Tuesday, April 1, 2008

Redeem us...all 13 stories of you

In Rio and on top of the city at the Christ the Reedeemer statue that sits atop Corcovado Hill...the size of this thing is amazing (almost a 13 story building) and the craziest part is how they got these huge stone pieces up the mountainside...obvious now why it is a wonder of the world!
Just to recap we left Buzios, the city (village) of pure fun, sun, nightlife, you name it, and arrived in Rio de Janeiro. Yesterday, we spent the afternoon in a favella looking for some excitement and were informed that cops were all over so that everything illegal was on hold. A bigger adrenaline rush occured when we realized that cops were in the favella circling with machine guns because only hours earlier there were some shootings only a few streets from where we were. Pretty much what happens in these favellas is that the cops arrive after a crime has been committed in order to calm the gang bangers that are ready to continue fighting. They circle for a few hours then leave by nightime hopeing that its given these hotheads some time to breathe and not commit more violent acts.
Unfortunately when that happens the kids that are selling drugs on the favella corners also have to leave, so it creates a backlog of drug selling. Ultimately this means that the drug dealers need to come into the more upscale places to continue selling until the police have left their favellas and that creates conflicts with the dealers that already "own" the blocks in the upscale neighborhoods, tension tends to build and more fights break out. It's an ugly cycle.
Note we ventured into this area because we met a local dude who had rented us the apt in Rio we are now staying at (for 4 days) and we met his kids and wife. Feeling pretty secure we went with him into the favella in the middle of the day to have beers in the local bar up there (next to the crime scene) pretty damn cool hearing all the stories of how these favellas work and the icing was watching the police circle with machine guns in hand. Sick...sick...sick...
The dude we were with, Marcelo, knows this area and knew that when the police are in there it is safe for "outsiders" to be in there. Interestinly enough a trip into the favellas cost tourist about 30 dollars each and all we had to do with our new friend was just be cool and drink some beers at the bar in there. We spent a solid 2.5 hours drinking and listening to his stories, we took off when he noticed the police had left the neighborhood because he couldn't guarantee that we'd be safe any longer. That was not good news to hear so Paula and I quickly made our way out, with his help.
So, Christ the almighty Reedeemer was today's tourist activity and tomorrow we are chillin out at Ipanema beach where all the beautiful women goto. I'll definitely be taking pics of the fine sand, water, and brazilian stringwear!!!


Sent by Jeffrey via BlackBerry from T-Mobile

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