The Big Apple

Hey, anyone got any tips for things to do and see in New York City? I have a student who is very wealthy and planning a 10 day trip to NYC in September, so money is really no object. I have only been there once, so am not much good at making suggestions for things to do. I told him he should check out the cliche tourist stuff: Empire State Building, Statue of Liberty, Central Park, etc. I also suggested Atlantic City, since he loves to gamble.

Any other tips would be much appreciated. Also, is Atlantic City worth it? I have never been there.

Thanks!

Comments

I heart comments. Nuff said.

The rich/poor divide

Some time ago my friend Jerry emailed this picture to me. In his email he was talking about the division between rich and poor in Brazil (he is an American living in Rio de Janeiro) and sent this photo as a rather shocking example of how the rich here are super rich and the poor are super poor. This photo was taken in São Paulo, and the name of the favela is Paraisópolis favela. The translation of "Paraisópolis" is roughly "Paradise City". Kind of ironic huh?

Anyway, Salvador is in the state of Bahia, which is a poorer state than São Paulo, but we certainly have our share of rich folks living in the lap of luxury while the poor folks (many of whom live right next to the rich folks) have to stare this luxury in the face every day as they pass by the million dollar apartments on their way home to their simple houses, trying to make ends meet on the minimum wage that is shockingly low and seemingly impossible to live on (R$400 per month, which is about $250US for FULL TIME WORK!).

I don´t have any answers to the economic problems of Brazil, but I guess I wanted to post this to remind all of us that we need to really count our blessings and be thankful for what we do have. The picture here kind of speaks for itself.

Drink, fall down, get up, repeat

More penguin news!

I decided to write some more about the penguin phenomenon that is happening here because I actually saw a live one on Monday! I went running, and stopped for my standard post-run coconut water that I buy from a woman who has a little stand in view of the ocean. I was spacing out, drinking my coconut and looking at the water when I caught a glimpse of what looked like a large, black bird swimming right off the coast. I said to the lady, "Is that a penguin?" and at first she said "no", but after we sat there and watched it for a while, it soon turned over on its back and we could see the white belly. It was a penguin all right! I felt real bad for the little guy and decided that I should call the group that is helping the penguins to see if they could send someone to rescue the guy. Well, turns out they only rescue them if they are on land. When they are still out there swimming, they have to fend for themselves.

The penguins are making quite a stir here. They started to appear in mid-July, and so far like 120 or so have appeared in the Salvador area. Some folks are doing really lame things, like trying to sell them for R$500 (about $312 US with the current exchange rate) or even BBQing them, as Vilma saw on the news (so sad!). But there is one group that is doing its best to gather up the live ones, give them fish and medicine, and then ship them back down to southern Argentina where they belong.

There was a super cute photo on the front page of the print newspaper yesterday of a group of penguins at the institute that is helping them, all standing around looking adorable. I love penguins! I just hope that this phenomenon will end soon, and that there won´t be an even larger number of them appearing here that are obviously mixed up somehow and migrating to the north, when they should be in their native cold water down in Patagonia.

PS. I took this photo from the online Salvador newspaper, A Tarde.

Era uma vez

So last night I went to see "Era Uma Vez". My translation for this was wrong in the last posting, the proper translation is "Once Upon a Time". Anyway, here is the trailer for the film, and for those of you who don´t speak Portuguese, well you can still kind of get the idea.

It was a beautiful but tragic film, kind of a Romeo and Juliet story. I liked it for a couple of reasons. First of all it really shows the classism/racism that is so prevelant here in this country. People from different social classes rarely hang out socially or get intimate, and yet this young couple fell in love and tried to make a go at it. I also like any film that is shot in Rio de Janeiro, because it is such a beautiful city and the scenery is incredible. And finally, I loved this movie because I understood almost everything that happened, without having to ask Vilma too many times about what was going on.

I have seen 3 Brazilian films since being here: "Tropa de Elite", "Meu Nome Nao e Johnnie" and now this one. With each film, I had increased understanding of the dialogue and story with (obviously) no English subtitles. I am so proud of myself and my Portuguese language learning!

That being said, if you get a chance to see this film, or the other 2 for that matter, by all means go. All three are excellent movies, and show one side of life in Brazil that really goes on. "Tropa de Elite" and "Meu Nome Nao e Johnnie" are based on true stories. Perhaps one or all of these will be at the International film festival in Portland this year? Lets only hope!

"You´ll never no"

I apologize for the lack of postings this week. I have no real good reason, other than laziness! I will for sure make more of an effort to keep posting at least 2-3 postings per week so you all will know what is up with me down here in the land of capoeira and samba.

The title of this posting is taken from a t-shirt that I saw a woman wearing. I get a kick out of checking out all the t-shirts that folks have here that have English words, but that are misspelled or make absolutely no sense. One of my favorites was one that an American friend of mine found to buy that said "I am dance cowntry". Another classic was the woman on the bus the other day who was pushing 60 with a t-shirt that said "Wanted: drummer for midnight rock band". Searching for these gems among the crowd make my outings on the street more fun.

An upcoming event here in Brazil that is stirring things up is the city government election in October. They are electing city mayor and city government representative positions, and the advertising has been slowly building up to what will certainly not reach the ferver that the presidential elections had back in 2006 when I first arrived here, but that is definitely annoying in its own right. Some of the advertising is similar to that in the US: television ads, billboards, bumper stickers, t-shirts, etc. But some advertising here is uniquely Brazilian, mainly the "carros de som" or sound cars, which are cars painted with the candidates names that drive around blasting special songs that have been written and recorded to promote the different candidates. These cars drive very slowly all over the city, pausing long enough in each neighborhood so that you have time to memorize the annoying lyrics and so that this music can intrude upon your otherwise peaceful and quiet day. And to think that we are only in August now, and have 2 more months until election day! You have to just learn to tune these things out, but it sure is challenging to do this.

Another annoying thing for me, and I am sure for the graffiti artists it is heartbreaking, is that many political candidates have hired people to paint over some beautiful works of street art with ugly signs advertising the political candidates. I will try to take a picture in the next week to show you what I mean, but take my word for it, they are much uglier than the beautiful art they have decided it is their right to cover up. Now I don´t have the historical perspective to know if this always happens during elections, but it sure makes me sad to see that some of my favorite pieces have disappeared!

I guess that is all for today. I am going to head to see a Brazilian movie called "Era uma vez" (It was one time) with Vilma and will let you all know how it is. It is supposed to be a story about love between a rich girl and a poor guy from a favela. Looks like a good one!