No Ritmo Paulista

May 27th, 2007 Posted by Tiff

The taxi driver was waiting for me at the airport with a sign saying:

Tiffaldo nunes zico frangozinho edmilson de escocia.

You know you’re in Brasil when you’re on the Ayrton Senna motorway section
and the driver is speeding
You know your jetlagged when your trying to turn the aircon on with the TV remote
and swearing in portugenglish

So I went straight to our hangout cafe I’m just going to called it cheers from now on (but of course pron. ’sheerz’)

Aonde todo o mundo sabe o nome (where everybody knows your name). The professores of portuguese weren’t there but some hot brasilian chicks (no, not the ones on the grill) and a steak sandwich helped me get into o ritmo Paulisto.

Bought some great cashew nuts, three brahmas and here I am in the hotel room and the church on the road opposite is playing weird troublefunk style 80s funk as people leave. I’m loving the funk church! I’ve done the decent thing on my first night and retired with crazy brasilian TV on and beer in front of me.

Legao!

Channel-hopping it seems that football coverage of 23 hours per day is a legal requirement, I’ve got zero issues with that. On other channels o film presente de grande star de Hollywood…Samuel el Jackson… Serpente o Aborde… Classic!

Theres something about the names of films translated into weird languages that is just great.

Next day the sun comes up and we hit the ground running. Toot-toot we weave through the traffic which sounds like a weird automobile brass section symphony as everyone in Sao Paolo just seems to use it like a friendly ‘oi’!

We walk out of Perdizes district and into the winding back streets. Up on a balcony in the capoeira house the mestre is leaning out and shaking his chekere. As you do. Feeling happily in time with the city’s ritmo we stop for a Brahma (it’s thirsty work doing reportage in Brasil) and take time to engage in Brasil’s main pastime. No, not samba or futebol, it’s people watching. Meanwhile the poster behind me states: ‘it’s party time’. Who am I to disagree?

Theres some goddamn chickens on this plane! O frango soltando e aborde!

Every TV in Brasil it seems is currently showing the same footage of Romario’s 1000th goal over and over again. It’s hypnotically mind-bending like being induced into a football cult. A bit like Brasil in that respect.Mind you, when you consider Diego Maradona only managed around 330, you’d have to say it’s not bad really… I still wouldn’t swap either of them for Henrik though.

On the balcony we tuck into some duty free and watch the sun go down behind the skyscrapers and appreciate the vastness of the city. It just goes and on and on. The weird thing is that your sense of this gigantopopolis (that isn’t a word btw but it should be) creeps up you only after a while and it seems smaller at first, the complete opposite of my experience of all other big cities so far in my life. Barcelona, Joburg, Cape Town, Kampala, Nairobi, Norwich. Never been to Swindon. Wonder if its like Sao Paolo without the caipirinhas…

Entry Filed under: Stories