The wall less travelled

Here, Brazil nuts are just nuts and street drinking is just drinking. Lapa is the nearby nightlife area, and I walked there one night with some new friends from Organic House Hostel, including the manager, Omar. We bought large capriosas and moved from place to place in a disorganised group of 9, though most drinking was between venues.

The next day I needed to move hostels, but that proved easy with one around the corner. I had considered elsewhere in Rio, but now I was familiar with the buses and subway trains, so Catete made a good base.

At the new hostel I made some enquiries as to where I could watch the live UFC event that night at 1am. It seemed Lapa was the closest place and some Brazilians from the new hostel were keen to come with me. My plan then was to get a meal and rest beforehand, as I had around 20 scheduled hours of activity the next day.

While finishing dinner at a corner shop, a grinning Philipe from my new accommodation came to join me. He ordered a beer and I did also as we talked in broken English. He seemed excited by the UFC and that I was from Australia. A couple of his friends came to join us and I excused myself when I finished my drink to head back to base. He told the owner he'd pay my bill as he ordered more beers and I didn't have the Portuguese to argue otherwise. I left a little unsure if this was a generosity to appreciate or a 'no free lunch' deal. Back at my dorm I discovered that a tall, leggy Brazilian girl was to be in the bunk above mine. Things could be worse.

An hour or so later, the group to head into Lapa was ready. There were 8 of us, including the model for mini shorts. Most were just planning a night out. Philipe was getting transformatively drunk and leaning on everyone he talked to. I suspected a "here we go again" vibe from his two friends and by the time we got to Lapa they were fine to leave the drunken extrovert with me and head to the nightclubs. I was unable to convince Philipe that leaving me alone is not a tragedy as I took up a position in front of a screen showing the event that had already begun.



There was a crowd of keen UFC viewers including me, and then there was the intoxicated liability next to me, reaching out for girls as they passed. Style-points were not awarded.

He was excited to have an Australian "friend" but was treating the situation like an unsupervised toddler with a pet koala. He wanted to reenact some moves he saw onscreen and when he grabbed the back of my neck I put him in a wristlock and explained that that shit wasn't going to fly. In hindsight, I missed an opportune moment to use a Portuguese line I'd learned "Vai se foder" (go fuck yourself). Instead I just made sure I communicated with the universal language of pain. Transmission received.

A little after that he disappeared for a bit to piss/spew and/or get another drink, but like a nasty rash he came back. At least now he either understood that I was going to watch the main event without further pestering or he had to devote more attention to holding himself up with environmental assistance. When the fight ended, I turned to see him on the other side of the busy road, sitting on a kerb with his head between his knees and looking a bit wobbly.

My first thought was that this would make an easy exit, but then I reconsidered knowing that this was the type of area with street prostitutes and hungry homeless just a few blocks away. He wasn't an enemy, just a dick that tried too hard to buy friends.

I went over and told him he needed food, "agua" and to togetherize his shit. I then made my way back to the hostel as he planned to find the others.

Lightly sleeping with one eye half open I noticed that a grinning Philipe entered the room. I was in somewhat disbelief (say, a bleary-eyed 5am version of disbelief) at this guy's pathalogical persistence as he jumped in the bunk above. He had somehow organised to change dorms and swap beds with Hottie Legsalot. Stalker alert!

Around 8am, I woke and steathily got my gear ready for a climb of Sugarloaf Mountain. This was with Omar and a handful of others from the previous hostel. The presence of a big rope indicated that this was going to be a literal climb away from the general public method of steps and cable car.



This was definitely a highlight of Rio for me and the view from such a high vantage point on the ocean just kept getting better.



Mini monkeys shared the mountain. We caught the cable car back down.



That took most of the day and we stopped for a meal on the way back. I had time for a quick shower back at the hostel ("don't be there, don't be there, don't be there, yes!") before navigating the 90 minute bus ride to Cidade de Rock.

My arrival at Rock in Rio 2013's last day was in time for Slayer. I was very far from the stage and there wasn't much of a way to advance through the chanting horde, but I knew there would be opportunities when the chaos began.

After a wait the stage lights changed and Slayer's intro was heard. Go!

I made good progress forwards. Then I started making great progress forwards and realised it wasn't all my own doing. I was in a rip tide 20 people wide that swarmed to the front.

This was improving my position but there wasn't much say I had in the matter. Like waves smashing on rocks we compressed as far as we could. Any movement now was up to the flow of the tide. In random directions the crowd surged - torsos first, then legs catching up. I recalled, "that's right - people do die at these things". It would have been a mass trampling, if only there was a space to fall down. Any gaps to trip into were likely death traps. The temperature shot up significantly from crushed human friction. I acknowledged that the situation required full attention to survival and none to the stage. Not ideal. But I was a veteran of this - surely others must be suffering more than me. It was then I noticed the first unconscious bodies being passed overhead to the front barricade. Some people near me started freaking out, shouting something I probably wouldn't understand if I could hear. It was time for a tactical retreat. I was 10 squished humans from the front and there was a tighly packed wall of literal thousands behind me. This was going to be tricky.

At first I just followed a convoy of meat grinder refugees that were snaking their way back to a safer area. That was going well until - shit! - another rip tide of fresh recruits caught me up in their charge. I lost valuable metres of escape before I could swim to the side. The convoy was scattered.

It was time to improvise. I slipped through what gaps I could and then when the wall was about to push me back I created an angle on a forward shoulder and rotisserized. It worked better than expected as I not only swapped positions but created some momentum to my exit. I also caught a ride in several mosh circles (NASA scientists would call this a 'gravitational assist maneuver' when launching space probes). It took some time, but I found my way to the front of the mixing desk. An excellent spot. From here I enjoyed the rest of the set.

Iron Maiden were the headline and they delivered an inspired show. Brazilians are mental for Maiden, but that Slayer crowd was something else.



My last day in Rio, I visited Ipanema with a Norwegian musician and another guy from "Meh-he-co". The weather threatened a thunderstorm and just as we arrived a dolphin beached itself. If it took any joy from being tagged on facebook, then that would have been well catered for by the number of people who's prime response was to stick a smart phone in its face. A few seemed to know what they were doing and around 25 min later it was rushed away by some official-looking people.

At 3.30am this morning I left my hostel to the airport. The taxi passed an organised soccer game with uniformed teams, which was interesting to see at that hour. I've now flown across the continent to Lima airport while I wait for my 10pm flight back inland to Bolivia. It's time to switch languages again and test my Spanish skills. I finally get to say...

Hasta la vista.

How wet can a passport get

If there is some universal law of balance, then the awe of natural wonders is offset by hordes of tourists that visit them.

Iguassu Falls is a network of waterfalls in a 3km wide arc on the border of Brazil and Argentina. That = Big. Although Niagra gets more press, it's like the difference between an Ewok and a Wookie.



While walking the path along its edge, the thundering roar of water is constant. The closer you get, the wetter. While taking measures to keep my phone dry, I seemed to forget that other items in my pockets were made of paper. The walkway ends with an optional platform that spans out over the "Devil's Mouth" where a perpetual mist makes it more of an experience than a photo op. Very impressive, although complete saturation and cold conditions enforced an appreciation time limit.



I visited a bird sanctuary where I enjoyed the exclusive privelage of being swooped by toucans and macaws. Luckily they didn't have the kamikaze attitude of magpies nor the bombing payload of tartare-filled seaguls. Perhaps my recent neglect of shaving makes my bald head look like a nest.



Tomorrow morning I'll explore the falls some more if the rain subsides, and then midday I fly to the warmer climate of Rio.

A familiar chaos

After a 10hr delay at Buenos Aires airport, I arrived at my first intended destination - Sao Paulo, Brazil. I was picked up by Cian (an accomplice from Hypercenter infamy) who drove me thru hectic traffic where more than one driver seemed to be in a playstation simulation. Along the way he filled me in on the latest crime trends. Some of the methods were cunningly ingenious and most were backed by the threat of new bodily holes. We passed some decrepid slums, including houses made from trash to a nicer part of town where he lived with his family. This is where I'd be staying for the next few days. Each house is fronted by a big fuck-off gate and neighbourhood watch is a paid off vigilante.



Jetlag only had little teeth, so we caught a train downtown were I got to sharpen some neglected Portuguese (under supervision). Now it would seem from the previously informed paranoia, that we'd be less likely candidates for Darwinism, but not so. While looking for a bar which was a murder scene from 2 days ago (maybe I did have jetlag) we found ourselves climbing stationary esculators in a building where we were the only gringos among a staring black neighbourhood. More than one store here had a sign with "Niggaz" in big print, but the mood wasn't right to pull out my phone camera. At a mutual point of realisation, our conversation stopped (the conversations of others had already stopped) and we hastily backtracked to daylight.

My time at Cian's was useful for learning the language from his daughter who used effective teaching techniques such repetition and emotional engagement. She later told me that i was her best amigo.

From Cian I was keen to gain some insight into his manic productivity in writing several books since the start of the year. The best I can summarise is that on the shoulders of a father's heightened protective instincts sat aggressive misanthropia.

Brazilian bbq is delicious.



It was good to walk the 3 dogs around the streets and we even found some grasslands where they could run free until a local urgently advised that it was infested with poisonous snakes.

I have now flown to Iguassu where I'm about to check out the falls.