*** Note all pictures taken with the Casio Exilim z850***
Another trip from 2007, this time I explored the city of Rio de Janeiro on my own, I must have been one of the few people who wanted to visit the city after watching City of God (personal favorite movie of mine). The mission on this trip was to chill out on the famous beaches, eat some famous Brazilian barbecue and catch a Brazilian soccer match.
The picture below was the very first picture I took in Brazil, it is a picture of the favelas (Brazilian ghetto) that I saw while riding in the taxi on my way to the hostel. I got a hostel near Copacabana beach, about 4 streets up for about $17/night. The hostel name was the Stone of a Beach hostel and I recommend it if you want to travel on the cheap in Rio.
The next day I went to the Christ the Redeemer statue, one of the famous landmarks of Rio. The statue is situated atop the highest mountain that is just behind/overlooking the city. You get fantastic views of the city and its two famous beaches – Copacabana and Ipanema. Rio is unlike any other city, it is right along the beach like Miami but surrounded by jungles and mountains. From the view at Christ the Redeemer it almost looks like the buildings themselves are part of the forest, growing up from the ground. Across from the beach is Sugarloaf Mountain, probably most well known to James Bond fans for the climactic battle between Bond and Jaws on top of the cable car.
On the way down from the statue we went trough the Santa Theresa neighborhood, it is an interesting mix of some of the most expensive houses and some of the poorest neighborhoods side by side. In Rio the majority of rich people live in the lowlands close to the beach, the hills are reserved for the favela shanty towns, strangely enough the poorest people have the best views in this city. Santa Theresa is one exception, the richest person in Brazil (a TV mogul) has his mansion in this hillside neighborhood, right next to some of the favelas. I noticed a lot of graffiti that looked pretty interesting as well. I’m personally interested in street art and one of my favorite graffiti artists is Os Gemeos, two twins that paint together. I was curious if any of the graffiti I had seen was their work and decided to make a stop when I had some free time to check out the art some more.
The hostel had organized a trip out to watch a soccer game at Maracana stadium, which happens to be one of the largest soccer stadiums in the world. At the time I was visiting the Brazilians were having a tournament to determine which of their many national teams would represent the country in the Pan-American games. The game that night was between two local teams from Rio and was the quarter or semi finals. Of course watching a game of Brazilian soccer was something that I couldn’t turn down. The hostel had a great set of locals who helped out with all the trips and travels, the person I was with helped us scalp ticket and told us what street food was safe to eat.
The game itself was amazing it was a high scoring affair that ended up going into overtime and requiring a penalty shoot out. Better then the game was the crowd, actually it was kinda crazy. The crowd brought Roman candles and bottle rockets and were lighting up in the stands. It looked like half the stadium was going to burn down in a inferno, imagine seeing something like that at Gillette Stadium or Fenway!
I made a trip out to see Sugar Loaf Mountain, this would give me the view of the city and Christ the Redeemer (the other panoramic shot of the city). The cable car to Sugarloaf Mountain is at Botafogo, basically the tip of the coastline, its a huge tourist attraction and there are lines to go up pretty much any day of the week. There are actually two separate cable cars to get up to the top of the mountain, the first one gets you halfway and then you ride another to get up to the summit. The views of the city are spectacular, especially at sunset and night when the lights are out.
As I mentioned before, I wanted to take some time to walk around St Theresa and takemore pictures of the grafitti that I found. The primary crew that operates in the area is called Santa Crew, they pretty much own the neighborhood and they have done some great murals. The other grafitti artists, Os Gemeos, didn’t have any work to be found in Santa Theresa, though some of the murals did have their style, as it turns out Os Gemeos primarily operates out of Sao Palo.
This was taken in St Therea as well, as you can see construction of the favelas is alive and well despite it being illegal. Supposedly the favelas have the greatest concentration of general contractors anywhere in the world, all construction, plumbing and electricity is handled by the people. Most utilities are siphoned off the main grid and thus never actually paid for. Despite regulation against construction the government does nothing to stop it, there is an implicit understanding by the wealthier classes that they need favelas – after all where do the servants, maids, janitors etc live if they were bulldozed over?
