A Miserable Four Days

The phone in my room rang, and I answered with a husky hello.  ´Your taxi is here´.  Holy moly it was four o´clock in the morning and I was about to miss my flight out of Manaus to Belem.  I have never dressed so quickly in all my life. 

I arrived in Belem which was my first port of call to get to the South again and I must say that it hasn't had a lasting impression on me; instead it left me with a bad taste in my mouth and a terrible impression of the north of Brazil.  I arrived at my hotel, once again being ripped off by the taxi but speaking no Portuguese there was no room for bargaining and made myself as comfortable as I could be there until I was able to leave and make my way back down to the South.

it was a city which seemed like it had lost hope, one that was just living for survival

The North of Brazil was very difficult for me, I didn't speak their language and no one spoke mine.  I met a Hindu from Suriname who I spent a day with and a 45 year old father of two from Guadalupe who was my chaperone for the next few days.  The city is big, noisy and crowded.  Sure it had an atmosphere about it like every city does, but it wasn't one that I was especially warming to, it was a city which seemed like it had lost hope, one that was just living for survival. 

The first day I walked around sorted things out but then my experiences of Belem became more seriousness.  One thing that you notice about Brazil is the poverty.  It is so prevalent here that you cannot walk one corner without being face to face with malnutrition children selling anything that they can.  Brazil is a rich country, so the poverty here in relation to the poverty in Peru and Bolivia is different.  In Peru and Bolivia the poverty is just as wide spread but it as a slight dignity about it (not that you lose that when you’re poor, but I am sure you can understand what I mean, where as in Brazil the wealth of the country is so obvious it leads to the unnecessary poverty to be lined with bitterness, resentment and sheer desperation.  Such a shame, you feel totally helpless but in spending four days being surrounded by this atmosphere which lies beneath the hustle and bustle of everyday city life rubbed off on me and I couldn't wait to be out of there.

The second night I was pretty much confined to my hotel room unless Gabby my Guadalupe buddy accompanied me.  It was unsafe to go out after dark and my first experience of muggings during the day time was enough for me to put my guard up.  This was when I realised what Raphael meant about the jungle being safer than the city, how I longed for the peace of the jungle.

So I am afraid at this point I was not very impressed with Brazil, but I know that part of this is down to my own ignorance of not knowing the language.  I have never wanted to be home so much then I did at this point of my trip, and I got the earliest flight out to Salvador where I was expecting much of the same, so much so that I was ready to change my flight to New Zealand to an earlier date.  How wrong I was.