Diamantina (Sunday)

View all my photos of Diamantina here

Since one of the reasons for coming to Diamantina was to take some photos, I was up very early to walk up the hill above the town to see what the dawn would bring. Yesterday evening I had calculated that the sun would come up behind the cathedral's spires - and sure enough it soon did, first timorously behind a curtain of roiling grey clouds on the far horizon, then in in a blaze of reds and yellows that fired up the sky.

Lazy high clouds were shot through with the molten power of the sun's hot rays; a foretelling of the hot day to come.

Then ever so quickly the sky turned the palest of pastel dove grey as a screen of misty clouds broke away from the cliffs on the other side of the valley. The sun's strength took pause as the burst of fire waned to a soft yellow light that gently touched the façades of the houses and hostels.

Within almost no time, this being the tropics, the sun was up high, the sky had turned blue and the once-grey film of clouds a bright fluffy white. For a moment still the light was still soft, but then it was gone; windows shone, shadows lengthened.

I strolled past Chica da Silva's house again, this time the dark green window frames warmed in the morning's light. Wondered down past the church to the square where another is being reburbished.

There a man was sitting on a stone plinth, catching the early rays. And as is the habit in country places, we exchanged good mornings. I shot a couple of photos of Valdemar, as he turned out to be named, we both decided they weren't very good, so I shot another, which wasn't very good either. He told me about the Camino dos Escravos (The Slaves' Road), that lead from Diamantina through the district at the bottom of the valley, where he lived, and up over the cliffs on the other side a further 20km to where the main fields once were. Something more to do then!

I checked the time. It was barely 8am. So, back to the Pousada for breakfast - grape juice, coffee, coconut cake and pao de queijo, little balls of cheesebread that I adore.

---oo0oo---

I wandered around town some more, then took a taxi out of Diamantina, down the valley through the district where Valdemar lives, up to the big cross that is set on the highest point of the cliffs opposite the town.

Nilton, the truck driver turned cab driver, waved me on as I scrambled out of the cab. 'Take your time, don't hurry. I'm happy to sit here and wait for you'. Yes, well he doesn't know I'm the type of guy who can wait all the time it takes for what I hope is the right moment to take a photo (or ten). Fortunately we fixed the price for the trip before leaving, which I'm sure is inflated for just these moments.

Up here by the concrete and iron hooped cross, the view is wide open. I'm standing on a sharp ridge, one of several, its steep rocky escarpment tumbling down to the left and towards Diamantina in front of me, a rounded hunch curling away on the other. The rocks are grey and flaked, looking rather like old, worn away concrete from a century ago. The scattered clouds paint a pattern of shadows over the town as I shoot for the sunnier gaps. Nilton is going to have to be patient...

From the cross we followed the top of the ridge, keeping the valley on the left. Not much further one there was a graveled parking area. 'The Camino dos Escravos runs across this road.' said Nilton. 'To the right there's no access but to the left, down that cleft there, you can see the road they made. And don't bother about me, you can take your time here too.'

This part of the road is a wide stone road of surprisingly robust construction. Its more like a ramp, made of heavy stones and built up in parts to keep the surface level where the hillsides fall away. This was obviously made for carriages to be drawn up, not a simple pathway for mules and slaves to toil their way to pan for diamonds for the Crown of Portugal (from the 1720s diamond mining was a Crown monopoly). Walking down it the 500 or so meters I did is no effort, but I'm out of breath walking back up. A small stream gurgles by the roadside; no doubt many a slave and freeman took a gulp of the rust tinged water. And checked to see if that glint was a diamond, not just the sun playing tricks with the cascade.

A circuit back into town and I thanked Nilton for the ride. He didn't hesitate to give me his card, if ever I was back here again. This is a custom of cab drivers here; I appreciate the initiative.

---oo0oo---

The squares in town were all quite empty and most of the stores were shuttered still. It being Sunday, many of the townspeople were in the cathedral, their choruses clearly audible. Strangely, its seems that only the cathedral was open - all the other churches were grimly closed too, as though they also observed the shopkeepers' hours.

In one street the manager of one enterprising tourist store has laid out fresh coffee for passers by to enjoy, courtesy of the store. I do, of course, and I buy a couple of trinkets for the house, of course. As intended and a pleasure. Just over the alleyway another lady is selling biscuits and cake. To her left a band of four musicians is hitting the notes of what is clearly a well known local song. They switch over to 'Parabens pra voce', the Brazilian words for, and sung to the same tune as, 'Happy birthday to you'. One of the people walking through jumps with surprise and her friends start clapping - its her birthday, and the band were told of it.

Old Maria Teresinha sits on the steps of the bookstore smiling at a small boy who's sitting there with her. They could be relations, but no, Maria Teresinha was married once but never had children; this is the small son of the store manager.

---oo0oo---

Going back to the Pousada I find that the owners are there. I compliment them on the beauty of the place, only to find that he is the fourth generation Nascimento, great-grandson of the assayer who first owned the house, and his wife is the daughter of a local writer and photographer, Couto (who's book I had riffled through just after breakfast).

Now there's one thing I want to buy, but I haven't found it yet. At tea yesterday and breakfast today, fine lace doilies with heavy beads sewn along the rims were placed over the dishes of food and jugs of juice to stop flies crawling in. Now I know what those things are for! Where can I buy some? 'Oh you can't, these aren't made in stores - my grandmother made them', said the Senhora. What a graceful touch, something from the family used to make a guest's stay more agreeable. 'Ah but if you go to this store,' Senhor Nascimento says, holding out a card for me to take, 'then you may find some interesting artisan work there'.

The store is just along the street so I stop by. I explain my need to Rosa, one of the shopkeepers. 'No, we don't have those. We do have normal lace placers, if you like those'. I take a look, paint a rim of heavy beads stitched around them in my mind's eye. 'I'll have four please!' Rosa packages them up while Christiane, her colleague, complains about the cold. 'Yes it does get quite cold here in the winter time', she replies when I ask the question. Then we get into where I'm from and how can I support this heat.

---oo0oo---

I walk down to the square where the public market is, with its red painted horse posts. There a small restaurant is open (I had a beer there yesterday), so I have lunch - the usual steak with fries, rice and some sauces - and a cold beer. That's three in a week - record!

It's too early to walk up to the Rodoviaria, so seeing others sitting there, including the cab driver, I clamber into the shade along one line of stores by the cathedral. Nilton leaves and the person he was talking to asks where I'm from. 'Norway', I reply, 'do you know where it is?'. 'Certainly I do! I'm from Greece!'.

Athanasios emigrated with his four elder brothers to Brazil from a dirt poor existence in the Peloponnese way back in 1958, when he was 18. What brought them over was a merchant who knew his eldest brother and suggested Brazil to them when the last great wave of emigration to Brazil occurred in the late 50s and early 60s. Eventually he and some of his brothers wound up in Diamantina, shopkeepers. As we talked his daughter drove by and stopped; she had just come back from a vacation to the coast. He told me that he had been back to Greece three years ago, and was amazed by how it had changed in fifty years. As we gazed out over Diamantina's placid, landlocked plaza, he went silent for a while, the lines in his tanned face just a little more tense.

Soon we all had to go our ways, me to the Rodoviaria and the six hour bus ride back to Belo Horizonte.

---oo0oo---

The coach turned up on time, I managed to get a window seat again. With the glass slid right back I could see the broad open country turn to bare hill top, to grazing land, to pasture land and to farming land. Locals clambered aboard and clambered down again as their stops came up. One of them I recognized from Saturday, when he also ridden a short ways on the coach. He looked the image of the classic Brazilian ranch hand, curled up hat and bright blue jeans.

Just after the stop in Curvelo the last of the light died and the rest of the way was in soft night of the Brazilian hill country. My iPod held out all the way as I watched 'Amor en el Tiempo de Colera', a film that manages to miss every spark of Garcia Marquez' magic and doesn't even have its own softness like 'Para Agua comc Chocolate'.

Back in the apartment and I begin sorting out the almost 700 photos I've shot in little more than 36 hours.

---oo0oo---

Diamantina (Saturday)

View all my photos of Diamantina here

'Thanks for the ride', I say to the driver as I'm leaving the bus. 'Just three questions though, if I may? Thanks. Does the bus leave from here also? And its at 15:30 tomorrow, right? Last one - where's the old part of town? Straight down the hill. Down that street there. That steep street just there. Well, thanks again!'

So, down the steep street it is then, though I haven't a clue where its going. All I can see is a bare, rocky ridge across the valley beyond.

The driver was right! Round a big curve I can begin to see terracotta roofs, a patchwork of pastel and there, the twin spires of the cathedral. Instead of being built along the hill's spine, old Diamantina was built slip-sliding down the hill's steep slope. Must have been to avoid the bleak wind that must blow in the winter, to be that bit closer to the river for water - and to search for the first diamonds, washed out of cracks in the rocks by the rains, lying there a million years waiting for a man's hand to reach out and grasp them tight.

The sun still sizzled in the late afternoon air, refreshingly light as the town sits 1200 meters above sea level. There's always something special about being high up in the tropics; all of the color, richness and variety of the verdant lowlands mixed in with the luminance of a high sky and clear mountain freshness.

Walked around the town to get my feel of the place, shoot some afternoon photos before the sun faded away over the mountain's ridge behind the town, and find a place to stay for the night. But five days ago the place had been a-bustle with Carnival; now life was concentrated in a small square between two bars. And noisy too, as though the people didn't want the buzz to die away too quickly.

As in all of the places on the Estrada Real, the old Royal Road that once lead from Rio de Janeiro and Paraty to just this place, the town's success is expressed by its baroque churches and trader's timberframe houses. Diamantina is of the same epoque as Ouro Preto but, like a diamond, it is more expressively lighter than gold. The streets in both tumble down the hillside, but Diamantina's streets tend to be broader. The churches are pastel, not bold. The houses are wood-and-brick, not wood-and-stone. Same, but different. A delightful unmatching pair.

---oo0oo---

One of the houses I especially sought out was the house of Chica da Silva. Depending on your (in Brazil, often ethnic) point of view, Chica was a heroine or a scandal. Either way, she remains famous 200 years after her death. What she did was, become the provincial governor's companion and bear him several children. Correct, they didn't marry. They could have, but convention wouldn't permit it. You see, she had once been a slave (the governor had bought her and freed her). She was African. And she had had children by her previous owners. Including a priest (well, he would, wouldn't he). Count the scandals!


Not that this apparently bothered her much - or the governor. When she was denied access to one of the local churches, as the legend goes, the governor had one put up right next to her house (I checked - there's a crucifix over the carriage gateway but no identifiable chapel, and the church the Governor did built is down the ways a bit),

Why is this important to me? The second time I lived in Brazil one of the many (eternal) soap operas running on TV that I used to learn the language from was about Chica da Silva. Really well played with the necessary dash of courage, calculation and charisma. And the only soap opera before or since with an African as main character. My five years in Africa and the experiences I saw there and in many places since always, always makes me sensitive to unfair and false discrimination. So, of course, I fell for Chica's story way back - and had to find her house, once I knew it was here.

The house is now a museum. With hardly anyone there I roamed around the rooms, courtyard and garden at will (there are grapevines here - the first I've ever seen in Brazil!). The lower rooms have a paltry collection of broken plates dating from recent times, nothing to do with Chica. The upper rooms have great planks of mahogany for their flooring (I adore this). A few items of furniture from the time (maybe) and several paintings by the same artist depicting Chica in various guises, which if I read correctly are the Seven Deadly Sins. Well, we know which side of the fence this artist is on, anyway. And the local tourist board, despite the tourist Real the legend brings in.

---oo0oo---

The sun was going down quickly now, so I went back to the Pousada (hostel/inn in the old sense of the word) I thought looked the most interesting and attractive, checked in and found it a delight. Would you believe this place still serves a complimentary tea with cakes at sunset? Wondrous! Hospitality!

A fast hike back up the hill to take the very last shots possible before twilight closed in, then back to the Pousada for a delectable orange tea and coconut cake in the enclosed courtyard.

At the end, the inn's attendant invited me and some fellow guests up from Rio (the ladies' loud nasal voices gave them away) to take a small 'tour' of the little museum set up in the house. In this spacious room was set out the story of panning for diamonds (here they were all alluvial, not mined as in Africa or Australia), with equipment and a small diorama. Think panning for gold and you have it. Also on display were the assayer's and jeweler's tools, this because the house once belonged to the Nascimentos, assayers and jewelers in the the diamond trade.

Quick turn around the town in the evening, just to discover that it mostly closes down as the night closes in. Then bed, in an old wooden room with mahogany floorboards, large mahogany bed, fresh white sheets, embroidered coverlet, soft fluffy pillows and the gentlest of cool breezes rustling the white linen curtains as I left the sash windows open. Memorable.

Somewhere in the distance a telephone was ringing (and not being answered) constantly.

---oo0oo---

The Road to Diamantina

View all my photos of Diamantina here

I had tried to travel to Diamantina during the Carnival period but the coaches were full and so ,the teller told me, were the hotels. Which turned out for the best as I found there was work to do anyway. So Friday evening I returned to the Rodoviaria to buy a return ticket for the weekend.

Bright and early on Saturday therefore (not so bright and early as when I went to Ouro Preto, but respectably bright and early) I found myself sitting once again by a window seat, gazing out at the countryside as we headed north for Diamantina.

Why go to Diamantina? Because of all the diamonds there, of course. Well, not quite - the town gets its name from the diamonds washed into deposits by the cascading rivers and streams, first found by the same people who found gold in Ouro Preto around 300 years ago. Nowadays its the town they built that draws people, rather than the diamond industry itself, which still exists but is industrialized and remote from the everyday life of the Diamantinines (not Diamantines, though it sounds way easier).

---oo0oo---

Heading north meant heading into much different terrain than the way south to Ouro Preto and Congonhas. No mountains and deep ravines here - this part of the world has been settled by ranchers and foresters, with the occasional steel mill thrown in. There are more small towns too, and rarely the view is devoid of some sort of habitation.

After the relatively steep hills around Belo Horizonte, the land softens, with more gentle open rolling hills. There seems to be an equal mix of open countryside, grazing land, crops (mostly maize/corn) and plantations of eucalyptus. Roll back a couple of hundred years (or less) and these lands must have been woodland, strip burned away like the Amazon basin continues to be today. Past Caetanopolis the earth is as red as South Africa or northern Queensland - rusty laterite full of iron - hence the steel foundries, islands among the plantations of trees.

These transplanted Australian eucalyptus are set so close together that nothing lives underneath their high canopies; only the outermost trees are fully leaved, making each planted section look like a shaggy, upturned box. With their slender, silvereen trunks its like looking through an elven forest. Wish I could stop to wander through, but the coach presses on.

---oo0oo---

Three hours we have traveled non-stop. Now the scenery is much more open, almost savannah. We roll into a town called Curvelo, which seems to be in the heart of rancher territory. Fifteen minutes to stretch legs, have a coffee, check up on the soccer matches screened on wall mounted TVs. Not much of the town to see in that time - plus the Rodoviaria is not centrally located. Back up into the coach and off again.

From now on right up to Diamantina the coach would stop at several places along the road; obviously this is one of the 'local' buses. The people coming aboard are the farming people and small town traders, young and old, just going a short ways down the road. They are regulars; they all know the driver, the conductor and each other.

Soon after Curvelo we slipped off the main road into a place called Ita......, a country town where houses are for the most part kept prettily clean, the public lawns are flowered and waters, their curbstones painted white and tree trunks daubed with quicklime. The same in Gouveia too, a place just a little larger than Ita... just up the road - almost like the towns in Morocco, with the sun brightening the green and white alike.

---oo0oo---

Between Curvelo and Gouveia the land changes quickly and dramatically. The grasslands give way to rough land spiked with singular grey boulders and broad green ficus bushes. Not that the cattle mind much; they are still tranquilly roaming around, three strands of barbed wire keeping them from short-lived freedom.

Then the stones coalesce into rocky outcrops and the lush vegetation falls right away. I can see miles and miles into the distance, like across the grimly bare hills of Scotland. These are the Brazilian highlands, broad expanses of land that never were jungle (too high for that), but some sort of steppe land, with isolated ranches stretching the land to its utmost as they raise cattle. No wonder the beef here tastes so good.

We slip between treeless plateaux and green river vales, eventually coming over the last ridge and into Diamantina. The little town of Diamonds.

---oo0oo---

Ouro Preto

View all my photos of Ouro Preto here

Up early to walk down through deserted streets once more to the Rodoviaria, this time for Ouro Preto.

Ouro Preto (Black Gold) was once called Vila Rica (Rich Town) because its entire reason for existing was as a result of finding gold in the hills around it in the mid 1700s. If I recall correctly, the fist gold was alluvial; the gold diggers soon had their slave gangs burrowing inside the hills for more. If you have ever seen fotos of the army of 'garimpeiros', men covered by the mud of sluiced down hillsides as they scrabble for nuggets, then this was the true face of Ouro Preto.

Even now, as the bus screams around every curve of the highway on the way to Ouro Preto (I'm sure all bus drivers here think they are White Rabbits, convinced they are late, terribly late), I can see that there is mining activity in the region. Now of course its a more industrial affair - open mechanical strip mining owned and managed by the state/federal government. The gold diggers sit in public offices now.

While the road to Congonhas slipped through hilly country, the road to Ouro Preto is altogether more mountainous. Nowadays the views are quite open, the still forested valleys releasing a long breath of mist as the sun begins to warm up the air. Imagine what it was like 300 years ago when the first of those enterprising sons of Sao Paulo, the 'Bandeirantes' (Bannermen) who were the first colonists to strike inland, struggled through wild, original jungle forest, slashing a path to their El Dorado without ever being able to get to a viewpoint to see where they really were.

The forest around Ouro Preto is long gone; cleared for settlement and grazing. The city itself is picture perfect, a traditional Portuguese fishing village transported whole and plopped down entire and complete in a tropical heartland. Literally the only things missing are the cry of seagulls and the roll of the ocean.

The people who built it up were, of course, the wealthy mineowners and the merchant who settled in the town to sell the provisions miners needed - assay offices, equipment, slaves. With their surfeit of wealth the place became a boom town, like Manaus, Klondike and Potosí. People settled, families were born, ladies of the household wanted the latest fashion and the Church was graced by the building of several edifices in splendid late Baroque style.

Which is where Aleijandinho's father comes into the story, emigrating from what would have been a relatively poor existence in Portugal to Brazil because his skills as carpenter were sorely needed in the construction of what we see today. Rather like a Brit going to Dubai nowadays (or yesterday, nowadays being what they are).

---oo0oo---

Since the bus left Belo at 6am, I'm here in Ouro Preto quite early - 8am - which was as planned so I could shoot some photos at a cooler and more interesting time of day. The sun was climbing fast in the sky, but on the other hand its power was often mitigated by many clouds, some almost Alpine in white fluffiness, others dirty grey laundry suds glowering with menace. A typical summer's day in Minas Gerais then.

I wandered around the streets, plazas and terraces, snapping away. One of the most unusual natural features is a cone of rock perched high up on the mountain opposite the town, its singular shape and oblique angle making it look like an elongated darvish's cap or, to be current, like an alien spacecraft crashed as in the movie Independence Day.

Ouro Preto also holds a Carnival, but unlike Rio with its regimented samba parade or Salvador with its trios blaring samba from truck drawn floats, Ouro seems to be an altogether more informal affair. Here college students (from where, I don't know) rent apartments/rooms and set up 'Republicas', complete with logo and banner fixed to balconies, where they revel and use as a base station during the festival.

At 8am of course, only a couple of diehards were still a-reveling. Most were in their Republics sleeping Saturday off, and not a few had chosen to let the sun of Sunday raise them from where they laid themselves to rest on the Saturday night - whether that be parapets, doorways or the cobblestones of the main plaza itself. The more professional drunks were recognizable not only by their disheveled appearance, but also by the blisters of too much time spent sprawled under the unforgiving sun.

Between scrambling over walls and things, I broke for breakfast, which was a truly delightful coffee with green cardamom (tossed in whole - I'll remember that) and a warn cake of raisins and cinnamon soaked in a sugary syrup. I have to find the recipe to that - it's unforgettably good.

Walked around the streets some more, which by now were beginning to come alive as shutters opened and the perkier of the students began the day. By 11am the sun was strong and the clouds had declared a truce. I headed for the best point in town to watch the town and its people - the platform on which the column to Tiradentes stands.

When my body said 'enough already with sitting on a stone!' I moved off and walked around some more, snapping shots of people. By 2pm the whole town was buzzing with the expectation of the excitement to come. The street stalls and solo traders were open by now, with sizzling skewers and caipirinha, hot dogs and icy beer for all. Soon after the music started up, not live - that was for later, in the evening - but the 'classic' pop and samba songs that got people jigging (too early for the full-blown everyone-together samba that marks Carnival here).

A convoy of police vans arrived, the visibly unhappy cops piled out and went their different ways to make sure the crows stayed happy but safe. At several key points several of them clambered up to temporary observation posts set in the plaza and principal streets. Actually not a bad idea - I haven't seen this at other events and it makes sense. Rather like the beach guards in Australia checking for rip tides and sharks.

In the late afternoon I could see heavy clouds heading fast for Ouro Preto. I also felt my face and forearms to be unnaturally hot and sensitive (I was sunburned!). So, after being the subject of a quick interview by a local TV station (as one of the few foreigners here I was collared by an enterprising and lovely reporter) and snapping some photos of people who asked them of me, I headed back to the bus station. No, I didn't stay for the night's revelries. I thought about it, but all the local pousadas (hotel/hostel/B+B rolled into one) looked full and I wasn't going to spend a night in the streets.

By 8pm I was back in Belo, rolling through the 300+ photos I had taken.

Ouro Preto is a pretty place, and one of the very few that ever were in Brazil. It feels automatically familiar to anyone who has spent time in the Latin/Mediterranean region, a human sized place of wood, stucco and balconies cascading over green hills.

If this were in Europe it would be like Portofino, an expensive locale for wealthy people to buy a small apartment, its streets filled with high quality artisan work and day tourists. In a sense its more lovely than that, as Brazilians don't hold such places in the same regard, the money generally going on a beachfront high rise apartment, or in a villa in Buzios, or a gated community in Florida. So it is entirely personable. If it were by the sea, then it would be a place to live in.

---oo0oo---

Congonhas

View all my photos of Congonhas here

This is Carnival weekend - five days of non-stop celebration. Unfortunately I'm not in one of the more 'established' centers to enjoy Carnival - Belo is not Rio or Salvador - and thanks to work impediments I wasn't able to book ahead to go somewhere interesting - all full or way too expensive at short notice.

So I resolved to do some day trips based from Belo - and from here its easy to visit the colonial era towns of Minas Gerais. Most of these were developed during the 'Gold Rush' of the second half of the 1700's; places like Ouro Preto and Diamantina.

My first stop, today, was to Congonhas, a small town on the Royal Road that connected Sao Paulo and Rio to the heartland of mining territory. Congonhas do Campo is special for one reason (and one reason alone), namely the Basilica and its surrounding statues scullpted by Aleijandinho, Brazil's native born baroque era sculpltor.

I've been here before, way back in Easter 1996. Then I was with Marcia and we were doing a tour of the region. So this is 'known' territory. Not having, or wanting, a rental car, I took the coach.

---oo0oo---

Since Brazil doesn't have a rail network to speak of many coach operators fill the gap. These all leave from the same terminal in each serviced town; it looks like each operator has an exclusive route, with the exception of travel to principal cities.

I'd checked out the 'Rodoviaria' in Belo on Friday night to see where it was and how it worked. On Friday, thanks to the start of the long Carnival weekend, the queues were wound around people waiting for departures and even out of the doors. Saturday morning turned out to be easier, but many departures were full already.

I booked a trip to Ouro Preto for Sunday and, given there was probably time enough, bought a ticket for the trip to Congonhas today. In the fifty minutes of waiting I walked around the terminal building seeing what I could shoot with my little pocket camera. Not easy, with the press of people and the scarse neon lighting in what is a low dark hall - Niemeyer's heavy concrete hand is everywhere in public buildings here, constructing caves where there could be light.

The coach turned up almost on time and departed quite quickly. Clean, comfortable with reclining seats and enough room for legs too. Most of the passengers were headed to Congonhas, returning home or to visit relatives for the Carnival.

Since Congonhas is south of Belo we passed by where the offices are, which felt kind of weird. Soon we were beyond the city limits and into steep hill country. Never mountainous, just very hilly. The road was wide most of the way, all the more room for the driver to zip around, given that he intended to stick to the schedule at all costs. We stopped at a couple of other small towns before arriving in Congonhas itself. A short taxi ride and I was up the hill by Aleijandinho's basilica.

There is a dispute about whether or not Aleijandinho ever existed, or if he did whether he ever did what is ascribed to him, or whether he did it solo or as part of a local studio. The story is that Antonio Lisboa was born in Ouro Preto of a Portuguese carpenter and his African slavewoman, raised with the children of his father's official family (presumably white) - so he is the archetypal Brazilian and the true reason why he exists. From these beginnings he learned his father's skills, joined a studio in Ouro Preto, suffered some disease or accident, earned the nickname 'Aleijandinho' (Little Cripple) and worked his life away sculpting façades and statues for the local churches.

Who cares? The work is very beautiful, characterized by the rich textures of the sculpted cloth and the almost Etruscan look of the curved, almond eyes. The stone statues are the true reason to come to Congonhas.

---oo0oo---

I've never been inside the basilica, aka the Sanctuary of the Good Jesus of Matosinhos. From the outside its a delicate, modestly sized church in classic Portuguese late baroque style which serves as a platform and backdrop for the statues. There are evidently twelve of them, all prophets from the Old Testament, each with a large scroll which carries a quote from the same.


Off the platform on which they all stand, down the sloping hill in front of the basilica, are several kiosks with wooden sculptures inside, from the same period as the statues and depicting several events in Jesus' life. I think these must be used in processions and are laid in these one room kiosks for people to view, as in a tableau, but these are so dimly lit by the two window slits that in essence they are invisible. They don't have anything of the quality of the stone statues; just the usual folk-cut emblems of religion.

I wandered around the souvenir stalls that lie around the precinct. The houses are quaint, the products the usual selection of miniature prophets and religious reliquaries you'd expect, plus the regional handwork of hammocks, covers and cloths, as well as painted stoneware, a lot of which is quite pretty - and which I bought the last time I was here.

Strolled down the hill to a large circular building enclosing a round plaza call the Romaria. Other than a sensation of being in a low rise amphitheater, I haven't a clue what Rome might have to do with the name. The Romaria is a very elegant, old style building which I think in part are the public administration offices of the town (the Mayor's office is there, at least). Its quite a piece of architecture for a small town - human sized and quite impressive for that.

Back up the hill, knowing that the bus back to Belo was at 9pm and it was now 7pm, my stomach kicked in and said 'dinner'. I was torn between the lower restaurant run by a woman and the upper restaurant, run by a man. The lower was empty, the upper had some people in, so I headed for the upper. The beer I ordered was the most deliciously cold, crisp beer I had had in a long time - perfect for the end of the day (for those that don't know me, I drink beer very very rarely). The dinner (I played safe and ordered steak and fries) was terrible - warmed up something that someone hadn't eaten at lunch, masquerading as steak grilled au point.

A taxi took me back to the Rodoviaria, the bus came in on time and by 10:30 I was back in Belo. What a pleasant jaunt out for the day.

Tomorrow I have to be up early - 6am bus to Ouro Preto!

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From Belo to Rio

I didn't sleep at all well during the night - having bad nights for many weeks now. Even dreaming that I'm dreaming and within the dream. All to do with work, stress, eating badly, no exercise and all that stuff.

Worked on a few things on the computer, downloaded some more old books about voyages from Google and Gutenberg.

Went back to bed, woke up a bit later than normal, struggled with things to do that were of any use.

Sun broke weak and what strength there was was soon masked by light clouds. At least it isn't raining today.

Remembered just in time to take the sheets to the laundry, shopped for useless snacks to munch on so I didn't have to cook lunch. Drank too much Chilean wine, packed and headed for the airport.

What would look like the usual chaos of travel at Christmas time greeted me. The difference was the milling crowds weren't milling because there was an excessive number - just that check in for three flights was being handled by three people.

I managed to select a slightly shorter queue in 'domestic' even though my flight was connecting to an international flight in Rio de Janeiro.

Of course then there was the x-ray check and pass control. Another long queue that went in fits and starts. Eventually I discovered why: there were only two x-ray machines for three international flights. And after them, in the same small hall, pass control.

Which of course was also being handled by two people. At every stage no-one really seemed to know what they were doing and were constantly asking their colleagues.

I already know from bitter experience how disorganized Sao Paulo airports are, and how dishevelled Rio's are. Belo's airport was obviously designed, built and equipped by the same company that has done airports in Italy. Same soulless metal, p[astic and tortured 'work' flow. It always amazes me that so many architects never seem to live in the same world as those who must suffer the consequences of their 'innovative, advanced, concepts'. In Brasil its worse as they all seem to suffer from the Niemeyer Syndrome - man reduced to automaton by swirls of brutal concrete wastelands.

One thing for sure is that in every airport I have been in in Brasil, even the idea of organization and service is non-existent. 'Ordem e progreso' - order and progress - the motto on Brasil's flag, can only mean disorder and decline when having anything to do with its transport network (amongst other things).

We landed, way too late as the plane waited for people to dribble through the controls in Belo, in Rio. Where of course there was absolutely no help and no support.

By the time I had worked my way through the entire length of its two terminals, the gate was closed. Fine - if ever I am in Brasil again, I will not fly TAM (for what that's worth - Gol/Varig are just as bad. Its like flying in Italy. Avoid it if possible.

No matter in the end - OK to take the even-later (1am) American Airlines flight to Miami and then Dallas. Wandered around the brutally desolate departure area in Rio's airport, bought Marcia the recipe book she wanted, a tasteless coffee for me and found a power outlet for the Mac so I'm OK for part of the flight.

The American Airlines plane arrived a little late, but not so much to delay departure significantly. AA still uses old planes on these flights - old heavy monitors with their worn out color, scuffed and rubbed chairs and tables. Who cares? I'm going to sleep.

Christmas spirit

I'm not using this blog for work, but it is good to recount that some things that the people I work with were hoping for apparently is coming to happen - and with it the rains stopped after two weeks and the place 'lit up' literally and figuratively.

On the spur of the moment, since I was back doing things in the office after an enforced absence, I went out and bought Christmas presents for the staff, these presents to add to the ones everyone had bought everyone else as a 'Santa gift'. I've not seen this custom before: everyone buys one gift for one other colleague then, gathered in a circle, each gives the gift to the other after first making a short speech of appreciation.

By evening it was back to dark storm clouds again, keeping me inside the apartment until a break allowed me to escape and go to the supermarket to buy something. That was not to be, as a generator had blown and the place was closed down.

So I went to the local sushi bar, selected a sushi/sashimi mix which, with a small flask of warm sake, made the end of the day very comfortable.

Everything is bleak

Everything is bleak - work, play and the environment. Rains are washing down off the buildings in torrents; what there is of a skyline in Belo is blotted out by mists and squalls.

Thanks to a series of events I'm working from the apartment these last few days, so in spare time I've been doing things like setting up a couple of other blogs (which seems a better place to put these things than on Facebook), figuring out how to do things in FileMaker (it's not bad once you get used to it) and downloading copies of books from the 17th through 18th centuries about voyages to the East Indies from two sites: Gutenberg, which I know from before but have 'discovered' the HTML versions are better than the .txt versions; and Google books, which are both PDF and text (at least before you download them).

That's fun.

Staying in Belo

Haven't done much this week. Had planned to go to Iguazu over the long weekend but that isn't going to be possible: I have to count the pennies in case things go sour.

It's lousy weather anyway, so I doubt any trip would alleviate the general gloom at present.

Escape by Internet

There's really not much to say about the passing of November. Its been mostly work and definitely no social life. Where I am in this apartment the sun doesn't strike directly, so there's no 'wild sunbathing'. Anyway the climate is quite variable and the nights are surprisingly cool.

The angle of the windows and the bristle of high rises around me cuts me off from seeing dawns that are worthy of being recorded. So the only shots I have are really of sunsets and storms from the office windows.

I have no urge to 'document' this place - like most places in Brazil the city is too ugly to be an inspiration for a foto essay. Down-out-people I can find anywhere in the world, and I've really never liked taking 'negative' shots. And, contrary to stereotype, most Brazilians are chubby to fat; that limits me when it comes to street scenes.

I've walked three times around the center of Belo, which is entirely foregettable. Not very interested in doing it again. No redeeming feature other than the park in the center, and that's saying a lot.

So I stay in the apartment, connect to the Internet, and fly away from here.

Back to work in Belo

Well during this week I've managed to get some papers sorted out for the project I'm engaged on, including renting an apartment. My client wanted two bedroomed place, so for the budget that meant unfurnished. I've chosen a location which is convenient, on Rua Curitiba, only a few blocks to a supermarket, laundry, restaurants, hotels and a mall. Taxis pass by frequently so transport isn't a problem.

So that means I have to find some inexpensive furniture in Brasil, which is by no means easy, as I recall. Until I do, I'm in the hotel.

Below the hotel itself and just in front of the municipal park, on Sundays there is a street market. They tell me its like the famous Hippy market in Ipanema, but with lots of local handcrafts and commerce.

I wandered around it and noticed that much of the stuff is the same as that in Rio, Salvador and also in Fortaleza, but of something local that stands out distinct from those cities, well, nothing in particular. With the exception of some be covers, which are very pretty quilts, I didn't see anything I couldn't find better in the other places - and as to variety Belo is much more limited.

Its strange, but I always get this sensation that the street art of Brazil is stuck in the 1970s and early 80s. Other than the naive 'folklore' stuff, all art is that popularized at that time - the semi-polished semi-precious stones in white metal settings, the air brush paintings, the metallized figurines, the wooden sculptures and, above all, the colored glass vases and wind chimes.

Nice stuff, don't get me wrong, and more 'innocnet' than the world-branded plastic accessories that most people seem happy buying today.

But where is the exuberance of Mexico, brilliance of color in India, the fine detail from Indonesia, or the sparkle of Malaysia? OK I know, you are all probably fed up with my constant critique of Brazil compared to other places. I agree - maybe because I know that 'new worlds' lack something that 'old worlds' do - and it isn't because of the folk art.

Something else is missing I think - a culture that supports and appreciates a strong artisan tradition as part of its sense of identity. In Brasil that doesn't exist, except in verbal 'homage'. People came here to grab the quick opportunity, an easy slice of the pie, something better than the misery of impoverished lives elsewhere. They brought no intrinsic wealth with them, unlike the Spanish in the other regions of Latin America.

This always disappoints me. Brasil could have been so much more.

A photographic challenge

Dawn breaks over Belo Horizonte, which from this hotel overlooking the municipal park, it quite impressive (dawn, that is).

So frequently the only impressive thing about Brazil is its natural setting and its nature. Check the photos on Flickr - so few are of what the Brazilians and their immigrant forebears have actually done to the place these last 50 years. I promise I will try to find something in the life of the country worth recording other than what the place can happily do every day without human presence. Now there's a photographic challenge!

Off to Belo Horizonte

Today I have to fly to Brazil to carry on with the project there. Dawn flight from Nice to Lisbon, then connect to Belo Horizonte.

Coming in over Lisbon I could see the Torre de Belem and the Monument to the Navigators that I once tramped around many years ago with Marcia. The wait in Lisbon Airport was the usual stagger from over-priced boutique to over-priced cafe to over-priced bookstore. All in a setting that, if I didn't know better, was deliberately retro 1970s. It wasn't retro, it was the original.

Total confusion at the gate for embarking; hardly surprising given general style of the place. The second attempt to get on board the transfer bus (the first attempt having failed for confusion over destination and a 'technical' problem with the plane - the crew hadn't turned up) and we did a total tour of the airport perimeter before deciding that, yes, this was our plane.

We're on, nothing happens untoward, I land in Brazil. This airport is woefully equipped to handle international traffic. Two people to check passports (one for Brazilians, one for everyone else). The baggage retrieval system was a farce. Too small to carry anything but the baggage of passengers from a Cessna, this was attempting to disgorge an avalanche of accumulated essentials and souvenirs from an Airbus 320. That there was no-one from the airport even aware of the fact that the bags were jammed up like the elephants in Walt Disney's Jungle Book, well you can imagine the scene. Passengers were scrambling over bags, conveyor belts and each other in a scramble to grab their bags before they disappeared into a tunnel or were crushed by the en suite of others' bags. Women screamed 'that one! that one!' then elbowed their way to one side of the belt so their men could to do the heavy lifting. Children twirled, men leapt to the challenge, officials determined this wasn't part of their duties. And so on for a good hour. Don't fly to Belo Horizonte direct unless you have hand baggage only. Unless, of course, you like a good show.

Back in Brasil

After days at home waiting to know the next business posting from my existing client, I spoke to some other people and soon found myself back in Brasil.

It took a while, since I was held over one day in Newark thanks to bad weather.

Anyway, I'm here in Belo Horizonte, working and fixing problems as is my wont. I've walked around the center of the city a couple of times; there's little of consequence here so it will be some time before I pick up my camera.

Work is too intense, my brain is too tired - and anyway its too risky to go out on the streets in Brasil with anything of value.

Belo Horizonte

This was just a quick jump to Belo Horizonte, Brasil’s third largest city. The weather is bright and clean and clear. The city is built up in a valleyed plain with higher mountains around its rim. Infinitely more ‘breathable’ than Sao Paulo.

I’ve been here before – when I lived in Brasil I came here a couple of times on business and once during a long weekend holiday. It looks like the place has grown significantly since then – its no longer a large city with one main street of no consequence; now it a larger city with several main streets and many shopping malls.

The people are more mixed here; simpler than in Sao Paulo but just as alive and, maybe, a little more confident. It certainly doesn’t suffer the sense of pressure Sao Paulo has, or the unchanging laid-back attitude of Rio.

If ever I come back to Brasil again, this is the place where I would see the most of in the future. Who knows …

Sao Paulo

My second time here this year. Nothing much to say about it; here it is business and nothing else.


Sao Paulo is the powerhouse of Latin America and the original concrete jungle, a totally anonymous carpet of high rises that stretch from horizon to horizon wherever you look.

About as enticing to live in as Milan. I hate Milan.

Return to Rio

This I never expected. I am in Rio de Janeiro again.


I lived here for almost one and a half years, in 1993-4 and 1996-7, when I worked for two software companies.

Here it is where I met Marcia, the woman I fell in love with, courted, went half way round the world to bring back to me, and married. Life has taken many unforeseen paths since then, but the memory of her here is so strong.

I am here with three business colleagues, the result of the earlier trips to New York, Houston and Vancouver. Its their first time here; our Brazilian colleague has set up a driver to take them around the usual sites – so I tag along to see them and Rio again, and to see what has changed in eight years since I was last here.

Well, nothing has changed that I can see. A few stores have different labels, the telecom monopoly is no longer (but the “big ear” booths are the same). But Rio is the same. No new construction, no remake of the road system (other than a back-of-city bypass that was being built when I lived here.

So strange to walk to these streets again, to see the apartment in which I lived in Lagoa district, and the other one in Ipanema. The Bahiana ladies who prepare their spicy snacks have moved from one corner to another corner in the Hippy Market, but the rest looks as it always did; some products are topical but essentially they are all the same as before – hammocks, wood sculptures, semi-precious gems, paintings, bags, painted glass vases, silver rings and things.


Families and tourists still go up to see Cristo Redentor on Corcovado, lovers still take the cable car up to Pao de Azucar. The beachfront road is closed to traffic on the Sunday; at the kiosks the cocos cost 2$ instead of 1$ (ah, there’s a change); the beach has its obligatory scattering of winter bathers, who stick to the beach and avoid the cold water; the vendors still stroll between them offering drinks, skewers of shrimps and beachwear. With the exception of most tourists, the women are sensual, sylvan nymphs the men their Adonis. The stories are all true. Believe me.

I put all the pleasure of living here behind me when the company I worked for then folded; I didn’t expect ever to be here again. It is most strange.