Many Faces of Rio

Tuesday, March 21, 2017

A busy day, and lots to tell.  But first the warnings.  We were warned to wear no jewelry, no watches, to not carry our passports but only copies, and to carry little money, only our room key-card and a credit card and a few dollars in local currency.   Pickpockets and robberies are everyday things, and we are not to look like we are worth robbing.

But perhaps the strongest warning was on a card in our room:

We awoke early to sunrise over Copacabana Beach outside our hotel window:

  

After breakfast we took the train up Cocovado Mountain to visit the colossal Christ the Redeemer statue at the top.  Christ’s arms are extended in a welcome/blessing to all of Rio.  The statue is truly massive, 96 feet tall on a 26-foot pedestal!  His arms stretch 92 feet wide:

The views from the top of Cocovado are spectacular.  There were some clouds moving in and out, but these will give an idea.  In this view you can see the lagoon where crew races were held during the Olympics: 

In this view, Sugarloaf Mountain can be seen:

A word about favelas.  These are ramshackle shantytowns which may or may not be authorized, where poor people live without any social services.  Our guide tries to put a favorable slant on everything, and she claims that 95% of favela residents have fresh water, electricity, and sewage.  They can be seen all over Rio, mostly on mountainsides, climbing up above the nicer areas to live.  This one was easily seen from Cocovado Mountain:

Here’s another we saw in another part of town: 

Rio also suffers from a terrible graffiti problem: 

The “new” cathedral, dedicated to St. Sebastian and built in the 1960s, is in what was described as “brutalist” style in concrete:

The interior is vast and, to me, not very welcoming:

A very large cross hangs down from the ceiling suspended in the middle of the space:

After leaving the cathedral we went to the site of the recent Olympics, where there is a giant mural done by a street artist named “Kobra”.  This mural portrays aboriginal individuals from each of the five continents represented by countries in the games.  It was very impressive:

Adjacent to the site of the Olympics is the Museu do Amanhã or Museum of Tomorrow, a science museum designed by Santiago Calatrava, in front of which is a giant “Rio Te Amo”, the equivalent of “I Love New York”.

 We walked a while in the very crowded streets of Rio’s downtown, where no one is dressed up for business.  Our guide told us that dress is extremely casual here, and we saw that slacks and an open-neck shirt seems to be the everyday business dress for men.  When not working, dress for men and women could easily be a bathing suit and a t-shirt, she said. 

We had lunch at a famous café, Confeitaria Colombo, which dates from 1894: 

After lunch, we had an introduction to Carnival in Rio.  This is a year-round project, with “schools” of neighborhood participants who prepare the floats, costumes, percussion bands and the dancing for the following year’s competition.  Each school has 4000-5000 members, 300+ musicians, and the preparations are amazing.  We visited a series of warehouses which serves just one school.  This year’s floats are being dismantled, and planning for next year is underway: 

 Some of the costumes are incredibly elaborate:

  

We had a chance to try on some of the costumes: 

We were like little kids playing dress-up. 

This evening Joyce and I walked Copacabana Beach.  Sewage is a problem here, and the smells were not consistent with the beautiful views.  Tomorrow we see Rio from the water as we go out on Guaranaro Bay.  More then.