carnaval, churrascaria, capoeira, & cachoeira

omigosh, lots to blog about & I’m behind. One of the students described Brazil as being overly visually stimulating. One of the life-long-learners said that, writing home, she told her family that she was out of adjectives to describe the experience. And it’s only port #2.

Sunday morning, Mary & I went to the Mercado Modelo, where I bought some beads, and walked around Pelourinho, the upper city. The bottom floor of the Mercado was once a holding place for slaves being sold at auction and the top stories are now a tourist market.

Pelourinho is a Unesco World Heritage Site with lots of narrow cobblestone streets. The word pelourinho means whipping post. Slaves were publicly tortured there and auctioned. Brazil was the last country in the Americas to outlaw slavery. While certain slaves were freed earlier, slavery was legal in some fashion in Brazil all the way up to 1885.

A few other items of note on Brazil: Brazil has more arable land than any other country in the world. It also has one of the leading economies in the world. Yet, its wealth distribution is abysmal. The rich are very very rich and the poor are very very poor. Brazil’s population is 46% Black, 52% White, and 2% Native American. Brazil has very poor public schools and very good public (free) universities. So, the rich get to go to the university completely for free, while the poor are not well-enough educated to be able to even compete for the available slots. Brazil is a country of clear dichotomy & contradiction everywhere you turn.

A few photos of Pelourinho:

Sunday night, I led a group of 26 students/faculty/life-long-learners on an evening “camarote” to Carnaval. A camarote is a viewing station, where things are supposed to be calmer than down on the street. It was madness on the street. 2 million people come to Salvador for Carnaval. The music was crazy loud. We saw some very famous Brazilian bands, but I don’t remember any of their names … it was a fun evening. And about all I needed to see of Carnaval. Having done the stay-up-all-night-on-the-street-thing in Cadiz when I was living in Spain, I didn’t feel the need to repeat that experience. Many students of course have been trying out the approach. The trip leadership went fine. My job is to make sure folks get on the bus, to be the SAS liaison for the guides, & to know who is not returning. I’m not responsible for making sure students actually return. The local guides were fabulous. At first, students were telling me they had decided to stay and that was fine. Many students were drinking, but largely they were all responsible. Dean Mike went also and it was good to have him there, but all in all everything went well. Of the 26 that went, 20 students returned on the bus and 6 life-long-learners took a taxi home earlier in the evening. No one was unaccounted for. I didn’t take my camera with me, so no photos of Carnaval. My apologies.

Yesterday, I took a trip to Itaparica Island, which turned out mostly to be a beach trip. First, we stopped (via boat) at an island that was given by the King of Portugal to the Jesuits. Two Jesuits were exploring the bay (Bahia de Todos os Santos) and decided not to return to Salvador and so they stayed on the island. (The Jesuits, incidentally, also built the first manual elevator in Salvador to haul goods from the port area to the upper city.) On the little island, there is a lighthouse and a church, but mostly just a beach.

The water was really warm. Boats pulled up right to the beach, so the water was lovely until it started smelling like diesel from the boat exhaust.

My back & shoulders are mildly burnt again. We then took the boat to Itaparica where we had lunch and went to the mineral spring. The spring has three taps: one for money, one for health, and one for youth. We drank from all (despite being told not to drink the water … money/health/youth seemed worth the risk!) We also watched some capoeira, which is an Afro-Brazilian dance/martial art. The story goes that the slaves turned martial arts into a dance form in order to hide their strength & fitness-practice from their slave-owners. It is beautiful to watch and the boys/men who do this are incredible athletes. It’s hard to imagine that they were hiding anything from the slaveowners. Certainly makes you wonder ...

Last night, a group of us then went to a churrascaria, which is described simply as a “steakhouse”. Vegetarians might just well stop reading now. It’s like dim sum, but with meat instead of Chinese food. First, there were the most incredible french-fries ever eaten (as an appetizer on the table with bread) -- cooked with dende oil -- which almost everything is fried with here. Hugely high in saturated fat, but omigod, good. Then there was a buffet that had shimp so large as you’ve ever seen, and caviar, and a million different cheeses, and salad, and a peppers & pickels & salmon & on and on and on. After that course, the waiters start running around with giant skewers full of all sorts of different kinds of meat and they slice it right there in front of you. We all had tweezer-like-things (tongs) that we would use to grab the meat off the skewer. They come and stand to the left of each person at the table and slice for you personally. I have no idea what I ate, but everything was incredibly delicious. We were advised to go slowly, but it was impossible. Waiters were running around amongst all the tables and feeding us meat like crazy. There were tables of 16 running all throughout the center of the restaurant with smaller tables to the sides. It was loud and busy and bustling and just nuts. There was a table of SAS students who sent us (faculty & staff) over a bottle of champagne. Dessert was amazing flan. It was totally nuts. I didn’t have a camera with me, but others did. I was going to get their photos for the blog, but better to just go to the restaurant’s website & see for yourself: http://www.grupoboipreto.com.br/index1.htm First click on “carnes” (meat) and imagine giant skewers of all those things appearing at your plate faster than you can think, then click on “buffet” and check out our first course, and then of course dessert (sobremesas). Then (unless you are vegetarian), immediately go book a flight to Salvador.

And then today … I went to Cachoeira, a colonial town about two hours outside of Salvador. Our tour guide was fabulous and went into a ton of detail about the Brazilian economy (and wealth distribution) and politics and land reform. On our way there, we stopped first at a rural market and then at farm that is part of the MST movement (http://www.mstbrazil.org/). In Brazil, they have squatter’s rights. People can come stake out a piece of unused private land. Landowners can contest and can sue but, if they don’t, after a certain period of time it becomes legal for the squatters to own the land. From the MST website:

Since 1985, the MST has peacefully occupied unused land where they have established cooperative farms, constructed houses, schools for children and adults and clinics, promoted indigenous cultures and a healthy and sustainable environment and gender equality. The MST has won land titles for more than 350,000 families in 2,000 settlements as a result of MST actions, and 180,000 encamped families currently await government recognition. Land occupations are rooted in the Brazilian Constitution, which says land that remains unproductive should be used for a "larger social function."

As you might imagine, not all in Brazil agree with the MST position. The woman we met there makes chocolate on her land from her coco plants. We tasted the raw coco fruit (which tastes nothing like chocolate) and learned a bit about how she makes chocolate without any technological assistance. And, of course, we bought some.

Then, we continued on to Cachoeira, which is a beautiful, colorful, riverbank town. Cachoeira established itself by ousting the Portuguese and helping to establish an independent Brazil. We had a lovely lunch inside a converted convent (Pousada do Convento do Carmo) and then wandered around the town. I’ve uploaded a ton of pictures to the map above, here are just a few:

Cachoeira is home to one of Candomblé's strongest religious centers. I bought a painting of the 0rixás, which is the first official purchase that may be difficult to transport home. I’m sure there will be others …

Tomorrow is our last day in Salvador. I am off to finish the evening with ice cream on the pool deck. What a crazy life I lead ...