From left to right: ME, Rafa, Gessica, Marina and in front Chubby

A place called 'Aracaju'

I arrived in Aracaju probably 1 or 1.5 month ago, if my memory is still functionning well. I stayed in a shitty hotel called "Hotel Brasilia", with expensive prices and not-so-clean rooms. This hotel was located in a dodgy neighborhood, in the center of the city. I arrived at night, biking fully loaded at 23h00 in empty and suspicious streets.

On the next day i explored around and intent to find the Condominio dei Fiori, where Raquel (aka. "Chubby") is living. Raquel is my long-time pal friend from Sergipe. I talked with her for about 2-3 years by MSN, i guess. I biked for about 1 hour and finally found the "Joventina Alves" street. A very nice place looking like Florida with huge condominium towers, in a clean part of the city. I met Raquel and the friends this night and we went out by car. The friends are all crazy, loucas sergipanas: Rafaela, Gessica and Marina. Some drives like insane racers, other dances forró like machines and the rest eat seafood like dying africans :)

We went to some bars and i ate crabs and tapiocas. The ladder was really tasty. 4 cheezes and sausages, very fat but man, incredibly good. The girls were constantly taking pictures everywhere we went, at the beach, they were very 'presuntuosas' hehehe. As every girls they take 1 or 2 hours to prepare before go out, and their hairs are never nice enough. They bring their complete kit in a big plastic box, and when they open it man, it's the total horror! :)

They were all very funny and my time there was too short. I hope to see them again.

The Salvador Odyssey

I took a luxury bus (without asking one thus) at the bus station of Aracaju and leaved for Salvador. I arrived in the night at 22h00 and Natali was waiting for me there. We transfered ourselve and my bike in another city bus and crossed the many districts to finally arrived at Praça de Sé, close to the Pelourinho. My first night was a kind of disaster of fatigue and weakness, and a combinaison of intolerance and overdose of 'city-guides'. You just want to find a quiet Pousada to sleep but there is always a damn improvised-city-guide that want to show you a better place and that never stops to speak. The kind of thing that you see too much in places like Olinda or other tourist-traps. [The only way to get rid of them is to kill them, you can believe me]

Well on the next days i discovered where Natali lives, and the nice Pelourinho. I transfered in a better hostel call "Albergue das Laranjeiras". The concept is always the same. To have normal prices you need to sleep in a damn Quarto Coletivo, litterally 'shared bedroom' with no intimity. Not too bad but after 5-6 days you get totally in need of some closed space just for you.

The Pelô (old historic center of the city, that was for so long a place of choice to torture africain people in chains) is a nice cobblestone park with many restaurants and shows in the night. There the music never stops. You can hear the drums of the Olodum many nights in the week, and if you try to sleep when you arrive in the pousada you are just idealist because there is so much noises in the street until 5AM that it is almost impossible to close the eyes.

In that Pelô you find the simili-bahian culture with woman-dolls that stay at the corner of the streets to be taken in pictures and ask money to the naive tourists that are too stupid and don't have a clue about it. Everything is a big FAKE of the past, as in every touristic places. To see the real bahian culture you have to get out of there and search in other districts, especially for the Candomblé terreiros, if you are interested in Afro-Brazilian rituals and religions. I plan to see some of those rituals soon, i just need the good timing to go there.

I actually lives in Barra, a gringo, gay and puta district at the southern tip of the Salvador city. My apartment is in front of the beach and i bought a diving kit to see the colored fishes in the coral reefs. I dive in front of my apartment and it's very nice. The street in front of where i live is filled with strange people at night, prostitues that change of gringo (tourist) all the time and many sellers that always try to sell you marijuana or other suspicious unecessary things. There is also a big concentration of gays in the district which is a bit annoying. I really don't know why those feminized men are so populous here, probably because there is some bars or activities out there for them.

I am getting really involved in photography. I saw some really nice pictures here from Pierre Verger and Sebastião Salgado, and a museum called "ACBEU" present a lot of nice black and white exposition regulary. There is also a nice cinema in the Pelourinho where you can see constantly 'good' movies and documentaties, a place like the 'Clap' in Quebec. We can see a lot of recent canne-winning movies for a cheap price (10 reais). There is also brazilian movies and other nice international titles.

The district of Barra is nice and lot of buses are passing there. The shopping center is at 2km from my Apartment and the life is a bit lazy here, no so much sounds and traffic, so what can i ask more? The good weather, the cheap prices, the interesting lifestyle of the baianos and hundred of mysteries and cultural facts to discover.

I plan to travel soon with Natali inside Brazil, to the south to see her parents in Eunapolis. After we will visit Porto Seguro and Arrial d'Ajuda. We are supposed to come back and go to the Chapada Diamantina, a national park where it is possible to do 3-4 day treks. More news to come :)