Rio de Janeiro: For reasons of security
Part 1/2: When visiting a much-hyped city, preconceived expectations can sometimes fall short of reality, as was my case in Rio.
Peter Allen and Barry Manilow have a lot to answer for. Copacabana Beach, for all its glitzy and glamorous reputation, is not what it’s cracked up to be. Such fame and popularity naturally brings crowds, which you expect to some degree. They can even add to the allure and general vibe of a place: piles of persistent litter do not.
Ugly high rise hotels line the long curved beach, and the tepid warm water is not that clean, nor is the sand. Crass commercialisation abounds. You can’t blame people from trying to make a buck. I get that. But the experience feels unauthentic, whatever my original expectations were. Maybe it’s me? However, I was not prepared for the heavily armed tourist police that patrol the beach, ‘for reasons of security’.
A day at the beach
I sampled the ubiquitous ‘coco’ mocktail dispensed with great fanfare from multiple kiosks scattered along the beach promenade. The young man behind the bar took a green coconut and held it upright in the palm of his hand and with a sharp, shiny machete, lashed down at the top and sliced off a section. This was repeated from a different angle, taking another wedge off the top to make an opening, through which some ice cubes and a straw were inserted. Dexterous, yes, but not delicious.
After that, I stuck to caipirinhas (mashed limes, sugar syrup and cane liquor, shaken over ice). Extremely refreshing in the heat. Dangerously so because they’re easily consumed. More than four can have your head in a spin, which is why it’s wise to have some acaraje (spicy prawn croquettes) as well, ‘for reasons of sobriety’.
Back from the beach, the city is extraordinary. The sheer physicality of its topography, with its high-density living, its frantic noise, its mega energy, its kamikaze bus drivers, its smouldering heat, its tropical downpours, its blizzardly cold beers, its poseurs and pretenders constantly parading along promenades, all make it feel like you’re living in a permanent fast lane with no drop-off zone in sight.
Everyone wears Havaianas, probably for reasons of national prosperity or identity.
A day in the favelas
In the favela slums, the drug barons and their armies keep the peace (and everything else) because the police rarely venture there, unless a gang war breaks out, which is usually for control of territory. Cocaine (powder and crack) plus marijuana are the main drugs of trade: apparently opiates have not made much of an inroad.
The drug boss of the largest slum (120,000 plus residents) has a nickname that translates from the Portuguese to ‘baby’ in English; this according to Simone, the guide of the excellent favela tour I took. Apparently ‘Baby’ moves house every week or so, ‘for reasons of security’.
A day at the football
In this football obsessed nation, I naturally had to see a game. Rio’s Maracana soccer stadium holds 100,000 plus. The week of my visit coincided with two arch rival teams in the local state league facing off. The game was played in scorching temperatures.
Rival fans where kept apart by polizia with batons the size of baseball bats. (These were different police to the ones on the beach beat.) You had to lift up your shirt at the security check point on entering to ensure you weren’t carrying firearms or other weapons.
Many males (and some females) took their shirt off to facilitate this inspection, and left it off. This had horrendous consequences on the train trip back to the city after the game as we squeezed into the metro, hands clinging to overhead rails, armpit to armpit.
During the game, fans with drums and horns and trumpets and trombones made more noise than a symphony orchestra, and sounded much better. Thankfully, the section of fans I ended up in (the largest of the warring teams) was the victor on the day (3-0). This somehow made me feel less anxious; you know, ‘safety in numbers’ and all that.
And that’s the thing. I’m travelling solo. Warnings everywhere (in research before departing; at the airport on arrival; from the hotel reception on checking in) point to the prolific crime rate. So there’s this constant, nagging angst about personal security when out and about, as in this constant strategising, which can become exhausting.
A day at the races
The jockey club races 4 days a week (entrance is free, seriously) with about 8-10 races each day. I went, and I only lost about $50, and that’s OK. Spent about $100 on expenses though, mainly on rehydrating refreshments because it was about 35 degrees well into the night and there was still 2 or 3 races to go. I didn’t stay to the end because I wasn’t sure when the last bus from the jockey club back to Copacabana was, and I may not have had enough money for a taxi.
There was a tiny crowd, which was 95% white , 99% male, plus one gringo who looked decidedly out of place wandering around carrying a camera. I did notice crowd numbers slowly going up as the temperature came down. I was encouraged to attend after the hotel concierge gave me 2 tips during a casual conversation. He sounded knowledgeable. The first tip ran last and his second tip was, “don’t even think about walking back to the hotel at night”, for reasons of security.
Part 2 of 2 coming soon.