I get to be old in Rio too!

My time is winding down in Rio and i had a rather lovely day, despite the lack of action, or sunshine. After hitting the beach for an hour or so, tasting the atlantic and trapping some sand in those hard to reach places between my toes, I decided to go on one of these organized tours. I know, it's not sexy, but I felt bored and itching to see some sites. Plus you just dont know what's safe and what isnt. This is the kind of city where you make a wrong turn and BAM!, you wake up in a bathtub full of ice, about 5 kilos lighter.

anyway, i had the hotel staff reserve the tour. I havent been on a vacation so long, I've forgotten the joys of a well connected concierge. "No problem, Mr. Don, you come down at 2:20, the bus will pick you up." Around that time, mas o menos, the driver came in and yelled '510' . This is me -- even down here I am instantly recognized as an East Bay all-star. I gave him a thumbs up (this is what brazlieros do), followed the man outside, and was overjoyed to discover that the "bus" was actually an old beat up Peugot Boxer. Kind like this guy with windows:


I hopped into the van, which had seats for at least 40 people, despite being only slightly larger than a ford taurus. instantly, i was greeted with a festive 'hola!' from an older mexican couple, while a recently employeed indian graduate student cautiously shook my hand. up front was fabio, (this appears to be a common name down here... they dont seem to get it when I say "No fucking way" everytime a fabio introduces himself to me), some random cute girl who's only role, apparently, was to fondle fabio, and an unnamed driver, who was unheard and unseen the entire trip.

off we went! braving the streets of rio in a giant white box. we hit the usual sites, stopping first at the national cathedral, which smacked of christy spaceship cum yerte on acid. the pope came here like 10 years ago and everyone creamed themselves. good times!



we leave the van to take some pictures. fabio and his girl make out a little, which is great for him, but our ultimate goal was to hit the suger loaf, or Pão de Açúcar (dont't worry, i don't know what any of these diacritic marks sound like either). on our way out there, we meandered through el centro, the downtown area of Rio. Commercially abandoned by the weekend, and robbed of any potential charm by a low hanging sky, the city appeared to us in its barest, post-apocolyptic form. Barefoot children, running after each other in the streets, merchants selling chewing gum and trinkets on the sidewalk, and scores of destitute young people, standing around, milling about, crashed out, hung over, and otherwise killing time, the only commodity god had allotted them. it wasnt shocking, but sad, like driving throuh the west side of chicago on a wednesday afternoon. i was happy to see this up close, even happier to be protected by 2 tons of french engineering. on the other hand, when was the last time the french engineered anything worthwhile? the bechemal sauce doesnt count. moving on...

slowly, we made our way to the bottom of the sugar loaf, all the while under the stern eye of the magnicient jesus on the hill. big jesus is watching you all the time, homes. apparently no one told the whores. we arrive to the bottom of the hill and where i am stoked for the cable car ride! we climb and climb to the top of the mountain -- overly medicated english women are grabbing me in fright, and i think fabio is getting a covert handjob in the back. when we get to the top i ask him how many times he's been on this rock. 'thousands. it's not so emotional for me any more.' must be tough -- desensitized to the loaf.

the views from the top were sweet as you can imagine:



my tour friends drop me off at my hotel, wishing me the best, and i give them a thumbs up and i remind myself that i need to stop doing this in the States, where i would be perceived like a total jerkoff, or worse, the President.

when i arrive to the hotel, Andreas, my concierge suggests a seafood place where the gentleman can enjoy all he can eat. i was famished and quite partial towards creatures of the sea, so i had him reserve me a table. when i arrived at the place, the joint was empty, which meant i had 7 people serving me at once. feeling like a mob boss, i kicked back, ordered someone to make me a gin and tonic and began at the "starters"buffet. there, i selected only the finest:

* shrimp salad in pasta
* risotto shrimp
* squid with some wierd shit in it
* cold potatoes
* green salad
* several different olives
* pasta salad with crab


i passed on the oysters for fear of the yellow-eyed death.

then the real magic began, one at a time , these guys took turns bringing me more and more dishes. feeling like audrey griswald in european vacation, i consistently made the same "holy shit" face, for fear of public explosion. during this time, i enjoyed

* popcorn shrimp
* wierd random shrimp in at least three varieties
* grilled lobster
* sauteed lobster
* paella
* fresh cod
* octopus
* fried calamari
* mussels baked in their shell, in cheese
* shrimp baked in some sort of shell, with cheese
* various fried vegetables
* some wierd but delicious cheesy / mayonaisey puff
* more paella

Then, this guy has the gall to ask me " would you like some steak?" umm, i dont think so, pal. chatting with the staff all the while, i found eating alone less lonely than usual. I topped all of this off with some fresh mango and a limey tart, some brazilian facsimile for key lime pie. I rolled out of that joint (literally), had the doorman grab me a cab, and headed back home.

when i arrived back at the hotel , i exchanged high fives with Andreas the concierge (he is my boy) and he motioned me to turn around. down the stairs came a stunner -- the kind they put in the brochures. it was unclear what was fake and what was real, but in fantasy land that doesnt matter i guess. Andreas winks at me and tells me that for $100 an hour she'll come back up with me. Let me tell you something about the staff at the Luxor Regente. Not only will they book you tours, buy you cigarettes and reserve you seats at empty restaurants, they will pimp out girls and then make you feel like less of a man for not buying pussy. It is a wierd ethos here at the Copa. She gets in her cab, makes eye contact with me, lowers her window, and via a complex network of portuegese note passing, i receive her digits.

I guess I just dont get the point of any of it. I mean, why risk a moral impasse, not to mention long term neurosis about my dick falling off, just to bust a nut? Is this the wrong attitude? Andreas seems to think so. I should just give him the money and my room and let him have some fun. Maybe it's a mitzvah? Besides, my room is a mess (i dont really trust the help) and for some reason i think its rude to invite a whore up to a messy room. my mother would be so proud.

Turning down sex for hire, i retired to my room, where i cozied up in bed and watched the only american movie showing, Mel Gibson's powerful "What women want". ding ding ding! Don Baron, this IS the gayest moment of your life.

Let's go OAK-LAND

Back from the beach, where the sun seems to evacuate the premises every time I lie down. Still, it is GREAT to read this news:

Giants get nailed 15-3.

Barry Zito, looking like a dipshit in orange and black (it's hard not to), getting rocked in his return back to the Coliseum.

Maybe my room number had something to do with it?

Rio

it's been a long day, friends. I arose this morning, packed up all my belongings -- two backpacks as you know. the osi coworkers figured it would be a good day to walk to the office, and when we arrived, i realized that I still had no accomodations in rio, and my main hookup -- the boss of brazil -- vitoria, was nowhere to be found, despite several calls to her mother. luckily, fabiano, half shark alligator half borat, was on top of it:



seriously, F-bomba saved my life. he figured out which flight i should use to get to rio, found me a hotel, and still had enough decency not to be alarmed by my neurosis. "Don, you are a freaking. it is no good for you to the freak."

as he was planning my trip, Vitoria, came to the office. vitoria is clearly in charge down here. she wields a tough brand of love which evokes memories of both a forgotten brazilian aunt and mussolini. within seconds, she was in action . "Don, you should not walk on the copacabana beach very late. there will be whores, and, como você diz?..... the homosexuals. they will offer you sex, and for $300. maybe you say $50 and then they kill you right there." i tried to assure her that bargaining with brazilian whores wasn't on my trip itinerary. she went on, "and maybe you call the police but you dont want to go to the brazilain jail. they are worse than the bandits. they will beat you TO HELL, and fuck you too." ok, i got it. "plus, all the whores are men. do you know how to tell the men from the women?" i suggested the standard crododile dundee trick "i just check their cock". "No , you look at their hands." anyway, Vitoria, god bless her, set me up with a car to the airport from god forsaken sao paulo. Look at this mess:



i took her warnings in stride. i am already expecting to be hogtied, de-kidneyed and sodomized in this town anyway. still, i needed some infrastructure. she set me up with a car to pick me up from the airport in rio and drive me to my hotel. she told me that for R$300 a man would drive me around for the whole weekend, but i wasnt too interested in solo time with caesar. my nerves, damaged by the south american temperment, need beach, drink and peace. if anything, i was hoping for a group tour with some limber sextagenarians to tie me over.

i board a plane to rio. when i arrive, caesar couldnt make it. instead noberto is there with a sign that reads very simply, "Mr. Don." my only regret. my ONLY regret, was that i felt awkard snapping a shot of him right out of the gate. i had the camera out and i was chuckling, but i didnt want to offend this gentleman while we were still in our honeymoon phase. norberto takes me to the hotel, and suggest we immediately go to the giant jesus on the hill. ok, i say, lets see this magnifiscent jesus on the hill. we tool through the flatlands of rio, driving around a gorgeous lake, surrounded by colonial era flats, pass through a tunnel and suddenly, we are asescending up cobblestone roads, lush ferns surrounding us. when we get to the top, Noberto has to drop me off, and i make the final climb alone, to the big jesus on the hill. there he is! JC himself, 200 feet tall, arms spread outward. there is a serious look on his face which i read as "someday, none of this will be yours , jewboy. " still, i snap some shots of him. some are in the clark griswald manner:

while others are an ode to the kids in the hall:




but on the way down, we stopped and took in Rio from above. it is a dusky, defeated, brazilian sun, desperately shooting out orange to fight off the night. failing in its attempts, but so beautiful in its demise, burning orange in ethanol skies:


we see the city from above:


stunning.

norberto drives me home, and after some difficulties with the cash machine, i pay his fare. it's like vincent vega said, its the little things that catch your eye. like the security gaurd in front of the cash machine with the bullet proof vest. norberto deposits me at my hotel. in my room, i find interesting art which induces me to chain smoke:




despite my newfound appreciation for brazilian warning labels:




they say brazil is a country of contradictions. they are right.

it is getting dark (winter time here), but I am determined to find a place to watch your world champion chicago bulls face the pistons of detroit. after several calls, the concierge makes it happen! i descend to the copacabana streets, looking for my sports bar. it is dark, and yes, there is whoring about, but my head is down and i try to attach myself to three indian graduate students. in my mind, they are here for some sort of symposium on solid state electronics, but are making the best of it. i follow them until i approach o rue miguel limons, and make a left. another quick left at Avenue N.S Copacobana, and smack! i'm at the sports bar. i head to the back of the joint, settle into my seat and within 10 minutes .0001% of the entire south side of chicago arrives. old black folks are drinkin beers and cheerin on kirk hinrich and i am in heaven. each one of them reminds me more and more of my old pal jonathan eldridge. those of you who know him will understand.

i ask frank why he's out here. "oh you know, chicago is the shit , but i got to GO!." i hear you there, big francis. a couple jack daniels and several beers later, the bulls are down big and the season is on the line.

the bulls give it away, but i got to see it go down in the hottest, sweatiest, sexiest, humidest, gorgeousest, wettest, southest motherfucker in the world. beat that.

Sao Paulo adventures? No thanks.

It's been subdued in Sao Paulo, and probably for the better. I have been working since 7am and am just now finishing up. Normally I would be stir crazy, but I am almost relieved to be busy because a) I rather enjoy the hotel life and b) it's basically the Wild West out there. every once in a while you hear screaming, or a car screeching it's tires then ramming something, and ramming again and again... scary shit, and this is the good part of town!

I ventured out briefly today for a 'hot dog'. I was curious to hit MickeyDs and in my head I was already have a 'LeBigMac v. Royale w/ Cheese moment' when I walked past Black Dog, where the local kids hang out to smoke cigarettes, babble, and look illegally good. After some hand waving I ordered a soy dog, with curry and mayonnaise. Hey, you can't win 'em all!

Speaking of winners check out this guy:




















That's right ! A warning label the size of a cigarette pack! Finally! I think the Canadians do this too, but not the whole pack. Maybe 70%. This pack of cigarettes cost $1.50. This guy should be a lot gnarlier if they are planning to deter me at those prices!

Anyway, today I got nostalgic for Germany. You heard me. Walk the streets, throw benches into rivers, laugh it off, eat kabobs, piss on the bar floors for reparations. Good times! Today I got nostalgic for Germany. Sao Paulo -- not so much. Although I have to say, more than one person here has reminded me of Borat. Naaaaaaaaaeeeiiiiiice!

earlier today i delivered a talk entitled "Visualização na “Empresa de Tempo Real"" . your guess is as good as mine. apparently it was a great hit -- brazilians love me! when they say hello, they touch and kiss me. they serve me only their finest meats, bathe me in coca-cola light, and offer me hotel-room porno.

but, i am shocked by my inability to understand them in their native tongue. every time i travel to a non-english speaking country, i encounter the same phenomenon. symptoms of my condition include:

1) overarching jealousy of little children, who, despite their mental inferiority to me (not to speak to their obvious physical disadvantages), have some sort of magical ability to weave phonemes into a useful portuguese sentence. hate em.

2) loud english. a technique usually reserved for communicating with the deaf and my parents, I find it sometimes also works with foreigners. at the very least, extreme decibels can get these people out of your face.

3) hand waving and ass shaking. no one can deny the efficacy of hand gestures as a focal point of non-verbal communications. for some reason, when i shake my ass, brazilians nod and smile. then they put dollar bills in my dental floss g-string. ole!

4) an unhealthy dependency on CNN International. ok i get it, the chinese must be handled carefully in business matters and africa is fucked. still, i can't turn it off. even now, sitting in my room working away, i can here the familiar, soft cadence of my adopted homeland.

despite our language issues, they still welcome me with open arms. they suggest drivers and hotels for my stay in rio. 'i will call caesar for you. he is a good man , with the wife and kids. he will take you to the big christ on the hill, and to the sugerloaf. you should not be scar-ed with him.'

what can i say. what can't i say! they love me in brazil.

The ozone layer is fucked. Trust me.

You can go to all the green rallies you like.
You can write your congressperson in an inflammatory tone.
You may be outraged about the environment, and you may think you can do something to help.

You can't.

Try driving 90 minutes through bumper to bumper traffic in Sao Paulo and see how your lungs feel, and imagine what it would take to change things. Now imagine Beijing, Rio, Moscow, and Mexico City, a symphony of atmospheric sodomy.

You may want to consider the neutron bomb for starters.

I staggered into my hotel room, nauseous and dizzy from the fumes of 50,000 diesel trucks, cabs, and fiats. I showered the grime off of myself and took a nap. I dreamt that I was in Pakistan, underneath a pile of sand, struggling breath by breath.

Brazil beginnings

i packed earlier today. I filled two backpacks, thus making both of them difficult to deal with at once. this packing technique, as well as an unshaven face, torn up cargo pants, and a bad attitude were my attempts to look non-rob-worthy . collecting my bags, i walked down liberty st to valencia, taking my first steps of a long journey. i dont think it matters how many times i get on airplanes to strange countries , those first steps seem daunting, that so many things can go wrong between departure to return. i carried my packs downhill to find a taxi to take me to the airport, and, as i somehow expected, my cab driver was from Sao Paulo. he warned me , as so many had before, on the dangers of this trip, not to wear watches or jewelry (covered! no bling, not for me). victor seemed to be doing ok for himself. the back of his head seemed healthy and he and i shared a penchant for bushy sideburns and the three day stuble (well, six in my case). driving this cab, riding out his soon-expiring visa, Victor was taking this time to learn "the english", and using it well, despite an occasionally superfluous definite article and other linguistic curiosities. twice he suggested that i make sure my door is lock-ed and my window is clos-ed. both times, they were.

i made it through miami easily. recent travels have given me a bit more confidence managing airports and itineraries, and i constantly think of the sales force at our company -- some of whom need explicit instructions on how to wipe their tight asses -- and how these folks manage to navigate the worlds transportation infrastructure just fine. anyway, Miami was a success, and despite my early worries about the relatively short layover period, i hit my plane early enough to steal off for a cigarette in a poorly ventilated room where the questionable air quality, coupled with the south florida humidity, made for an interesting 3 and half minutes for my lungs. when i arrived at D46 , the reclining brazlieros suggested that there was plenty of time to spare. they reminded me in several ways of israelis -- they maniacally waved their hands when they spoke and they over applied varies creams and lotions. another unfortunate commonality: women often chose not to respect the inevitabilities of gravity; denial can have such unfortunate visual repercussions! but there was also something new world about them. certainly , most of these people were white, but their complexions varied all across the board and the men (who were far less ostentatious) looked positively american. i read earlier in my brazil book about the terrible favelas, and the destitution amongst them and i considered whether the intensity of modern social ills is directly proportional to the length of forced labor in a country. brazil did not outlaw slavery until 1888 and they were by far the greatest importers of human labor. now, descendants of this massive slave class live in areas that make me miss the tenderloin. no public power and rampant violence which has caused the brazilian authorities to shrug off any discussions of human rights -- assassination attempts from the police are common and sanctioned practice. reading about these conditions, and their inevitable spill over into more affluent neighborhoods, I wonder distantly, if there is a man or a group of men in brazil now -- perhaps sitting around the bar drinking caiprinha and laughing, maybe they are tending to their sick mothers or children, or sleeping under a piece of corrugated cardboard at this late hour -- with whom i share a fateuful meeting place. i often think of the unlikely rendezvous, like the mountain and JFK -- seemingly such unrelated entities, one providing the lead which happened to be cast into the shape of a projectile, the other encased within an all too penetrable target of flesh and hubris.

in this ultra modern aluminum boat, the tenderloin is disappearing fast behind me, but through pitch black night, i train my eyes to a northwesterly bearing, and i swear she is out there, surrounded by a warm , settling glow, smelling like sunshine, letting me know that she will be waiting when i return .