Channelling the Cane Spirits

Sunday 09.09.07

My friends Pedro and Diego picked me up in Pedro's huge pickup truck to go wakeboarding on the Rio Paraguay. Asunción lies on the western border of Paraguay and soon we were speeding off in Pedro's boat to a quiet reach of the river winding lazily between an island and the Argentinean shore. A smooth patch of water with barely a ripple in sight stretched a couple of kilometres between deep reed beds, overlooked by a few scattered hovels perched perilously close to the crumbling embankment. Wakeboarding is to waterskiiing what snowboarding is to skiing, and aside from being infinitely more stylish than its companion sport, a skilled boarder has the opportunity to do jumps off the speedboat wake. My first attempts contained both pain and disappointment - while the boat began to speed off and the board still underwater, my arms attempted to separate themselves from their moorings in my shoulders; naturally a painful experience.

Eventually I got the hang of it, and was soon skimming along the water in a haphazard way behind the boat. What we novices soon discovered, was that wakeboarding accidents tend to happen so fast, one scarcely has a chance to realise what is going on, and by then it is far too late anyway. On one particularly notable crash i managed to point my board in a perpendicular direction to where it was supposed to be, and flipped rather rapidly onto my face and hands. With the wind in our faces on a hot day, with refreshingly cool water to swim in and free food from Pedro's restaurant, it is no wonder that we all had a blast. My body was beginning to protest while we were still on the water, and slowly the muscle soreness increased until by nightfall I felt like I was dragging around several sides of meat attached by fish hooks to my bones.

Naturally the soreness hadn't subsided by morning, and in fact through the pain i discovered several group of muscles i never even knew existed. After school was thankfully over, i checked myself in for a Shiatsu massage. There is something incredibly decadent about getting a full body massage, lying there while someone you don't really know rubs your limbs, extremities, body and head. There is a place your consciousness seems to go in these moments, it drifts off into a realm of introspection, as if spring cleaning. Waves of sensation roll through, and complicated mental matters are swept away and fragmented into solvable pieces.

Tuesday I armed myself with my camera, a bag of sweets and a Guaraní phrase: Ikatupa anohẽ foto peẽme, and i set off to Plaza Uruguay to ask permission to photograph the indigenous people. Their lives at the moment are unbelievably wretched - living in a park in the middle of a noisy city, uneducated, unemployed and justice undone. I was astounded at the amount of children running around the place, and whilst sipping Tereré again in the park with locals, i learned it is normal for a woman in rural Paraguay, both indigenous and mezcla (mixed) alike to have ten or more children.

Tuesday 19.06.07

After a leisurely swim on a blustery day at Ipanema, me and an Englishman (apparently an ex-Manchester City player), went to watch a five-a-side beach futebol match. The skill of the players was mind-blowing, the players dancing across the sand, bouncing the ball on their heads or feet as they dodged their opposition. Soon, we were offered a game, played to best of three goals, and with the two of us, and three skillful brasilians on our side, we took the field. Never have I felt so unfit, at times knee deep in sand, breathless whilst being deftly side-stepped by my counterparts. Despite this, I scored a goal and we won 3-0!

Wednesday and Thursday ran off singing La Bamba somewhere between the beach and an empty plastic cup formerly containing Cuba Libre, which left Friday to explain my whereabouts:

We were picked up at 7.30am for a tour to the Costa Verde, in the west of the state of Rio de Janeiro. After an hour or so, the road was meandering around a coast littered with islands, but the vistas of beauty around every corner had been invaded by characterless towns, industrial harbours, oil tankers, and small patches of water carrying unclean-looking slicks, froth and rubbish with the tide.

Sailing off in an elegant boat, able to hold 60 people or more, we passed numerous stately dwellings, some only accessible by boat and perched on the water amongst trees with their own private beaches or piers. Our first stop was Angra dos Reis, a town that has all the charm of a pack ox, thanks to the two oil rigs parked out the front in various stages of construction. Like the lumbering ox though, this town pulls its weight as an important centre of the oil extraction business that has taken over the area. Closer in, we came to rest amongst fishing boats, whilst people boarded, and herons and vultures alike scanned the harbour for signs of food. The town, climbing the hills behind, was a mess of concrete and brick, homes of industry workers, painted painfully brightly in some instances. Here in Angra lies the essence of the Costa Verde - fishing and oil. These two industries are locked in a tumultuous symbiotic relationship, pushing each other to destruction amidst violence and broken promises to their surrounds, all in the name of Ordem e Progresso (Brasil's motto).

We lay anchor at a tiny islet named Ilha Botanica, surrounded by beautiful water and sandy beach to have a swim, and apart from distant oil rigs in sight, it was easy to imagine a little slice of paradise here. Little islands such as this were dotted everywhere, formed volcanically like the mountains of most of the state, and gorgeous coves abounded, but signs of progress in the region were never far away. After seafood for lunch, we headed to our last stop, Ilha Grande. 'Great Island' is a popular tourist spot, as well as a weekend getaway for locals. Once again, the beach was set in a beautiful cove, with an old white church overlooking the scene.

Back in the city, I joined a group of wealthy Cariocas to visit a beautiful bar, Estrela de Lapa. It was without doubt the nicest bar i have visited so far in the city, with a fine selection of Cachaça including my favourite, Sagatiba. It was in celebration of a special event, the June festival, which was marked with a 9-piece samba band playing traditional songs and dances, some of which reminded me of a cross between a polka and the Hokey Pokey. Dancing and laughing until close, we left to enjoy 24-hour pizza in Ipanema before heading home.