered. The leader finally called to start and the gringos started, somewhat tentatively at first, but then they grew That night, the rehearsal was intense and the energy beyond stronger and more confident in a few short minutes. belief. The gringos took the stage with their drums and they were They marched up and down the parking lot. They then moved joined by an equal number of Brazilians. Celebrities were there inside and played with one of the official puxadores (samba this night and one of them, very unexpected. singers) from Beija-Flor. Again, they played very well. A break Neguinho da Beija-Flor is known throughout Brazil as a top was then given to see a dance demonstration. I stopped video samba singer and he was there to rehearse. He was surrounded taping, I happened to pass by and hear the seven Brazilian instruc- by fans and onlookers and I made my way to him to hug him and tors talking about the gringos in Portuguese, whispering to them- thank him again for his support. selves. "If I had half ofthese gringo drummers here today, I could But then I saw someone who at first, I didn't believe could throw out half our bateria at Beija-Flor!" I guess that was a be there. She was there in great spirits with a beer in one hand and compliment. They were truly impressed. I let the gringos know a cigarette in another.! looked at her several times and she glanced about what I heard right away. It brought some smiles. my way but I wasn't sure. Because of the crowds of people and Brazilians have to remember that we gringo sambistas study, reporters, I had people constantly coming up to me with comstudy, study samba. We don't grow up with this stuff so we have ments, thanks, and questions. A little while later, one lady who to study it later in life to try and make up for lost time. Maybe the I had met before said: "Let me introduce you to someone". She Brazilians were slowly starting to understand this. walked me over to the mystery person and then I knew. It must Needless to say, the gringo samba drummers or bateria earned be her. their spots on the last day before the parade. But one question still "Beth, this is David. He is one of the founders of the school lingered: is Unidos do Mundo a gringo school or a Brazilian one? and was the one who organized everything over the Internet". "Oh!" she replied with surprise, turning to her friends. She then Unrest or Satisfaction? introduced me to her friends saying "this is the guy who started all this over the Internet!" I told her that it was a great honor to We ate our final dinner at Beija-Flor and I agreed to talk to have her here and that she was a legend to everyone including we the group right before we left. It was time to see ifthe gringos egos gringo sambistas. Later on, she would tell us all why she was there and emotions were repaired from the wounds ofthe previous day. in her own words. Right now, I had to get ready to sing. Just before talking with them, I sought out Alessandra who was Pavao, the director of the school, introduced Neguinho, hidden away on her cell phone making the millions of decisions, myself, and Ricardo from Portugal as the puxadores for the plans and adjustments needed for the huge job of parading 700 school. Neguinho and Ricardo talked to the crowd and then Pavao people in the Sambadrome the next day. started putting the parade groups in order to rehearse. Pavao had I found her and waited for her to end her current phone call. another person he said would like to speak to the school and She looked at me with very tired eyes and said: "E ai?" (What's especially the gringos. She came on stage and called me next to up?) That was becoming her standard comment when she saw me. her so that! could translate. She spoke in Portuguese in one lovely We had learned very early on that we could trust each other and sentence that expressed her feelings of why she was there to help 14
BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
give her support. She then turned to the bateria and asked me to translate. I did so by first telling them who she was. "This is Beth Carvalho". You should have seen the looks of amazement on the gringo bateria. They were so emotionally involved and charged that they did not recognize her at first. Now they did. Their mouths hung open in a collective gasp as! translated. "Beth said that when she came to know about our project Unidos do Mundo, that it lifted her heart and spirit so, that she had to be part of it." That said it all. It seemed that everyone was catching the spirit of the project that kept both Alessandra and I going for so many years despite the obstacles. It was now coming true in the most remarkable ways. Pavio then announced that the last rehearsal would be started with the gringo puxadores—Ricardo and myself. This was Ricardo's first time so I sang as principal. Neguinho was standing next to us with a lyric sheet to help him learn the song.! started and Ricardo and I sang the first two times through alone. The bateria came in and the dancers were whipped into a frenzy. The quadra was truly the gringos quadra and the Brazilians were there to help and to participate alongside. Neguinho began to sing and we three sang for a few verses together. There were only three microphones so we had to rotate as the night went on. Beth Carvalho came to the stage and I shared my microphone with her for the refrain which she already knew. She then moved away as we sang the rest of the song, animating the crowd and taking it in. Now I really knew why she is the first lady of samba in Brazil. She lived and breathed samba and she knew that we were making samba history—something already familiar to her. One Favor, One Chance
I could do my be t. But this concentration was suddenly broken and the emotion f the moment 'took hold. Ricardo from Portugal had handed th microphone to Jairzinho and he moved up front next to me and p t his arm around me. There we w re: Jairzinho do Imperio with David from SambaLa singin in between Neguinho and Beth Carvalho. A dream come tru for Jairzinho and I. A time to remember. Afterabit, I h nded my microphone to Walter, apuxador and composer from ocidade who also was singing with us tomorrow. After all, I ad to save my voice for the big day as all of us. We were there til very late. Saturday,
arch 11, 2000
We all met a the Rio Othon to go to the Sambadrome. This was the day. It w s threatening to rain but so far had held off. We were to parade a 8 pm, right after the children's samba school and right before e Italian Carnaval group. A noticeable portion ofthe gringos di not have their costumes and were already letting me know. I told em they would be sent to them in the concentration area of th Sambadrome and to go with us. We piled onto the bus and hea ed out. When we got here and started to put on our costumes the rains began. SambaL ' s porta-bandeira and mestre-sala costumes were made of v vet and they began to get very heavy. For our King Momo, the ain was a nice cooling shower for such a greatsized man. But really didn't even notice the rain. I went with everyone to th concentration area and met up with the cavaquinho pla er and other singers. We hid under the side of our float to kee dry and not to catch cold and ruin our voices. Alessandra ad reached her wits end. This was her first really big event a she could no longer function. Pavio, her husband, and my w fe Doris were calmly solving a thousand problems a second, w ving some offas impossible to solve, others they improvised. Ike t with the singers.! had to have my voice strong so they could fe 1 the presence of a gringo in the song. Finally, the ateria entered the Sambadrome and all we singers and music ans entered behind. We looked down the Sambadrome w ich looked a thousand miles long filled to capacity looking as i we were gladiators going to battle. We were pumped! Negui ho came running up to me and told me that 0 Globo wanted t interview me before the parade. I went to them and answered a bunch of interview questions right before we started. Milan there I stood, next to the sound car in the Sambadrome, 1th Neguinho da Beij a-Flor, Beth Carvalho, Jairzinho, and ndreds of gringos and Brazilians ready to parade. Four year of work were about to come to a head. I didn't even have time o talk to Alessandra. It was show time! A few seco ds before the start, another newsperson tapped me on the shou der. I didn't really have time for another interview. But when she showed me her badge, it stopped me in my tracks for thos few seconds. She was a reporter from Brazzil magazine. I did 't even know her name but at that moment, it hit me as to how f I had gone during the last four years. There she was, a reporter for a magazine that was local to our area and country and pro uced by my friend Rodney, standing next to me in he Sambadrome. A piece of home was close by du ing this historic event. It shook me for a moment. Then, it started...
Back in late 1998 when Alessandra joined the proj ect, I asked her one favor. It wasn't money, or a plane ticket, or a hotel. I paid my way and the way of a few othersto get to Brazil for this project and had no special treatment. But there was one special favor I asked: not for me, but for someone in my family. Jairzinho lives in a town north of Rio and is an incredible person. Liked by all, he is humble, yet very strong emotionally and physically. But most of all, he has a big, big heart. He had once been called to sing at a big school in Rio when he was younger. He went to Rio but at the last minute, he got scared and didn't show up for the meeting. He was from a small town, was young, and was not emotionally ready for the chance. My wife and! also tried to get him to come to the United States a few years ago during Carnaval to sing. He composed some very beautiful songs for SambaLa, which we sang, but again he declined the invitation. He was still not ready. But this time,! invited him to a place and at a time in his life he could never refuse: to sing in the Sambadrome with me. It is the dream of tens of thousands of samba singers all around Brazil. That is the biggest show on earth for a samba singer. It is the Carnegie Hall, the Albert Hall of Rio. And this time he didn't refuse. He said "David, we'll show them how to sing, you and!!" So! asked Alessandra if my brother-in-law who was a samba singer and composer could sing with me on the avenue in the Sambadrome. She told me, "Of course!". But I really didn't know until the week before if it would happen. Sixty Minutes of Heaven There are so many politics involved in putting us in Neguinho yelled out his praise forthe school and the Sambadrome that! its members and began to sing our song. At his side knew thatthere was a small s Beth Carvalho who although did not sing, was chance he may not sing. re showing her support. All we other singers But she kepttelling me that need in time with the music ready to sing when it would happen. time came. Once the first two lines were done, Well, Jairzinho was guinho turned to us and we began singing. What there that night when I emotion. We were so ready. We were more than started to sing during the dy. We were super ready. And not one tear. Just last rehearsal. When I was a r, 4 " "Gtell ging, singing, singing our hearts out! Singing the singing with Beth and NeUnidos do Mundo break out in singing St we could! The clock moved to zero hours, zero guinho, I was concentratm nutes. Our sixty minutes of heaven had started. ing on my singing—my is was our time. But would the audience react? technique, not singing too loud to ruin my voice for the next day. I was using techniques I Would Brazil act and understand why we were there? At the righ moment, the bateria did its breaks and came in had learned in my lessons from atop singer teacher in LA so that BFtAZZIL — MARCH 2000
15
strong without missing a beat. The paraders on the avenue in front wedges that looked like sailing ships in front when separated, and of us began to swing and sway and jump to the beat. Each person moon crescents from the side. They all came togetherperiodically did their part. I watched in amazement as the spectacle passed by. to form a globe of the world which then spun around and around. We were stationary in the traditional holding area for the bateria When it stopped, people inside would come out and juggle and and sambistas as the rest of the parade passed by until our place do tricks, then they went back inside to repeat their choreogracame to enter the avenue. Neguinho was phy. This part of Unidos do Mundo was so good that the amazing with his voice and had an inleague of samba schools said it was better than halfthe front credible respect for our new small commissions of the top schools. school. He turned to me while singing These incredible creations and ideas came from Ricardo and with his booming strong voice PavAo and his team in Brazil. Incredible job, guys!!! called out my name: "Davidgee!!!" Our school, SambaLa made some history that day. We (That is the way Brazilians pronounce were the first samba school outside of Brazil to parade the my name, David). What an incredible following in the Sambadrome: mestre-sala,porta-bandeira, I rush! I sang better and stronger! What Neguinho, Jairzinho, madrinha da bateria, rainha da bateria, Ret Momo, and first an amazing person to recognize that this David, and Beth Carval non-Portuguese speaking gringo to sing. Something we can vo, was our school that he was here to help. tell our grandkids! Incredible! And what held everything together and told the millions To add a touch of "gringo" to our song, during our practices of Brazilians on TV and the tens of thousand in the stands why I added the English phrase "I love you" in between the verse saying we were there was the song. The song by the musical genius "Eu te amo, eu te amo, eu te amo Brasil." Now that I was in the Martinho da Vila told everyone there that we had traveled far to parade, I shouted this at every chance that I could at that point see them and to help celebrate their 500 year birthday in the year in the music to let Brazil know that we gringos were there and 2000. It told our story to the Brazilians as did our floats and our that there was a gringo samba singer. costumes. But it was our dancing, playing and singing that showed It was finally our turn to parade and we turned onto them we are gringo sambistas! the avenue. It was still raining and the avenue was wet, The crowd by the end of the sixty but I only remember that as a fact, not feeling. Emominutes were singing along with us. Beth tionally, I didn't feel the rain. What I do remember are; Carvalho paraded down the avenue pointtwo incredible sights, sounds, feelings. First, looking ing the gringo bateria, dancers, and singdown the avenue and seeing the Sambadrome entirely ers out to the crowd and applauded along filled with our school. I had always imagined that it with them for their efforts. Carl inhos would only fill a small part of the 750 meter length of Jesus, a famous Brazilian dancer also the Sambadrome, but it filled the entire length! joined in the fun and spirit. The TV anI was immediately struck by what an incredible job nouncer noted that they had not seen such Comissao de Frente Alessandra, Pavao, and their staff did to put together spirit of fun in many years on the avenue such a spectacle! Second was the crowd. They were and of course, never so many gringos!!! on their feet clapping in unison and singing and waving. What a sight! What a feeling! I looked at the clock and there Final was still 40 minutes left and I wondered if my voice could hold out for that long. I hit my stomach muscles with my fist now and I reached the painted line in the Sambadromethatliterally says then to remind myself to project. Voice, don't fail me now! "final" and the documentary film crew approached, camera rollDoris came around to video tape us singing and I grabbed a ing. "So, how was it?" they asked. hold ofNeguinho and Jairzinho and we paraded past Doris as she "It was sixty minutes of ecstasy between total chaos" I said. filmed. Neguinho was such a sport to let us sing with him. He made And it was. Carnaval is a moment of bliss between the struggles us feel so comfortable. Doris disappeared behind us and we con- of everyday life. And the gringos lived this during this trip. But tinued singing. She then reappeared and this time, I felt that I now it was over. wanted to record a more intimate moment for our family. I At the end, Doris, Jairzinho and I found each other and we put grabbled Jairzinho and we paraded in front of the camera. our heads together for a group hug. We had no words. No words Sure, we were live on TV, there was a documentary film crew were necessary. I then looked for the other half of this project: filming us, and 65,000 people were in the stands, but this was a Alessandra. We got close to each other and we both let out our personal moment. Jairzinho and I sang not for the audience, but emotions in a flood of tears. We put our hands on each other's for Doris. A stream oftears larger than Brazil's Iguacu falls started shoulders and pressed our foreheads together like Siamese twins falling down her face. She wasn't even looking into the video joined at the head. Our hands linked our hearts and souls. camera's view finder. She just held the camera next to her head "Conseguimos" we said in unison. "We did it!" and was bawling like a baby. I kissed Jairzinho on his clean cut head and we went on with our bliss. The Future The Parade
Thinking back now, time has not diminished my feelings. During the writing of this article, tears and a lump in my throat The parade of Unidos do Mundo made history in so many were the norm as the words of this piece made me relive the ways. The one float we had from Porta da Pedra school stopped moments of the last four years over and over. The emotions do in the middle of the Avenue and half the paraders went up one not go away but only get stronger. side and out the other. The float was a huge computer screen and But if there is one defining moment during the four years, I the participants entered the screen on one side symbolizing them would have to pick something that I already knew defined the entering the Internet in their country, and walked out of the entire project, but during the parade, only reflection would make computer screen into the Sambadrome on the other side. First time this clear. a parade went through a float. Jackson was born during the first year we started our samba Another first was the big ball. A flag made school in the Los Angeles area back in 1994. His up of19 countries were sewn together to make mother is the madrinha of SambaLa and he accomup one large Brazilian flag and for the round panied her in the Sambadrome on this historic day. blue part in the middle, there was a two meter As I watched the video of the parade, I saw little ball. Once every so often down the avenue, the Jackson for the first time in the parade walking along ball was hit around by the participants in the the entirety ofthe Sambadrome playing. People were parade eventually landing back in its spot. Each throwing streamers, which were landing on the flag was supported by a person dressed as a avenue along with bits and pieces of costumes and candle, each representing a country ofthe parJairzinho, David, and floats. Jackson was fascinated by these treasures on ticipants. Neguinho the avenue and during the entire parade was pickThe most spectacular part of the parade — ing them up, playing with them, and then throwing however was the front commission (comissao them away. At one point he innocently offered a de frente). There were eight people in 25-foot (8 meter) high streamer as an imaginary banana to Beth Carvalho to eat. 16
BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
Epilogue At first I felt angry. Angry that he did not play or dance down the avenue. He dances and plays samba very well and people are A fire broke out a week after the event, destroying everything always impressed by his ability at such an early age. Yet years before I arrived in Brazil, I knew that Jackson had but the front commission globe. Everything that was being stored to be there with us. He was symbolic of samba in the 21" century. for next year's event was turned to ash. But thankfully, no one Before, you could only grow up with samba in Brazil. If you lived was hurt and Alessandra's family business had no damage. outside of Brazil there was no chance to be as good as a Brazilian Alessandra and I believe it as a new beginning for next year. But we don't know how the fire started, nor does sambista. But it was now different. Jackson has it matter now. Thank goodness it didn't hapgrown up with samba all his life. He thinks that bepen BEFORE the parade! ing in a samba school is normal. He danced his first Unidos do Mundo returns to Rio and samba show before he was born and samba is in parades in the Sambadrome on February 30, his blood. When he got to Brazil and played and 2001 and you are welcome to join us! Workdanced samba with the Brazilians, it was as if he shops will be bigger and better and will run lived there all his life. February 27-29, 2001. What I didn't understand when I saw him in Check www.unidosdomundo.com for the Sambadrome was his complete lack of want to details in the coming months. All participants do the samba. I couldn't figure that out. Jacqueline, her son Jackson, of the first event are considered founding Then it hit me... and Beth Carvalho members and will have special privileges and Jackson didn't need to samba in the Samba•,7,1 discounts for all the hardships they experidrome. His samba world wasn't Rio de Janeiro. I. enced durin our first encounter. Sure, Rio is the Mecca of Samba and we adults We are looking to take Unicos do Mundo to different counknow and feel its importance. To him, the Sambadrome was filled with fun toys and fun people. To him, Beth Carvalho was just tries once every so many years, but always returning to Rio reguanother ordinary person who needed to eat like the rest of us. larly. Maybe we'll follow the world cup? Who knows... Unidos do Mundo and samba continue strong into the 21" Samba is what he does at home at SambaLa in California, not in the Sambadrome. When he returns to the United States that is century and beyond but with one big difference thanks to our small when he will dance and play samba again, not now. Now is his but historic event: samba is truly universal and is uniting the world. vacation. Samba is truly becoming universal. Gringos cannot only David de Hilster is one of the founders and is the samba with some of the best Brazil has to offer, but can "feel" International Coordinator for Unidos do Mundo. a bit what a Brazilian feels during Carnaval. Participants of the He is the founder and president of SambaLa first Unidos do Mundo had suffered through what Brazilians samba school, a chief research officer of a software suffered each and every day—things not working as well or as company, an accomplished and collected artist, fast or at all. But through this suffering, a universal bond formed and is president of a worldwide physics society that is between Unidos do Mundo participants and they not only made replacing Einstein's theory. You can e-mail him at history as founding members of the first gringo samba school to david@dehilster.com parade in the Sambadrome, but they also experienced a bit ofwhat it is like for a Brazilian sambista to parade during Carnaval—a melancholy of all the emotions—good and bad of life.
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contest in San Francisco, in 1980. How time flies! Please, publish some news about soccer also in your excellent magazine. I am sending $10 for the subscription. You deserve more. Chaparala Kishore El Cerrito, California
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Although some of your magazine is often informative and interesting, I find your obsessive treatment of sexuality vulgar and offensive. Please cancel our subscription. Jim and Julia McNutt Boise, Idaho It wasn't until today that I've found out about Brazzil magazine. I found it fascinating and at this point I've read articles under the topic: "The Northeastern Drought." I would like to know if there is any spot in the electronic site where we can post our comments and opinions about specific topics. Also, if there is this place, can we search for opinions based on the topics we are interested in? I hope that you can write me back soon and I think that I am going to read the magazine in a regular basis. Now, I have one more question. Is the electronic site constantly updated? I have looked for some articles that have been published lately in Brazil and I can only find records from June of 1998. Alexandre Felipe Brazil, Via Internet I got your excellent magazine Brazzil when I went to the Brazilian consulate in San Francisco. I loved it. I will visit your webpage. I am including a check for a year subscription. How can you publish at this very low price? I am writing in English because I am not sure your group has Brazilians. I am Brazilian. Marina Gutierrez Kensington, California 1.11111111MilladallIMMIN I just realized that my subscription expired. Here is a check for $3 to keep another year going with your wonderful magazine. Keep up the good work. I enjoy the articles and interesting tidbits of information! Steven Burkhardt San Rafael, California
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1.111111illt-itl;111-inuntam Cara Danielle, parabens e obrigado pela pesquisa em que voce se empenhou. 0 incrivel e que dois dias etas, estava comentando com urn amigo, justamente sobre essas gravagOes do Stokowski. Ha em algum lugar o mesmo texto em portugues? Camilo Cassoli Via Internet
Dear Bruce, I'm in the process of writing an article about Karnak, and I'm writing to let you know that I've found your interview with Andre Abujamra and Lulu Camargo in Brazzil magazine informative and 1 plan to cite it. My article talks about Kamak's music along with Beck's, and explores 111 1111111111111,111K the idea that the concept of memes can be useful for Parabens mesmo, Daniella Deveria existir mais understanding music like theirs that is made from so many brasileiros como voce. diverse stylistic references. My previous article on BrazilFernando Novaes Duarte ian music was about Mestre Ambrosio, and it's part of the Bandolim - www.bandolim.cjb.net forthcoming collection that Charles Perrone and Chris l 1111111111111Wialla Dunn are editing on Brazilian popular music and globalizaThe industry should give out detective awards for tion. things like this. John Murphy Jack O'Neil Music Department - Western Illinois University Blue Jacket http://www.bluejackel.corn Daniella Thompson, just finished reading your article I "Stalking Stokowski." I commend you. I suspect this article I am planning on coming to Carnaval in Rio next year will be highly valued, and your work will be referred to as and would like to get all the information that I can before time passes. Your dedication to our neighbor's authentic making my plan. If possible would you send me all the heritage will likely encourage the appreciation for material information you have about the Carnaval and any other that might otherwise become completely lost and forgot- intemet addresses that would be helpful. Some things I ten. I want to hear those recordings myself. would like to know: I am proud for you as I read this, that you are using 1. Hotels along the parade route your careful attention and talent for such passionate stew2.1s it true that I will have to pay to watch the parade? ardship, so far from your home yet so close to your heart. 3. A list of nightclubs that would be fun to go to. Charles Schmalz 4. Do i need to have a person from Brazil with me? San Francisco 5. I have heard that some of the other cities have nuommu nuli:Eaaimm Carnaval and they can be a lot of fun. If this is so, would you Danielle, I live in Rio, have just read your article "Plain tell me about them? Joao" and would like to let you know that I really enjoyed Joe learning so much more about the man whose music we just Via Internet love. His last CD, Joao Voz e Viola°, "directed" by Gaetano, is a masterpiece exhibition of the simplicity of what his I have a grandmother who was born and raised in music is all about. If you have a mailing list related to Joao Brazil. She is currently living in Pennsylvania and is too old Gilberto or Brazilian music in general, please include me. to visit her homeland and relatives. I would like to buy her Thanks and congratulations. a subscription to your publication so she can feel someRui Wong what connected to her heritage. I am hoping that your Rio, Brazil magazine is not strictly by email, as my grandmother does not have a computer. Please let me know how I can go Danielle, thank youl Delightful article! Enjoyed every about getting copies of Brazzil sent to her home. bit of it, including the glossary. Via Internet Wyatt Underwood Via Internet Glad I found you on the Internet. lain looking for more info on the Brazilian communities in the DC-area and in the Danielle, gostei muito do artigo! But what a wild- rest of the USA, and on a way to communicate with these goose chase! I've been hearing about this Holy Grail for 2- groups. 3 years but this was the first time I got the whole story. Dr. Garcia David Rumpler Brazil Services International Via Internet Arlington, Virginia bsi@wizardnet have no words to describe poy¹,immss,q, FOR MORE LETTERS AND ENTIRE LETTER SEE: http:liwww.brazzil.com
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19
Reform Now? When he was first elected in 1994, president Cardoso promised a sweeping political reform, but did next to nothing to make it happen. He repeated the pledge after his re-election. A year and a half into Cardoso's second term, little has happened to indicate that a reform is actually in the works. This could change soon. ADHEMAR ALTIERI
Two of the most influential leaders in Brazilian politics put on the type of display in the past week that could only serve to further harm the image ofCongress, an institution that can ill afford further blows against its credibility. This loud, ugly, but not entirely surprising display between veteran politicians who should know better, may turn out to be the spark that finally ignites a much-needed political reform—which, like so many other reforms, has been gathering dust in Brasilia for far too long. Analysts have described the exchange as the political equivalent of a barroom brawl. It involved Senate president Ant8nio Carlos Magalhaes, of the centerright PFL—still the government's main ally, and _fader Barbalho, president ofthe centrist PMDB—Brazil's largest political party and a lesser ally, looking to cozy up and gain additional space in government. On Wednesday, April 5, each went for the other's jugular, as their backroom battle climaxed on the Senate floor. In separate speeches, the two senators described each other with words like corrupt, thief, liar, undignified, impostor, truculent, and an untranslatable piece of local slang (bajulador) for which the closest English expression would be something along the lines of "butt kisser". The clash included plenty of shouting and finger pointing, all of it carried nationally by the Senate's cable channel. Ironically, while they lock horns over space at the federal level, PFL and PMDB 20
are also working hard to dissociate themselves from the central government, as part oftheir strategy for next October's municipal elections. As part of that effort, both parties were heavily involved in the minimum wage debate that ended recently. The PFL continues to exploit the issue, openly pushing the government to find a way to raise the amount to the equivalent of $100 per month. Behind the scenes, the PMDB has used the PFL's minimum wage rhetoric to suggest that perhaps the government should consider a more "loyal" partner— like the PMDB... President Fernando Henrique Cardoso was on an official visit to Costa Rica during the Senate blowout, and steered clear of any involvement. But the broader political consequences are unavoidable. The two parties involved, plus the government's own PSDB, form the bulk of the alliance that gives the executive support in Congress. Like it or not, president Cardoso will have to get involved in the conflict, to preserve his own ability to govern. On another level, there's the inescapable disappointment with yet another show of disregard by top elected officials for institutions they should be working to protect. The fallout from all this, or lack of it, will only add insult to injury: to support their accusations, both MagaIhAes and Barbalho submitted "dossiers" on the other's wrongdoings, which turned out to be extensive collections of newspaper clippings—not exactly solid evidence. The expected result is no action of any kind against the battling senators, and some in the media have already raised the question: after this, how can anyone ever be punished for breach of parliamentary decorum? What this episode once again exposes is Brazil's dire need for a clear, reasonable, efficient political system, in which parties have meaning and voters can understand the mechanics of an election and the consequences of not putting any thought into who to vote for. When he was first elected in 1994, president Cardoso raised the specter of providing such a system through a sweeping political reform, but did next to nothing to make it happen. He repeated the pledge immediately after his re-election in 1998, adding that not keeping the original promise had been a major mistake. A year and a half into Cardoso's second term, little has happened to indicate that a reform of the magnitude the country needs is actually in the works. But this is
said to be about to change. Word in Brasilia is that once again, the government will attempt to give political reform priority treatment. Previous attempts to do this failed miserably, so this time president Cardoso' s main strategists are reported ready to try a different approach. Instead of a complete package of changes, which would involve constitutional amendments (harder to pass in Congress) and be easier to oppose, they're preparing a series of specific projects, to be introduced at both the Senate and the Lower House, each dealing with a separate issue. It'll take longer to accomplish a full reform this way, but that is apparently seen as a fair swap if the chances of reaching the final goal are also greater. Isolating each aspect in a separate debate will also expose politicians who resist any and all change—they seldom criticize political reform openly, but the fact it has gone nowhere in almost six years is a good indication of where most politicians stand on the issue. Of four points which the government hopes to pass in Congress by the end of this year, two are key. First, a so-called "barrier clause", which would impose minimum requirements for parties wishing to enter candidates in an election. Today, there are no restrictions of any kind, and any party can enter candidates at any level. This is a major reason for the proliferation of small parties with no serious political objectives of their own. They use their candidacies to beef up a larger party' s campaign, often swinging wildly between political extremes from one election to the next. Not surprisingly, these mini-parties are often described as "legendas de aluguer", something like "rent-a-party". The new proposal would force a party to demonstrate a certain level of involvement and activity before entering candidates: state and municipal ofBRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
flees, number of affiliates, elected members, and votes received in the past election, would all become determining factors. Party loyalty is another aspect government strategists intend to pursue. Currently, nothing stops an elected official from switching parties, except during a one-year period before the next election, when those who switch cannot run. Shuffling politicians are a familiar sight in Brazil's legislatures at all levels: immediately after taking office, the party-shifting begins, in perhaps the most obvious display of a party's lack of importance in the current scenario. Following the 1998 elections, more than 60 members of the Lower House of Brazil's Congress swapped parties, including one who switched three times in a single day. Eventually, the government would move on bigger themes, like the introduction of district voting and the end of compulsory voting. As it stands, the system currently in place in Brazil encourages the type of politics that senators Magalhaes and Barbalho so aptly exemplify. Both are known as "caciques"—the word actually means Indian chief, but appropriately describes politicians with large numbers offollowers, usually because of their regional strength (this is the case with Magalhaes) or their power within a large enough political base (Barbalho and the PMDB). Accordingly, both senators drag around an entourage wherever they go, and show little or no hesitation if there's ever a need to go beyond tough talk. It's questionable whether they realize they ought to be embarrassed by what they did—both are more likely to be celebrating a victory of some sort. In practice, they function as centers of influence in the most negative sense: this is influence exercised to extract benefits for followers and associates—not for the benefit of all, but to benefit the few. Author and columnist Luiz Fernando Verissimo perhaps put it best in his daily column in the Sao Paulo daily 0 Estado de S. Paulo. A day after the clash in Brasilia, he compared it to a schoolyard shoving match, and concluded: "It had the makings of a balanced, thrilling bout, to be decided by points of rhetoric or possibly a verbal knockout. Instead, what we saw was an embarrassment: the Brazilian politician reduced to his inexpressive essence, wasting our time
in a battle of inarticulate egos." The Magalhaes x Barbalho clash disappoints not just because it exposes the poor quality of political leadership in Brazil, and the great distance that still must be covered before the political scene in this country progresses as much as other areas have. It is also disturbing because in the Cardoso era, this is precisely what many in Brazil hoped to see gradually removed from public life. To see it solidly entrenched, live and in color, is a sobering wakeup call that the government must answer. Clearly, the hope is that this new plan to forge ahead with political reform is for real, and hopefully this time, successful—even if it is almost six years behind schedule.
Adhemar Altieri is a veteran with major news outlets in Brazil, Canada and the United States. He holds a Master's Degree in Journalism from Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, and spent ten years with CBS News reporting from Canada and Brazil. Altieri is a member of the Virtual Intelligence Community, formed by The Greenfield Consulting Group to identify future trends for Latin America. He is also the editor of InfoBrazil (http:// www.infobrazil.com), an Englishlanguage weekly e-zine with analysis and opinions on Brazilian politics and economy. You can reach the author at editorsAinfobrazil.com
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My wife assures me that there are rules, but I just don't understand them yet. The first rule is: Don't stop at stop signs. I have so many more to learn. JOSEPH K. YOUNG
Think of sandy beaches, lush jungles, hot tropical sun, and coconuts galore. This is most Americans initial conception of life in Brazil. However, moving to Brazil was the hardest thing that I have ever done. Living in a culture where you don't speak the language, and you are an eternity away from all that is comfortable is what some people call "culture shock." From paying bills to ordering in a restaurant, nothing is easy in another language. The biggest and most important differences are often in the details. For example, like most Americans I am quite fond ofpizza. In Brazil, all pizzerias have been ordered not to put sauce on their pizzas. I cannot say for sure who is giving the order (I am a believer in conspiracy theories), but every pizzeria must be afraid to put sauce on your pizza because it never happens. Although I diligently tried many pizzerias and frozen options, I could not find anything remotely similar to a sauced pizza. Finally, I tried ordering from 0 Rei da Pizza, "The King of Pizza." To shift the sauce in my favor I asked for muito molho, which means "much sauce." In addition, I ordered another medium pizza with bananas, sugar, and cinnamon (a local specialty). When the pizza came,! had one medium pizza, half with bananas and sweet stuff and half with a huge mound of corn (the Portuguese word for corn is milho). Oncg again there was complete pizza chaos. In addition, to supplement the glaring 22
lack of sauce, most pizza places generously supply you with mayo andmustard packages which Brazilians generously smear on their mounds of mozzarella cheese, dough, and corn. Part of the confusion is that Brazilians are not used to other people speaking their language—especially in Brasilia, the capital city. Because Brazil is such a mammoth country (roughly the same size as the continental US), people can spend their whole lives inside the borders. They can see mountains, rivers, wetlands, beaches, dark people, light people, tall people, short people, huge metropolises, and small towns, without even venturing out to A Bolivia. Because Brasilia does not have a repuLt tU414411244h tation for being a tourist destination, many locals do not encounter people who speak Portuguese as a foreign language (Many locals quip that "Brasilia is a nice place to live, but I wouldn't want to visit."). The other source of confusion is that their notion of what is pizza is completely different than mine. Who's right? I ponder this question often. When my wife and I first arrived in Brasilia, we were given an article written by a principal of an American school in Africa. The crux of the article was that culture shock is a real phenomenon. Moreover, you are not right and a whole country cannot be wrong. That is, a country and its people have survived for generations doing things their way. They can and will survive without you. But pizza really is better with sauce. If you do not believe me, go buy some crust, throw some mozzarella cheese on top, bake for a short period of time and taste. Sauce is a key ingredient. Pizza without sauce is like cereal without milk, salad without dressing, or PB and J with no jelly. These issues of right and wrong are much more divisive as the importance of the issue is increased. We rented a car to drive to Piren6polis, a small getaway for the Brasilia elite. On the approximately 140-kilometer trip we witnessed half a dozen accidents, blatant disregard for human safety, and simply insane behavior. It seems that normally congenial Brazilian folks behind the wheel of a car turn into stock car racers. My wife teased me incessantly when a barely breathing, 80-year-old woman, tailgated me, flipped her lights, then passed me flashing a face of disgust in my general direction. When the speed limit read 80 kilometers per hour, I went 100. However, I was clearly the slowest car on the road. Moreover, I stopped at all of the Pare signs. Pare literally means STOP. No one actually stops at Pare signs. They are more of a suggestion. Most rules in Brazil seem to be just that—suggestions. Maybe you should drive 60 kilometers per hour or maybe you should drive however fast you want. You can stop or don't. Jason, one ofmy colleagues and a science teacher who lived BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
in Egypt for several years, laughed at me when I asked him why they post speed limits or have stop signs. He replied, "when you are outside the U. S. don't ask why, let go, you will only frustrate yourself" Being a teacher I feel that! must question. I have to understand. My wife assures me that there are rules, but I just don't understand them yet. The first rule is: Don't stop at stop signs. I have so many more to learn. Many of my observations concerning Brazilian behavior have been gained through supermarket encounters. People operate their carts much like they do their cars. When one would like to pass through a crowded aisle in America, one simply says "excuse me," then people theoretically pull off to the side or allow you to pass. However, the Brazilian shopping experience in the large grocery stores or supermercados like Carrefour is much different than my experiences in the southern United States. To get through a crowded area, one must slam other carts or knock into people to get them to move. The Portuguese word for excuse me is corn licenca. However, it has a different connotation. Literally it means "with license." This is often meant as "get out of my way." If it is not heeded, there can be drastic consequences. The grocery store takes on a Darwinian character where only the strong and aggressive survive. The second rule is: Be aggressive in procuring important material items. This can be a difficult rule to follow for someone from an ostensibly polite society. Another glaring difference from my middle-class American perspective is the Brazilian party atmosphere. After giving my students a fair amount of homework for the weekend, one particularly garrulous teenage girl said "the weekend isn't for homework, it's for social time." Everyone in the class nodded in agreement. Even though !have only been teaching for a few years, I am used to students complaining about any amount of
homework. I think complaining is more of a catharsis for American stude ts: they do it, but they know that nothing really changes. However, Br zilians place a high value on socialismo, literally spending t. me with friends and loved ones. At a party for one of my wife's students, there was a mix of all ages. The parents hung aroiind by the pool, drinking and socializing while the younger kid danced in the living room. In America, teens would prefer de th to partying in the same place as their parents or their teachers. There are completely different socially acceptable norms. The third ru e is: Friends and family are the pinnacle of importance. Th s is a strange one for Americans. From our perspective, f ily and friends are important, but socializing is rarely valued a much as the "American Dream" ofhard work leading to mate ial success. What parent hasn't sacrificed an aspect of their s cial life to achieve their career goals? Who hasn't put in mire hours at the office at the expense of their children? Who' right? Am I wrong? What should be our main priorities? Both my wif and!chose to teach overseas to challenge our previously held conceptions. Moreover, I knew that moving away from the . S. would provoke internal change, but I feel like my tectoni # plates are shifting and there are cracks and fissures in my b , lief system. I can't figure it all out now.!don't know all of the les. Jos ph K. Young previously taught secondary mathemati s and social studies in Orlando, Florida at the Celebrati n School and currently teaches secondary mathe atics at the Escola Americana de Brasilia (American School of Brasilia). To contact the author send e-mail to jyoung@lab.eabdf.br
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lessons in Revelry Tarnavar, smiled my friend as he dropped me at my door, 'don't you just love it'. So, this I thought, is carnaval, coming home at 7am, slightly drunk and with that song about cachaca still ringing in my ears. PHILIP BLAZDELL
If you want to annoy, or at least mildly upset a Brazilian, casually mention to them that Brazil is only famous for three things: football, samba and carnaval. Football and samba I understand, in fact one of my earliest memories, long before I ever knew where Brazil was, was watching Zico score a stunning goal in a thrilling World Cup match. Carnaval, however, is a different matter. Everyone seems to know something about carnaval, but no one I spoke to could really divine it for me in a few words. My trusted Lonely Planet guide book says it's when people descend on mass 'to get drunk, get high, bag some sun and exchange exotic diseases'. Which I thought sounded all well and good until I considered that I don't have any exotic diseases to exchange. For the five months I have been here in Brazil I have heard carnaval mentioned almost everyday, but yet I was still not really sure what it was really about. It seemed the only way to understand was to experience it first hand. 24
BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
Camaval's roots go back to the ancient Romans and Greeks who celebrated the rites of spring. In the Middle Ages, when the Catholic Church tried to suppress all pagan ideas, it failed when it came to this celebration. The Church incorporated the rite into its own calendar as a period of thanksg iving. The nations of Europe, especially France, Spain, and Portugal, gave thanks by throwing parties, wearing masks, and dancing in the streets. All three colonizing powers carried the tradition with them to the New World, but in Brazil it landed with a difference. Not only did the Portuguese have a taste for abandoned merriment, (they brought the entrudo, a prank where merry-makers throw water, flour, face powder, and many other things at each other's faces), but the Negro slaves also took to the celebration. They would smear their faces with flour, borrow an old wig or frayed shirt of the master, and give themselves over to mad revelry for the three days. Many masters even let their slaves roam freely during the celebration. Since the slaves were grateful for the chance to enjoy themselves, they rarely used the occasion as a chance to run away. The Friday before Carnaval I was killing time wondering around the local supermarket. To the casual observer it might have seemed as a state ofnational emergency had been declared. Beer was being rationed (only five cases per person), people were fighting with two, sometimes three trolleys loaded with meat, and the queues at the checkouts stretched almost the length of the store. When I finally made it to the checkout I asked the young assistant why it was so busy. She looked at me quizzically; I guess my question was blatantly obvious, carnaval' she smiled. So, this I thought, is carnaval. Chaos in the supermarkets and beer rationing. Rather like Christmas Eve in England. My own carnaval had begun a week before with the Carnaval da Saudade in a local club (which means roughly something like Carnaval of longing or home sickness). The Carnaval da Saudade is the traditional 'first shout' of carnaval and marks the beginning of the country becoming a little bit more unglued than normal. The. 13-piece band were banging out the classic songs of carnaval, many of which seem to be about drinking cachaca or how special Brazil is whilst the dance floor was packed with people dressed in their most exotic and colourful clothes. It seemed, to a casual observer such as myself, that sartorial elegance had been suspended for the night—which gave me a good opportunity to deep into the back of my wardrobe and pull out the shirt I had made for me one particularly drunken night in BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
India, the one which my girlfriend had sworn never to be seen dead with me wearing. The party went on well into the early hours and as we staggered out the club the sun was rising. My ears were ringing and I was drenched in sweat. 'Carnaval', smiled my friend as he dropped me at my door, 'don't you just love it'. So, this I thought, is carnaval, coming home at 7am, slightly drunk and with that song about cachaca still ringing in my ears. Early on Saturday, the first proper day of carnaval, I was driving along the packed highway with some friends. The roads, which are normally empty, were packed with cais with case upon case upon case ofbeer stacked impossibly high on the roof. The traffic jams were horrendous and to kill time I asked my friend what carnaval was really about. He told me that as carnaval season opens, Brazilians start to make a sort of annual balance. It's a time to forget or recall an old love affair, to celebrate a new passion or search for new romantic experiences. It's also a time to protest against corrupt politicians, to complain about the poverty and give creative suggestions to turn the country a fair place to live in. It's also, he winked at me, a good opportunity to have the odd beer or two. So, this I thought, is also carnaval—a time of social readjustment. A few minutes later we were pulled over at the first of a number ofpolice roadblocks. Normally I have no problems with the authorities here, unlike some other countries I halte lived in, and it is extremely unusual to be stopped whilst driving, in 4ict this was the first time it had ever happened tome. As we climbed out the ar and I was ticked off for not wearing my seat belt I asked the police man why we had been stopped. He told me it was nothing personal, and that it was just normal carnaval procedure to check on all cars to make sure no one is too drunk or the car is not too stolen. 'After all', he told me, 'anything is possible in carnaval'. We were soon on our way, and I had another definition of carnaval for my rapidly growing list: carnaval is a time when anything is possible and the authorities hold their breath and hope for the best. Prior to 1840, the streets of Brazilian towns ran riot during the threeday period leading up to Ash Wednesday with people in masks hurling stink bombs and squirting each other with flour and strong-smelling liquids; even arson was a form of entertainment. In 1840, the Italian wife of a Rio de Janeiro hotel owner changed the carnaval celebration forever by sending out invitations, hiring musicians, importing streamers and confetti, and giving a lavish masked ball. In a few years the masked ball became the fashion and the wild pranks played on the streets disappeared. Today Rio de Janeiro has the biggest and best-known pre-Lenten carnaval in the world—its most colourful event is the Samba School Parade. The samba schools taking part in the parade—each roughly having three to five thousand participants—are composed overwhelmingly of poor people from the city's sprawling suburbs. Every carnaval, Rio's samba schools compete with each other and are judged on every aspect of their presentation by a jury. Each samba school must base its effort around a central theme. Sometimes the theme is a historical event or personality. Other times, it is a story or egend from Brazilian literature. The costumes must reflect the theme's h'storical time and place. The samba song must recount or develop it, and he huge floats must detail the theme in depth. One of the most popul r schools, 5500 dancers in 47 contingents, this year based its presentation n the sad years ofmilitary dictatorship. Its floats recalled the victims of ne rly two decades of iron fisted rule. Even the sudden, and mysterious e plosion of one of the school's floats did not dampen the schools enth siasm and their chant of 'I go from ashes to celebration' seemed to tou a collective nerve. My own personal favourite school, Caprichosos de Pi ares, based their theme on 'God Save Brazil', their message was clear • nly the supernatural, not economic reforms can save Brazil, and that God ad best be Brazilian. This is the glitzy visu fly stunning tourist orientated carnaval that everyone knows about, bu in the Northeast carnaval is just as important. Towns such as Salvador a d Olinda have some of the most famous, and according to a lot of peop e, most authentic camavales, the main difference is that they take place on the street whereas Rio's carnaval take place 25
mainly in balls and clubs which can be prohibitively expensive. Iliad chosen Bebiribe to experience my first carnaval for two reasons: it was close to Fortaleza and it was considered to be one of the state's fmest. By the time we arrived at the beachfront house we were staying at the party was well underway. The barbeque that is a focal point of Brazilian life was almost ready and the beer was chilled to perfection—as only Brazilian beers can be. Although I only knew a few people there I was made instantly welcome and soon found myself centre of attraction. It often strikes me that the Brazilians love only one thing more than children, and that is a visiting foreigner who is willing to try and learn a few words of Portuguese, try to understand the culture and accept things for what they are (it also helps ifthey are football mad and admit freely to crying last summer in France). In between lumps of perfectly cooked meat my host explained to me how important at this time of year it was to be with family and friends, and that as I was so far away from home, I had to make myself at home and consider myself amongst family. Being with family and reconciling the past year that is camaval he told me. No sooner than I had finished my food I was dragged off for a cruise on the beach. I stood on the back of the neon pink beach buggy, as the front seat was taken up with the driver's cooler of beer. We went shooting round the beach at about 100 km/h. Suddenly whilst bouncing over the sand dunes the driver, who was old enough to be my father, would see some pretty girls and would shoot off in the opposite direction to chase them alongthe beach, we chased another group into the sea and spent an amusing five minutes driving in circles around another whilst they threw bags of flour at us. I was still hanging on the back for dear life, tears rolling down my cheeks. So this is carnaval I thought, doing all the things you really wanted to do all year, but for some reason, you couldn't. Later that night, after a few more beers and a lot of good conversation we headed off for carnaval proper.! still wasn't really sure what to expect. So far the day had been like any other normal day in Brazil—a little bit of drinking, a little bit of silliness and a little bit of chasing semi naked girls around the beach in a neon pink buggy. Driving to the next town for the carnaval was something incredible, almost beyond my comprehension. Every conceivable road law was broken; I saw seven people in a buggy and people sitting on the bonnet of cars, I even saw one car slide gracefully into a military police car with a sickening crunch of metal. The police didn't seem too concerned as they were sitting on a bench, pump action shotguns resting on their knees, drinking cokes and chatting with some girls. Every car had its boot open and awesome sound systems pumping out loud distorted carnaval music—Los Hermanos' Ana Julia seemed to be the most popular song that night. We left the car about a kilometre away and made our way through the crowds. I had received an invitation from the town's mayor to enjoy carnaval from the VIP area, but when I arrived and saw the few sad empty boxes overlooking the square and then the packed throbbing square below! tucked my VIP invite into my shorts and dived headlong into the mass of human26
ity. Eventually after much pushing and shoving we made our way to the central town square (normal capacity about 5000) where 100,000 people were dancing and sweating in front of a stage. The atmosphere was undeniably tense and electric, but despite the crush ofhumanity surrounding me I didn't feel particularly threatened—besides, I had only the clothes on my back and a few notes stuffed into my shorts, anything! couldn't afford to loose, like my camera, had to be left at home. As! shoved my way to the front! was sprayed with snow spray and had untold bags of flour emptied over my head. By the time I reached the stage I was cOvered from head to toe. No sooner had we pushed our way close tO the front, which was not mean feat, than the band started blasting out this year's most popular carnaval song, which is about a Brazilian guy who falls madly in love with an English girl and the problems he has communicating with her. The chorus is something like `blah blah blah latino americano...blah blah blah ...thank you very much'. 100,000 people screamed 'thank you very much' and it sent shivers down my spine'. I found myselfscreaming along in Portuguese much to the amusement of my friends. Like they told me, anything is possible during carnaval. ' And than, just when! was loosing myself f to the music, a fight broke out. Quite how anyone had space to throw a punch was beyond me as I barely had room to breath let alone flail my arms about wildly. I think security handled this in a bit of a heavy handed manner as they went in fists flying to the group of nuns which had started the trouble—surely no way to treat ladies of the cloth. Before I knew what was happening the night was a mess of flying habits, scattered rosary beads and dislodged wimples. Their opponents, a bunch of beefy black guys wearing nothing but loincloths, and covered from head to toe in blue paint dispersed quickly into the crowd. I thought about asking my friends if they had been beaten black and blue—but the translation was too difficult and I carried on dancing instead. By now I was squashed in-between a group of rump-shaking pensioners on one side and a bunch of girls dressed as babies on the other. My shirt was covered in snow spray, water and flour that was being thrown around in liberal quantities (mostly by me I must add). The music never stopped, the band went from throbbing number to throbBRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
bing number without pausing even if everyone hadn't known all the words and the dances it would still have been the most impressive show I have ever seen. The energy the band radiated was almost frightening. At one point I was fighting my way through the crowds for a beer when the band started playing a song about drinking cachaca (cachaca nab é cigua....) and as on cue everyone began to bounce backwards and forwards. The sight of 100,000 drunk, sweaty bouncing Brazilians all screaming their heads off is something to be appreciated—preferably from a safe distance, ofa couple of miles, but defmitely not from the middle of the crowd. As I bounced and groped my way to the nearest beer seller! bumped into a beautiful girl dressed as a devil. She smiled at me enticingly and I thought: if this is camavalI love it. We planned to leave the next day under the vague pretence that I had to prepare my lectures for a trip to Europe and that we were all tired—real carnaval aficionados will be shuddering at this—but no sooner had we driven half a kilometre out of town we were turned back by the police who told us it was too dangerous to try and leave town now due to the number of drunk people around. It was 7am and none of us had slept. There was no alternative but to return back to the house and carry on partying. So, this I thought, rather sleepily, is carnaval, stranded in the middle of nowhere under martial law in a beach house with 28 hangover Brazilians. Later that night I was back dancing in Beribe. The crowd was even thicker this time and as a precaution against having another T-shirt ruined I wore only my shorts and sandals. No sooner had we squeezed ow way into the square then I was attacked by a group of girls who covered me in head to toe in spray snow. Every time I thought! had lost them in the crowd they would pop up, spray me with snow, pour flour over me, and then melt back into the crowd. Once again I thought: this is carnaval and I love it. Just as I was loosing myself to the music again, Death tapped me on the shoulder—complete with white face paint and scythe. I started to splutter an explanation of why! had drunk that last bottle of cachaca last night and how I would definitely cut down my consumption in the future, when I realised that I was actually standing on his cloak and he couldn't move. He smiled as I freed him and gave me a knowing look "ate logo" (see you soon). He was soon moving easily through the crowd to meet up with a dozen other grim reapers and four dozen priests were busily getting slightly hammered on cachaca. Squashed as I was in front of the stage I had no choice but to dance. If! had been able to look around I would have seen men dressed as women, women dressed as babies, one group of men dressed as nuns, one group of women dressed as go-go dancers, another group wearing cloaks and masks from the movie Scream, the odd bare breast and everything in between. I guess there must have been more than about 120,000 people jammed into the square. Once again there were a few small fights throughout the night, but considering the number ofpeople, the amount of alcohol consumed and the sheer energy, of the music I was greatly impressed with how trouble free the night was, and I will always treasure the memory of the six burly security guards carrying a screaming and kicking moun, tain of a rnan dressed in a frilly dress shoulder high through the crowds. Later that night as we made our way home! chatted to some other sweaty, bruised and slightly drunken revellers. In between singing and declaring their undying love for my country, which is the opposite of what normally happens, they explained why carnaval is so important, especially here in the Northeast. They told me that it was a festival that everyone, regardless of social standing or wealth could participate in. Covered by the anonymity of carnaval, working class, businessmen, judges and maids dance together. With new identities, modelled by a costume, all of them reign for a while. It seemed the most accurate image of carnaval I had heard so far. BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
We had almost fought our way back to the car when I caught a grubby little child with his hand in my pocket. Clearly he wasn't a professional pickpocket as instead of screaming blue murder and blaming everyone standing around him he just looked miserably at me with sorrowful eyes. He told me he wasn't trying to rob me, which would have been difficult as I had no money anyway, but he wanted my empty beer can, which like a good civic minded person! had stuffed in my pocket until! came to a garbage can. To authenticate this story he pointed towards a huge sack of cans which he was dragging behind him. I willingly gave him my empty can and he explained to me that during the four days of camaval he would work collecting cans more or less continuously and the money earned from this allow him perhaps to buy school books or some food for his family. This, I thought, is also carnaval. By the time I got home a few days later I hardly recognised the person who stared back at me from the mirror. My bloodshot eyes, my stubbled chin and the remnants of a bag of flour in my hair gave me the look of a wild man. I hobbled on bruised feet (the result of some excessive bouncing on the part of a rather over zealous, and overweight girl) to my bed. Ithad been so long since I last slept that I was vaguely worried if! still remembered how. I lay quietly trying to fmd sleep humming a song about cachaca. In all honesty I was none the wiser in understanding carnaval. I had been there, of that! was sure, but had! really understood all that I had seen? My fmal thoughts as sleep fmally claimed me was to find when next year's carnaval is going to be. Perhaps, then I will finally understand. The author grew up in London and left at the earliest opportunity for a glittering career in Asia. After failing miserably to adapt his Japanese colleagues to an English sense of humour he took off for sunnier climes. He currently lives, and is rumoured, works in the NE of Brazil. He has travelled extensively, mostly using other people's money—of which he is absurdly proud. He is a regular contributor to this, and other esteemed travel magazines. He is always happy to receive letters from readers and will personally reply to all. He may be contacted at philip@dem.ufc.br 27
Continued from the last issue
'—Talvez voce no se considere como tab. Mas sua mde, Dona Quite5, A OPOSIcA0 na, e seu pai, Seu Hermenegildo, tern-na por pessoa distinta, sim. E o Eram s6 tit's. Urn casal, Jesuino povo tern comentado que voce vive e Vanalva, e mais urn contra, demais no meio das prostitutas. Eles Agapito. ja estao falando que voce vai acabar 0 padre Leonardo olhou para sendo igual uma delas. E voce sabe, os dois e virou a cara. Conhecia nao e?;aqui quando se fala uma coisa, aquelacorja—viviam provocando ou a pessoa foi, d, ou sera. brigas na cidade. Lembrou que Vanalva, nascida au, mulher que uma vez Vanalva foi lhe procurar. conheciatudo quanto era lagartixa do Mardoqueu is made out of fine French Era de noite, a noite estava assim, lugar, as pedras, as gentes, tambem bread dough. White and lean like a cada passaro que fazia morada naexplodida de estrelas, e a lua fazia pantim antes de invadir o negrume praca, e tambem os rios, e as baguette. The press used to call him quela do teto. Vanalva veio corn aquela plantas, o vento frio e o quente, conversa besta. Coisa mais cheia Pole. But all his friends—and in the Vanalva no perdeu o ritmo. Seu de imoralidades. A danada queria era estar au. Defensora dos political middle he thrives friend and foe destino rezar uma missa para as raparigas. direitos de todos, incluia as raparigas, —Mas de jeito nenhum!— as putas, nao se estremecia diante de are all the same—call him Doctor Shit. arrebentou padre Leonardo.— urn padre. Urn padre de fala escoUma missa para as putas? Aqui?! minchada, como se dentro dele DIOCLECIO LUZ De forma alguma. existisse urn formigueiro. Vanalva se calou, so reparando Olhou para o tab embaixador do nabalburdia que fazia otal. Dentro Todo-poderoso e disse, mastigando da batina tinha urn homem se cada palavra: esbravejando. Suava dentro do seu sotaque italiano. "0 —Se é verdade isso, acho born o senhor prelado tomar cuidado. sotaque deve cansar o sujeito, essa falaemborcada, cheia Andam falando por ai que vossaeminencia é veado. Sei que é boato. de macarrao, deve mexer corn as fezes que residem na Mas, como o sen h or mesmo disse, quando falam uma coisa, a cabeca desse enrolador", pensou Vanalva, espetando pessoa é, foi, ou sera... sua avaliacao diante do escandalo do padre. A missa acabou acontecendo. Foi o major rebucete na cidade. —Tern mais uma coisa, querida: nao flea bem para Todas as putas estiveram la. Algumas, mais afoitas, foram corn a uma moca distinta como voce freqiientar os cabares da roupa de trabalho, revelando seus decotes, suas docuras, suas coxas cidade. macias, suas barriguinhas, deliciosas, suas boquinhas melosas, as —Mas quern disse que eu sou distinta, seu vigamais novas corn seus peitinhos de manga rosa e as velhas corn as rio?—debochou a outra. muxibas gastas, comidas pelo tempo e pela fome dos fregueses, Leonardo, que é branco, branquinho, todo ele feito todas corn suas dengosidades, rebolados, as bundas, sim, as mifidas da alvura divina, da mesmacor dos anjos, dapele macia e as maiores, todas conhecidas dos homens, que, ficaram ern casa, de Jesus, da rap boa que existe na terra, da cor do aciicar amarrados pelas matronas de Quiboco, assistindo televisao, de se fazer bolo de noiva, de tudo que presta sobre o resmungando do tempo, da novela, dos filhos, do cachorro, da planeta, ele, entao ficou vermelho. Devolveu o tiro: pa! chuva que nao vem, do barulho na pia,... Por dentro e por fora: jila 28
BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
paraagiientar o papel de moralistas, eles, que tantas e tantas e tantas vezes foram ate elas, e conheceram seus ardores, as xerecas macias, e tomaram tres banhos quando chegaram em casa, nao para se livrar da macula de trair a mulher, mas para tirar o born cheiro de mulher de puteiro, suas quenturas, seus saberes, os perfumes de mulher da vida, de bem corn a vida, de fazer felizes os homens dali. 0 padre, comedor de galinha alheia, teve que corner aquele sapo. No sermao ainda apelou para necessidade de se conquistar a salvacao atraves do espirito e nab da came. Disse da importancia das pessoas obedecerem aos dez mandamentos. Finalmente, já assediado pelo calor dos decotes, pelos labios carnudos, pela lembranca do oficio daquelas meninas, pensando na punheta que ia bater mais tarde, Leonardo disse, primeiro, amern, depois, passe bem. Correu para sacristia fugindo delas e de si. Sentou-se num banquinho limpando o suor da cara, e tentando segurar o calor que vinha de dentro e acendia as partes santas entre suas virilhas. Agora, naquela Prefeitura calourenta, o padre tinha que agtientar a responsavel pelo acinte: Vanalva. E seu marido, Jesuino. Foi se esconder na janela, espiando a cidade suja, os esgotos correndo nas ruas e desaguando no rio onde todo mundo se banhava. La cala o fluido dos miquiterios, os pirblicos e osprivados, armazem de bosta virou o rio belo, latrina de todos, e de Id se puxa a agua que serve ao povo, corn seu cheiro de coco e agrotOxico. Era um rio sem poesia. Tao sujo que nem a lua mais se refletia nele. "0 rio ficou igual a gente que mora nas beiradas dele", blasfemou Ovidio, tido como louco por ali, num assombro de juizo. Cuspiu de lado espantando o pensamento maldito. Nao ia este pensar obsceno se querer se grudar nele, feito uma consciencia... Jesuino tern cara de lobisomem. Sabe como 6 lobisomem: a cara barbuda, branca, os olhos azuis que brilham no escuro feito fossem radiativos—e 6. Nao brinque corn ele, que pode perder a mao se for ladrao, o pe se for bandido. Se o cabra nao presta que se cuide, pode virar liquid°. A alcateia do prefeito, em comparacao, é isso: espremendo, botando num vidro e depois pulverizando na roca, funciona melhor que o tamaron, folidol, dithane—e veneno dos bons. Jesuino, filho de onca pintada corn cascavel, nao era de muita conversa. Trazia urn aparato policial federal que estava la fora. Na tocaia. —Onde esti o material de propaganda eleitoral que a Prefeitura produziu? Eleuberio, encarado assim, ciente de que sua protecao policial se resumia a um delegado meganha que so brigava corn ladrao merrei da regiao, amofinou. Tentou segurar a lona do circo que ameacava desabar: —Mao sei do que o senhor esta falando... 0 visitante meteu a mao no bolso e tirou dois panfletos. No colorido se ye a arrogancia de EleubOrio ladeando seu candidato, Abalvino—o cabra esta azulado, e nao é por falha de impressao. Misterio que nao se solucionou ate hoje: porque este homem tern a pele azul? 0 professor de biologia do colegio mantem sua tese: parentesco corn a ameba. "Este é urn homem de genes limitados", avaliza. 0 outro era uma cedula de votacao. Igual, cuspida e escarrada, a cedula que seria usada no dia da eleicao. A turma do prefeito iria entregar aos eleitores, já marcadas corn os nomes dos seus candidatos. 0 eleitor, curralado, seria instruido a guardar a que recebesse la, na boca da urna, e depositar na cumbuca essa outra, já prontinha, arrumadinha, sacaneadazinha. Jesuino prosseguiu: —Descobrimos na capital a grafica que rodou esse material. Foi paga pela Prefeitura. Temos ate a cOpia da nota fiscal. Agora so falta os panfletos... Viemos busca-los. 0 prefeito remoeu seus poderes. Podia contar corn quem au? BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
Tudo uns bostas. Nem mesmo o juiz, corn seus poderes juridicos segurava aquela porra. Nem mesmo o delegado, homem de picar cobra e comer corn farofa. Ali era tudo frouxo. Arriscar um escarceu? De jeito nenhum. Tinha lembranca de outros insucessos... Mesmo assim, escamoteou... —Voces podem olhar onde quiserem. E vao descobr r que nao tern o que se descobrir. Jesu no olhou para Vanalva. E, sem se falar, os dois dissera : "esta bem, se esse corno quer assim, vai ser assim... ' Deram urn berro pela janela e loguinho dois policiai estavam juntos deles. —S nos permite, nesta caca vamos acompanhados Naq elasala tinha urn arm art°, urn bicho de madeira antiga, o velha que nem os cupins tinham mais gosto em dige ir aquilo. Foram ver la. Abriram. Papeis. Nao eram os sue buscavam. No outro armario, alem de papeis encontr ram garrafas de cerveja, uma coruja empalhada, d as pizzas abandonadas da festa de inauguracao da pref itura ha mais de 3 mil anos, urn rebanho de baratas, ordas e formais, conversando besteira, falando davida lheia, da alta sociedade, jogando cartas, imunes ao tern. O e aos homens. op efeito sorriu. Sorriu corn sua magreza. 0 bigodi o brilhando. Seg iram para a outra sala. Eleuborio, Abalvino, o juiz, o d legado... Umaprocissao. Vanalva reparou que al o po O trabalhava normalmente. Jesuino ainda foi espiar o armario... Ela desconfiada... Enquanto seu compa heiro e os policiais mexiam nos armarios, fucava nas gavetas, espiavam nos nichos dali, ela pensav Pas aram para outra sala... E Vanalva pensou: "nao aqui..." 0 prefeito, que tudo olhava, temendo o pensar daquelamulher.Nao dava nem para saborear a perdicao dos seus inimigos, daqueles baitolas invasores do seu princip do. Na erceira e Oltima sala Vanalva sentiu que havia algo de stranho. 0 lugar estava muito arrumado, limpo, sem o dot dos ratos e o cheiro pesado do bolor que exala d suvaco dos papeis quando eles se banham na umida • - e depois ficam expostos ao tempo. Ali mais parecia lugar decente. Cada coisa no seu lugar, cada gente n sua lida limpa, toda escrivaninha arrumada. E havia u a porta. Uma porta? Sim, mas era da cor da parede. • intadarecentemente. Encostada a elatinha uma escriva inha... — e que ha aqui atras?—Perguntou Vanalva ao prefeit A p rede era amarela, meio creme de baunilha, brilhos . Eleuborio ficou igualzinho a ela. Todo mundo parou, o silencio, au, grosso, gelado e verde feito um sorvete de abacate. — tras de onde?—Perguntou, descrente do que dizia. Jes Ino sorriu. Parecia que tinham encontrado urn dinoss uro, vivo, junto de uma criacao de galinhas. — h,... Atras nao nada...—sofria o prefeito.—Urn depOsiI .de tralhas... Coisas inuteis... S6 um buraco inutil. — 6 tern urn jeito da gente saber o que tern atras dessa orta—disse Jesuino, insensivel ao padecer de Eleubo io.—Vamos abri-la. E t atou de afastar a escrivaninha que tapava a entrad 29
—Me de a chave, seu prefeito—pediu Vanalva. —Ah, a chave nao tem—disse Eleub6rio, jd expelindo a raiva natural que lhe enche as tripas e as veias, desde que veio aomundo para ser o que 6, urn belissimo exemplo de ladrao e canalha para o universo. —Bern, se nao tern chave, inventemos outra coisa—diz Jesuino. E corn um chute na barriga da porta faz corn que ela se abrisse despudoradamente. Ld dentro, o que se esperava, o Apocalipse de EleubOrio, a prova de que andava sacaneando: cedulas, igualzinhas as que seriam usadas nas eleigoes. Evidencias visiveis. 0 delegado nem estava mais au, se escondeu, sumiu—neste dianaofoi visto nem nos puteiros, onde todas as noites, na saida do trabalho, faziaparada antes de voltarpara suamulher, distinta dama, famosa por suas agoes filantropicas. 0 juiz tambem se escafedeu—dizem que o magro ocultouse, blasfemo, nas grotas dos ratos que viviam au, serenos, senis. Foisembora uma semana, ou pouco menos, o tempo de urn boi dar a voltinteira num pasto de meio hectare, mais o tempo de uma mosca subir e descer tres vezes sobre urn prato de comida num boteco de beira de estrada, ate que o juiz fosse visto novamente. Da corja municipal ficou somente Eleubdrio, seu candidato, Abalvino, azul celeste, inocente diante daruma de papel apontando o crime cometido. "Mais alguns milhares de anos e seres como Abalvino evoluem ate o maxim° de organizacao paraespecie, um fungo"—comentou certa vez o professor de biologia do colegio. —Seu prefeito, V. ExcelenCia entrou numa fria..,---observou Vanalva. E a Prefeitura de Quiboc6, pela primeira vez em sua historia foi lacrada, conforme decisao do juiz eleitoral do estado. 6, AS ELEIOES Nas eleicaes em Quiboc6 os defuntos votaram. exe, se sempre foi assim. Tambem se obrigou peao, vaqueiro, servidor publico, mestre de obras, pedreiro, agricultor, a votar como determinou seu patrao. 0 prefeito, como se sabe, utilizando seus conhecidos na capital, livrou-se da pena por fraudar cedulas de votagao. Perdido nas instancias estaduais, o caso foi a Brasilia, onde o Supremo Tribunal Federal, ladino, olhos de raposa, percebeu que outra pessoa, e nao o eminente prefeito, havia feito a maracutaia. Eleub6rio foi considerado honrado, limpo, urn homem seri°. 0 dnico incidente citado nos autos policiais do Segundo Distrito, refere-se a discussao tida e havida corn a participacao de Jesuino e Vanalva. Os dois estavam fiscalizando o infiscalizdvel e descobriram urn cabo eleitoral do prefeito obrigando o cidadao a votar em Abalvino. —Nao senhor!—Gritou Vanalva.—Ele vai votar em quern quiser. —Nada disso, madama, esse cabra tern que votar em quern o patrao determinar, tá compreendendo?—disse o tal, que era bem mais profissional pistoleiro que cabo eleitoral. disse que nao vai acontecer—segurou Vanalva. —Pois entao vai ter con fusao, tá compreendendo?—alertou o sujeito, puxando urn revOlver, que, dizem as testemunhas mais medrosas, tinha metro e meio de lingua.—Se ele nao topar eu dou urn tiro nele, tá compreendendo? Urn tiro na testa, entre as sobrancelhas, tá compreendendo? 0 povo id, votantes e mesdrios, quando viram o trabuco do 30
homem, arremedaram para a rua. Desapareceram. Quase todos. Ali ficou Vanalva. E Jesuino no meio, tentando segurar as duas ongas. 0 sujeito, o mote da confusao, estava lá no meiinho disso tudo. Era todo mundo girando.Uma danga? E quase se agarrando. Urn xamego, visse. 0 bandido aqui, mais junto de Vanalva, e depois Jesuino, e o eleitor querendo correr e nao podendo, e o outro, de lado, preparando a mira. —Se nao vota no determinado, ele morre, ti compreendendo? Atiro nele. —Ah, é? Pois atira!—dizia Vanalva.— , Vai, atira que eu quero ver. Atira se for homem. Tu no e homem mesmo. 0 homem do revolver se arrumando, se aprumando, se ajeitando para dar o tiro. 0 sujeito, o eleitor, se escondendo atras do nada. Vanalva querendo agarrar o pistoleiro e ele se esquivando, ajeitando o tiro. Jesuino au, o rume-rume, no sabendo se *gurava a mulher, o bandido, ou eleitor. Na ddvidajdeu urn salto e antes que o bandido pudesse dizer ai, ui, rre!, caramba, puta-que-o-pariu, Jesuino estava au, de carana cara dele, espiando nos seus olhos, matando o homem de susto, vendo o inexplicdvel—de quemundo terdbrotado tal lobisomem—se perguntando que fazia ali aquela assombragao que ainda ha pouco se se misturava corn a mulher e o outro, distante. S6 pensou isso. Isto é, nao pensou porranenhuma. No deu tempo. Quando ele olhou para si estava voando de costas, derrubado pelo murro de Jesuino. E ponto fmal. Porque, ao que se sajn, diz a lenda, esse al virou crente no dia seguinte, convertido, falam, em virtude de ter perdido o cerebro; "foi urn choque anafilatico provocadopor um murro divino", explica hoje o pastor na igreja. 0 importante é que o antigo pistoleiro viveu feliz ate os Altimos dias, pregando o Evangelho, criticando a violencia dicidade, e, finalmente, se unindo ao padre numa camiianha de defesa da tradigao, familia e propriedadet, 0 que nao faz urn murro terapeutico?... Teve outro murro nessa historia. Foi no cbmicio da situacao. Da capititl vieram os companheiros de partido do prefeito. Velo o vice-governador, Mardoqueu Maziel, e urn deputado federal, Sonsinho Carvalho. Tinham nome de gente mas eram sim gabirus de primeira cepa. Gente que inventou o peido do cao. Mardoqueu é feito da massa fina do pao frances. Branco e espigado feito uma baguete. A imprensa apelidava-o de Poste. Mas os am igos—e na politica que freqUenta amigo e inimigo é a mesma coisa—chamamno de Doutor Bosta. Por que? Ora, porque sempre esta em cima, boiando, ao lado do poder. Fede. Mas isso é outra historia. Nada que urn desodorante bastao nao oculte. Se fez na politica colaborando corn tudo quanto foi govern° tine passou pelo pals: se tern Govern° ele a favor. 0 outro patula, o deputado federal Sonsinho Carvalho, tern a pele escura, os cabelos enroladinhos. Negro. Mas se diz, ele, "queimado de sol", negro jamais. Moreno. Moreno escuro. "Um deputado que preste nao pode ser negro", explicavaaos amigos na sua sobriedade de jaca. "NO maximo sou urn negro de alma branca", acrescentava, despudorado, mostrando os dentes BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
brancos onde, ao que parece, guarda essa sua alma clara. Sonsinho se fez deputado desde os tempos em que nao existia o mar. Sempre foi e sera deputado. Elegendo-se corn a distribuicao de buchadas de bode, alpercatas, cesta de comidapara os miseraveis, promessas de emprego. Os dois sairam abracados do carro procurando o comicio. Urn servindo de estaca para o outro, bambuzados, bebados. —Onde 6 que é a porra do comicio?—todo mundo ouviu Mardoqueu perguntar, liquido, alcoolico, em frente a praca, onde se ajuntava o povo. Era la mesmo. Talvez ajudados pelos guardas, ou pelo demonio, o vice-governador e o deputado federal, subiram no palanque. Era Abalvino que falava. Falava?Nao. Expelia algo pela boca, um dialeto extraterrestre ou egipcio... As autoridadesreconheceram os visitantes ilustres. E loguinho tomaram o tnicrofone do fimgo-homem Abalvino. 0 locutor era o chefe de gabinete de Eleub6rio: —Els que nos vemos aqui diante da presenca ilustrerrirna de duas dignas personas, representantes da nossa ousada politica brasileira nacionalista e pos-liberalista... •E por al seguiu, desenhando, empalio, o retrato dos ilustres convidados: os dois crapulas—um estadual e outro federal. Mas ali nao havia distincao. Todo bebado é igual, corno reza a Epistola de Sao Mateus; cu de bebo nao tern dono, corno estabelece o Pentateuco em seu Livro quinto, conforme o versiculo dois, nas palavras de Simao, o besta. Em resumo: autoridades ou nao, os dois nao sabiam o que usavam primeiro se a lingua ou as pernas. E Eleuberio ao lado, dentro dos seus olhos finos, arregalando os olhos, porque, esperto, sabia que aquela festa nao ia dar certo. .14 de olho no caminho de saida. 0 locutor fez a besteira de anunciar a presenca do vicegovernador na cidade. Pior, entregou para Mardoqueu o microfone. 0 vice-governador normalmente nao é de falar. Faz tudo nos cantos, nas esquinas, nos gabinetes. A cerveja, que normahnente ele nao bebe, misturada corn uma cachaca de beira de estrada, foram os responsaveis pelo estrago. 0 homem estava um bagaco. —Porra!—ele disse, se ajeitando dentro do paletAsuado. Uma palavra histerica. Foi a primeira proferida pela major autoridade que já passou por Quiboc6. A segunda foi: caralho. Finalmente conseguiu alinhar uma frase. Infelizinente: —Eu vim pedir os votos de voces, seus merdas, para o meu candidato, urn bostinha, porque voces tambern sao uns merdas, e merecem ele. La debaixo alguem devolveu: —Merda é a puta-que-pariu, seu corno! Normalmente Mardoqueu nao briga em pUblico, nao discute, nao polemiza. Quando alguem lhe perturba, aciona seus parceiros no poder, e otal, nao sendo do mesrno nivel, leva um tiro ou uma facada politica, e morre ou cai de quatro. Mas hoje ele resolveu abrir as portas dos demonios que sempre carregou consigo. Quando o outro berrou lade baixo, um baixinho magrelo corn jeito de quem come came de bode uma vez por semana, o vice-governador nao se avaliou, e saiu em disparada, descendo do palanque para topar corn o atrevido. Segundo as testemunhas, no rol do qual se inclui Seu Leonardo, diretor do Palmeiras Futebol Clube local, Ze Buzina, dono da melhor oficina mecanica da cidade, doutor Roberto Galleti, medico do posto de sande e atleta nas horas vagas, capaz de fazer trezentos metros em BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
quinze segundos, toda essa gente percebeu que Mardoq eu ia proferindo a frase celebre, a mesma que Jesus us u quando foi questionado por Pilatos: "Voce sabe co quem esti. falando?..." Nao • eu tempo. 0 murro veio de baixo, reto, acertoulhe a c antes que o vice-governador tomasse pe do mundo. evido a sua altura demorou para sair da vertical p horizontal. Mas, urn segundo antes de perder a Visa° este planeta, mesmo que fosse daquele jeito, cheia d luzes extraterrestres e seres gosmentos, Mardo eu ainda pensou que tinha errado o caminho, ao inve de descer para a plateia embaixo do palanque, foi dar urn curral, e ai uma mula esganicada acertavalhe urn oice estratosferico. De is disso houve tiros, correrias, mulher gritando, cachorri latindo, o poder local se escondendo debaixo das mes s de cachorro quente, ate que o comicio acabou se acab do. 7,
FIM
• Em S uiboc6 o calor chega todos os dias. No year), dizem, Deus e.ntrega o lugar ao diabo e sua trupe conse adora. Mas o Co, que nao é besta, s6 vai la, assina contrato, e rapidinho abandona o lugar a sua sina de fogueira. Dizem que num desses verses mais quente, fez tanto, mais tanto calor, que as pedras se derrete am no meio das ruas e as galinhas botaram ovo cozido Fu ico. Ex gero. Ele b6rio tinha born senso e pele de camaleao para ver qu nao era tao quente assim. Jo ou o dinheiro para Shirley, profissional das camas dos aconchegos, e se rneteu na rua onde o povo resmu gava do calor. Q ou para a os bodes comendo capim na praca, e as vac s e os porcos, deitados na lama. Aquela pintura era do empo da Renascenca. Olhou corn cornpaixao, corn tr steza, benevolente. udo isso vái acabar—falou, mastigando cada palav a, temendo que o vaticinio viesse antes do previs o.—Urn dia aqui explodira um a bomba atomica. A pessoas evitavam encontra-lo. Achou que caminhava por uma cidade vazia, largada a sua ma sorte. Os antigos amigos ocultavam-se, acrobatas, atras de bancos de praca, arvores, cavalos e carrocas, postes... Entrou na barbearia do prim°. Vegelio afiava a navalha na madeira. —Se eu nao fosse tao bonito e gostoso mandava me matar—disse Eleuborio, ajeitando seu bigodinho fino e sua magreza diante do espelho.-0 mundo deveria saber como eu sou importante para ele. Bern que eu merecia uma estatua nessa cidade. —Como a tia Zeldia, e tio Ormundo, e tia Orelia... —E. Bern que mereco, primo. 0 barbeiro espalhou a espuma amarela ern seu rosto. Nao se falaram por urn 31
minuto. Dois. Tres. Corn a navalha Vegelio foi cortando os pelos do magro, e o silencio duro, rasquento que ameacava baixar au. —E entdo, prim, eles já tdo mandando em tudo, ne? EleubOrio se mexeu na cadeira. Foi uma formiga entrando pelo rabo. E mordendo seu —E—disse baixinho. Mas todo mundo na cidade ouviu porque foi dito corn a raiva corn que se geram os demonios. E veio novamente o siiêncio. Vegelio ficava incomodado corn aquilo. Falou besteira: —Eles pegaram a Prefeitura mas ndo a nossa alma, primo. Eleuborio, que tentava se achar no espelho, levantou os olhos para o outro: —Ndo pegaram a alma porque ha muito tempo ndo temos mais, primo—disse, resignado. Foi o nnico instante de sua grande e magrela e devassa vida nesse planeta em que foi sincero. —0 fato deles terem vencido as eleicdes ndo quer dizer que nos venceram—insistiu, falando besteira, o outro. Mas corn justificativa—tinha pavor ao vazio. F ainda mais que ndo se ouvia nada au. Nem de fora vinha som. Nem os passaros cantavam mars. 0 que eles conversavam, imaginou Vegelio, dava para se ouvir na cidade vizinha. "Vamos falar mais baixo", pensou. —Nan. Eles ndo nos venceram—disse Eleuborio olhando-se no espelho. Viu: seus olhos estavam la. Sinai de quem ele estava bem vivo. Era urn pavor antigo, de menino: um dia olhar-se no espelho e ndo se ye. Mas, mesmo corn a derrota, ele permanecia vivo. Magro, aquela magrezarebelde, comunista, e corn bem menos amigos, mas, vivo.
RIO-SP
FROM.LAX
0 outro
acordou-o do devaneio:
—E o processo que lhe movem? lava feio, ampliara-se: corrupcdo, extors do, apropriacao indebita, uso dos recursos da Prefe tura em campanha eleitoral,... Ao contrario do que era tradicao, seu advogado perdia em todas as
instancias, seu nome caia num buraco, uma fossa. A contragosto, engolindo devargazinho aquele batraquio, respondeu, mentindo como sempre, voltando a normalidade: —Estatudo sob controle—disse. Mas loguinho voltou a ter medo porque no espelho, ele viu que Ira° existia, ndo existia mais nada. The original title of the this short story is "Eleicoes em Quiboce". From the book Genie Sobrenatural, published by the author,
November 1997, Brasilia. Dioclecio Luz, 47, is from Serra Talhada in Pernambuco's backlands. He is a journalist and a writer. Among his books there are Genie Sobrenatural and 0 Diabo Modernista. These short story books can only be bought directly from the author. Luz has contributed to weekly newsmagazine Veja and daily Correio Braziliense. You can contact the author at dioclecioluz@bol.com.br
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SANTA CATARINA The Germans and Italians who settled in Santa Catarina in the 19th century, unlike most immigrants in the rest of Brazil, owned their small, family-run farms. This European model of land-use has produced a far more egalitarian distribution of wealth than in most of Brazil-83% of the farmland is owned by farmers with less than 1000 hectares. Many of the state's four million people still own their rich farmland which, combined with some healthy smallscale industry, has created one of Brazil's most prosperous states. This relative affluence, the very visible German presence and the efficient services give the state the feel of Europe rather than of Brazil—at least in the highlands, which are green and pastoral. If Santa Catarina reminds one of Switzerland, it's less because of geography and more because ofthe sedate middle-class consumerism. Most travelers don't come to Santa Catarina to visit a foreign culture—they come for the beaches. There's no doubt that the beaches are beautiful: they're wide and open, with Caribbean-like coves and bays, clear, clean emerald-blue water, and views of offshore islands_ The water is very warm during the summer months, and there are plenty of calm, protected beaches for swimming. Santa Catarina also has some of Brazil's better surfing spots. The currents can be very dangerous in places, so be careful. While there are still fishing villages along the coast, you don't really find the kind of primitive fishing villages that predominate in the Northeast. The setting is less exotic and less tropical, the villagers less secluded and less friendly, and the escape from Western civilization less complete. Many of Santa Catarina's beaches have become fashionable vacation spots for well-to-do Paulistas Curitibanos and Argentines, so during the January-February holiday season, the beaches and hotels are jammed Several little Copacabanas have sprouted up in beach towns such as Camboriii, and this growth is changing the coastline at an unbelievable pace. Santa Catarina's climate is nice and hot during the Brazilian summer. In the winter, the wind along the coast picks up considerably, although it never gets too cold_ The best months to go, unless you like the crowds, are March, April, November and December. Compared with other parts of Brazil, this is a polite and proper place, where children are subdued and well BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
mannered. You may be excluded from a restaurant because your jeans are worn, and you will probably be excluded from a bar if you're not wearing a shirt. You must wear either bermuda-length shorts, or long trousers on intercity buses—no swim suits. What's so unusual about this Brazilian state is not that it has these rules but that they are respected and enforced. JOUNVILLE Imagine a city where blondes stroll through town on clean, well-lit, heavily policed streets, perusing Bavarian-facaied, neon named shops full of modern Western appliances, with well-manicured lawns, flower festivals, and a central park in which children play at night. A city that is polite, efficient and pleasant. Now here's the hard part: imagine that this city is in Brazil. Santa Catarina's second largest city, Joinville (pronouncec joyvilee) is described in its own tourist brochure as 'an industrial cit:4'. The industry, however, is outside the pleasant inner city, which is quite habitable and seems like the kind of place to raise a family. For the traveler, Joinville is relaxed and pleasant, if unexciting. Joinville is on the BR-131. 180 km north of Florianopolis and 123 km south of Curitiba. The road is good ani the views are beautiful around the town, particularly where th highway traverses the lush coastal mountains. The dri e down to Guaratuba (on the coast to the north) is stun ing. Orientation The city center is small, with most stores and services concentrated on and around Rua 15 de Novembro and Rua Princesa Isabel. Museu Nacional da Imigracao Housed in the old palace (built in 1870) at Rua Rio Branco 229, the Museu Nacional da Imigracao is full of objects used by the pioneers of the state. It's open Tuesday to Friday from 9 am to 6 pm. Alameda das Palmeiras In front of the Museu Nacional is an impressive, palmlined walkway. These Imperial palms are over a century old. Don't miss the rare 'dual' palm It's the second palm on the right as you face away from the museum. Museu Arqueologico do Sambaqui At Rua Dona Francisca 600 is the Museu Arqueologic° do Sambaqui, an exposition of the Sambaqui Indian li:estyle. It's worth a visit on a rainy day. The museum is oplen Tuesday to Friday from 9 am to noon and 2 to 6 rm. 33
Museu de Arte de Joinville This is quite an interesting one. It houses works by local artists, and contains a small restaurant. It's at Rua 15 de Novembro 1400, and is open Tuesday to Sunday from 9 am to 9 pm. Mirante A high tower on top of the Morro da Boa Vista, the Mirante is a good place to get your bearings. It also provides a 360 0 view of Joinville, and you can see the Baia da Babitonga and Sao Francisco do Sul. Festivals For the last 53 years, Joinville has hosted a Festival of Flowers each November. The orchids are the main attraction. During July, the city also hosts the largest dance festival in Latin America. For places to stay and eat, read the book.
JOINVILLE TO FLORIANOPOLIS This stretch of coast has many beautiful beaches, but it's being developed rapidly and without controls. In general, the more famous a beach, the more developed and ugly it is. Balneario Camboria, the area's best-known beach town, is an excellent example. Sao Francisco do Sul This historic city's island setting was 'discovered' way back in 1504 by the Frenchman Binot Paulmier de Goneville, but the city itself wasn't settled until the middle of the next century. It became the port of entry for the German immigrants who settled the land around Joinville. Beaches The beaches on the Ilha de Siio Francisco are good, but their proximity to Joinville (and even Curitiba) makes them some of the most crowded. On the positive side, there are several cheap hotels in the city, and a variety of beaches accessible by local buses. There is also a lot of surfing. Both Pra in ha and Praia Grande (to the south) have big waves and are popular surfing beaches. Swimming is not safe. Closer to the city, Praia de Ubatuba and Praia da Enseada are pretty, and safe for swimming, but they're developed and often crowded. For another option, ask in town about boats leaving from Capitania dos Portos to the Ilha da Paz. For places to stay, read the book.
beaches. The beaches south of these two are less crowded. From Praia da Armacao, boats leave every half-hour or so to the nearby islands of Itacolomi and Feia. Itajai At the turn-off to Blumenau. Itaial is an important port for the halal valley. However, there's not much here to interest the tourist and the best beaches are out of town. There are a couple of hotels across from the rodoviciria and several more on the main road going out of town to Camboriii. Plenty of buses come and go from Itajai. Balneario Cam boriii This little Copacabana, with its sharp hills dropping into the sea, nightclubs with 'professional mulattos' and an ocean boulevard named Avenida Atlantica, is clearly out of control. In summer, the population increases tenfold. Balneario Camboria is Santa Catarina's most expensive town. Here you can meet well-heeled Argentines, Paraguayans and Paulistas who spend their summers in the ugliest beach-hugging high-rise buildings you can imagine. The spoiling of this beach front is surely a crime against nature. Outside the city, there is a Museu Arqueologico e Oceanografico that's worth visiting (six km south on BR101, open daily from 9 am to 6 pm), and a nude beach (a rarity in Brazil) at Praia do Pinho, 13 km south of the city. Porto Belo The beaches around Porto Belo are the last good continental beaches before Ilha de Santa Catarina. Praia de Bombas (three km away) and Praia Bombinhas (seven km from town by dirt road) are the prettiest beaches around. For a great walk, head out to Ponta do Lobo, 12 km from Praia Bombinhas. From Rua Manoel Felipe da Silva in Porto Belo, you can catch a boat to the islands of Arvoredo and JoAo da Cunha. Both have fine beaches. BLUM ENAU Blurnenau is 60 km inland from Itajai, 139 km from Florianopol is and 130 km from Joinville. Nestled in the Vale do Itajai, on the Rio halal, Blumenau and its environs were settled largely by German immigrants in the second half of the 19th century. The area is serene, but the city itself wears its German culture way too loud. Everything is Germanicised with the commercial, but not creative, flair of Walt Disney. The city attracts tourists (mostly from not too far away), but isn't particularly special. Festival Blumenau hosts an increasingly popular Oktoberfest, beginning on the first Friday in October. For places to stay and eat, read the book.
Barra Velha If driving south from Joinville on the BR-101, this is the first point where the road meets the sea. Four km to the south of town, Praia do Grant is popular with the younger set. The surf beaches are Praia do Tabuleiro (two km from town) and Itajuba (five km away). Pica rras Picarras. 14 km south of Barra Velha, has a good, big beach, and several small islands which can be visited. The town is lively in summer, but the campgrounds often fill up. Pen ha Penha is a big fishing town, so it's not completely overrun by tourism. Only six km from Picarras, the ocean is calm at the city beaches, Praia da Armacao and Prainha. There are simple hotels at these
FLORIANOPOLIS Florianopolis, the state capital, fans out in both directions from the spot where the coast and the large Ilha de Santa Catarina almost connect. The central section is on the island, facing the Baia Sul. Over the hill, on the north shore, is a long row of luxury high rises (none of which looks more than a couple of years old), and modern restaurants to feed their occupants. The mainland part of the city has the industry. Much of the city's shoreline appears barren due to undeveloped landfill. The city is modern, with some large structures such as the new rodoviaria and many works in progress. The island side of the city, where you'll probably spend your time, has a small-city feel. It's easy to get around on foot, and there are regular public buses to the
Things to Buy If you're in town on the second Saturday ofthe month, check out the artisan fair in Praca Nereu Ramos. For getting there & away, read the book
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BRAZZIL MARCH 2305
island's beautiful beaches. Praga 15 de Novembro & Around While you'll probably want to get out to the beaches as soon as possible, it's definitely worth wandering around the city for a look at some of the colonial buildings. From Praca 15 de Novembro and its 100-year-old fig tree, you can cross the road and go into the pink Palacio Cruz e Souza. It's the state museum, but the most interesting things to see are the ornate parquetry floors and the outrageous 19thcentury ceilings. Entry is $0.50. It's open Tuesday to Sunday from 10 am to 6 pm. On the high point of the praca is the Catedral Metropolitana; it was remodeled this century, so not much from the colonial era remains. The least-remodeled colonial church is the Igreja de Nossa Senhora do Rosario, further up from the cathedral. Waterfront Back down on the old waterfront are the Alfandega (Customs House) and the Mercado Municipal, both colonial buildings that have been well preserved. The market is a good place to have a chopp and watch passers-by in the late afternoon. For places to stay and eat, read the book. ILHA DE SANTA CATARINA The island's east-coast beaches are the most beautiful, with the biggest waves and the greatest expanses of empty sand. They are also the most popular for day trips, and most do not have hotels. The north-coast beaches have calm, bay-like water, and resorts with many apartmenthotels and restaurants. The west coast, facing the mainland, has great views, a quiet, Mediterranean feel and small, unspectacular beaches. lat East Coast The following beaches are listed from north to south. Praia dos Ingleses, 34 km from Florianopolis, is becoming quite developed, and although the beach is a good one, the surroundings aren't very attractive. There are lots of hotels and restaurants catering to the Brazilian, Argentine and Uruguayan tourists, but nothing's cheap. Sol & Mar (269-1271) has doubles for $40. Praia do Santinho has a few beach houses and barracas and one ofthe island's most beautiful beaches. The island's longest beach, Praia do Mocambique (or Praia Grande), is 14 km long and undeveloped. It's hidden by a pine forest from the dirt road that runs a couple of km inland from it. The camping here is good. Barra da Lagoa, a big, curved beach at the end of Praia do Mocambique, is a short bus trip (No 403, 'Barra da Lagoa') from Florianopolis. It is still home to many indigenous fisherfolk, descended from the original Azorean colonists. Although there are more hotels and restaurants here than anywhere else on the east coast, except Praia dos Ingleses, there are still not many ofthem, and they are not modern eyesores. The barracas are excellent, and it seems every second house is for rent. Praia Mole is a beautiful stretch of beach, with one hotel, the four-star Cabanas da Praia Mole (232-0231; fax 232-0482). The beach is hip in summer. A good bar there is Mole Blues. Paulo, the manager, is a Carioca who lived a long time in Los Angeles. He speaks excellent English and is a fun guy. Praia da Joaquina hosts the Brazilian surfing championship in January and the Hang Loose championship in September. There are a few restaurants, and this is the busiest beach on the island. The crowd is young and hip and the surf pumps. Surfboards can be hired from the Surf BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
Punks surf shop, right next to the Barra da Lagoa turnoff. Giba, the guy who runs the surf shop, also has a comfortable pousada, a short walk from Joaquina for an early morning surf. Dune-surfing is also popular on the Joaquina dunes, and you can hire a board right there. The three Main beaches to the south are the most remote, and quite spectacular. Praia do Campeche has a few barracas, and the beach is long enough for everyone to find a private patch of sand. Praia da Armacao is similar. As at Campeche, the current is often strong. Pantano do Sul, at the end of the paved road, is a small fishing village with a couple ofrestaurants. The mountains here close in on the sea, which is calm and protected. We must mention here one of the best places on the island for observing birds and other wildlife. It's very undeveloped. To get there, you have to walk along a hilly trail from either Armacao or Pantano do Sul. Don't miss it. North Coast The north Oast is the most developed coast on the island, and the beaches are narrow; however, the sea here is warm calms incredibly clean, and perfect for swimming. Canasvieir s, in particular, has many apartments, families with holiday homes, and nightlife (during the summer). In many ways it is the least attractive beach town on the island, and plenty more construction is planned. A few km West, Jurere is similar to Canasvieiras but a bit quieter. Out at Praia do Forte are the ruins of the Fortaleza de Sao Jose da Ponta Grossa, built in 1750. West Coast If you wailt to explore the west coast, the town of Sambaqui is c arming and peaceful. There are a handful of barracas, and some beachgoers on weekends. After the town and tlie barracas, keep walking on the dirt road a few hundred meters for a more private beach, or continue another m to reach an even more secluded area. Both beaches are tiny and cozy, with good views. The road is blocke3.1 soon after this second beach. On the sohrhwest coast, the old colonial town of Ribeirao da Il a has an impressive little church, the Igreja Nossa Senhora da Lapa. The Interior It's not just the beaches: the entire island is beautiful. Lagoa da Conceicao is the most famous region in the interior. The views of the lagoon, surrounding peaks and sand dunes make for great walks or boat rides. Lots of boats are for hire right next to the bridge. Typical costs are $20 for two hours, but the boats can take up to 10 people, so try to get a group together. If you're down south, the turn-off to Lagoa do Pen i is at Morro das Pedras. The lake is fun to explore. SOUTH OF FLORIANOPOLIS Garopaba The first beach town south of Florianopol is, Garopaba is 95 km from Florianopolis, including a 15-km drive from the main BR-101 highway. A lot of surfers settled here in the '70s, but the little town has not been overrun by tourism. The beaches are good, and you can still see the fisherfolk and their way of life. Garopaba is now the base for Mormaii Surfwear, who sponsors a big surfing contest in August. Praia do Garopaba is one km from the town. Praia do Silveira, three km away, is good for surfing, while 11 km away, has some large sand dunes. Avoid the next 35
town, Imbituba: it's polluted by a chemical plant. Laguna Laguna has an active fishing industry and is the center of tourism for the southern coast. Situated on the southern point of the line that divided the Americas, between Spain and Portugal, in the Treaty of Tordesillas in 1494, it's a historic city, settled by Paulistas in the 1670s. Laguna was occupied by thefarrapos soldiers, and declared a republic in 1839 in the Guerra dos Farrapos, which was fought between republicans and monarchists. Museums If it's a rainy day, have a look at Museu Anita Garibaldi, on Praca RepUblica Juliana, which honors the Brazilian wife of the leader of Italian unification. The museum is open from 8 am to 6 pm. The Casa de Anita Garibaldi, on Praca Vidal Ramos, contains some of Anita's personal possessions. It's open daily from 8 am to 6 pm (closing for lunch between noon and 2 pm). 4'
Beaches The best beaches in the area are out on the Cabo de Santa Marta, 16 km from the city plus a 10-minute ferry ride. The ferry operates from 7 am to 10:30 pm. There are beautiful dunes here, and it is possible to camp or to stay in barracas. Rooms can also be rented in houses. For something closer to town, try the Praia do Gi, five km north of Laguna. There are hotels and restaurants along the beach. From Mar Grosso, the city beach, you can take a one-hour boat ride to Ilha dos Lobos a rather unspoiled ecological reserve. From Mar Grosso, the city beach, you can take a one-hour boat ride to Ilha dos Lobos, a rather unspoiled ecological reserve.
Further South Further south are the coal-mining towns of Tubarao and Criciama. Unless you want to go to the mineral baths, there's no reason to stay in either. Both have a handful of hotels, and are serviced by regular buses along the coastal route. From Tubarao you can get to several
mineral baths, including Termas do Gravatal (20 km), Termas da Gurada (12 km) and baths on the Rio do Pouso (19 km). The Termas do Gravatal are very popular and have many facilities. The radioactive waters are said to heal rheumatism, ulcers and a variety of other ailments. Unfortunately, none of the four-star hotels in the park grounds is inexpensive. There is camping, however, and you can easily come up from Tubarao for the day.
SAO JOAQUIM Not many overseas travelers come to Brazil to see snow, but if they did, this is where they'd come. The mountains are scenic in winter. Sao Joaquim is Brazil's highest city, at 1355 meters. Bon) Jardim da Serra Born Jardim da Serra, in the middle of the Serra do Rio do Rastro, is a hair-raising but beautiful 45-km drive from Sao Joaquim. There you'll find access to the Parque Nacional de Sao Joaquim. The park is completely undeveloped, so if you want to explore, ask the locals about hiring a guide.
Excerpts from Brazil - A Travel Survival Kit 3rd edition, by Andrew Draffen, Chris N1cAsey, Leonardo Pinheiro,and Robyn Jones. For more information call Lonely Planet: (800) 275-8555. Copyright 1996 Lonely Planet Publications. Used by permission.
EDGARDO QUINTANILIA Esq. ATTORNEY AT LAW/ABOGADO/ADVOGAD MEMBER, STATE BAR OF CALIFORNIA
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Far and Away Distances are so tremendous and communications so primitive, in the Amazonas, that countless number of its riddles will remain unexplored for many years. It is this, rather that her more superficial attractions, which is the true adventure of the Amazon. YEDO FIGUEIREDO
Brazil is a nut. Brazil is a wood. Brazil is a land. But it was not the nut that gave the country its name. This vast country, occupying all the eastern bulge of South America and stretching some 3,000 miles from east to west, was first called Vera Cruz, the True Cross, and was named so by the young Portuguese navigatoi from Belmonte (a small mountain village west of Oporto) Pedrn Alvares Cabral, who discovered it by chance on a voyage to India on April 22, 1500. The natives called it Pindorama, Palm Tree Land. Each time a ship called on this coast it was loaded with Brazilwood logs. The traders who bought them, nbt knowing that the country from which they came already had a name, began to refer to it as the Land of the Brazilwood, and soon the country became known as Brazil. It is a land of records. It has the largest river and the greatest system of waterways in the world. It is one of the few countries where man still has new frontiers of exploration to push back. It is also a land of legends. One of the most romantic is the belief that there are lost Indian cities lying abandoned, and explorers from the eighteenth century onwards have been drawn in searc of them. Two degree s south of the Equator, in a region full of palm trees, is the ci of Belem (Bethlehem), the gateway to the Amazon river. elem was a boomtown when Brazil supplied the world with natural rubber; the splendid buildings of that prosperous era still stand side by side with graceful churches and modern shopping centers. The climate is terribly hot and the humidity 1- igh. Rainfall averages between 60 and 100 inches a year, rising to as much as 160 inches. The town of Belem started with the foundation of a fort by the Portuguese in 1616. Hot, dusty and mysterious, it is a city of contrasts, with its fine churches all built of stone shipped out from Portugal. Its Opera House is one of the finest in the world and is proud to have had Pavlova dance there on her way to the USA. The picturesque market, called Ver-o-Peso, at the end of the waterfront, is unique; early every morning sailing boats, with their bright-colored sails, bring in all sorts of produce from far up the Amazon to be marketed. But above all Belem, as the gateway to the mighty Amazon, entices one up-river in the steaming heat to the jungle where the trees, bamboos and creepers are so thick and so tall that the sun's rays do not pierce them till many hours after dawn. I had nothing else to do but stand on the deck of the river boat and watch our departure from Belem to the west. Slowly the Amazon appeared between ship and quay, and the gap grew steadily wider and wider. By now it was growing dark and I watched the twinkling lights of Belem. Its harbor used by over 3,700 mil s of river, a river that stretched its tentacles out on every side. was a clear night and the white cathedral made a wonderful si ht, but from the outline of the city it could just BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
37
as well have been New Orleans, or any other port, except for the tremendous blanket of humid heat that hung over us. The older men, small and thin with the cheekbones of Indians, sat on the hatch covers with eyes gazing out across a river they did not see. Once their forefathers had come down the coast from the jungle and there taken to clothes. Now the wheel had taken the full circle and they themselves were on their way back to the jungle. As we journeyed up-river, small, narrow canoes manned by children kept shooting out from the bank clearings as though our boat were a magnet. When the canoes were within two yards or so from us, the children dropped their paddles and sat on the narrow bows, for they had come to bob up and down in the waves. They had lean, yellow faces with jet black hair cut straight across the eyebrows, and they sat there, bobbing up and down, enjoying their see-saw until the waves had passed on towards land and died away. Then they picked up their paddles again and returned to their dilapidated huts of bamboo and palm leaves on the bank. None of them can read or write. Their food is as wretched as it can be. Here, in a country where a branch will send out roots or bear fruits if it is merely stuck down in the soil, where nature is so prolific that countless fruits shower down from thousands of trees every square mile, here the people live on rice and beans, beans and rice, day in and day out. Perhaps occasionally there will be fish or fowl in the water in which the rice is cooked, but beans and rice and a handful of manioc flour sprinkled into the pot—that is their main meal from the cradle until their all too early death. After three days and nights of navigation in a wide brownish stream, with shores low and undistinguishable, the jungle closed in and I saw primitive man in his native place for the first time. Our river boat anchored to allow some of the men and their families, together with their strange bundles, to go ashore to start a new life in Amazonas. I, too, went ashore in one of the little canoes. The few houses on the bank were but square roofs on the fronds ofthe species of palm, upheld at each corner by poles seven feet high, had no sides and were quite open. Several children, quite naked, watched me walk towards one of the dwellings. A tray of manioc root was set in the sun to dry. Under a gourd tree was a heap of turtle shells. But most remarkable were the pets. A bunch of macaws ran in and out of the bushes. Looking up, I noticed an audience of monkeys. A sudden movement of mine set them off like fireworks. To come upon a settlement on the Amazon is like a windfall at sea, but there at last was Santarem. In 1682, Jesuit missionaries founded a monastery there and the Portuguese built a fort, both powers seeking, each in its own fashion, to gain control of the same area. The three towns, Belem, Santarem and Manaus, are still the key points in life on the Amazon, marker flags that civilized man has placed at strategic points of that scarcely inhabited green expanse. There is a chapter in the history of Santarem that gives it a special position in Amazonas. When the American Civil War 38
ended it left 200 inhabitants of a small Dixie town feeling disappointed and bitter. With their slaves and implements they sailed to Santarem and settled there. These colonists have been absorbed into the local population, although traces of their influence can still be seen. Their descendants speak Portuguese and do not understand English; that is, in fact, the only case of an Anglo-Saxon colony letting itself be absorbed into a community among which it has settled. It is almost impossible to conceive the vastness of the Amazonian untouched jungle forests. No one knows for sure how many different kinds of tee grow in them, or what unknown kinds of animals may be lurking beneath the thick roof of leaves; new insects and reptiles are continually being found. The jungle has remedies for fevers and diseases. We have a lot to learn from the Indians who live in Amazonas. They certainly know much about plants of which we are ignorant, and this could, therefore, prove a rewarding field of study. Amazonas is such an inconceivably huge district, the distances so tremendous and communications so primitive, that countless number of its riddles will remain unexplored for many years. It is this, rather that her more superficial attractions—a boa rustling in the undergrowth, a distantly growling jaguar—which is the true adventure of the Amazon. The greatness of Manaus came with the rubber boom. In 1866, where before there had been an insignificant village, deep in the heart of the jungle, a modern town sprang up. Manaus, although over 1,000 miles from the sea, soon became the great distributing port and export center for rubber, due to the fact that this part of the river affords a splendid harbor for shipping. As the huge black balls of raw rubber were carried down-river, so a stream of white men came up from the sea. A number of rubber barons of Manaus decided at the height of the rubber boom that they would make their town a cultural center, as good as any in the old world. They ordered, among other buildings, an opera house to be built with Italian marble, Bohemian crystal and other fine materials shipped all the way from Europe. Today Manaus is quite a city, but there stands the famous Teatro Amazonas, its blazing gold and blue cupola visible from far and wide above the tops of the trees. It was built to rival Belem, but when the rubber boom ended Belem was saved by its harbor next to the ocean; Manaus had no such lifeline. On leaving Manaus for the last and longest stretch of the journey, I had many opportunities for exploring the jungle and its clearings; often we stopped at a tiny, sleepy settlement where noise and liveliness sprang up as we appeared. A continual great nuisance were the mutuca flies; they are almost the same size and appearance as the bluebottle. The mutucas would settle on my wrists and ankles and where each had fed there would be a wound from which the blood steadily trickled. Also in this region the pium mosquitos swarmed; tiny black insects which alight on the hands and face, perhaps a dozen at a time, and gorge themselves, though you may be unconscious of it. Where the pium feeds it leaves a dot of extravasated blood which remains for weeks. It was night when we reached the huts which I knew to be the Cucui Mission, and I could hear a continuous low thundering of the rapids which lay only a few yards up-river. Here I was, at last, at the end of my journey, on the fringe of hostile Indian territory. I had great respect for the priest in charge, who, without fuss or show, just a though it was the natural thing BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
to do, had sold all his possessions thirty-nine years ago and settled thousands of miles from civilization in order to try and help primitive people. Since when the Portuguese discovered that the long tongue of muddy water which stretched from the North Coast of South America came from a mighty river, countless deadly struggles have happened between white men and Indians, for these primitive people cannot differentiate between those who come to plunder and those who come to help and teach them how to live. The Indians have learned, moreover, that firearms are not the only things to fear when the white man approaches. In his footsteps come diseases that have never been known in the jungle before and to which jungle dwellers have no resistance. Today one can still see in the Indian villages, and especially the larger ones like Cucui, natives who were maimed in punishment by the early rubber collectors. The hatred which this deed implanted deep within the souls of these primitive men keeps rising to the surface and impelling them to fanatical struggles whenever, through the years, the white man has made any attempt to approach or make friends with the tribes of the remoter parts. At Cucui we could feel safe from an attack by the Indians only at night, for no Indian would dare to go out of the ring of fire in the dark. However primitive the Indian's way of life, and however much we may have that seems wonderful to him, he would never change his lot for ours. We have so much to learn from them, for their knowledge of nature's secrets is amazing. However badly one gets lost in the jungle, if one is lucky enough to have an Indian bearer, he will find his way to a river, even in terrain that is quite strange to him. A few days later, when the sun was just rising, I stepped
into our small boat, about to leave Cucui for the journey back to Manaus, and Rio de Janeiro. As the priest had said during one of our long talks, the pull of the Amazon is very strong and grows stronger as you leave it. Now it was pulling me and I was sorry to leave, for I felt that there was still so much to see, so much to learn. I had grown to love Amazonas and to look forward to the next bend in the river, which always revealed something new and unexpected: the wonderful scenery, the hidden waterfalls, orchids, hundreds of butterflies and the snakes banded orange and black. I should remember all my life the white herons, standing on one leg in the shallow water. With their fine tail feathers they are far more the birds of the Amazon than the parrot and the toucan, commonly chosen to symbolize this river. The loveliest sight of all is when, towards sunset, the herons all make for the same tree. T ey come gliding in from every side and settle in its top until the whole tree appears covered with white blossom. Amazonas i wonderful, fascinating, but it demands a castiron will and a s ong constitution to exist there, even for a few days; the realit of its horrors and all its grandeur are not fully realized until o e is back home, in the safety of civilization. Then it seems long, long way away. edo Figueiredo, yedomail.ru, lives in a small mountain town north of Rio de Janeiro. As a geophysicist, he has spent most of his life traveling all over Brazil and also abroad (South America, Canada, Europe and Southwest Asia), usually in the hinterland, looking for mineral deposits. Main interests are folklore music, soccer and making friends around the world.
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Singing Along In Brazil, children's songs were performed with no instruments, always in a circle where the kids would hold hands and follow special commands. They started as a cross between the ballroom dances and square dance! CRISTIANA HAMANN The world seems to have adopted Brazilian music. Some music stores throughout the world have even opened up a special section for Brazilian recordings, and we are no longer being classified as general Latin music. But where does that all begin? How do we get little Brazilians to grow up with that passion for their own music? Well, the magic happens through tradition, and it begins very early, as Brazilian lullabies and children's songs (the nursery rhymes type) are passed on to the new generations by their parents. It all begins around the 1890's at a very "European Brazil" enchanted with France. As a matter of fact, France seemed to dictate fashion trends, music, dances, and costumes in general. This was the time when music was danced in groups, according to very fancy choreography. The Minuette and other ballroom dances were most popular at the Brazilian saraus (music parties), and a proper education would certainly include those dances. From the ballrooms, the songs moved to the household, some of them through the kitchen door, as the less fortunate Brazilians had no other access to the balls. Mothers and nannies eventually adapted those songs to be sung to the children with educational purposes. From then on, the music took a totally different course, and the songs got a new classification and began being called cantigas. Some lyrics carried a political context, some were merely entertainment more on the comic side, and, some were just nonsense. The children picked up fast the new fashion, and enjoyed very much the "playing songs". The cantigas were performed with no instruments, always in a circle where the kids would hold hands and follow the special commands on the lyrics. In practical terms, this was a cross between the ballroom dances and square dance! Some were to be danced performing choreography with a handkerchief (such as "Samba Lele"), some were just repetition for rhymes and rhythm (such as "Mineira de Minas"). ,f4r-tfvo There is nothing better to spread a new fad than good mouth-to-mouth communication. Soon the cantigas got their own local flare, a Brazilian twist, getting mixed up with afro rhythms and a lot of hand clapping, brought in by the slavery. A Brazilian tradition was born, and by the 1920's the cantigas were true Brazilian music. Sadly enough, with the invasion of television, video clips, video games and massive media information, the cantigas were on the verge of extinction. Entertainment for kids did not include cantigas, and artists in general were not too concerned with tradition or folklore. Very little has ever been recorded. Fortunately, a new duo, Jab and Kiki, came to the rescue of culture, releasing a CD where they perform the cantigas in sophisticated arrangements of bossa nova, samba and even salsa. The CD is called 40
BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
Canta Pra Mim and more information on purchasing it can be found at their web page: www.geocities.com/cantapramim or e-mail: cantapramimAhotmail.com. Some of the most popular cantigas are the romantic ones such as "Nesta Rua" and "0 Cravo e a Rosa." Nesta Rua
If Only This S reet Were Mine
Nesta rua, nesta ma tern urn bosque Que se chama, que se chama solidAo Dentro dele, dentro dele mora urn anjo ue roubou, que roubou meu coracAo
On this street, on this street, there is a little forest And it's called, it's called loneliness In this forest, in this forest, there lives an angel Who has stolen who has stolen my heart
e eu roubei, se eu roubei teu coracAo porque tu roubastes o meu tambem Sc eu roubei, se eu roubei teu coracAo E porque eu te quero tanto bem
If I've stolen, if I've stolen your heart It's because you've also stolen mine If I've stolen if I've stolen your heart It's because I like you too much
Se esta rua, se esta ma fosse minha Eu mandava, eu mandava ladrilhar 'corn pedrinhas, corn pedrinhas de brilhante Para o meu, para o meu amor passar.
If this street, if this street were mine I would have it all paved And covered in tiny precious stones So my love, so my angel, could walk on it with me
p Cravo E A Rosa The Rose and the Carnationa 0 Cravo brigou corn a The Carnation had a fight Rosa with the Rose Debaixo de uma sacada This happened under the veranda 0 Cravo saiu ferido The Carnation was wounded E a Rosa despedacada And the Rose was left in pieces 0 Cravo ficou doente The Carnation got ill A Rosa foi visitar The Rose paid him a visi 0 Cravo deu urn desmaio The Carnation passed out A Rosa pos-se a chorar And the Rose began to cry
Pezinho Little Foot Ai bota aqui, ai bota aqui Ai bota aqui o seu pezinho Seu pezinho bem juntinho Corn o meu (bis)
Ah, put your little foot here Ah, put your little foot here Your little foot, your little foot Right next to mine (repeat )
E depois no vai dizer Que voce se arrependeu (bis)
So that later you will not say That you have regretted it , (repeat)
ote: This one between lines tells the story of a omantic political scandal of the period. Some of them are fun, playing songs where the children obey certain commands as they dance. Here are some of those:
Fui ao Torore Fui ao Torero beber ague no achei Achei linda morena que no Tororei deixei Aproveita minha gente que uma noite nao ĂŠ nada uemnao dormir agora dormira de madrugada Oh Dona Maria, oh Mariazinha Entra nesta roda ou ficaras sozinha
I Went to Toror6* I went to Tororo to drink water,.but I couldn't find it Instead I found a beautiful brunette but I left her there Please everybody take advantage because one night is not nearly enough The ones that will not sleep now will have to do it a dawn Oh Miss Maria oh Little 'Maria Come inside this circle if you don't want to be left alone "Alone I won't be, al-o'nYe*I wonu :4tstpw a because I've got Pedro to pair ith me".
TororO is actually the "Natural Springs of Itoror
BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
41
Samba Lele Samba Lele esta doente Estd corn a cabeca quebrada Samba Lele precisava De umas dezoito lambadas Samba, samba, Samba ô Lele Pisa na barra da saia 8 Laid (bis)
6 Morena bonita, Como é que se namora ? POe o vett na cabeca Deixa a pontinha de fora 6 Morena bonita Como 6 que se casa POe o yeti na cabeca Depois dá o fora de casa 0 Morena bonita Como 6 que cozinha Bota a panela no fogo Vai conversar corn a vizinha
6 Morena bonita Onde ë que voce mora Moro na Praia Formosa Digo adeus e you embora
Samba Lele Samba Lele is sick He has broken his head Samba Lele really deserved Eighteen beatings Dance the samba; dance the samba, am a o Lela Note: this one is Step on the rim of the skirt, oh Laid (repeat) supposed to be about very fresh house slave, Oh beautiful brunett Samba Lele, that fell in How is it that one flirts? love with a young lady. Put the handkerchief in your pocket The children dance this Leave the top showing cantiga holding a Oh beautiful Brunette handkerchief and How is it that one gets married. mimicking the lyrics... Cover the head with the veil Such as using it as a And then just get away from home bandage around the head, putting the hankie Oh beautiful Brunette in the pocket, using it as How is it that one cooks a veil, waving bye-bye,-Y Put the pan on the fire and so on. Then go and talk to the neig How is it that one gets married? Tell me where do you live I live on Formosa Beach I say bye-bye and I go awa
The cantigas also evolved to fit the local events and celebrations. This is the case of the ones that are sung during the St. John's festivities, during the month of June. They are referred to as Cantigas Juninas (June Songs). Being a very catholic country, events and celebrations would take place around the "holly days" or the days of the saints. Many of those days happen to fall throughout the month of June, the month of the "happy saints" (St. John on 06/24, St. Peter on 06/29 and St. Anthony on 06/13). Those cantigas were either for square dance or were simply a description of the festivities. Still today, during the month of June, Brazilians will UI dress up imitating the country folks (hillbilly style), to attend local open carnivals, or church fairs, where they Cai Cai Bala° Fall, Fall Little Balloon dance around open fire and eat typical country food. It is important to say here that although this all began around the Cai cai balao, Fall, fall little balloon Church, the cantigas and festivities have no longer a cai cai balk) Fall, fall little balloon religious connotation. They are merely folkloric. Here are Na rua do sabao Fall on Soap Street two examples of Cantigas Juninas: Nao cai Tido, nao cai Don't fall there, don't fall nao cai no there, don't fall there Cai aqui na minha mao! Fall right here on my hand Capelinha de Melao Little Chapel of Melon Capelinha de meld() d de Sao Joao E de cravo é de rosa d de manjericdo Sao Jodo esta dormindo Ndo acorda ndo! Acordai, acordai, acordai, Jodo
Little chapel of melon belongs to St. John Belongs to the carnation, to the rose, to the basil St. John is sleeping He won't wake up Wake up, wake up, wake up, John
Cai cai balao, cai cai balao Aqui na minha mao Nao you la, nao you la, nao you la Tenho medo de apanhar!
Fall, fall little balloon Fall, fall little balloon Fall right here on my hand I don't dare to go there, I don't dare to go there I'm afraid I'll get spanked
Note: The little balloon referred to in this song, is a miniature hot air balloon, made of tissue paper, very popular at the June Festivities.
.1
Lullabies were meant to put children to sleep, but also to scare the little ones and thus reinforce the bond between mother and children, making sure they would stay in bed all night. Here is the most popular one:
Boi da cara pre Pega esta crianca que tern medo de qr Ndo, n e o Ndo pega eIFn T Ele é bonitinho, ele chora coitadinho He is a beauti 1 child and he is crying, poor little one For more information about the cantigas, please visit www.geocities.com/cantapramim, where you'll be able to actually listen to the songs of the CD Canta Pra Mim. You will be surprised at the diversity and richness of rhythms. 42
BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
elk Setting a new standar r technical m4tenr and imagination, Sao Paulo Confessions ufftoeils exhilarating frontiers of highly coloristic textaft and percussive interplays. BRUCE GILMAN
It's beginning to seem like all the pacesetters in Brazilian music die young. Guitar virtuoso Rafael Rabelo was lost to drugs in 1995; Chico Science, creator of mangue-beat, perished in an automobile accident in 1997; and only five months ago, a predawn apartment fire took the life of Mitar Subotic (Suba), Brazil's vanguard producer and a musician who had been leading a new generation in the development of electronic music. Suba was the first professional sound engineer to come to Brazil with an understanding of how to match his vision with the concepts of13razilian artists, regardless of style. "The year 2000 was going to be big for Suba," says producer and A&R man Beco Dranoff. "He was finally coming to the surface and out of the sao Paulo underground, becoming recognized as the hot, new mainstream producer." Exceptionally sensitive to nuances of mood and color, Suba created fiercely expressive musico-dramatic environments by superimposing and synthesizing a wide range of dense and interweaving electronic textures, his quick mind enabling him to open and build heterogeneous collages in the studio exactly as an artist wanted. Says Bea) Dranoff, "Suba had created such an innovative sound and was so far ahead of the curve that everybody wanted him. He opened a whole new door." At the time of his death, Suba had produced tens of CD's, composed music for over 25 theater pieces and dance companies, written sound tracks for more than 15 films as well as for Yugoslavian, French, and Brazilian television, including original scores for ESSO (an affiliate of Exxon Corporation), BMW, and Philip Morris. In addition, he was negotiating with Natasha Records for the release of his solo CD, finishing production on BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
Bebel Gilberto's, and working with Daniela Mercury and Skank on their test projects. Outstanding among his numerous theater works in Brazil are his sound tr cks for Oswald de Andrade, Os 12 Trabalhos de Hercules, Sá ara, and Bonita Lampilio, which received the sao Paulo Asso iation of Art Critics' award for best theater sound track. Suba's sto began on June 23, 1961, in Novi Sad, Yugoslavia, a meltin •pot of Serbians, Croats, Hungarians, Romanians, Slovaks, osnians, Russians, and Gypsies. He grew up in a home whe both parents were journalists. His father, a well-known T journalist, received the Villa-Lobos Award for promotion o Brazilian culture, hence Suba's early ties with Brazil. Suba be ame interested in music at an early age and studied music eory, accordion, and piano from 1966 until 1980 then comp •sition and orchestration from 1980 until 1985 with professors •udolf Bruci and Dusan Radic at the Academy of Arts in Novi ad. During a vi it to Novi Sad last year, Suba joked that the Danube (due to the NATO bombing campaign) was the only river that flows ver its bridges. Between 1982 and 1984, Suba specialized in ectronic music at the Radio Belgrade Electronic tudio and also researched Eastern European ethnic usic and jazz, working closely with electroacousti composer Paul Pignon.' He egan his professional career in Novi Sad under t e pseudonym Rex Ilusivii (King of Illusions) by brill'antly creating and recording a mix of new wave, lectronic/ambient, and sophisticated funk. There i still Rex Ilusivii graffiti on some buildings around Novi Sad, reminding his fans of the period betwee 1982 and 1986 when Yugoslav radio played countle s hits by this mysterious artist whose material was al ays at the top of radio station play lists and was being c ivered by the scene's best groups. Remaining 43
anonymous for years, Rex Ilusivii ultimately revealed to both press and his admiring public that the true identity of the man hidden behind the persona was their own Mitar Subotic. Ahead of his time, Suba constructed sound installations in open spaces, made extensive research in electronic minimalistic music, evolved compositional procedures, and wrote articles about jazz styles, the relationships between philosophy and music, and musical cultures in.non-European countries. He moved to Paris in 1986 where he composed music for theater, ballet, elite fashion shows, film and television, and produced numerous radio broadcasts and recordings, including his CD Dreambird and the first volume of his project Angel's Breath. While in Paris, his electronic piece based on Yugoslavian folk lullabies, In the Mooncage, received the International Fund for Promotion of Culture award from UNESCO, which included a three month scholarship to research indigenous music and AfroBrazilian rhythms.2 Classically trained as a pianist and composer with a huge background in theory and an aesthetic foundation in electronic music, Suba, planning only to gain firsthand contact with the music and distinguished musicians of Brazil and enjoy the beauty and spiritual wealth of the country, became engrossed in Brazilian roots music and the Brazilian musical chemistry. Commenting last year to a Yugoslavian journalist, Suba said, "Brazilian music is so rich that it comprises a unique planet. Every 500 kilometers there is a new rhythm and musical style, authentic, delightful, and unique." Speaking of his initial reactions he said, "In the beginning, I could not speak a word of Portuguese, but I found that in such situations all the antennas are turned on, absorbing the new smells and sounds. I had a feeling of rediscovering the world. A year later I had already made friends with excellent musicians and worked with them. I soaked up their energy, was in touch with everything that was going on. Initially, it was culture shock, a strong but pleasant one." In 1992, Suba met percussionist Joao Parahyba and forged a partnership that lasted until his death.' "The first conversation we had," says Parahyba, "was about our musical philosophies and the rhythm and harmony of the universe. It was a conversation that ended after seven hours and in which there had been a surprising congruence of intuitive response. Suba was the first guy I'd met who spoke about music as the universal language—no labels. His concept of music was so close to my own, that it was like finding a mirror that reflected my music with a high-tech image. We started working together from that first day on a project called Harmonia Mundi. Using diverse influences from all corners of our planet, we built some of the most interesting music I've had the pleasure to work on. "We would go to the studio in the afternoon and stay until late at night. Suba would say, 'First, we'll make a Frankenstein.' He was a garbage mind who destroyed to construct, using everything. He was completely open, so it was easy for us. We were like two very tight musicians who could just 44
deliver. We'd find a groove, a melody, or a harmony and transform it into a kind of colored noise and then start recording. We cut everything, sampled cells, transformed these, and made other grooves. When we started doing this, I realized how a simple cell of percussion could be transformed with flangers into chords and melodies. He opened my mind to working directly with effects." Electronic effects and their potential within the context of popular music have been recognized and considered seriously as an extension of an ensemble's performance since the 1960's. (The Beach Boys used a Theremin on "Good Vibrations" and the Beatles used tape loops and recordings played backwards on Revolver.4 ) And one of the central facts of electronic music is that it depends on a rapport between musician and technology. "Electronic effects, for us, are just a different tool," says Parahyba. "Just like the drum set is a rhythmic tool, like acoustic guitar and electric guitar are different tools, the computer is one more tool musicians use to create different sounds, to create new images. Musicians who have talent can create excellent material on a computer or they can do this on a small match box. The musicians do this, not the instruments. These electronic tools, be it a compressor or a flanger effect, were Suba's instruments, the tools he used to speak his language. Anything you plug in could be a new instrument for him. His was an electronic/organic thing." Effects and samples have assumed an increasingly important role in the most musically elaborate pop, in many cases eliminating entire horn sections and ousting the electric guitar as the center of a group's sound world. As these audio tools are refined, a new vocabulary of sounds comes into common usage. Limited possibilities become unlimited, and everything which was imponderable can be subjected to precise measurement. With 24-bit digital technology offering greater resolution than 16-bit, digital recording has come even closer to analog quality. "What's happening," says Beco Dranoff, "is that the technology is improving and something inside our brains is saying, 'Oh, we can deal with this now on a very different level.' Our ears have acclimated to the point where electronic effects and sampled instruments don't jump out at us like they used to. We're getting used to them. The good electronic music is almost becoming acoustic music to our ears. Before musicians needed record labels to pay for their studio time, but many are now working with Pro-Tools and creating a lot of music cheaper and much faster at home."' Skill and imagination are needed to create sounds which retain a sense of wonder, as most of our music makes use of only a narrowly defined spectrum from the enormous range of sounds we can hear. In the hands of a sensitive musician, these devices give rise to that sense of new discovery, but they have also encouraged amateurs, who lack discretion, to create works that are limited and that tend to sound the same. The electronic medium, after all, makes it only too easy to indulge in trick effects: bizarre juxtapositions of unrelated ideas, sudden shifts from the familiar to the unfamiliar, gradual BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
disruptions of everyday sounds. When Suba was asked about this trend last year he said, "A person can have a computer at home without knowing how to play and still make music, provided, of course, that he has some musical taste. This democratization in music is phenomenal, but nothing will happen without talent. You may have the most advanced studio, all the education you need, but all will be in vain if there is no trace of that lunacy in your head, which we call talent or inspiration." Says singer Cibelle Cavalli, "Suba would develop the foundation of a piece, and then we would get together and jam at his place. He had the sound table, everything there, all his computers, filters, and effects in a case that he went around with. We called it the Suba-movel. Suba would start mixing textures, filtering, looping, working with the table, and I would hear a sound, which felt like it was right in front of me, and another sound at the back of my head, and another sound spinning over my head, and another sound inside my right ear. He made the music come alive. Once we had a song nearly ready, we would go to Wah Wah Studios, his studio, to finish it. Suba could respond to every expression of thought in the realization of his ideas." Recalling their work together on "Sereia" Cavalli says, "One night we got together at Suba's apartment, and listened to some acoustic bass loops that he had recorded cut, and pasted. After picking up on one, Suba started filtering and stretching the sound, creating all kinds of effects. He kept doing that to the sound, creating another and another. We went on into the night cutting and pasting sounds that we were creating right there. Actually. Suba was doing the creating. I could only describe the sounds I felt! needed to hear and say 'Yes' or '!don't think so,' because! can't deal with effects yet. Remember, I came from the acoustic bossa/MPB/ jazz school. Finally, I went to take a nap and when I woke up, I heard this looped melody that sounded just like a poem I had written before I met Suba. That's the lyric you hear throughout "Sereia." The funny thing is, when I wrote it, I had a particular melody in my head, like a drifting thought. And that night, out of the blue, Suba played the same melody. I rushed into the other room, got my poetry notebook, found the poem, and sang it along with the loop. I just couldn't believe how perfectly it fit." Suba's live electronic ensembles had the same freedom to use any conceivable sound, as the composer had in his studio, with the advantage that human subtleties were immediately involved. Combining live instrumental playing with electronics enabled Suba to relate his work directly to a common musical experience and to extend the capabilities of conventional instruments. Additionally, this medium lent itselfwell to performance in spectacular locations, where the visual enviWkA2211_ - MARCH 2000
ronment could atch the strangeness and often the grandeur of the music. "A few years ago," says Parahyba, "I went to the studio and recorded twelve percussion tracks, just rhythms. Afterward, Suba destroyed ese twelve pieces, and we rebuilt them again in electronic re rocessed samples. He made a playback of these that we to k to a theater with all of our instruments and we played on to of this again, live. I played all percussion and Suba rebuilt liv on top of this with effects. It was an extraordinarily success 1 balance of live electronic music and conscientious ense ble playing. Everything live again on top of this! The results and breakthroughs were exhilarating. "We toured the universities with these pieces for four months in 1997 I remember students sitting on the grass at ight under a very big, full moon. It was ompletely magic and crazy. Hermeto Pascoal) worked with us on that tour, which as funny, because in the beginning, Hermeto ust looked at us like he was wondering what as going on with these two guys. And then hen he realized that this was a language very lose to his own, one that liberated the cornoser and made it possible for him to use any ound whatsoever, he started to do amazing Rigs together with us, always funny things. e and Suba became very, very good friends." Electronic music is unusually dependent n the means accessible at the time. That is the atural evolution of electronics, and that evoution in the last ten years has been fast and ar-reaching. The resources available ten or ifteen years ago were primitive when comared with the elaborate advanced technical owledge which composers now have at eir disposal. Thus, any judgment made about ew music must take into account the effirency and imagination with which a musiian has used what was at hand, in terms both of apparatus an of theoretical knowledge. Because there has always been a 1 g between the creation of powerful original music and its pu lic appreciation, all we can draw from when judging a work' relative merits, is our listening experience within the partic lar idiom. When the sound images are cornpletely new, ho ever, there is little help from the memory in recognizing the enius, originality, and beauty of a work that, at first, appears lien. Suba was a ioneer in the discovery of new possibilities, and his achieve ents, in terms of both technical innovation as well as his radic lly new contribution to the Brazilian musical experience, can e heard and felt—first bar to last—on Sao Paulo Confessi s. "The mark of this recording," says Beco Dranoff, "is th t it is really a bridge to the millennium, something that i going to be heard and studied for years to come. This albu is far ahead of its time, really ahead of the curve." Entirely work of the new generation, rich in imagery, and powerfully tmospheric, Sao Paulo Confessions takes the listener into real s of the unknown and the mysterious where he is thrown hea long into an angular and complex world that both shocks and harms the ear, where he is obliged to suspend expectations an to follow, every moment, a path unfolded 45
amid changing soundscapes. "Sereia" (Mermaid) is a completely different sensation from the ordinary listening experience. Cibelle CavaIli elicits a world of mystery and essential solitude where the sound of her words are as important as their literal sense. Providing not an accompaniment, but a parallel dimension enmeshed With voice, Suba layers Cavalli's lyrics atop an electronically generated baiao/coco groove that is punctuated with deep cuicalike accents and laced with ambient traces of jungle and triphop. Reverberation and a wide spectrum of filtered sonorities exploit tone-color, extending rather than contrasting with Cavalli's exotic voice. This powerfully atmospheric alliance of allusion, both musical and linguistic, creates a dreamlike ambience. With enhanced surrealistic images of highly colored electronic effects and unusual juxtapositions of timbre, register, and rhythmic forms, "Segredo," a Bahian samba-marcha, displays Suba's finesse in handling the technique of timbre composition. His attention not only to the tune's expressive effect but also to the more delicate properties of rhythm and color is stunning. Functioning like a liaison between a delicate web of percussion and a luxurious ambient sonority, Katia Bronstein's voice, like some celestial hybrid that crawls over your eardrum in drifting clouds of sound, tickles a part of the brain that has been sleeping. In a wave ofprolonged musical motion, "Samba do Gringo Paulista" (Samba for Our Gringo) sets blocks of musical material against one another in flat, multi-layered planes. The metallic resonance of the cavaguinho and the percussive foundation created by Joao Parahyba from an array of samba school instruments function like traffic signs in the unlimited space ofthis electronic sound world. Says Parahyba, "In a very, very good samba school, like all live music, you appreciate a certain delay from the musicians. But with samples, you need to be more mathematical. You need a hundred beats, and every one has to be together." Here it all adds up. What is electronic and what is instrumental remains open to the innocent ear. Suba perfected a way to make electronic music sound organic, not chopped up or recycled, in which only the physiological sensitivity of the listener's ear and Suba's artistic sensitivity prescribe borders possible. "Abraco" (Embrace), is simply mesmeric; the listener can sense Suba's joy in creating atmospheric strokes as well as his almost boyish enthusiasm for pursuing the potentialities of the electronic medium. Parahyba plays perpetual repetitions of an African rhythm on congas and a Firchie snare above an implied trip-hop pulse while Edgard Scandurra's guitar pierces the ceiling. A background canvas of voices—Joanna Jones and Arnaldo Antunes—appears and submerges, alternating between quasi-declamation and rhythmically articulated spoken lines. And all these references are woven into a fabric of largely intuitive playing. Snaring the listener again and again, "A Noite Sem Fim" (Infinite Night) is a densely patterned bossa nova with transformations of motif, each growing imperceptibly from a small germinal cell that works itself out within the tune's tightly formulated gauze of contrapuntal tissue. By juxtaposing sepa46
rate, yet ultimately assimilated elements, including acoustic guitar and timba samples, and by employing an extremely broad array of coloristic, electronically processed, looped, and filtered resources, Suba creates a musical contemplation, or better still, a reflective, playful, yet gently ironic tone painting. In technical and musical respects, Sao Paulo Confessions is an aural dramaof sound effects, rhythms, and tone color that embraces surreal and extreme counterbalances. An enormously powerful pulse, references to indigenous music, and richly complex textures of intricate rhythmic counterpoints stamp this work and assert its claim as the crown of Suba's career in tirelessly seeking new sounds and combinations. Suba's cornposition and decomposition of timbre as well as his merging and dividing of complex entities with different degrees of intensity, is not simply sound manipulation, but an invitation to alter one's way of perceiving the world. Sao Paulo Confessions speaks of energy, integrity, and essences. "I introduced Suba to a lot of musicians from my popular Brazilian music area," says Parahyba, "and he always spoke with them like he was their closest friend. No matter if it was a rock player, a symphony player, some Indian guy, or an old woman from Rio de Janeiro. In five minutes they were friends. And he taught all these people how to shine professionally without losing their identity. He had an amazingly open mind and made friends easily. For him, everything was new and good, but he never lost his sharp European, Oriental focus, regardless of where he was—Sao Paulo, Bahia, Rio de Janeiro. In all his contacts with musicians, he shed new light on how they could give heart to their music with this new language. What was most important about Suba was what he did for the new concept of Brazilian music." Memory and hindsight are unreliable faculties; details fade in the mist as time and distance change impressions of an event. Folha de Sao Paulo and Trom beta do Café reported that around 5:30 a.m. on November 2, 1999, smoke was detected coming from Suba's apartment, that the building custodian called on the intercom, and that Suba, who had been sleeping, told him that he was unable to open his door. The custodian battered down the door and found Suba on his feet, but disoriented, inside the burning studio. Amid the chaos that followed, it appears that Suba reentered his studio, and his friends believe it was to recover a small case containing the original audio files and back-ups (safety copies of computer files) of the new Bebel Gilberto album. Suba was overcome by smoke and taken to the emergency room where at 6:32 a.m. he died from smoke asphyxiation. He had planned to travel to Belgium on November 3, 1999, to promote Sao Paulo Confessions and to finish producing the final tracks of the Bebel Gilberto CD, Tanto Tempo (So Much Time). On Tuesday, November 23, 1999, a long journey came to MVaZIL-MARCH2030
r its end as friends, professors, fellow musicians, and notables from the Yugoslavian cultural scene gathered at the Cultural Center of Novi Sad to pay homage to the composer, producer, instrumentalist, and connoisseur of world cultures who explored the electronic frontiers of music and theater in both Europe and Brazil, the distant and beautiful land where Suba's concepts of cultural interaction continue to nurture scores of musicians. Family and friends remember his life-affirming presence, his sense of humor, and his generosity of spirit. They tell me that he loved to paraphrase Kierkegaard: "If I were to wish for something, I would not wish for either wealth nor power, but for the passion of possibilities. I would wish for an eye eternally youthful because it forever yearns to see possibilities." Reflecting on Suba's work and the terrible loss his passing brings to loved ones and the music world, I rummaged through my books for a quote from Kierkegaard that embraced the complexity of the circumstances and the depth of sorrow that his family and friends have shared with me: "Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards." Suba's ashes were placed in the Municipal Cemetery's Hall of Serenity, though he lives forever through his music, his style, • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •
Tenho tua palma na alma da mao Tenho tua mao no meu corpo no chao Tenho teu corpo e tua alma de sao Na mao e na calma da intuicao
• • • • • I have your soul in the palm of: my hand • I have your hand over my body in the sand I have your body and the core of your soul In my hands and in tranquil intuition
Quero esse simples tao livre de ser Quero esse livre tAo simples de ver Quero te ver em teu livre tecer Teu antes teu hoje teu simples viver
I want this simple freedom to be I want this freedom so simple to see I want to see you growing to be Your yesterday, your today, simply to live
Sereia6 (Suba/Dranoff/Cavalli)
cret
Se or um jo If it is desire p pm me 'tar I ask you to guide for urn If it is a secret, I letille it carry me u eigo m egar reedg°a •on ar eoragom eu rezo If there is no courage, Pra ahencoar for a blessing I Pray gro que vent Dark skies are moving on chegattdo And will soon be pouring raj desabar down Se eu perder a born Voce vai me lever euperder a bora vein me buscar
If I lose the time Its you that takes me ffi lose the time It's you that picks me up
to faz agora I t matter no encontrar What time we meet -e van, Clouds that come and 14° 'Let erk*SO` Are fooling my heat e leVancln If they are taking me. o7ou dnvidar will not question qtie-rieri naniora „ girl who has no love e o'que tern no Doesn't know what the sea
Mermaid
• • • • • • • • No mar In the sea •• Sereia Mermaid No fundo do mar... Deep under the sea... • • •• Eu you ter voce I'll have you • Acima da lua cheia Above the full moon • Eu you ter voce I'll have you • No fundo do mar Under the sea • • • Eu vou ter voce I'll have you • L • • La fora Outside • • Já brilha Venus Venus glow • • • • Bern dentro pele na pele Inside skin against skin • • • • Sereia Mermaid • • • • No fundo do mar... Deep under the sea... • • • • • • • • • OOOOOOOOOOOO • ••••••••••• OOOOO •• BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
Segredo Suba/Katia
whispei Rebellions dist FOrever rSil Forever you 'Forever you In the solitude of thoui wpm "'wee .Forever you ijot-e outras In other kisses and,Othe Forever you =tot di empre voc TortuosoS:, Sen1PrnY'?c wo onde me afcgo etnpre voce For
you
INN SIM MOM
UI
47
and his determination to find new ways and new modes of expression. Peace Web sites of interest: Six Degrees Records http://www.sixdegreesrecords.com Crammed Discs/Ziriguiboom http://www.crammed.be/zir/ index.htm
Selected Discography: Date Label Artist Title 2000 Six Degrees/Ziriguiboom Bebel Gilberto Tanto Tempo 1999 Ziriguiboom Discos Suba Seto Paulo Confessions (Released in the United States on Six Degrees Records in 2000) 1999 Mestre AmbrOsio Sony Fua Na Casa de Cabral 1998 Sony Edson Cordeiro Clubbing 1998 Mercury/PolyGram Marina Lima Pierrot do Brasil 1998 Vulkana Music Katia B Katia B 1996 Arnaldo Antunes BMG 0 Silencio 1996 Visom Joao Parahyba Kizumba 1995 Natasha Records Taciana Barros Janela dos Sonhos 1973 RGE Trio Mocoto Trio Mocot6 (Reissued 1997)
Fylkingen Records http://www.fylkingen.se
The Theremin, one of the first electronic instruments to attract public attention, was invented about 1924 by the Russian scientist whose name it bears. 'Pro-Tools, the brand name of the most popular hardware/ software combination designed for recording and editing audio digitally onto the disk of a computer, is cheaper than multitrack professional tape, sounds (almost) as good (this is where the analog vs. digital controversy begins), and has allowed a wealth of new music to surface. When used by someone knowledgeable, it is an impressive tool—especially for editing—because you can cut, copy, and paste sound without destroying the original source. Used in conjunction with good microphones and preamps, Pro-Tools yields extraordinary results, which explains why many of the best recording facilities today are Pro Tools studios where the engineer uses a mouse and two monitors rather than a mixing board. Presented here is Cibelle Cavalli's original text. The recording substitutes the English lyrics in the B section.
Katia B http://www.katiab.com.br Joao Parahyba http://www.geocities.comf-parahyba OHM: Early Gurus of Electronic Music http://furious.com/perfect/ohm/index.html
'Paul Pignon is a Yugoslavian composer known for fragmenting music into tiny micro-ingredients and focusing on well-specified timbres. He is also acknowledged for the enormously important role he played in Sweden's free improvisation movement. 2 UNESCO is the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization. Seminal percussionist Jofto Parahyba is known for his innovation of the small timba drum set, his collaboration with Jorge Ben Jor in the development of a samba/ pain that we notify our rhythm 'n' blues hybrid, and his perrelatiself ia..ds cli equaintsinen, that oar formances with, among others, Trio MIlAR SUB()1-te SUI3A MocotO, Paulinho da Viola, Dorival (1961.1999) fireicookot tri bre Kok.. (Weed Caymmi, Dizzy Gillespie, and Michel bapai) wu '.10 names hut ihe flames could Mil hare, the km. M. %weenie. Va..0. th.ctft rich eon ,ersatild creatirity.'Orly the mune has ermined.. Legrand. ix, lion with mukh SeNtliq and line Hie family and Airway 11 t% 1111M1.01:1bit
I. lift
ifl 1110111plAti Oh*
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io fen io *31 11 Ilivsnavia. in the itionedistely once the tragic *endear ilk ash. usil Nhinicipal Concisely n Novi Sed. :mat to les wools, deemed denies. Radornit firoitie The inemotial service lb,our beloved Sul. Juni. *111 1* held in Mini Sad. r the 14311 of Serenity. on'23' of November in9n at We shall evasive his iiienixy and we ahall always line him the way he loon/ us.
Bruce Gilman, music editor for
Brazzil, received his Masters
degree in music from California Institute of the Arts. He leads the Brazilian jazz ensemble Axe and plays cuica for escola de samba MILA. You can reach him through his e-mail: cuica(&interworld.net
isslcit.1:17 li 'r‘ l'171tiT1 1 1C, wife I ACIANA fSARROS, ohe telaliSen and Piaui,
48
BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
immersed in sex and drug experim nts. Directed by Victor Garcia Peralta, with Beth Goulart and Guilherme Leme.
SAI PAULO
Os Mondlogos da Vagina (The Vagina's Monologues)—Comedy. Written by Eve Ensler, directed by Miguel Falabella, with Zeze Polessa, Claudia Rodrigues, and Vera Setta. Based in 200 interviews made in 200 different countries by American Ensler, deals with sexuality and problems with dealing with it from a woman's perspective. Henrique IV (Henry IV)—Comedy. From Luigi Pirandello, directed Ant6nio Guedes with Cia de Teatro do Pequeno Gesto. Classical text of Italian playwright mixes fiction and reality. Bonitinha, Mas Ordindria (Pretty Little Thing and a Slut)—Drama. Written by Nelson Rodrigues, directed by Moacyr Gees, with Natalia Lage, Andre Valli, and Leon Goes. Classical text by controversial author revisits the themes of sex, hypocrisy and guilty so dear to Rodrigues. Capitu—Based on Machado de Assis's Dom Casmurro, a book many consider Brazil's best novel ever. The story of Bentinho and his reminiscences on his
childhood and jealousy over his wife Capitu. Adapted by Marcus Vinicius Faustini and Walter Daguerre, with Edney Giovenazzi, Alexandre Barilari, and Maria Ribeiro. Teatro da UniverCidade Decadencia (Decadence)—British playwright Steven Berkoff tale of two couples BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
Filhos do Brasil (Brazil's Children)— Comedy. Written by Andrea Bassitt and Regina Galdino, directed by Regina Galdino, with Andrea Bassitt and Deborah Serretiello. Show examines Ins ian children's games as well as kids' stor es. A Vaca Metaffsica (The Metaphy ical Cow)—Comedy. Written by Marcili de Moraes, directed by Leonardo Cortez, ith Glaucia Libertini, Henrique Pes oa, Claudia Tordatto and Leonardo Co ez. The presence of a cow in a' middle- lass home makes life a little easier for a co pie who cares for the animal. Boca de Ouro (Golden Mouth)—Ne son Rodrigues's classic tragedy written in 1 59. Title comes from main character who affirms his leadership as animal's game oss by pulling all his teeth and adopti g a golden denture. Directed by legendar director Jose Celso Martinez Correa, ith Marcelo Drummond and Silvia Pr do. Teatro Oficina. Cazas de Cazuza—The dreams and frustrations of a group of residents from an apartment building in Rio's Baixo Lesion. Musical. Written and directed by Rod igo Pitta, with Jay Vaguer, Lulo Scroback, and Debora Reis. At Tom Brasil.
Just-released American movies:
20 Dates (20 Encontros), in Interrupted (Garota Interrompi a), Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo (Gi olo por Acidente), Fear and Loathin in Las Vegas (Medo e Delirio), For ove Of The Game (Por Amor), ell (Inferno), Music of the Heart (Ma ica do Coractio), The Whole Nine Y rds (Meu Vizinho Mafioso), The Ti ger Movie (Tigrtio-0 Filme) Bossa Nova— Brazil/2000--Base on Sergio Sant'Anna's book A Senh rita Simpson (Miss Simpson), this rom tic comedy tells the story of an American ho teaches English in Rio and who fall in love with two of her students. By B uno Barreto, with Amy Irving and Ant nio Fagundes. Castelo R6-Tim-Bum-0 Filme (Rd- imBum Castle, the Film)—Brazil/19 9— Based on a successful educational TV s ow of same name. Directed by Cao Hambu ger, with Diego Kozievitch, Sergio Mamb rti, Rosi Campos, Marieta Severo, and M eus Nachtergaele. Hans Staden —Brazil/1999—The ad entures of German explorer Hans Sta en, who in 1554 almost became Indian lu ch. Narrated in German, spoken in Tupi. Directed by Luiz Alberto Pereira with C rlos Evelyn. Sound track by Marlui Mira 'a. 0 Viajante (The Tray eler)—Brazi1/19 9— The passage of a salesman though a little town in Minas Gerais ends up in trag dy. Directed by Paulo Cezar Saraceni, ith Marilia Pera, Leandra Leal, Jairo Ma tos, Ricardo Graca Mello, Nelson Dantas, and
Milton Nasciniento.
Hest sellers FICTION 1 A casa dos budas ditosos, Luxuria, Joao Ubaldo Ribeiro. Objetiva, R$ 19 2 A pedra da luz: Nefer, o silencioso, Christian Jacq. Bertrand, R$ 38 3 0 colecionador de ossos, Jeffrey Deaver. Record, R$ 30 4 Ramses vol 1, o filho da luz, Christian Jacq. Bertrand, R$ 37.48 5 Conte-me seas sonhos, Sidney Sheldon. Record, R$ 28 6A muralha, Dinah Silveira de Queiroz. Record, R$ 25 7 0 clube dos anjos, Luis Fernando Verissimo. Objetiva, R$ 18.20 8 0 testamento, John Grisham. Rocco, R$ 29.50 9 A filha da fortuna, Isabel Allende. Bertrand, R$ 38 10A morte de Rimbaud, Leandro Konder. Companhia das Letras R$ 17
NONFICTION 1 Noites tropicais, Nelson Motta. Objetiva, R$ 39.50 2 Brasil: terra 6 vista, Eduardo Bueno. L&PM, R$ 16.90 3 0 livro de ouro da mitologia, Thomas Bullfinch. Ediouro, R$ 29 4 0 Papa de Hitler, John Cornwell. Imago, R$ 40 5 Capitdes do Brasil, Eduardo Bueno. Objetiva, R$ 24.50 6 As melhores piadas do Planeta and da Casseta tambem, vol. 3, Casseta and Planeta. Objetiva, R$ 14 7 Estacdo Carandiru, Drauzio Varella. Companhia das Letras, R$ 26 8 Noticias do Planalto, Mario Sergio Conti. Companhia das Letras, R$ 35 9 A Viagem do descobrimento, Eduardo Bueno. Objetiva, R$ 18 10 N6ufragos, traficantes and degredados, Eduardo Bueno. Objetiva, R$ 19.50
CHILDREN 1 Quem canta seus males espanta, Theodora Maria Mendes de Almeida. Caramelo, R$ 27 2 Matilda, Roald Dahl. Martins Fontes, R$ 17.50 3 A casa sonolenta, Audrey and Don Wood. Atica, R$ 10.80 4 0 pequeno prfncipe, Saint-Exupery. Agir, R$ 13 5 Coisas que toda garota deve saber, Samantha Rugen. Melhoramentos, R$ 11.40 6 Pedro and Tina, Stephen Michael King. Brinque-Book, R$ 16 7 Sons divertidos, vdrios autores. Brinque-Book, R$ 21 8 Minhas ferias, Marcelo Coelho. Companhia das Letrinhas, R$ 12.56 9 Outro como eu so daqui a mil an Os, Ziraldo. Melhoramentos, R$ 11.60 10 Meu cachorro é um elefante, Ana Maria Machado, Remy Simard and Pierre Pratt. Moderna, R$ 10 According to Jornal do Brasil, http://www.jb.com.br 49
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53
Amid the nightlife that surrounded the monument to Brazil's first emperor, in the darkened theaters under flickering lights of newfangled cineniat,ographs, and on the benches and among the shrubbery in the park, men who sought out other men for sexual escapades took advantage of the loosened morals in this part of the city to procure pleasure for themselves. JAMES N GREEN
Pleasures in the Parks of Rio de Janeiro during the Brazilian Belle Epoque, 1898-1914 As Brazil entered the twentieth century, Rio de Janeiro, nestled among towering granite hills and surrounded by a broad bay on one side and the Atlantic Ocean on the other, underwent remarkable transformations. For a decade after the abolition of slavery in 1888 and the declaration of the Republic a year later, the nation had been enveloped in political turmoil. According to one historian of this period, "[in 1898, with [President] Campos Salles' assumption ofpower and the reassertion of a calm dominated by the regional elites, the Carioca (from Rio de Janeiro) belle ĂŠpoque begins. That year there was a noticeable change in the air which soon affected the cultural and social milieu. The revolutionary days were over. The time for stability and urban life of elegance was at hand again." While the urban elite looked forward to political and social stability, impoverished Afro-Brazilians continued to pour into the capital from the surrounding countryside and other states in search of employment. Likewise, as apart of the tidal wave of European migration to the Americas in the late nineteenth century, foreign immigrants, especially Portuguese, contributed to the city's dramatic growth. Between 1872 and 1890, Rio's population almost doubled, jumping from 266.831 to 518.290. Sixteen year later, in 1906, it had increased to more than 800.000, and by 1920, the capital had 1.157.873 residents. During this period, men outnumbered women in Rio de Janeiro. In the 1890 census, the new republican government registered 238.667 males and 184.089 females residing in the nation's capital. Among the native-born
population, there was a relative gender balance of 159,393 men to 151,428 women. However, among foreign immigrants, men surpassed women 79,374 to 32,561. Amid the bust e of everyday life in Brazil's largest urban center, thousands of young, single men roamed the streets in search of work, entertainment, company, and sex. Rio's demographic boom also placed enormous pressures on the city's infrastructure, housing supply, and public health. In 1902, the federal capital's mayor, Francisco Pereira Passos, with newly elected president Rodrigues Alves's backing, ordered a radical urban renovation project that would transform much of the city center. Rio was to be heralded as a trop:cal version of modern Paris. Illuminated broad boulevards lined with fashionable beaux arts buildings replaced dark, narrow, crooked streets and modest structures. Public health officials campaigned to improve sanitation and eliminate yellow fever through a program that, among other requirements, involved the obligatory inoculating of the entire population. The municipal government condemned more than sixteen hundred buildings, including many tenement housing units, and forced almost twenty thousand poor and working-class residents of Rm, many of whom were AfroBrazilian, to find new housing. Some moved close by, while many others were forced to relocate to outlying suburban districts to the north of the downtown area. Although protests and riots against new public health, sanitation, and residential removal programs revealed a deep resentment toward the government's overall plan, officials carried on with determination. In 1906 they declared their project complete, and Rio de Janeiro soon became known as a cidade maravilhosa (the marvelous city). The press boasted that the nation's capital
had become a bourgeois urban public space comparable to any of Europe's modernized cities. The forced removal of poor inhabitants from some of the downtown districts and the new French-influenced architectural facades lining the city's main new thoroughfare, Avenida Central (later renamed Avenida Rio Branco) produced an environment more pleasing to Rio's elite. However, the renovation plan did not eliminate all overt evidence of chaos, poverty, and urban decay deemed inappropriate by Carioca high society. Prostitution continued in parts of the downtown area. Crime remained a threat to those who frequented the newly renovated areas of the city's center. Poor men and women, especially people of color, still peddled their wares on the streets. And men who enjoyed sex with men tenaciously clung to several sites in the city center that they had appropriated as public places to find sexual partners and socialize with friends. The most noted urban space for male-to-male sexual encounters and socializing was Largo do ROSSiCi, a square at the edge of traditional downtown Rio de Janeiro. The area received a facelift at the time of the Pereira Passos urban reforms and has remained a location of homoerotic sociability from the late nineteenth century until recent years. At the center of the Largo do Rossio stood a majestic statue of the Brazilian emperor Dom Pedro 1(1798-1834). His son, Dom Pedro 11 (1825-1891) had ordered its erection in 1862 to celebrate the fortieth anniversary of the declaration of Brazilian independence from Portugal. On March 30 of that year, amid fanfare and fireworks, the emperor and his entourage dedicated the sixteen-foot bronzed likeness of independent Brazil's first ruler, mounted on a steed and clutching a raised scroll representing the nation's constitution. The equestrian statute, which weighed sixty tons, rested on a massive thirty-foot pedestal decorated with bronze figures symbolizing Brazil's major rivers and metal plaques inscribed with the names of the country's provinces. The government subsequently ordered the landscaping of the square around the monument with trees, gardens, statutes, and benches, making it one of the downtown area's pleasant open spaces, as well as a public representation of Brazilian nationalist sentiments. Located immediately off the plaza was the Sao Pedro Theater, which hosted major cultural events for Carioca high society throughout the nineteenth century and helped to draw other entertainment venues to the square). Soon after the statue of Emperor Dom Pedro I was erected, the site fulfilled another "less patriotic" function as a venue for homosexual interactions. So much clandestine sexual activity took place in the praca that in 1870 a city administrator sent a communiqué to the head of local government operations about the situation. He complained that the municipal guard in charge of making the rounds in the plaza gardens had "abandoned those same gardens for most of the day to the perversity of boys and ill-intentioned people." His complaint had little effect, however, and the area continued to attract men who sought each other out for socioerotic ends. As a result, in 1878, the secretary of the court police had to take more drastic actions, "seeing how there are individuals who go there at late hours to practice abuses against morality, forcing this Division to have patrols in those gardens, impairing the police from being in other places." He directed the four entrances to the gardens in the plaza's center to be closed every night at midnight. Two weeks later, in response to
BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
another compl 'nt that, in fact, the square was not being closed down as ordere i, a government official assured the chief of police that the g dens were, indeed, being sealed off at night. Moreover, the night patrols issued a whistle warning to guarantee that o one would remain in the area past closing time. Regardles of police surveillance and control of the area, men persisted i using the park as a venue for trysts with other men interested 'n sexual liaisons. Legal but Not Legal During the ost-1889 republican regime, homosexuality per se was not i legal. This had not been the case in colonial Brazil under P rtuguese rule, when the law had defined sodomy as the al penetration of a man or woman. When two men were invol ed, the Office of the Holy Inquisition, which was installed in ortugal in 1553, as well as Portuguese legal codes, consider d both the penetrator and the receptor to be sodomites. If fo nd guilty of this offense, a person was subject to burning at the stake, and his or her property could be seized. Between 1587 d 1794, the Portuguese Inquisition registered 4,419 de unciations. These included both those suspected of havin practiced sodomy and those who provided confessions attesting to the fact that they had committed the "abominable and perverted sin." Of the total number, 394 went to trial. Th. rty were eventually burned at the stake, 3 in the sixteenth ce tury and 27 in the seventeenth century. Those not put to death ould be sentenced to hard labor on the king's galley ships or t • temporary or perpetual exile in Africa, India, or Brazil. Often these harsh punishments were enacted after the condemned ad already suffered seizure of property and endured a bruta public whipping. In 1830, ei t years after independence from Portugal, Dom Pedro I sig ed into law the Imperial Penal Code. Among other provision, the new law eliminated all references to sodomy. The 1 gislation was influenced by the ideas of Jeremy Benth ,the French Penal Code of 1791, the Neapolitan Code of 1819, and the Napoleonic Code of 1810, which decriminalized exual relations between consenting adults. However, articl 280 of the Brazilian code punished public acts of indecenc with ten to forty days' imprisonment and a fine correspon ing to one half of the time served. This provision gave e police the discretion to determine what constituted a p • lic act of indecency. It also gave them the power to extort oney from those threatened with arrest or detention. The 1889 re ublican government approved a new penal code in 1890 th t maintained the decriminalization of sodomy. Although ot explicitly punishing same-sex erotic activities, the new law sought to control such conduct through indirect means d restricted homosexual behavior in four distinct ways. icle 266 referred to "assaults on decency of a person of one r another sex through violence or threat with the goal of satiat ng lascivious passions or for moral depravation" and was pu ishable "by one to six years' imprisonment." This article wa usually applied in cases involving sexual relationships be een adults and minors, including men with young boys. Adults enga ing in sexual activities with other adults in a public setting ci uld be .charged under article 282, "Public Affront to Dece cy" (atentado public° ao pudor). The crime was described a "assaults on modesty, offending propriety
55
with shameless exhibitions or obscene acts or gestures, practiced in public places or places frequented by the public, and which without offense to the individual honesty of the person, assaults and scandalizes society. It carried a prison sentence of one to six months. This provision, a revised carryover from the 1830 Imperial Penal Code, provided the legal basis for controlling any public manifestations of homoerotic or homosocial behavior. With catchall wording, the police or a judge could broadly define improper or indecent action and punish behavior that did not conform to heterocentric constructions. Article 379, "On the Use of False Names, Fake Titles, or other Disguises," outlawed cross-dressing by prohibiting "disguising one's sex, wearing inappropriate clothes and doing so publicly to deceive. The law carried a penalty of fifteen to sixty days' imprisonment. Although the police winked an eye at cross-dressing during Carnival, throughout the rest of the year, they could use this legal provision to arrest homosexuals who liked to wear clothes of the opposite sex. The fourth method for regulating public manifestations of homosexuality was to arrest a person for vagrancy. Article 399 of the 1890 Penal Code defined vagrancy as "leaving the exercise of a profession, employment, or any service in which one earns a living; not possessing a means of support and a fixed domicile in which one is residing; earning a living in an occupation prohibited by law or manifestly offensive to morality and propriety. A penalty of fifteen to thirty days' incarceration could be imposed on anyone who happened to be arrested without work papers or who was engaged in male prostitution. The person also had to find gainful employment within fifteen days of his release. Together, these four provisions placed legal restraints on those who might congregate in public places in order to meet others interested in same-sex erotic activities. They gave the police the power to incarcerate arbitrarily those homosexuals who engaged in public displays of effeminacy, wore long hair, feminine clothing, or makeup, earned a living through prostitution, or took advantage of the cover of bushes or shrubs in shadowed parks to enjoy a nocturnal sexual liaison. Sodomy had been decriminalized in the early nineteenth century. However, criminal codes with vaguely defined notions of proper morality and public decency, as well as provisions that limited cross-dressing and strictly controlled vagrancy, provided a legal net that could readily entangle those who transgressed socially sanctioned sexual norms. Although homosexuality in and of itself was not technically illegal, the Brazilian police and courts had multiple mechanisms at their disposal to contain and control this behavior. The Crossroads of Sin On February 21, 1890, only three months after the overthrow of Emperor Dom Pedro II and the Brazilian monarchy, the new republican government changed the official name of the Largo do Rossio from Praca da Constituicao (Constitution Plaza) to Praca Tiradentes in order to commemorate the upcoming centennial of the execution of Joaquim Jose da Silva Xavier commonly known as Tiradentes. This leader of a 1789 conspiracy against Portuguese imperial rule was tortured and executed near that site in 1792, and the rechristening ofthe plaza affirmed the antimonarchical sentiments of the new republican regime. In spite of the official name
56
change, the square remained Largo do Rossio in the imagination and common parlance of turn-of-the-century Cariocas and was still associated in the public's mind with same-sex sexual encounters. Stately buildings, in the process of being remodeled in the latest French architectural style, surrounded PracaTiradentes. Since the streets next to the park were also the termini of the streetcar lines that serviced the northern neighborhoods of the city, including the areas where many former downtown residents had been relocated as a result of urban renewal, this public space bustled with movement. The plaza's strategic location encouraged an eclectic combination of theaters, the brand-new motion picture houses, a concert hall hosting musical reviews and vaudeville performances, not to mention cabarets, popular cafĂŠs, and bars. Bourgeois Rio attended the elegant and spacious Sao Pedro Theater, while middle- and working-class customers had an array of cultural, culinary, libational, and sexual distractions close at hand. At the turn of the century, Pascoal Segreto, an Italian immigrant turned entrepreneur, built his entertainment empire at Praca Tiradentes. Among his investments was the Maison Modeme. This urban amusement park featured a mini-roller coaster. carrousel, Ferris wheel, and shooting gallery, with a small, partially open theater in the back and a cafĂŠ that served beer to working-class customers. From this and several other modest entertainment establishments, Pascoal Segreto expanded his holdings by purchasing most of the public performance venues in the area around Praca Tiradentes. When he died in 1920, the humble immigrant, who had begun working as a shoeshine boy, owned most of the theaters and movie houses in the district, from the elegant Sao Pedro that billed top European talent to concert halls featuring the latest in risque entertainment for the popular classes of Rio de Janeiro. Nestled among these establishments of public distraction in the vicinity around the plaza, one could find brothels and boardinghouses in buildings that had once served as expansive dwellings for elite families. The city's demographic imbalance in favor of single young men, especially immigrants, and the large number of poor women from the countryside and overseas favored this sexual traffic. Prostitutes ranged from high-classfrancesas, with the allure oftheir French origins, and recently arrived Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe, known as polacas, to light-skinned Afro-Brazilian mulatas. Middle- and upper-class men, engaging in fleeting bohemian forays in this demimonde, could mingle with prostitutes in popular establishments like the Stadt Munchen bar and restaurant, and the CafĂŠ Suico, which were right off of the Plaza. If not satisfied with the crowd in these meeting places. Carioca males could also wander a few blocks away to seek camaraderie or carnal pleasures in another vibrant center of nightlife in the Lapa neighborhood. Store clerks, students, and modest public servants who were unable to pay for the sexual services of women who boasted a French birthright could still find lower-class polacas and mulatas working near Praca Tiradentes. Although this was not the only prostitution zone in downtown Rio, the proximity of so many theaters, eating and drinking establishments, and popular entertainment venues provided plenty of customers for women in the sex trade, who serviced their clients in nearby bordellos or in the privacy of a rented room behind closed Venetian blinds. As has been
BRAZZIL- MARCH 2000
noted, the Pereira Passos urban renovations of the century's ing to the Spani h-born barber, he had been angry with Jose, first decade had been designed to modernize downtown Rio "for reasons of onor." He further testified that he had indeed de Janeiro and place it on equal footing with European called Jose a pu o because the Turk had rouge on his face. He capitals. In spite of popular resistance, the government suc- added that they ung man even had to go into the house to wipe cessfully forced many poor people, especially Afro-Brazilians, it off. The barb r was eventually acquitted of the charges. out the downtown districts. However, regulation of prostituRacial and ational rivalries between immigrants and tion in the area during the first two decades of the twentieth recently freed laves in turn-of-the-century Rio de Janeiro century remained sporadic. Too many journalists, intellectu- constituted a co flict-laden backdrop to working-class social als, artists, and politicians from well-connected families pro- interactions. Th s particular dispute, carried out in the public cured women around Praca Tiradentes and other downtown arena of a w rking-class neighborhood and involving sites for the police to operate effectively to rid the area of Afro-Brazilians as well as Spanish, Portuguese, and Turkish female prostitution. immigrants, ind cates that the accusation of being aputo could Amid the nightlife that surrounded the monument to unite diverse gr ups against a common moral social enemy— Brazil's first emperor, in the darkened theaters under flicker- the feminized who allegedly worked as a prostitute. The ing lights of newfangled cinematographs, and on the benches record does no indicate definitely whether or not Jose, a and among the shrubbery in the park, men who sought out recent immigr t who still signed his last name in the script of other men for sexual escapades took advantage of the loos- his native count in the police record, was in fact a puto, that ened morals in this part of the city to procure pleasure for is to say, that - earned money at the Largo do Rossio by themselves. The mounted monarch continued to be a refer- having sex with other men. However, while Baudilio G. was ence point for male-to-male sexual and formally charged with the offense of uttersocial encounters. Rio chronicler Luiz ing the "indecent" word puto, the young Edmundo recalled a typical scene of 1901: Beyond Carnival street vendor was actually the one on trial. "After eight at night lads with feminine Jose's personal grooming and possible secairs, who spoke in a falsetto voice, bit on ondary source of income became the subcambric handkerchiefs and laid their sheepject of public scrutiny. His use of rouge and ish eyes on the manly and handsome statue other feminine markings represented inapof Mr. Pedro." propriate and immoral behavior that merBoth the public spaces and the varied ited social condemnation. The resolution entertainment options offered ample opof the altercation exonerated Baudilio even portunities for men to congregate with though several witnesses, including the others of like-minded sexual and social defendant himself, admitted that the barber affinities. The half-dozen theaters, counthad uttered the "indecent" expression. less bars, cabarets, and music halls also While using the word puto scandalized the employed some of these men as actors, neighborhood, being a puto was a much dancers, singers, waiters, and service emworse offense. ployees. A favorite meeting place for this The term puto, the masculinized vercrowd was the CafÊ Criterium, located sion of puta, or female prostitute, was used immediately across from the park, where in colonial Brazil and in Portugal to refer to "actors and young lads with high-pitched "a boy who prostituted himself with the voices who wore rice powder makeup and rouge" socialized. vice of sodomy 1r masturbation." It was a popular version of One such painted youth who frequented the Largo do Rossio the older term, s donzita, with its biblical origins, that was the was Jose N., a nineteen-year-old Turkish-born street vendor. standard religio s and legal way of describing persons who On April 13, 1905, his neighbor Baudilio G., a forty-five-year had anal sex wi persons of either sex in colonial Brazil. old Spanish barber, was arrested for calling Jose N. a puto do During the Br !Ian belle Êpoque, the pervasive stereotype Largo do Rossio. for men who ha sex with other men emphasized their link to The police charged the barber with violating article 282 of prostitution. Ph sicians, politicians, lawyers, intellectuals, the Penal Code, "Public Affront to Decency." At the court and artists po yed modern sodomites as effeminate men hearing, Maria dos Anjos, a native of Portugal and who engaged in anal sex as passive partners and supported washerwoman by profession, who lived across the street from themselves as s eetwalkers. As we shall see throughout this the defendant, testified that at 10:30 that morning Baudilio G. work, the conn ction between prostitution, effeminacy in had started fighting with the Turk, Jose N. She stated that the men, and homos - xuality remained a powerful representation older man called him "a male whore, a depraved one, a male of same-sex ero ic behavior well into the second half of the whore from the Largo do Rossio" and that these immoral twentieth centu ,when alternative notions of sexual identity words were heard by many people, including some young emerged that ch ; lenged this dominant paradigm. girls. Three other neighbors, both immigrants and BraziAt some po. t in late-nineteenth-century Brazil, a new lian-born, repeated Maria dos Anjos's testimony. pejorative expr sion, fresco (fairy, faggot), which literally Then the young Turk, who lived in the same building as the means someone or thing) that is fresh, came into popular use. defendant, was asked to speak. He also confirmed the Portu- Francisco Jose ;veiros de Castro, a professor of criminal law guese washerwoman's version of events. Jose N. added that at Rio de Jan eir 's law school and a judge of the High Court Baudilio G. had accused him of "taking his wife" and of of Appeals of th - Federal District, used the term in an 1894 "having makeup on his face." The defendant, Baudilio G., volume entitled Assaults on Modesty: Studies on Sexual provided a different version of the verbal exchange. Accord- Aberrations. In is chapter "Pederasty," he described Rio de
BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
57
Janeiro's frescos, referring to the men who in the 1880s, during the last years of the empire, invaded the masked Carnival balls at the So Pedro Theater in the Largo do Rossio: "One of these frescos, as they are known in popular slang, became famous using the name Panela de Bronze (Bronze Buttocks). He dressed admirably as a woman, to the point of fooling even the most perceptive. They say that he was able to acquire a fortune through his vile industry and that he had so many visitors, people of high social position, that they had to request an appointment beforehand." In turn-of-the-century Brazil, fresco, with the dual meaning of a fairy or faggot and something fresh, became a common double entendre used to poke fun at effeminate men or those assumed to engage in "passive" anal sexual encounters with other men. Moreover,frescos were intimately associated with the Largo do Rossio. The term's multiple uses appeared in the Dicionario Moderno, a slim tongue-in-cheek compilation of erotic and pornographic slang, published in 1903: "Fresco—adjective meaning cool weather, depraved due to modernization. Almost cold, mild, agreeable, that which is not hot nor warm. That which is whimsical and breezy. One finds them in the hills and in the Largo do Rossio." Not only is a space associated with the fresco, but the figure evokes a relationship between social degeneration and modernization, as if the process of urbanization and the transformation of traditional ways were to blame for same-sex erotic behavior. As we shall see, medical and legal professionals commenting on the subject during this period drew similar parallels between homosexuality and modernization. The renovation of the Largo do Rossio during the urban renewal project at the beginning of the twentieth century provided one cartoonist the opportunity to link frescos to the plaza. An ink drawing and a sardonic poem entitled "Fresca Theoria (Requerimento)" (Fresh idea [or fairy's idea] [petition]) appeared in a 1904 issue of the magazine 0 Ma/ho, which specialized in humor and political satire. In the cartoon, a man in a fashionable straw hat, flowery bow tie, short tight jacket, and busy closefftting pants stands with a buttock protruding, lending his figure an S-shape, the classical pose of women in turn-of-the-century drawings. His index finger is resting pensively on his chin as he ponders his new idea and the request that he is going to make to the city government. Behind him is a garden with the statute of Dom Pedro I in the background, an obvious reference to the Largo do Rossio. Since the recent relandscaping of the park had temporarily diminished access to the grounds for cruising and courting, the protagonist, represented by the artist as a male prostitute, has found himself out of work. The poem reads: "Given the cruel destruction / Of the Rossio of my dreams / The unemployed Muse, / Although in gloomy verses, / Will take a risk. / It is a rather hard shock / That constrains one's freedom / In this ungrateful profession, /And from the mayor of the city /1 require compensation." Not unlike the Spanish barber who accused Jose N. of wearing makeup and being a "puto do Rossio," the author of this poem associates the square with male effeminacy and streetwalking, as if sex between men could only take place if an exchange of money occurred. In the cartoon, the fop even considers petitioning the government for some type of financial support because of the temporary unavailability of the plaza. The stereotyped well-dressed dandy, who lacks manly comportment and entertains foolish ideas, is quickly identified with homosexual prostitution. Just as the working-class
58
neighbors of Jose N. linked his use of makeup to the Largo do Rossio and male prostitution, one can assume that the middle-class readership of 0 Ma/ho understood the constellation of markers pointing to the ridiculed figure of thefresco. The conflation of particular forms of dress, prostitution, exaggerated unmanly behavior, the term fresco, and the specificity of the Largo do Rossio as a privileged space for same-sex erotic adventures occurs in another cartoon from the same period also published in 0 Ma/ho). The drawing, entitled "Escabroso" (Unseemly) captures two men in conversation. One is a mature male, quite large, almost monstrous in size, with a goatee, walking cane, and a rough masculine appearance. The other figure, a man with a much smaller frame and a hint of a pencil mustache, is stylishly dressed with a flower in his lapel. He coyly looks downward and holds a Japanese fan in his left hand. A curled pinkie suggests effeminacy. His other hand caresses the edge of the fan. The more delicate man comments: "It's so hot. Neither cashew juice nor any other refreshment is enough, sir. I think that I go out every night in search of some place fresh [or cool]." To which his burly companion replies: "Won't the Largo do Rossio do?" Once again aplay on words allows the cartoonist to portray common held social notions about thefresco and his territory. The corpulent, masculine gentlemen is capable of classifying his shy and demurring friend and relegating him to an appropriate urban territory where he can cool down while warming up with some sexual adventure. The artist operates on the assumption that the average reader will know the slang term for an effeminate man and thus understand the double meaning of his remark. Interestingly, this cartoon provoked comment in the pages of Rio Nu (Nude Rio), an erotic publication founded in 1898 that featured seminude women, piquant cartoons, short stories, and gossip columns. Referring to the cartoon, the editor of the magazine commented: "Last Saturday 0 Ma/ho carried a drawing showing an old man talking with a small elegantly dressed man with the airs of a little missy (of that kind from the Largo do Rossio) After repeating the printed dialogue between the two figures, the editor sarcastically noted: "Well, Ma/ho, you, who try to be a serious journal and say you are read by families, publish innocent items like this? If it were in Rio Nu, it would be pornographic, but in Ma/ho it is humor." According to Cristiana Sunetinni Pereira, who has studied turn-of-the century Brazilian pornography, Rio Nu's editor used the cartoon to delineate the character of the journal in comparison to its competitors. By imputing a hypocritical attitude to the editors of 0 Ma/ho for publishing the drawing with its overt references to same-sex erotic behavior, Rio Nu effectively drew the limits between acceptable and unacceptable middle-class morality. In doing so, Rio Nu established its preeminence in the area of piquant journalism, and ridiculed its competitors for their middle-class moralism. Jokes about frescos, while appropriate in a magazine dedicated to pornographic humor, transgressed the boundaries of respectability when found in the pages of publications with a family audience, or at least so the editors of Rio Nu argued. Excerpted from Beyond Carnival by James N. Green, The University of Chicago Press, 1999, 408 pp. Green is assistant professor of history at California State University, Long Beach.
BRAZZIL - MARCH 2000
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