Channelling the Cane Spirits

Friday 01.06.07

After a fairly non-eventful week, i was ready for shenanigans on the weekend. The shenanigans started a bit earlier than expected, though they were confined to our sister hostel, less than half a kilometre away. The place was invaded by a few pistol-waving bandits in broad daylight who separated all the people downstairs from their belongings, stole the computers and emptied the till. Luckily no-one was hurt, and although it is less likely the same will happen here because of our more conspicuous location, one can never tell.

Parking a car is an adventure in Copacabana. Either drive straight across the mosaic footpath, taking care not to make pedestrian pancakes, through an innocuous looking metal gate complete with flashing orange lights into one of thousands of underground multi-level car parks, or park at your own risk on one of the overcrowded one-way streets. Parking attendants will soon wave you into an empty spot on the street, and if there is not enough room, they'll push a car out of the way for you. Now this kind of behaviour may leave your car with less personal space than an anchovy, so when driving off, simply batter the other cars out of the way with yours until you are free! Also feel free to run any red lights on the way home, everyone else does it....

We finally left the hostel post-midnight for the nightclub district, Lapa. When our taxi pulled up, there were young people all over the place. Its was as if Pelé had been conducting a football demonstration earlier, and the crowd hadn't been told to go home. Through the throng weaved numerous vendors, most notable among them were the guys selling tequila shots (complete with lemon & salt) and kids using the wounded puppy dog technique for selling gum. Also for sale were the ubiquitous Rio kebab skewers and 50-50 ginger / Cachaça mixes, sold by the plastic cupfull. Drinking one felt like a Molotov Cocktail was being thrown down my oesophagus by a member of the Finnish Resistance. We finally settled on a salsa club, where we let our hips do the talking (slurring) for the next few hours.

The best soda in Brasil is Guaraná Antarctica. To me, it tastes like a cross between 'V' (an energy drink) and lemonade, and costs the same as a regular soft drink. Fresh juices can be bought everywhere, from all the usual fruits, plus sugar cane and Açai which contains, amongst other nutritional benefits, high amounts of dietary fibre and essential fatty acids. Cachaça, the most popular spirit in Brasil is made from distilling fermented sugar cane juice and is the main ingredient in the famous Caipirinha cocktail.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acai