Brazilians Part II

Ok, I was gonna make you all wait a little longer before I was gonna update "Brazilians" Part II, but I am too impatient.

I left off at...

The Tangas...

So, what is a Tanga? you may well be asking.

A book I read soon after I arrived in Rio de Janeiro gave possibly the best definition possible.

The book is called "How To Be A Carioca The alternative Guide for the Tourist in Rio, by Priscilla Ann Goslin (not the most Carioca of names) a woman who moved to Rio as a child.
In the book Priscilla makes very good observations about the "Carioca" that even my Carioca friends have had to have a good laugh at!

Anyway, to make a short story longer and in case you don't know, a Carioca is a native of the city of Rio de Janeiro. The nickname was given by the Tupi-Guarani Indians to the first white men who came to live in Rio de Janeiro: CARI (white man) + OCA (home).

Ok, so this is not a book review, but I like to give a bit of background to what the hell I am going on about, otherwise I mmay as well make this blog two lines long!

tanga ['tun gah]: tiny triangular pieces of material usually held together with strings. Worn by Carioca women as a bikini on the beach.

In fact, if you look back at the books cover picture you can see an illustration of what I am talking about!




Anyway, again as I was saying in the last blog...

If you look back at the beach you will see another beautiful sight too.

The Tanga...
... to be continued

And continue we shall...

I had always heard that in Brazil the women wear small bikinis and more or less I didn't doubt it. But my god...

That first day walking along the beach, I stood on a dying wasp and it stung me in the sole of my foot... I am not gonna lie and say it wasn't too bad, because it fucking hurt! So I decided to have a little sit down and whine to myself about my sore foot.

I had probably only been walking for about 2 minutes and I had been so enamoured by the skyline that I had neglected to really look at the people around me. But while i was sat there rubbing my tootsies, I looked over my shoulder...

and there was a bikini...

well, there was some of the bikini...

the rest had been gobbled by some beautiful monster!

In fact the vast majority of that bikini was internalised by the wearer I think!



But I remember bikinis from my holidays to Greece and France... the ones that cover the arse! Here they are after as much exposure as possible.

I have a little theory that the reason the bikinis here are so small is because unlike the beaches in Greece and France where almost every girl has her tits out (which I do not complain about), here it is illegal. So as a compromise, someone decided to make sure that these bikinis are as miniscule as possible, to maximise sun exposure.

My foot soon stopped hurting and I decided to go for a bit more of a walk. (After what I had just seen I probably should've taken a quick dip in the sea to calm down!) And it was whilst I was continuing my promenade along the beach that I realised something else about Brazilian women and the tanga...

I thought that the super tiny trinangles were only reserved for the super, fit bodied, young ladies on the beach...

This I have in fact found to be not exactly right.

The tanga is universal... I'm not gonna say one size fits all, but...

The fatties wear them too!

Brazilians Part I

I remember my first couple of days in Rio de Janeiro fondly.

After leaving the beautifully air conditioned plane that had brought me from New York, via Miami, I walked out to what can only be described as a furnace. I was still dressed in some of the clothes that I had been wearing to snowboard in about a week before. Basically I was in jeans, trainers, T-shirt, hoodie and snowboarding jacket... I also had on underwear. Luckily the airport terminal is air conditioned, otherwise I would've died from dehydration straight away.

Map of

Rio de Janeiro

I knew I had about two hours at the airport while I was waiting for Suzi (my now girlfriend) to come and meet me. I brushed my teeth after finally translating signs for toilets (Luckily, they also expect lazy english speakers to not understand any portuguese). and tried to squeeze all the excess clothing I had on into my already overstuffed bag and put on my flip-flops.

I was still smoking at this point and after a 10 hour or so total journey without nicotine (must remember to tell you about nicoteen) I decided to venture back out into the inferno (winter in portuguese is called "inverno") that was waiting!

It was hot!

One thing I will tell you about Rio, is even the kids begging outside the airport are really friendly, which after having been in the States and Canada for the previous couple of months was a refreshing change. In fact everyone was really friendly! Maybe they thought I was a rich american who was gonna give them all my excess dollars? Maybe they were wrong. But they did keep me entertained for a little bit, being fascinated by my i-pod, and doing the belly rubbing hungry look. but at the end of the day I am a cheap uncharitable bastard!

Oh and you will never have a problem finding a taxi here... everyone is offering one. What suprised me though was the helpfulness of the guys you said "no thanks" to. In particular there was one, Silvio, who kept on asking me if I needed a taxi, and eventually when he got the picture I was waiting for someone, he offered me the use of his cel-phone to call. I think that is something that is known as great hospitality!

Eventually Suzi arrived we got on the bus and she started pointing out things to me of interest. I will always remember that first journey to her apartment from the airport, because I did not speak any portuguese and I think Suzi was very nervous speaking english, so we communicated in a combo of english, pictionary and sign language (and I was convinced that she wouldn't like me).

Seeing the favelas that we passed on the way I realised that this was a completely different place to any I had ever known.

Later that day, Suzi was busy with writing her theses, so I decided to leave her in peace and take a walk along the local beach.

Praia (beach) do Flamengo is about a 5-10 minute walk from the apartment. When I arrived there it was still really hot, maybe about 3pm so I decided to take a walk up and down the beach to take in the views.

and what views are there!

View of

Pão de Açucar

from

Praia do

Flamengo
From Praia do Flamengo you can see across most of the Bay of Guanabara, which includes in its skyline Pão de Açucar (Sugarloaf Mountain), Niterói and the nearby national airport. If you look back at the beach you will see another beautiful sight too.

The Tanga...

...to be continued