This Week in Bahia

Inside Villa Matos

2012-01-21T00:39:00.000-02:00

That's some good surfing!

2011-10-20T16:48:00.000-02:00

It was hot, muggy and becoming unbearably mosquitoy. For at least
three days they promised us rain and thunderstorms. It just stayed
hot. Then in less than three hours the rain blew in and the
temperature dropped 10 degrees on the tail of 45km winds. Today
brought us some great surfing conditions if you wanted too brave the
cold (cold being a relative term). I saw no less than five umbrellas
flip inside out in the last 30 minutes on the road and countless
others mangled and abandoned on the sidewalks and in the gutters. In
the USA you get Indian summer. In Bahia you get Indian winter.

Proteste já

2011-10-17T18:40:00.000-02:00

In the news there has been an awful lot in the news lately about
corruption in politics of Brasil. Corruption is nothing new here and
is so widespread and common that people have seemingly fallen into a
kind of complacency about it - like it's going to happen anyway, can't
stop it, so why bother waisting my time being bothered by it? One
politician in particular even made a comment recently that they needed
to sweep out the corrupt that resulted in hundreds of brooms being
placed upended in the ground on front of the famous domino
congressional buildings in Brasilia (many of these unguarded brooms
were soon stolen by those needing brooms - which did not surprise me
at all) in response. On Children's Day, also a Catholic holiday of
some kind so many people were conveniently off work, a parade/protest
of sorts was held here in Bahia. To my memory, this is the first
protest of this kind I have seen and in a city that can completely
fill the streets for Carnaval, it looked relatively small. Probably
many just went to the beach instead - I mean, what is the point of
walking around with signs when there is beer to drink and queijinho to
eat? No stress, Bahia!

What are you looking at?

2011-09-29T20:58:00.000-03:00

In a city surrounded by so much ocean, of course we have lifeguards.
Along the open ocean side of the city there are periodic life guard
towers the rather resemble the wooden log playground equipment being
built around the city in the plazas (João Enrique really likes to
build pracinhas). They are big enough to accommodate a couple of guys
but not nearly so that they can stay out of the sun except in the
middle of the day. The rest of the time they need to provide an
additional manner to get out of the intense UV. These two have hung a
banner along one side of the tower; the side that faces the ocean.
Luckily there does not seem to be anyone in the water at the moment,
so they are not missing anything. Stay sharp guys!

"Various Interventions"

2011-08-25T14:14:00.000-03:00

As we approach election times, many neglected city improvement
projects find new life. The upcoming world cup games (upcoming being
in a couple of years, which are more like weeks when you factor in how
quickly things move here and how much there still is to be done) have
added increasing pressure, enough even to get an actual train put on
the Metro track, though the track remains unfinished and the train
does no actually move. Signs begin to go up near elections - operation
"filling in holes" or operation "dredge the river" (both also
sometimes called operation "elect me".) It's a sign that shows you
that not all your tax dollars are going into the politicians' pockets
(some of them go to pay for large signs too).

This sign showed up near my house about a week ago. It ruffly
translates into "various interventions-your government working for
you." About a week later, another sign went up facing the other way
saying the same thing. What these "interventions" might be remains
vague. Perhaps the sign is the intervention in and of itself.

Sunny seas... Missing beer

2011-08-19T16:10:00.001-03:00

For those familiar with Bahia and our lovely beaches, this is old
news, but in the time table of this blog, it has yet to be addressed.

I take a lot of pride in the fact that you can go to the beach here
fully clothed and acquire everything you need on site - biquini,
sandals, sunscreen, canga, food and beer - to have a fine day at the
beach. We had barracas that served a whole fried fish, steamed clams,
fried aipim and cold beer and coconuts. It was always a good time.

The the barracas were bulldozed to be replaced by more uniform and
structurally sound buildings with bathrooms and proper sewage and
electricity. This was progress? It would seem. Half way through the
project construction was stopped and those who ran the barracas just
found their own jeitinho to fill in the structure where the city
government had stopped.

And then, for environmental reasons, all the barracas were bulldozed
again and completely removed. Now there is a lack of full sustenance -
no fish or fries to be had. It's a sad state for many of us. You
should now bring your own food to the ocean excursion lest you faint
from hunger. There is also less security and less vendors walking
around. I have to make sure I take sunblock with me because it may not
waltz by. But now the drive along the Orla sure is pretty.

Red River at night

2011-08-18T12:40:00.000-03:00

Rio Vermelho has quite a bit to do at night. Numerous bars dot the
area closest to the Orla and there is the burracharia for after hours.
It is also
privilege to some of the worst traffic jams in the city at nearly all
hours of the day and the least amount of official parking areas. I
love it here, personally. But then again I never have to drive or
park.

2011-08-15T15:44:00.001-03:00

Mmmm, sound appetizing? I'd like some squid vinegar, wouldn't you?
Despite having a plethora of English teachers in the area, it seems
Google translator is an easier choice when it comes to placards in
nicer restaurants here in Salvador. The regular restaurants don't even
bother with English - if you want to know what you're eating, bring a
translator.

Building invasion

2011-08-14T14:52:00.001-03:00

Here sits the last house that I believe actually functions as a house
and not a business of some kind. It is surrounded on all sides by high
rises built in the last 15 years. Much of Salvador has been under
construction in the last year, apartments going up all over the city,
especially in the green spaces on the coast and the Paralela. This
lone house sports the extra security features of razor wire and bars
on the windows. How long until it becomes like it's neighbors?

Rainbow

2010-08-31T18:51:00.000-03:00

More water in the street

2010-05-23T21:35:00.000-03:00

After all that rain, seems we missed the rivers in the street. No matter. Seems the water pipe outside my neighbor's house broke, again. This happened about a year after I moved here and was fixed after a time, but for nearly a year after still looked like a construction site, with the sidewalk tiles piled to one side and an open sandy pit in the middle. This time around resulted in gallons and gallons of water, just pouring into the street. Visualize draining an Olympic swimming pool with a hose the diameter of your head. The problem should be easy to fix, after all the pipes are only a few feet below the surface of the ground, but call after call to Embasa, the water company, got no answer - it was a Friday afternoon when it began to pour out water, after all.

So Sunday afternoon, finally, after two days of who knows how much clean water is running down the street into the ~~open sewer~~ storm drain at the end of the road, some guys with a small bulldozer and a dump truck came out to dig a big hole and stop the flow. This process took the better part of an afternoon, during which for some of the time, the workers just sat on the curb with their bare feet in the running water as it went down the gutter. All that is left behind now is the pile of sidewalk squares, a lot of dirt, and a roughly covered hole. Lets see how many months the pile of tiles will remain untouched. Doesn't matter I guess, after all, we all prefer to walk in the street.

Some local photos

2010-04-15T20:15:00.000-03:00

None taken by me, but quite telling. This is this week, and last week, in Bahia.

United Nations getting wet

2010-04-15T14:10:00.001-03:00

Not that you can tell much from this picture through a rainy window, on a rainy day, where traffic and flooding is sucking so bad that the city is nearly shut down, but there is a UN conference going on here right now. According to this site, it is the United Nations Congress on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice. If my suspicions are right, all these poor people are meeting in tents and inside the building with the loudes tin roof ever in the rain, and are getting water logged walking between their probable hotel (Holiday Inn, the only one in Salvador, across the street) and the convention center. Last week a huge display of holey lycra was strung up in front, covering the bottom half of this very large building and I wondered why. Now I think it might be an attempt to decorate for the conference in the traditional manner we do here (minus the tons of balloons), but the quantity of fabric and the hieght of the building were so great that no one bothered to really do the job. The result is a very peculiar spectacle, visible all the way down to the ocean front.

April showers 2010

2010-04-10T10:04:00.000-03:00

About a year ago, I put up a post about the horrible rain and flooding and what not. Apparently this will now be a yearly or perhaps monthly post. The rain is back. It's already caused hundreds of deaths down south. And it's come to call in Bahia again (although from what I was told yesterday, the news casters are now saying these last three days of rain is just the cold front coming in and are not even dumping what was predicted, YET). There are parts of the city that have been without power since the rain started on Wednesday and are still, as far as I can tell. It's kind of the talk of the town. (fellow Bahia blogger)

So far it's not nearly as bad as it was last year, where the end of my road disappeared, the wall at the French school down the street collapsed, and the sewer over flowed all over the street. At least, not yet.

There is also the new characteristic of frequent lightning and thunder, not usually a staple of storms here in Bahia. You have to admit, the clouds coming in over the ocean are pretty scary looking.

Not a scarecrow

2010-04-03T18:03:00.000-03:00

At the risk of republishing a photo (as you can see it is from 2006) that you have already seen, meet Judas. Part of the Easter tradition here is to blow up the biblical betrayer of Jesus. You can see these cute little guys for sale at the side of the road, full of fireworks (have you noticed that our holidays almost always include some fireworks?). You have a big Easter party with your extended family, read a poem about what Judas leaves each person (he only leaves unpleasant things and is definitely written to evoke a laugh or two), and then light that sucker on fire. It's kind of gruesome on many levels, not the least of which is the risk he will explode on someone and blow off a few fingers. As I'm pretty sure I wrote a post about this somewhere several years ago and I have several other things on my list today, I won't go into too much detail. This isn't your fuzzy bunny Easter down here - we don't look for baskets with chocolate bunnies, wear pretty spring dresses, or have quiet family dinners; we give our kids a large chocolate egg (no searching involved), let them eat it and a bunch of other crap, run around like while animals, and then blow up a biblical figure made of fireworks. At least it's a good time.

While we're waiting for Carnaval Pics...

2010-03-08T21:16:00.002-03:00

A friend just sent me a link to this. Prepare to be grossed out. Yes folks, this is Carnaval.

2010-02-12T17:45:00.001-03:00

Carnaval is coming. I'm sure I don't need to explain what it is - even those who are newbies to Brasilian culture know about Carnaval. Part of the big deal here in Bahia is to go out with the Blocos or to watch the Trioelectricos go by from a Camarote. I generally don't go to either of these options; I am a pipoca girl. This year, however, I was gifted the key to enter the "exclusive" club. In order to get behind the ropes or gates of these choice places, you have to pay for it and wear the proper attire. Enter the abadá.

As far as I can tell, these things are generally made of the hottest, most uncomfortable fabric that exists, perhaps in order to put most of the R$200-R$2000 you put into acquiring one into the pockets of those who run the establishment. Often they come as a one-size-fits-all gigantic sleeveless sack like object, with holes cut somewhere for your arms, and another hole somewhere for your neck, sometimes with actual finished hems, sometimes something just sort of "hem like." They are ugly. And usually big. Any why not, as you will probably only wear it just this one day because of the amount of sweat, pee and other disgusting substances you will get all over it when you go out in to the biggest street party ever. Disposable clothing!

A big temporary business here is revamping these one-time-wear shirts into something one might actually want to put on your body (ignoring the kind of fabric it is, of course). I have no idea what the current going rate is, but I suspect it is around R$15-R$20 a shirt, depending on embellishments and what not. There are rules you have to follow to do it, I guess - some things cannot be removed or changed at all. Each bloco or camarote may have different levels of abadás that allow you to do different things, with distinguishing characteristics and colors for each day and level. Maids, nannies, and anyone who has a sewing machine at home may try to make some extra cash pre-Carnaval by "reformando abadás." Signs pop up all over the city with phone numbers offering this service.

Just for fun this year, I decided to try a few myself. They came out pretty cute in my opinion.

And if you're headed to Campo Grande on Tuesday, be sure to look for me on the top of the Trio;)

Lavagem do Bomfim

2010-01-14T11:11:00.003-03:00

Want to walk 10 KMs in the hot sun? Drink lots of beer and pee on the street? Nope, I'm not talking about Carnaval, our most popular event for drinking lots of beer in the hot sun and peeing in the street, I'm talking about Lavagem do Bomfim. Each year a group of Bahianas sets out way down by Mercado Modelo and walks the distance on the streets to the Church of Bomfim to wash the steps with lavender scented water, some assortment of flowers and plants and so on. This tradition, steeped in religious meaning and importance is a great excuse for a party (like anything here is) - so the streets are also populated with beer sellers, churrasco de gato (who knows what the mystery meat is) and some very specific things for the event like hats to keep the sun off, sunscreen and the famous Bomfim tapes. You walk the distance either to pay back for a miracle in your life, or to ask for one. Or just to drink. I did this walk myself about 3 years ago and didn't even feel the distance pass for all the beer. This year my husband went and brought me back a flower he found along the way.

Many happy returns!

What, I can't park here?

2010-01-03T09:52:00.004-03:00

Streets here are kind of created as a second thought for much of the developing sections of the city. Poor people don't own cars, so why make streets a usable width? I have gone down streets here that were only a few inches wider than our car and that turned at odd angles that a typical American would never think of driving up. There are streets that I fear trying to drive a car up, their angles are so steep (wouldn't want to walk up them either) and you have to use 1st gear to get up for the whole length. There is also one somewhere that I swear I will take a picture of someday that continues at a steeper and steeper angle down a hill and abruptly turns into stairs and goes down to a sidewalk below. It's not really a street per-say, but it gets used that way eventually as the area develops and the city sees it fit to pave it with asphalt to try to avoid the typical mudslide situations we get with our rainfall.

I spent 30 minutes in a car trying to move about 40 meters. I was lucky to not have waited more time than that as this was NOT during rush hour. Traffic would sit unmoving, then move up one car's worth, then sit again. The reason for the slow down was soon revealed -

That's a large truck loaded with cinder blocks. This is one of the typical streets that should run one lane in each direction - really only wide enough for one lane in one direction (but Brasilians are amazing at their ability to fit many cars in many directions in places most Americans wouldn't dare to try), not to mention that people park on both sides of the street, halfway onto side walks... or not - it typically slows and speeds up according to how people are driving, parking, and how many bars have put tables into the street for patrons. It is somewhere in Boca do Rio, much of which is a developed/ing lower middle class section of the city. Seems someone was going to build... something... with a lot of cinder blocks. So they hired a truck and the truck brought them and here they sit, parked, on the street, taking up more than half of it. No driver in sight. And it wasn't just one truck, there was another one behind it, also parked in the same fashion. And another. And finally, the real reason for the hold up.

The fourth truck, going the other direction, was trying to park. You can see just beyond, that bus, probably sitting there with no way to get out, just like we were. At least our lane wasn't blocked by 4 trucks loaded with cinder blocks. Our lane of traffic slowly moved on. Their lane, going the opposite direction, just sat and sat. Bumper to bumper. I wonder how long.

Nap

2009-11-01T21:22:00.004-03:00

I know, I'm overdue to post. I apologize profusely. I suspect it may happen again though, as it usually does, so...

It's not usual to see people just sprawled out on sidewalks in the city during the day. The homeless or poor pretend homeless generally have their "beat" they occupy and the traffic signals they prefer to frequent, sending their children to beg for change or anything really there is to offer. There is a gallera who hangs on at the traffic light on Paulo VI near my home who I walk by frequently, who all know me by now, and who generally don't bother me asking for things unless one of them is really hard up for something (the kids just ask regardless, it's in their nature) like juice for the baby or something along those lines. We have a generally amiable relationship, although I do not appreciate the amount of trash they leave on the corner where they hang out. Sometimes I walk by and they are all sprawled out on pieces of cardboard or old mattresses, sleeping at 4 in the afternoon. That is the best time of day to sleep, really. How many of us are just dead tired after lunch? Just find a comfortable and reasonably clean place to lay down, and close your eyes.

This guy found a way to do this which serves two purposes - make sure no one steals your wheel burrow while you sleep, and get off the ground!

At 4 in the afternoon, in the middle of a busy area, buses passing, people commuting, and here he naps and no one will bother him. Que vida boa, neh?

Death Metal in a biker gang club thingy

2009-09-02T21:28:00.004-03:00

A few weeks ago now, I went to a death metal concert with a friend here. Her BF plays in a band that was preforming and so I tagged along. This particular venue is the home of the Red Devils, soon to be Hells angels. Formerly they were known as the Red Pigs. In order to be promoted up this motorcycle royalty ladder, your gang has to do things to help the community and other good deeds. I was told that this particular gang is so helpful that they pay some poor local women to do a strip tease for them every Wednesday. That's some hearts of gold alright.

Having been to few other concerts here in Brasil, I have little to compare it to. Death metal isn't really my thing either. It sounds a little bit like the sound my car made when driving down a gravel road with my tailpipe hanging off.

One main comment I have to make though ---->

How tacky is it to wear your own band's T-shirt while performing? I mean, seriously.

signs of a democratic government

2009-05-22T13:46:00.004-03:00

A few weeks back I was sitting watching the news in the evening. Every once in a while, usually close to election times, the airwaves get taken over by political messages that last anywhere from 20 minutes to an hour long. Not like the typical 30 second spot in the USA, these things consist of set up interviews with people in the street, the talking head politician, "public service announcements" and any other typical political propaganda you can think of. When these things come on, there does not seem to be any way to escape them - they take over every channel (at least on the free antena fed stations, as I am too cheap/busy to pay for things like satellite here), as this video demonstrates. Right in the middle of the usual news casts, suddenly PPS took over with their message about how worried the public is about the government confiscating their savings from the bank to deal with the country's debt. It went on for half an hour on every channel, even MTV. Not what I wanted to watch, but I did learn a new word "Popança."

Yes, as I flip through the channels, you will notice there are only like 5 or 6 (I watch so little TV, I am not even sure). Still, the effect is nice, a little like brainwashing.

Rain showers don't bring mayflowers, they bring floods

2009-05-05T18:53:00.006-03:00

The rainy season has arrived fast and furious. Despite the fact that heavy rains plague us at least 3 months out of the year here, engineers cannot be troubled to deal with adequate drainage when designing roads and city spaces. Sometimes it seems they cannot even be troubled by trying to address traffic flow. Today it began raining heavily around 10 AM. A normal 5 minute drive took more than 2 hours. Some parts of the city were completely under water. Where I work people were out digging canals around the building to try to get the water directed somewhere other than inside the building.

Streets like this one, which are so numerous around the city, become waterfalls of rushing water carrying with it all manner of crap from the surrounding areas above. It all pools at the bottom, some low laying area, sometimes inside a parking area, or worse someone or several people's homes, and more often than not, also a busy street. People try to escape the rising waters, driving the wrong way down one way streets, coming head to head with motorists trying to go the opposite direction trying to do the same thing and bringing everyone to a complete stand still.

---------->@#$Q^@^#%&<-----------

Our mayor, or someone, declared a state of emergency (again) and advised everyone to stay home so as to not float away in their cars. Here I am at home, despite not having a car.

Drink this!

2009-04-20T14:51:00.004-03:00

Mmmm, aloe vera. Good for you.

English words are used the world over, just for something different, new, cool, novel. I have seen T-shirts in upscale stores here with words from a newspaper article about Dan Quayle (where'd they dig that up?), random slightly off phrases like "The noise is come to the your town," among others. Is this just another random case or did the makers of this drink really think this would make a great name?

The power of rain

2009-04-19T20:41:00.003-03:00

It rains often here, sometimes everyday during certain seasons. It is a fact of existence here that if you place something outside, it will probably get rained on, even if it's in a "covered" area. Knowing this, certain precautions should be taken when building, one would think. Like using certain types of paint, sealant, cement, what have you. I am not an expert in construction, but generally speaking it seems some people who are building things here are not either ( actually many people who work in construction here were probably never formally trained to do anything, but learn on the job).

Take my balcony wall, for example. A solid cement low wall. Then pained white. Then painted again. And again. And probably a few more times. And then the rain falls on the edge of the wall. And more rain falls. And more. And soon there is a small hole in the paint surrounded by a bubble that when tapped either squirts out 1) water, if it has been raining, or 2) cement dust, if it has not. Then more bubbles develop. Then a large sagging mound begins to form at the bottom as all the paint separates from the wall over a two month period. Finally, a whole section of solid paint falls off, pouring piles of cement dust all over the balcony to blow into our bedroom. The rest quickly follows with the help of the resident small child.

Who is responsible to fix it? Well, techincally the condo, as it is an outside portion of the building. We spent about 6 months with cement dust wall until we arranged someone to do it ourselves.

I gather this sort of thing is not entirely uncommon, considering I have seen buildings go up here that 6 months later have whole sections of tiles missing from the side where they just peeled away from the wall and fell to the ground below.

Rain, it's a powerful thing. And it's raining now. Again. As it has been for days.

Fresh Greens

2009-03-21T16:05:00.002-03:00

For sale on your local street corner. This cilantro is way better than what you get in the super market, usually fresher and more crisp and we won't even go in to the taste of the basil. Could be grown in someone's window box, or maybe in the community garbage dump area, so wash thoroughly.

It always rains during Carnaval

2009-02-22T18:30:00.002-03:00

Just the thing you need to cool off while dancing the afternoon and night away, a little shower. I got one last night, from what I remember of the evening.

Happy Carnaval!

Carnaval traffic

2009-02-21T09:32:00.004-03:00

The rush to pick up Abadás began earlier this week. Traffic had picked up and made passing through certain parts of the city near impossible in a timely manner because there are so many people trying to park anywhere and everywhere in order to pick up their cheap-really-hot-fabric brightly colored shirts that allow them access to the "safe side" of the ropes and walls that make up Carnaval blocos and camarotes.

One of these pick up points is Aero Club on the Orla, one of the main veins to get from anywhere to anywhere in the city. At all hours of the day, traffic is built up to a standstill while people park on the grass, sidewalks, and even on the street. Vendors with coolers line the edges of the road, waiting to sell beer and anything else you might want as early as 7 a.m.

There are way too many cars in this city.

Hiper knows what you need for Carnaval

2009-02-14T15:53:00.005-03:00

The first page of the Pharmacy section gives you a taste of what to "expect" for Carnaval. Some medicine for an upset stomach, some eye drops, oh, and these, you will probably be needing.

Not bad to pay for your safety this Carnaval season. I like the name of the brand too. And notice that some even have "heating lubricant." Just what we need! It's a good price to pay for your health, don't you think? Compared to the price of sunblock...

Now, you can see the value here - for your everyday person living on R$430 a month, obviously your sexual safety much more doable than avoiding skin cancer. Although that depends on how much sex you plan (or don't plan) to have during Carnaval. For some it may even out.

There is a term for people who were conceived around this time of year, mostly born in November - Novembrinhos. If your birthday falls in that month, we know what your parents were doing during Carnaval!

What to do in case of an Emergency

2009-02-08T15:32:00.003-03:00

In Bahia we often park just about anywhere that is available. It may or may not be legal and the likelyhood of parking in a no parking area is 99% dependent on if SETE (the traffic police) will come and find you there and give you a ticket. Apparently that risk is about zero in the Emergency lane. Hope no one has one. FYI - The number to call to get an ambulance here is 192.

Carnaval comes

2009-01-25T11:43:00.003-03:00

No one reading this site is probably a stranger to Carnaval - 5 days of drinking, music and insanity. Already there are signs of Carnaval to come, specifically the 22nd-24th of February, but in Bahia it starts the week or even the month before and may go for several days after. "Pre-Carnaval" "Post-Carnaval" - any excuse for a party here. Even at the local home building supplies center this weekend, we saw shredded paper all over the floor and they had a pair doing live samba music on a raised platform in front of the lighting display area. There are all kinds of pre-Carnaval sales going on, and the rush for Abadas (the shirts that allow you access to Camarotes or Blocos) is already on.

This is a Trio Electrico. A giant truck of speakers - the band rides on top, doing a live show for hours at a time in the hot sun. I don't envy those who ride up there, except that they probably have easier access to somewhere to pee than those of us in the "pipoca" do. I have never followed a Bloco or been in one. I usually hang out on the sides and just fight the crowds (called the "pipoca", or popcorn), but I don't knock those who want to pay the money to be inside those ropes. Peeing is important and not having somewhere to go when you really got to go (blame beer) can put a damper on your festivities.

Hot car!

2008-12-28T23:51:00.001-03:00

Caught driving in the Pituba area, rumor has it there are only 2 of these things in Salvador.

Do you know where your seafood comes from?

2008-12-14T16:01:00.004-03:00

This is a private lobster boat. The owner probably gets up and goes out at whatever hour is low tide to retrieve lobsters from the rocks. This particular day we caught him coming in at about 9 a.m., dragging his boat in with assistance, and then he allowed us to take some pictures of his catch that he keeps in an old plastic bag. He will walk around the beach attempting to sell them to whoever wants to buy, about R$7-R$10 or so apiece.

Lobster - tastey and fresh. And still moving.

R$4 gets you a buzz cut

2008-11-17T20:30:00.002-03:00

Need a hair cut? Shave? It's cheap!

Like many store fronts in the city, barbershops and nail salons can take on a hole in the wall appearance. It is, in fact, quite practical to just pull up the garage door in the morning, sweep all your trash into the street and scrub your floors with a broom and buckets of soapy water to clean at the end of the day because the liquid can just run out the door into the gutter. It's especially practical if you don't want to pay the high electric bill for A/C.

Now filming

2008-11-06T22:53:00.002-03:00

Shooting started this week on Trampolim Do Forte. Photos to come later. The director happens to be a friend of ours, but the movie is really a big deal. Check it out!

Update! A picture!

Election

2008-10-26T22:52:00.001-03:00

By the way, the results are in - João will continue to be our mayor. So much for the party in the Red Square.

A bug

2008-10-26T22:47:00.002-03:00

Living in the city, you don't see much variety in your insect life. Outside of cockroaches, ants, and fruit flies, there isn't much in the way of diversity. Once in a while I see a random butterfly that reminds me of a cabbage butterfly. This guy came in and spent a good 10 minutes sitting on my T.V. until he was almost squished by a small child. I don't know if he survived the tour of my house - may have been eaten by the cat.

Ojá - white strips of religious tolerance

2008-10-15T21:05:00.008-03:00

Anyone driving around Salvador may have noticed the plethora of pieces of white material tied to trees, lamp posts, and other tall objects. These are a sign of religious tolerance on the part of the Candomblé practitioners (? not sure, there may be a technical term for this, perhaps Markuza can correct me??) in response to a recent court decision. The story as I understand it is as follows - a woman named Mãe Gilda was persecuted by the Igreja Universal (IURD). Her picture was published in the paper with something to the effect of "these charlatan Macumbeiros do harm to your pocket and your life." The church was sued for defaming her and the ruling was made in favor of the Candomblé side. IURD actually had to pay out money to these people, which I have been told was unheard of up till now. In response to this decision, these Ojás have been tied up to show religious tolerance (and probably victory too). I feel I do a bad job of explaining it. There is more info here.

P E A C E

S H A L O M

P A Z

Today is election day

2008-10-05T15:37:00.003-03:00

All over Brasil people are voting for city mayors, representatives and so on (but no presidents) today. Election day is a holiday here - everyone is supposed to have the day off so they can vote because it is the LAW. If you don't vote in Brasil, you can't open a bank account, you can't get a driver's license, and you can't get a passport, among other things. You show up at your polling place, show your picture ID, sign in a notebook and receive a little ticket that serves as proof that you voted. In Salvador, our voting machines are electric and look a tad like fax machines from the 80's. Each party has a number - 13 is the worker's party (P.T., Lula's party). Today you cannot buy alchohol, but you can walk around on the street drinking some you have from home. You cannot go to the polling place with the party number or candidate number displayed on your person (although I saw this rule enforcement was quite lax in our polling place). You cannot hand out little pieces of paper that support a particular candidate or party near the entrance to a polling place (again, this law was broken where we went). Like most laws in Brasil, there seems to be a bit of wiggle room here. My husband went to cast his vote in a PT t-shirt with an Obama t-shirt hanging off his back.

Teaching a dog new tricks

2008-10-04T11:30:00.004-03:00

These photos were actually captured by a colleague of mine on her way home one afternoon. There is also a video, if only I could figure out how to download it. According to another colleague, this man lives in Boca do Rio and rides all over the city with his backseat moto-dog. I actually saw him myself about a month ago, going into Boca do Rio in front of the Convention Center.

Barack Obama on Brasil ballot

2008-09-20T16:52:00.001-03:00

I came across this article today - rather an amusing idea. It's a little like our "no ducks can wear pants" kinds of laws, only it actually gets used.

Not a hurricane

2008-09-03T21:29:00.002-03:00

Freaky weather is far and few between here, although every time it rains we have random flooding problems in various places. You'd think some where some engineers would have decided to tackle this problem, but none of them seem to be here. In the mean time, this is what a storm looks like when it comes off the ocean in the Southern Hemisphere.

Hey, who's that?

2008-09-01T18:06:00.005-03:00

Scattered about Salvador are some rather distinctive billboards.

Look closer.

The caption here is "O Poder Mudou" - "the power has changed," "the person in charge has changed," or what have you. A friend of mine here who is rather Obama obsessed is worried these signs will jinx the election with that kind of statement. So we shall see...

Old and inaccurate

2008-08-21T08:38:00.003-03:00

This post has less to do with going ons here, and more to do with good sense and reference. I have always used google maps to look up roads and pictures here - they are more up to date and it's an easy service to use. Today, I tried to do the same with MSN maps. And let me tell you, if you want to find somewhere in Salvador, at least, don't bother using them. The pictures are at least 5 years old (there are whole sections of buildings and roads missing that have been here at least for the last 4 years I have been living here) and their entire "street map" overlay is completely off by about 15 miles, so obviously so that some of them run through the open ocean. According to this map, I live north of Rio Vermelho (20 south west of reality) and Avenida Sete runs through the ocean through Barra. I hope no one out there is actually trying to use these accurately with it being THIS far off...

A prize to be cherished

2008-08-10T11:58:00.003-03:00

This is one of our powdered chocolate mixes one puts in the milk or with water and powdered milk for a nice chocolaty treat. This is a common remedy here to encourage kids to drink their milk and many drink it everyday. As with many products here, there is an extra incentive - buying this brand over another type could win you a special prize.

Only in Brasil? I actually can think of a few different countries where this kind of thing might work. My first inclination for Brasil now, having lived here for more than four years, is that this kind of thing shows how far Brasil needs to go to join the "1st world." Although it is stated that one can win either they cow OR the equivalent in R$ of the value of it, what people who spend R$5 on chocolate mix powder are really buying it hoping to win a cow? Okay, so this might appeal to those in the interior who might have a good fazenda to keep the cow in. It might even appeal to the general minimum salary worker here in the city, since there is no law against farm animals within city limits, although the cost of upkeep of a cow might be a tad discouraging. Sure, sure, it's just a symbol to go with that fact that this is chocolate MILK, okay, whatever. It's still just a tad on the ridiculous side.

A 40 mile traffic jam

2008-06-22T09:21:00.003-03:00

São João is a big holiday here in the northeast. The basic deal is that everyone tries to leave the city and drive to some tiny town in the interior, find someone's floor to sleep on, and goes to the public square to dance to Forró all night. It's one of my favorite holidays here, maybe because it's so focused on being in the country and just dancing - reminds me of home and going contra dancing. The holiday falls on the 24th of every June, but the major party is on the 23rd. This year the 24th is a Tuesday, meaning it was a 4 day weekend for anyone going out of town, and the public responded quickly.

This is a lame picture of my television of a live shot of BR324 in the BrasilGas sector, near Pirajá. This traffic jam went for over 80 KM, traffic stopped or moving slowly, everyone trying to get the heck away from the city. Having only 2 major highways to get you out, not at all surprising result.

See the number of people clustered at the non-bus station stop? And at the moment a good friend of mine visiting is out of town (Chapada) and will try to return on the afternoon of the 24th to catch an extremely early plane on the morning of the 25th - I hope she actually gets here in time....

Fusca leads a double life

2008-06-09T20:53:00.003-03:00

Fuscas are the car. You can't go anywhere without spotting one and they are frequently the "goal" car for those who were not able to previously afford one. They are also very versatile.

Take the above example. Not only is a cheap an affordable, it can double as an office and a store. Need a snack? Find it here in the Fusca! Transportation by day - hard working restaurant by night.

Cool house

2008-06-01T13:00:00.005-03:00

There is a lot of old architecture spread throughout the city. We have buildings from the early 1900's beside those built in the last 4 years I have lived here. There are many that have been fixed up, and others that are left as empty outer shells, full of grass and trees inside. I think those are the most interesting to look at, but they are seldom in places I am likely to 1) go to alone, and 2) drag my camera out and start photographing. I like this one in particular, near Canela. It's not that old, but has been kept up nicely and retains some of it's original feel. It'd be nice to have a look inside.

Not really all that shocking

2008-05-24T23:55:00.001-03:00

Came across this online. Much more shocking things happen in traffic here everyday, but this at least is something that people outside the country can connect to and understand on some level. Makes a heck of a lot more sense than the whole "turning left from the right hand lane without signaling" thing...

Threats of chaos

2008-05-22T21:30:00.002-03:00

Some time ago, maybe a year or more, there was a short bus strike. The companies wanted to raise the price of a ride on one of our many city buses some thing like another R$1 or so and when the talks weren't going well (or at all, I can't quite remember), the drivers took a one day strike that threw the city in to absolute chaos. Nannies couldn't get to their charges, doormen couldn't get to work, security guards were stuck at home, people who normally took buses had to brave the streets in their cars... I remember distinctly that there was a lot of traffic on the roads that day, and that several people were still waiting at bus stops in hopes of a bus coming by anyway, or that one of the opportunists would stop and give them a ride to where they needed to go for a small fee if it were on the way or a larger one if it wasn't. The city stops with out buses. We have no other transportation (save the monorail that has been under construction for 10+ years now) and those who are too poor to have a car but have a job and mouths to feed are the ones who get screwed the most. Some employers expect the employees to find there way to work on their own. Others will go pick them up or arrange other transportation. The traffic becomes ridiculous (when it already was before).

The buses are about to go on strike again. The drivers only make a little more than R$600 a month. If no agreement is reached for a pay raise, they will strike on Tuesday, as was announced on the news this morning. Lets all cross our fingers...

Acarajé passing

2008-05-17T21:39:00.002-03:00

I have looked all over my computer and try as I might, I cannot find a photo to accompany this entry. I was informed that Dinha, the Bahia de Acarajé based in Rio Vermelho and one of the more well known ones in Salvador has died of a heart attack late this week. Some of my fondest memories are of eating near her street stand and drinking beer from our "home" bar there in the square. I never had the pleasure of meeting her (although my partner in all things Bahia did), but her acarajé and abará accompanied some of the most memorable first nights and experiences I had here in this wonder of a city. She will be missed, but her memory lives on in the form of tasty dendê foods.

Rain Rain, go away....

2008-05-10T14:49:00.002-03:00

Yeah, so this is an old picture. But the stretch of road looks about the same right now, so I don't feel too bad posting it. Between being gripada again and all this lovely weather we are having lately, I haven't felt too inspired to go out taking pictures of new things. Not that there haven't been some interesting things happening here lately - an accident involving a SKOL truck and some cases of beer falling off onto the cars behind it blocking the entire Orla in the Itapua bound direction comes to mind - I just haven't felt like dragging around my camera.

Bringing in the catch

2008-04-13T19:17:00.005-03:00

Yes, traditional fishermen still exist. Even in the middle of a rich weekend housing area. And they still drag in nets and it does take a whole team of people to do it. And all the weekenders come out to watch, totally fascinated by this traditional show of manual labor. Perhaps they were also jarred into remembering that the fish they eat were once living, flipping silvery forms in these nets. Perhaps some of them don't have jobs that require actual work, so the idea of work in and of itself is interesting.

*** DISCLAIMER ***
All of the fish shown in these photos were harmed and most likely eaten later that day.

Home security

2008-04-02T18:09:00.002-03:00

As you may well know, crime is expected here - better safe than sorry. One generally does not walk around on the street without being constantly aware of the surroundings, who is walking behind you, and who is looking in your direction. Surprisingly, few people carry "self protection" type things like mace, rather it is safer to hand over your things than to resist the inevitable. For homes, however, we can be a little less discreet. Take this example - too cheap to spring for that electronic home security system or razor wire? Just break some bottles and mix up the cement and you can easily show off your "don't come here" attitude without removing your welcome mat. The poor man's answer to a low wall or an easily hopped border. Although, after having watched the last movie in the Borne series, one could think of some easy ways over it.

Feeding Micos

2008-03-16T11:27:00.004-03:00

There is a large population of small monkeys here, and they hang out and beg just like squirrels and pigeons in the States. If you feed one, the whole colony shows up asking for a handout. It's kind of funny to go to the zoo and see the depressing animals in cages and see these guys perched on the signs outside of the cages. Our inner city pests. Occasionally in Pelo you will see a random guy on the street with one on a leash that you can pose and have your picture with. Their little teeth look pretty sharp, so I'd rather treat them as the wild animals they are. Still, they are awfully cute.

not my fault

2008-03-11T21:13:00.002-03:00

It's not my fault I haven't posted the video of the river that was our street some weeks ago - it's a "my camera" / "your camera" issue, but rest assured I have not forgotten those who read and I will get the spectacular video up momentarily.

Video of Praia 24 horas

2008-02-24T11:36:00.004-03:00

Here is a short video of last night's event, shot by my partner in all things Bahia, featuring me in the water. Unfortunately there was no music being played at the time.

Beaches open 24 hours

2008-02-24T11:16:00.008-03:00

A news article led us to the "Praia 24 horas" event, last night in Porto da Barra. A stage was mounted in the middle of the bay inlet where the boats usually achor and a free Bossa Nova concert was given from 7pm until 2am with various artists, some well known, some just locally known. All one had to do was show up and find a place to park. There were food vendors and drink vendors and guys walking around with LED blinking toys. It was generally family friendly.

You could swim out to the stage and watch the concert treading water if you so desired, as long as you didn't try to hang on it (I actually saw a guy reprimanding some swimmers for doing this, which really surprised me since generally no one really cares if little social rules like this are broken). A large screen was mounted on the beach to show close up video feed of the singers.

You can see how far away the stage was, so this video was a nice touch. Also on the schedule were events such as an artisan fair at the Farrol, aerobics on the beach in the morning, and breakfast on Sunday. I hope this event is repeated next year - definitely worth the trip down there!

Fight global warming!

2008-02-14T20:37:00.005-03:00

This is an interesting advertisement on the back of a bus - "Against global warming? Have a cool Skol at Amanda's". Can't think of a better way to spend a hot afternoon than that.... Well, maybe not at Amanda's - it's not on the beach.

Bananananananananana

2008-01-26T18:29:00.000-03:00

Yes, sometimes on the side of the road, you find bananas growing. Eventually these will either be claimed and eaten, or possibly stolen and sold and then eaten. Once upon a time a branch of bananas came to our home, all green. We were told to cut some off and put them in a plastic bag to make them ripen faster. This seemed to be a good idea at the time, since we eat a lot of bananas. But they just stayed green, forever, it seemed. What eventually happened was that they all ripened at the same time so we were suddenly over run with bananas all over the house. Let this be a lesson to all who think buying a branch of bananas is a good idea.

It seems to go on forever...

2008-01-13T23:03:00.000-03:00

For New Year's, we went to the island of Itaparica. It's a lovely little place, relatively safe, and just drive a little bit and it's like you're in the country. There are three ways to get there, if you are a commoner - take a ferry launch, take a car ferry, or drive all the way around to the bridge on the other side of the island (a 4+ hour trip on roads that cannot really be depended upon for upkeep). Most people choose the first option, as it's the cheapest (about R$6 per person; about $3 US). New Years is a popular time to go to the island, as any holiday is a popular time to travel here, and so the line to get on the ferry launch was extremely long to go to the island, but that was nothing to the size and endurance of the line to go back. We opted to stay as long as possible to try to avoid the line. These pictures were taken on the 4th of January - and the line still seemed endless. I imagine many of these people may have camped out all night to not loose their place in line, having obligations on the main land. Thank goodness we didn't.

The beginning of the line.

The middle of the line.

The end, or maybe not....

Techincal problems

2008-01-07T17:50:00.000-03:00

I swear I will post a nice story/photo as soon as I can get the two things on the same computer and out of my head.

Fuck doors

2007-12-28T12:50:00.000-03:00

This is a photo I have been meaning to take for a long time. Anyone familiar with Engrish.com will appreciate this post. It seems someone may have clued them in to the idea that Fuck is not the greatest name to use, because in the 3 years that have passed since I moved here, they have added an SA to the end of the name. It's still funny, but not as, since you no longer see a whole bunch of "fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck,..." stretching across the packaging. Some how having a FUCKSA door is not quite as intriguing, but still the photo is worth something.

Christmas decorations

2007-12-25T12:28:00.000-03:00

Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, etc.... It's 85 and humid here in Bahia. I had something eloquent to say about our decorations, but I have forgotten what it was. In any case, here is one of our many Christmas trees around the city. Not many of them are real trees, in fact, most are not even trees at all, but things in the shape of trees. This one is made of light up stars and is on the Orla near Pituba.

Caldo de Cana

2007-12-12T20:30:00.000-03:00

Mmmm, sugar water! Just what everyone finds refreshing on a hot day while walking along the beach. Quite literally, this sugar cane juice is made by shoving the whole sugar cane down a sort of wood chipper / juicer and catching the juice coming out the bottom. It's not bad, you know, tastes like sugar because that's what it is. The residual parts of the cane come out looking like wet cotton fluff. I personally prefer coconut water, but this drink is popular enough to find at least half as many caldo de cana vendors as agua de coco.

Alternative modes of transportation

2007-12-03T21:37:00.001-03:00

Nothing really educational in this post. These kids happened to be running down the side of the road with the wheelbarrow in action. They may even be playing, although I doubt it. More likely they are off on some errand or trying to find a quicker way to get somewhere.

Horses Xing

2007-11-18T18:26:00.001-03:00

Not that you would ever see a sign indicating that anywhere around here. Although I was unaware of it at the time I was living in the States, there is some kind of law prohibiting farm animals inside city limits. I never thought much about it, but it would seem rather striking to see chickens and pigs wandering around down town Lansing or Grand Rapids. There is no such law here, however, and I would be hard pressed to think of a day that I have gone out on the street here and not see at least one rooster on the sidewalk or a horse tied up on the side of the road, nibbling the grass. The farther outside the city you go, the less restrained the animals are, until you start finding them wandering around on the road, just waiting to scare the bajeezes out of you as you come around a sharp turn. I only hit one deer with my car in MI and I cannot imagine the damage a full grown horse would do to the tiny cars we drive around here. Luckily, the pot holes are so bad in most of the roads, the speeds you need to drive at will most likely allow you to stop in time.

In the middle of nowhere

2007-11-11T15:08:00.001-03:00

These photos are more of the Praia do Forte area. We happen to have some friends who live there - not in the main store littered walking area plaza, but across the highway and back up the back roads a ways. This is the main stretch of road to get to and from their house. Most of the rest of it is more the state of a two-track, complete with pot holes and large ponds in the middle of it (see below). I would say this would be a good place to buy a small lot and retire to, but development has picked up so much that I doubt it would be quite this nice and secluded 10 years from now.

Moto-Taxi

2007-11-10T10:30:00.001-03:00

Outside of the big city area of Salvador, taxis are far and few between. It just is not cost effective to run a large taxi service with cars in areas where people don't need to take transportation to many places during the day. What you end up with, then, are motorcycle taxis, which will take you short distances on the back of a motor bike for a relatively low cost. This particular stand is in Praia do Forte, right in the middle of the public walking area full of little shops and restaurants. There isn't much to do in Praia except walk around and window shop, go to the beach, or go to the TAMAR area. If you get sick of one beach, you can take a moto-taxi to another one. In the mean time, the drivers can sit here on their nice covered platform and drink beer.

Maintenance

2007-11-04T21:46:00.000-03:00

Obviously, all lights need to be changed once in a while. You know, the ones in your house are so easy to do, but what about your friendly neighborhood traffic light? I know these things need to be fixed once in a while, yet I could not think of any time in my memory that I actually SAW one being worked on, or a light bulb being changed, or anything, in the States. It was just like some kind of magical state that they remained in perfect working order, always.

Not here. This scene is taking place during the end of rush hour here, on one of the only TWO major routs to get ANYWHERE>>> The Orla. And not only did they decide to do this one particular light (I cannot recall if it was burned out, but it might have been) at this time, but they proceeded to do the rest of them in this stretch over the next several days, always it seems, at the same time. Just to give any non-locals a perspective : This is a two lane in each direction road that runs along the ocean - no way to turn off or go around. One lane was completely blocked by this truck.

The two lives of Pineapple

2007-10-21T08:41:00.001-03:00

In case you never got to see a real pineapple growing.... Here, they can be both breakfast and landscaping!

Rock samba

2007-10-17T20:41:00.000-03:00

This little scene was our background music for our day in Imbaccai, just North of Praia do Forte. A small river meets the ocean here, and it is dotted with barracas and bahianas with acaraje. Most of them have tables in the river and people sit partially submerged, eating a drinking. On this section of the river, there was a large rocky area, which was covered with people with drums and shakers playing some kind of samba for everyone's enjoyment. It was like a large jam session.

Occupation

2007-10-15T20:56:00.001-03:00

On our way through Canela/Graça yesterday, we passed through the UFBA area and came across this building. It is the dean's office, I believe. More information can be found here. Most federal things here are doomed to have strikes, be closed at odd hours, etc. I can think of at least 3 times since I moved here that I have heard that the teachers of UFBA have been on strike for one reason or another, usually having to do with benefits and pay I assume. It seems the students are fed up with something (according to the website, it has something to do with "political student assistance" but I am not really clear on it) and so have taken over this building in protest. You can't see well, but the Brasilian flag's "ordem e progresso" have been replaced by "vergonha e desumanidade" and there is something about "robam" taped over one of the stars.

Verticalization

2007-10-03T21:02:00.001-03:00

If you have driven around big cities, you have probably found that not all neighborhoods are created equal. There is generally a section of tall buildings, some shorter suburbs, and then houses in the outskirts. In really big cities, maybe you have seen mostly high rises like this one.

In fact, here in Salvador, the city was built, then grew, then rebuilt in it's new borders, then grew, and so we have several places that contain the tall tall buildings with almost every other kind of neighborhood in between. Our new epicenter for tall buildings in the last 5 to 7 years has been Pituba. Just since 2003 or so a few dozen new apartment buildings have sprung up, all high rises selling views of the ocean (at least until the next high rise is built in front of it). This has a way of wreaking havoc on the already established environment, causing massive heat bubbles where no ocean breeze can pass, or strange traffic flow because of increased rich commuters. Unsurprisingly, people generally do not want to see it happen to their nice-non-high-rise neighborhoods. There was recently a protest not far from the site of where this photo was taken, in Patamares, against the "verticalization" of the area. At the moment, this is the only high rise in the area - so marked as of yet that you can actually see the shadow it casts on google maps (search for Patamares, Salvador, Bahia, Brasil), while no other building in the area casts such shadow. There are signs announcing the planned construction of at least 2 other buildings just on this street, so it's a valid concern. But of course, why have a bunch of open land when you can build huge buildings on it...

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A valid, sad reason

2007-09-27T17:22:00.001-03:00

Granted, this shot is over a month old. I delayed posting it out of respect for who ever was at the end of this long line of cars that we sat in for almost an hour. It is not uncommon to get stuck in long lines of traffic that seem to appear for no reason at all, or because of some political type reason, like a blitz. This was our encounter on Paralella late one night. Often this stretch is plagued with traffic like this because of either the FTC college site or the Wet and Wild concert venue. We figured that was probably the case when we got stuck in this line, but as we finally got to the end we started to smell a horrible stench, and came upon a body in the middle of the stretch of 4-6 lanes of traffic, covered with a sheet. It was rather shocking, even though this is not the first dead body in a road I have seen in my life. And considering it was stinking so badly, I imagine it had been there for some time. Apparently only the morgue can come to remove a body, and there is some paperwork involved, so the long line of cars probably continued to pass it for some time after we did, waiting for the red tape to be cut. For a few nights after we passed it, I couldn't sleep well, and kept seeing the strange position of the legs in my head. Rather awful, and yet so much a part of this reality.

Morning Rituals

2007-09-24T18:01:00.000-03:00

7 AM is a very busy time here in Salvador - people on their way to work, kids on their way to school, and delivery trucks are out in storm, leaving their goods where ever they are needed, often in the middle of major traffic routes.

Here, for example, is our coconut distribution service. Besides the local kids who collect them and sell them individually, there are companies that "harvest" the coconuts and bring them into the city in big trucks that may have "DISK côco" painted on them (DISK is what you call truck delivery; we have DISK banana, DISK sugar cane, DISK gas...). Unfortunately, as traffic was moving, you can just barely see there are two guys with large metal shopping carts, loading up coconuts to take to their stands which I assume must be somewhere nearby. This particular delivery was being made near a bus stop on Tancredo Neves Ave, one of the main veins (even shown on Googlemaps as a yellow road, so you know it's a serious route) of the city. Not that we would be concerned about traffic slowing....

Water doesn't grow on tress, but we have DISK water as well. This truck is loaded every day from the distribution center building, or maybe vice versa, I have never been sure. Nice clean water, coming out of nice blue bottles. Yet not more than 50 yards from this nice clean water waiting to arrive in your home, is a small river that is so full of garbage and sewage that you can barely walk past it without passing out from the fumes on a hot day. And, I might add, it is populated by dwellings of the lower class who must be immune to the smell by now. At least this DISK, on Orla - another major route to everywhere, parks on the sidewalk instead of in the road...

For sale

2007-09-07T10:05:00.001-03:00

There is no shortage of abandoned buildings and homes here, even in the "nicer" neighborhoods like Caminho das Árvores and Pituba. Some fall victim to squatters who can enter and live in a property for some time and then claim it as theirs because they are occupying it. Still others remain untouched except for the signs spray painted here and there and the graffiti added some time afterwards. These places have been abandoned since I moved here, but perhaps now they will find an international buyer since I am posting their photos on the site (*smirk*).

The world of EFL

2007-09-02T09:21:00.000-03:00

I have been sitting on this photo for a while, trying to wait until I got several photos of English schools and then could post a kind of series, but I am demorando too much, so the series will be rather disjointed.

You can't walk through a barrio here without tripping over an English school or two. Every Brasilian studies English in their regular school, but often it is not taught in a way that allows for a student to get much out of it apparently, and most attend a secondary English school in the afternoons. At the end of these courses (can take anywhere between 3 and 6 years to complete) a student generally "graduates" with some sort of certificate declaring them to speak English (although I suspect this is rarely the reality).

Because of this huge market, there are big schools with several branches (ACBEU, CCAA, Cultura Inglesa, etc) and other schools with only one or two branches (too numerous to name). Many of them seem to choose the colors of red, blue, and yellow to decorate and designate their schools, like this one here called Skill. The buildings can range in all sizes, but many seem to be rather on the small side to be a "school." I have only ever been inside of two, both of which were on the large side, so I cannot imagine how a smaller school building is set up in terms of class size or number of classes available.

The makings of a fun afternoon

2007-08-07T18:22:00.000-03:00

Welcome back!

This shot was just too good to pass up. Some friends of ours live in a rather rustic condominium towards Itapua. It's full of kids who play soccer in the street and pot holes and a couple of stray dogs. This past weekend when we went to visit, it also had a large Skol (a popular Brasilian beer that I personally think tastes like ass) cooler in the middle of the street next door to a really interesting chopper that vaguely reminded me of a dune buggy and may even be designed for use on the beach. Unfortunately it was not plugged in...

The state of the world

2007-07-26T19:25:00.000-03:00

Of all the nice photos I could have taken on my travels that show how incredibley insane and annoying air travel is here - I was on vacation and I did not. But let me just tell you that I spent more time in airports than I would have liked and sat in a terminal for hours with no flights leaving or arriving and thousands of people just sitting around. I will get some photos moving here soon though, rest assured, just as soon as school starts and I am able to think strait.

This week in Bahia goes on vacation

2007-06-21T17:24:00.000-03:00

I know it seems like I must be doing it all the time, due to my sporatic posts over the last few months, but now I am going on a actual vacation - out of the country. So, obviously I won't be able to post anything until I get back, unless it is of something other than Bahia, which would, really, defeate the purpose of this blog. So, just to hold you all over for a while, here are several photos to ponder until my return in July.

As you may or may not know, the months of May, June, and July are winter here. Winter means rain and sun in the same ten minute stretch with no way to be assured that you will remain dry if you leave the house without an umbrella, no matter what the sky looks like in the morning, or what the forecast (hahaha) says. Most of the time, there is so much rain that the streets flood a bit and slow down traffic. And no matter what time of year it is, drivers seem to feel rain merits more cautious driving (hahaha), so you will likely be later than you plan if you head out in the rain. This particular door has nothing to do with the story, other than that the shot was taken in the rain. I thought it was a particularly nice picture, somewhere in Brotas.

This photo is particularly nice because of the nice "late" day sun shining on select spots on the building (late day being about 4pm, sun setting around 5:30ish), as well as showing the ingenius "jeito"for older building adaptations to electrical connections. Coming from somewhere out of the shot is a direct connection to the wires running electricity into this particular building - one connection obviously is somewhat planned, because you can see the glass fuses on the side of the building. The other, however, comes from I'm not sure where and goes directly into the corner of a window to supply power to a store that probably didn't have any connections before. Rather than breaking through walls and doing costly renovations, the easiest way to get your power is to go around the outside. Not astetically pleasing, but very common, even in newer buildings (our downstairs bathroom uses this route for an over head light, and it was built in the late 80's!).

You can buy almost anything you want on the street. The most common is pirated CDs and DVDs. Just yesterday I saw that Shrek 3 is already out for sale on the street, along with Ocean's 13. There seems to be no way to prevent it, at least in this country, and guys selling these illegal copies are almost as common as window washers. This one is stationed next to a bus stop, as vendors often are (there and at traffic lights). I have no idea why no one ever gets arrested for doing this, but I have never heard of it. I suppose it's better to be selling something, however illegal, instead of stealing.

And last but not least....

This great green tunnel is the entrance to the Salvador Airport, where I will be headed tomorow afternoon for an 18+ hour journey north. It's kind of a landmark and very memorable. This great green forest is made entirely of bamboo (it grows wild here, all over, who knew?) and goes about 3/4 of a mile (I think). It's quite attractive and makes you have the urge to pop out and take a few pictures, except that you might get run down by the other passing motorists who drive like bats out of hell through it. I have a friend who actually did wander around being photographed here, naked, as she told me, and was almost arrested.

Urban Cowboy

2007-06-17T18:14:00.000-03:00

It's not terribley unusual here to see horses, or any kind of farm animal/livestock, within city limits on a regular basis. People keep them all over, and they are left grazing the grasses at the side of major roads, sometimes tied up, sometimes not, and are frequent road hazzards for unsuspecting motorists if they happen to think the grass on the other side might be tastier than where they are. Less common, at least in city limits, is the cowboy riding along the street (other than cops). This guy wasn't really riding in the street, but on the sidewalk between the lanes in each direction. He even had a saddle, which you usually don't see, and seemed dressed for the part. The only thing missing here is the cellphone he was chatting on right before I managed to drag out my camera.

Tree trimmers

2007-06-03T12:49:00.000-03:00

I have been sitting on this photo for about 2 weeks for some reason. Just too lazy to log in and upload it I guess, that and the constant Ju distraction is making it difficult to sit down and finish anything online in a consistant time frame.

These are the tree trimmers of Coelba (electric company). Not that you can usually see the electric lines from the street anyway, but the overgrown trees do seem to become too overgrown and then they show up and trim peices off here and there at odd hours, like 7 am on a Sunday. There were 5 guys in this truck. In this photo, two of them were somewhere else picking up branches off the ground and dragging them either to this truck or into piles on the street. I have no idea what conditions allowed for one branch to enter the truck while others were left behind. There did not seem to be any commonly observable rule.

The truck would slowly drive along the street, stop under a random tree and extend this rickety ladder and I would not have trusted to climb on. One guy climbs up, jiggling the ladder all the way up, and starts cutting branches - with a large (and probably very very sharp) machete. This makes the shakey contraption wiggle even more and I feared I was going to witness some underpaid worker fall to his death or permanent handicap. After the branch was sufficiently hacked off with the giant knife, it would either drop to the ground where perhaps another worker would retrieve, or it would be somehow hooked on the wires you see attatched to the ladder, and shimmied down into the back of the truck. A neat contraption, but I wouldn't want to climb it and I bet in the States you'd have to sign about 30 papers stating you wouldn't sue anyone if you took off your arm somewhere in this process.

The rainy season

2007-05-12T08:06:00.000-03:00

And so begins winter time. Supposedly arctic air is pushing up from the south, making us windy and cooler here. It was almost so cold I didn't want to shower this morning. It is not infrequent to see people dressed in jackets, hats and scarves in weather like this - outfits much akin to a brisk fall day in MI, right along side people dressed like those in this photo. Today, I wore long sleeves, a long skirt, and I seriously considered if I should take a jacket or not. When I got home, I had hot cocoa. Tonight I will probably sleep with a blanket - it's only like 75! Brrrrrrrr.....

Mosquitos beware

2007-04-30T22:09:00.000-03:00

Long time no post. I have no real excuse other than lack of inspiration, until this week.

Not the best picture, I know. If you look closely, you will see a white truck with a sort of "sprayer" on the back, blowing out a smokey substance that hangs in the air for some time after it passes. This is the public health department's "Contra Dengue" movement. Several times a year, they send people to your house to walk through, put insecticide of some kind in your drains, and check all the places in your house where you might have standing water where mosquitos could lay eggs. Apparently they also send a truck around to blow mosquito killing fumes into the trees in residential areas. What the truck is spraying, I have no idea. Years of working for MSU Entomology made me terribley paranoid of things being sprayed out of the back of trucks to kill insects. Yet there were people walking around on the street as this truck went by, and they seemed unfazed.

The smoke hangs in the air a bit and I imagine settles on the leaves and the ground, doing it's job. How much of it is in my lungs?

Borracharia

2007-04-06T16:33:00.000-03:00

Need tires? Just look for the sign made of a tire, or a large stack of them at the side of the road. Looking for new tires? Probably won't find them here. At least, it doesn't seem like many non-fully automated with lifts and what not stores sell new ones. If it doesn't look like a typical USA style tire store, you will probably have to go for the new used tire, which is much cheaper and more common. These hole in the wall stores are much more common than the fully automated ones. They can patch your tires, replace them, buy your used ones, you name it. Looks like this one does bike tires as well. Shame the bus got in the way of the cool sign made of a tire. Oh well.

(singing) The itsy bitsy anty....

2007-04-01T15:27:00.000-03:00

No, it's not dirt. What you are looking at are the tinyest ants I have ever seen. They are by far the most irritating insect that infests homes here in Brasil (beating mosquitos only because at least there is a repelant for those). They work just as fast as the super speed ants upstairs, but they are always around, and are on everything, even me. Ever feel that tickle that might be a loose hair touching your arm? Nope, it's an ant. And that itchy feeling on your neck? Also an ant. Tickel in your nose or ear? Probably an ant. I can't figure out how to get rid of them - the smaller they are, the more ellusive they are. I wouldn't mind them so much if the didn't also populate the trash cans as well as investigave my table and Ju's high chair tray (which is where they are in this picture). They have sort of artistically surrounded some spilled juice here, but that doesn't really add anything credible to their CV in my book.

Stairway to nowhere

2007-03-24T22:15:00.000-03:00

This is a stairway on my street. It used to go up to another street that runs along the top of the hill, but has long ago been walled up and blocked. Actually, there is a doorway with a large metal grate over it, with bricks walling it up behind it, so it seems it was sort of open after the initiall walling. There is another such stair way farther into the neighborhood that is in such a state that I don't even dare walk on it - full of holes, caved-in sections, and plants and trees growing out of every crevice. This one doesn't appear to be in too bad of shape, but I have not tried to investigate it thorally. The city is full of these funny little used-to-be-a-street-or-passage-but-was-blocked-for-some-unknown-reason things. Does it add to the charm? You be the judge.

Yeah, and old picture, deal with it

2007-03-11T13:05:00.000-03:00

Due to the new "shopping" opening up on the other side of Tancredo Neves, Iguatemí is expanding. It has already been stated that there will not be enough parking for this new mall, nor will the traffic flow be lessened or helped by the numerous road renovations and expansions and confusions near by. So to compensate for the future competition for consumers who have little or no money, a new and improved parking ramp is being built to lure them by want to easy car access. Never mind that Iguatemí is still trying to fight the city to allow them to charge R$5 per car per park....

Pop

2007-02-24T19:14:00.000-03:00

This is my dish towel. In case you can't tell, that is supposed to be a chicken on the top, and underneath is a nice row of eggs waiting to be eaten in their little egg holder cups. I remember when I was a kid, I loved having a hard boiled egg to eat for breakfast in that little cup. I thought it was so cool. Now they seem to be obsolete; I'm sure no one gives them as wedding presents anymore, and I had not seen them in stores in a long time. I have no idea if they have ever existed in Brasil, but they at least exist here in memory in my kitchen. When I first moved here, I thought this towel was so strange, and was baffled by the "Engrish" on the bottom of it. So much in fact, that I believe I already wrote about it once in my other blog. Eggs are Pop? In Michigan, pop is a carbonated drink, which made it even more funny to me. There are many other great examples of English here, perhaps I will begin a series...

Rain brings out all manner of creatures

2007-02-16T10:04:00.000-03:00

Today we have some rain photos. It has been raining pretty much everyday since last week. It looks like it's going to continue to rain all the way through Carnaval which officially started in Bahia on Wednesday night.

First, a photo I took earlier and forgot to post. The rain seems to put everything on the move here, so I was only somewhat surprised to see a frog resting quietly in the cats' water bowl first thing in the morning. Actually, judging from the amount of water on the floor around the bowl, I suspect Lela was trying to get it out of there for some time, but some how proved unsuccessful. It's hard to see from the photo, but he (she?) has a lovely bright yellow speckled with black spots under the back legs that my husband insists is the poisen he (she?) carries for protection. We poured the bowl out in the garden, and the frog hung out under a cactus for another 10 minutes before disappearing.

Carnaval has begun in Bahia, more specifically here in our condo. Last night someone threw a Carnaval themed birthday party that lasted at least until 2AM, which is when some woman went screaming/laughing by our front window and woke me up. We get to "participate" in all the parties because we are right next to the pool, so we can either sleep through it, or roast with all the windows closed (although this only muffels the sound). The confettie and streamers are all over this morning, sticking to walls and sidewalks in the rain. There is even quite a bit of it in the pool, along with these strings of balloons so common at parties here. Rain won't ruin anyone's parade at this time of year.

What is it?

2007-02-10T15:26:00.000-03:00

I just don't know. This strange construction seems to be made entirely of cement and is being erected inside a nature preserve in Busca Vida. This picture just doesn't do it justice. It seems to be a boxcar in the style of Frank-Loyd-Wright-meets-Salvador-Dali-kind-of-esk. There do no seem to be any roads to it and we didn't see any movement indicating an inhabitant. I have no idea what it's doing there, since I thought no one was allowed to build on or walk around in these federal preserves....

It's 78% of what you breath

2007-02-04T09:00:00.000-03:00

Pick your non-poison. Air, like in the States (at least in some places) is free, but Nitrogen will cost you up to R$2 extra. Supposedly it will make your tires last longer by not allowing them to heat up so much while driving all over this hot hot city in the summer - an important detail where potholes the size of the car itself are not so "news worthy" as they should be. Sounds like a good deal, right? But how much longer will your tires last? No one seems to know. Another important point - no mixing allowed: once you choose N2 as your preferred gas, you have to stick with it. If you happen to be low and go to a station that doesn't have nitrogen available, you'll have to completely drain your tires and refill them with air. The infrequency N2 pumps in the city is what prevents us from putting it to the test.

Smart FUZZY!

2007-01-30T22:09:00.000-03:00

I have no anicdotes to go with this photo, only to say I took it on Paralela (our sort of highway in the city) on Sunday and thought it was quite funny. And the fox is cute too, even sideways...

Beware of snake!

2007-01-27T08:34:00.000-03:00

Just on the outskirts of the city, one can easily find poisonous snakes - usually coral snakes to be exact. They are usually the main reasoning behind the trimming of grass and maintaining of landscaping, lest you be walking through your "natural" yard one morning and step on one, resulting in death. It's also a good reason not to just go walking into someone's private property if it's not regularly maintained. This sign is one of several strung up around some beach front property that appears to owned but not lived on - "soon to be developed." Between this and the barbed wire everywhere, I can only assume they mean to keep out squatters or others who might think "hey, let's go check this place out because no one lives there." The question remains as to if the owners mean to warn against wild snakes that might be in the property or a snake they put there themselves to protect the property, because the wording here "careful snake" (or more colloquially "beware of snake") is similar to the "cuidado cãe" (more less the USA equivalent to "beware of dog").

Razor tip sharp

2007-01-18T11:42:00.000-03:00

A sweet even scale of notes coming from a simple pan pipe signals the arrival of the knife sharpener (the "call"). This guy wheels his sharpener around the neighborhoods, sharpening your scissors, your knives, your machetes, anything metal that needs it. For about R$3 an object, you can make all your cutting and slicing and hacking apparatuses like new. This is a lot less than buying new scissors and knives and machetes. The sharpener is a foot pedal contraption that must work somewhat like old sewing machines and that any freshman engineering major could probably build, yet I could not explain it to you (you know us language people...). For a video of my knives and scissors being sharpened click here.

Um, dois, tres!

2007-01-08T09:58:00.000-03:00

Like we have seen before, you can buy just about anything you have a hankering for on the street. This is Tonho and he is a "historia" as my husband would call him, meaning he's been around a long time. You want to know anything about Salvador, he could probably tell you; he has been walking the streets selling pipoca about 18 years or so. He remembers our neighborhood before it was populated, he remembers the old indian who had a bar around the corner (who cursed the land when he was kicked off and no shop has survived there since), he remembers when there when the Centro was actually the centro and not on Tancredo Neves... He walks the streets with a large bike horn attatched to his cart (bike horns are the "call" of popcorn - every vendor has a song; see Capelinha for another example), honking away, keeping an eye out for crazy drivers with his sideview mirror. He sells three types of things - popcorn with molasses (just like carmel corn!), plain popcorn, and candy in his divided mobile store. Should you want to buy something, you need only yell "Pipoca!" when you hear the bike horn.

Good Omen

2007-01-02T08:29:00.000-03:00

This is by far the coolest thing I have ever taken a photo of, in my opinion. I wish I could have taken a photo of the actual event, but evidence is good enough.

These two paths here are the tracks of a sea turtle that came ashore and layed eggs sometime after 2 AM on New Years day, right in front of the house we were staying at in Busca Vida (and passed right over where I had fallen asleep with Ju earlier in the evening - good thing I moved, lest she had been scared off). The one on the right is the path in and the one on the left is the path out. Where the two converge is the laying site.

A TAMAR (the sea turtle project in Praia do Forte) guy came riding by on his bike, saw the paths, told my husband the story (I was still sleeping), checked the eggs and marked the site with this pole.

I remember reading somewhere that when the ships of the Conquistadors appeared on the horizen, the Aztecs could not see them because they had never before seen a ship, so the object didn't appear to them (not sure how we can validate this claim) - the lesson is that things when one has not experienced a thing before, one has a hard time seeing it for what it is. Case in point would be when I noticed all the poles up and down the beach here. They are everwhere in this area (the TAMAR guy says this is because no one here bothers them, unlike in Guarajuba or Praia do Forte, so this is an ideal place for sea turtle eggs), and despite having wandered this beach before, I had been completely blind.

Mobile store

2006-12-30T12:08:00.000-03:00

If one wanted to leave the house and spontaneously go to the beach, without so much as a bathing suit, it would be fairly easy to find anything you would need being sold by vendors - bikinis, cangas, food, water, sunglasses, sunscreen.... Many people make their living walking around looking for customers. This rule actually can apply all over the city and the stores come to you both on foot and by vehicle. There is a woman in Pituba who sells hammocks, usually camped out behind Iguatemí, but if you so desired you could buy one from this guy, whose noise polution announces his arrival. It is a common practice to drive a vehicle around with a giant speaker, announcing your products and prices, or if you are politcal candidate, your views and to throw mud at your competition. I didn't really pay attention to what his prices were, but I imagine they might have been on the high side, considering the neighborhood he was driving through is mostly private houses.

Capelinha! Olha o sabor de fruta!

2006-12-19T11:50:00.000-03:00

This is a rather nice shot of the roadsides of Salvador. It is not unusual to see livestock with in city limits - chickens and roosters run domesticated near favela areas. In the areas that still have green space in the city, there is often horses grazing at the side of the road, usually not tied up or monitored in any way. They seem to know someone will come for them eventually and just stay put.

This guy is selling popsicles, but not just any frozen treat - within the depths of this cooler is Capelinha, a frozen fruit puree that puts Dole strawberry to shame. The most common favorite here is the Amidoim (peanut) flavor, but they come in a range of flavors including Morango (strawberry), Côco (coconut), Goiabab (guava), Cajá (no idea), Acerola (no idea, but one of my favorites), and Açaí (a purpley healthy tasting thing from the Amazon). This type of vendor also has a song he sings (most vendors have a sound or song that allows you to recognize what's comming long before they appear), saying something along the lines of "Look! Capelinha! Fruit flavor!" This is one of my weaknesses for Bahian food - I cannot resist the sabor de fruta!