So, I forgot some happenings from Friday nights return trip. We get in the car and start heading home, making our way onto the highway. Carlos points to a grouping of buildings ahead in the distance, and says “Over there is where lots of prossistutes …?”
“Prostitutes?” “Yes, prostitutes, that’s where they stand” “We call that our red light district,” I said. I thought that was that.
The car took the exit and I assumed he was going to the gas station. But when we again veered to the right, I found myself in a car driving through Campinas’ Whoreville. It was a series of clubs that looked like abandoned olive gardens and boardwalk tourist shops. Each one blared American pop music: Rihanna, Black Eyed Peas, and most fittingly, Lady Gaga (If you are into that stuff). Two days later, when having lunch with Mari, she mentioned how she hasn’t found clubs in Curitiba that play American pop music, and I stopped myself from asking if she’s checked its red light district.
In front of each club was a grouping of several courtesans, well, looking at the clientele, I guess strumpets fits better. Hos. Actually if there is ever a word to look up in Oxford English Thesaurus it’s prostitute: Tart, Moll, fille de joie, scarlet woman, camp follower (awesome), cocotte, trollop, woman of ill repute (which is usually best seen in reference to Andrew Jackson’s wife), and, finally, wench. I used to say wench a lot when I was little because of the movie “The Cable Guy.” It seems it was inappropriate.
If I were to rank these prostitutes attractiveness to those in HBO specials, I suppose I’d give the nod to Brazil. All are over-makeup’ed, covered in a minimal amount of leather (understandable) fashioned in a cowgirl fitting (inexplicable). I wondered if prostitute fashion in the cinema classic Pretty Woman was art imitating life, or if the movie set off a whole new wave of prostitute fashion.
It’s hard to gauge what I was feeling driving through. It seemed long. It was probably 7 or 8 minutes. Carlos pointed and laughed at them. I was scared to make eye contact, I was nervous about having my window halfway down, and any time we were stopped because of traffic, my heart started pounding. I don’t know Portuguese! If they come up to the window how will these trollops know I’m rejecting them? I should’ve brought my knife.
The buildings were eventually closer than they appeared, but alas were now in my side mirror.
“I don’t like prostitutes,” Carlos said.
I decided I didn’t either.
We hit the side road, those wonderful potholed roads in the middle of nowhere, as to avoid the insanely expensive tolls. Halfway through, Carlos pulls over, “I pee”. Great idea, I was about to burst. Let me say, you haven’t relieved yourself until you’ve relieved yourself on a dirt road in Brazil looking up at the sparkling sky. Zero light pollution. Satisfaction in peeing somewhere you’ve never peed before. What a country.
Saturday was now my last day in Indaiatuba. I woke up, and Ana’s mom was leaving for Campinas for the weekend. She said her good byes, told me this was my home and if I ever needed her to call her. Carlos took me to a bakery for breakfast. The coffee seemed like it was cappuccino. The bread was delicious. A crispy, toasted ham and cheese sandwich, bread and butter and pao de quiejo.
We then were going to head to Bracas, but I’ll double check the name. It was two hours away, and apparently very, very beautiful. I would confirm this later. Ana’s mother started fake hitting him because she was jealous she couldn’t go. I was excited. We first headed to Campinas and picked up his girlfriend. Then made our way. En route, I tried to think of the best way to describe inland Brazil. The strangest part is it always seems like at the tallest part. You can always see for miles, in a cool way. Not in the Kansas-I-can-see-for-30-miles-but-you-can’t-tell-the-difference way, but seeing many rolling hills, some of them covered in farmland, some covered in houses. Palm trees sprout up in collections, and the occasional orange grove is passed.
We entered Bracas, a really charming small town with cobblestone roads and many shops in it’s downtown. It seemed in a valley of a bunch of farmland. Carlos walked in to a shop. It was a nature adventure shop, I guess. Zip lining, rafting, and kayaking. He came out and asked if I wanted to go rafting. Of course I did. I mean, I was a bit nervous only because I’d been rafting before. A key component is the dialogue with the other raft-mates and river guide. I wasn’t going to be able to hear the story that follows “when did you start doing this” and the tour guide speaks of working a 9-5 job before giving it all up to get back to nature. I was going to be sitting in silence, like an asshole.
We get on the bus. It was rowdy, laughter and jokes, I assume, erupting from the back. Carlos was talking to one of the river guides. His girlfriend passed me the bug lotion. Thank God, looking back. Some of the pot holes this bus had to go over reminded me of the Simpsons monorail episode written by Conan O’Brien, where Marge wanted to fix up main st., and it cut to a scene of cars just driving into a gigantic never ending pit. But somehow only ¼ of the bus fell in every time.
I step off the bus and acknowledge a thick collection of forest west of me that is likely where the river is. The aforementioned rolling Brazilian hills surround me, but this time more pristine. These hills seem to take on different colors from the sky. An assorted mix of trees I’d never seen before. Shaped like conifers, instead of needles, puffs of tiny heart shaped leaves burst out of the branches.
The river guides went through a long speech on safety I didn’t understand. We then had 10 minutes of calisthenics. Not sure why. Then we got in the raft. It was beautiful. The water was clean, trees and vines hung over. As opposed to Colorado white water rafting, in the middle of mountains and with many rocks as obstacles. The rapids here were just tiny waterfalls, a quick drop off. Still fun.
The best was an area where the rapids were shallow; you could lay on your back and slide down through them. And we did. And then to the right of this was a large waterfall through the trees. And above the waterfall was a family of monkeys, you know, swinging through trees. And above them, toucans flew into the tree. It was overwhelming. Brazilian waterfall in the middle of a jungle with monkeys above that and then toucans appear. It thought King Louis might just jump out too! Hahahahahahahah
One somewhat creepy thing, was though we were seemingly in the middle of nowhere, twice there were just men crouched over on the riverbank staring blankly. One in a pair of Chinos and blue-and-white striped polo, the other in what appeared to be scrubs sponsored by Viagra.
They put up the rafts, and waiting for us was not only a sunset behind the hills, but a bottle of cachaça. Carlos’ girlfriend, who did a wonderful job translating for me on the raft, got me a tiny Dixie cup full of it. It was warm, and strong going down, but it tasted accomplished. There was something perfect about a ritual of a group of strangers coming together over a bottle after a trip down a river, in the middle of a sunset. We headed on the bus, the river guides refilled everyone’s cup. And the back of the bus sang, hit it:
Glory Glory Hallelujah
Glory Glory Hallelujah
Glory Glory Hallelujah
Dyah blah dyah dah bah vahhhh
(Scattered laughter)
Good stuff Mags, you really should give the prostitutes another try though.
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