04-MAY-A-2
ARRIVAL AT TERMINAL DESTINATION FOR THE
ORION CRUISE AND TOUR OF BELEM, BRAZIL,
SEEING THE BOTNAIC GARDEN AND ZOO, THE
BASILICA,
THE OPERA HOUSE, MARKET, FORTRESS, AND
LUSITANIA,
BEFORE PACKING OUT FOR FLIGHT TO SAO
PAULO,
BY WAY OF BRAZIL’S CENTRAL CAPITAL,
BRASILIA,
FOR THE LONG TRIP BACK THROUGH NEW YORK
AND HOME
MAY 1, 2004
You figure out the logistics of the way the aircraft flies (as opposed to how the toucan flies.) I am arriving at my destination by a 16-knot maximum speed luxury cruise ship at Belem, then flying through two jumps over two thousand miles due south to get started doubling back north. But, then, I overshoot, going a much longer way north by about six hundred miles to turn around and retreat south to Washington adding an extra half day after an all night trip. For security reasons, I could not check my bags all the way to DCA; yet for the higher risk flight, I could have it simply hand searched for one and simply waved through for the other in Belem to Brasilia to Sao Paulo to New York, without claiming it along the way to allow it to go through with the security system not disturbed by these transfers through the international circuit. Go figure.
I had a lobster dinner along with a great deal of laughter and hilarity last night as the captain’s reception and dinner was the farewell event of the cruise. I got up super early while most of the group were still recovering from the evening and I typed up the last of the cruise to date, put the bags outside with my film and laptop sequestered in the bags that would go to the airport for my next view of them where I would take both of the latter items out for hand carrying to get them out of the high zapping X-rays that would fry all of that photographic treasure from three dozen undeveloped rolls. All of that seemed to happen eventually, but not automatically. We had a full morning tour of Belem, a city of two million people on the Amazon an hour from the Atlantic, and the capital of Para state, second biggest in Brazil, behind only the Amazonas, (the capital of which we had also toured at Manaus) and the fates of these two expanded equatorial cities had actually been fueled by the same boom in the rubber trade at the end of the i9th century. We had no dancing girls at our departure from the ship, but the naturalists had produced a CD for each of us with the log, the species list and the address and phones list we had each offered to them, along with a wide range of digital pictures they had master copied and put out as a souvenir for each of us. I had only my carry on and a few rolls of film in it, which I thought would be more than enough for a sleepy port town on the May Day holiday for the “Worker’s Day” also know to us as Labor Day, when most people would have fled to the Atlantic beaches or to some resort.
Instead we got into big luxury air conditioned buses that refrigerated us, as we moved easily through he usually crowded Belem Streets. I had pointed out that it was founded in 1616 by the Portuguese to defend against the Dutch English and other colonists making inroads into Guinea and Surinam. My last tourist part of the day was to tour the Fort over the sleepy port with its big siege guns still pointed out to sea across the wide river. On the other side of the broad river is a big island known as Marahonoes, which is a bit of shifting real estate as the river chooses to change its course. I noticed now having run 2,067 nautical miles from Iquitos to Belem that there are no bridges over the Amazon, and probably non e proposed, since the river itself shifts directions and also gets as much as five times wider at certain high-water times of the year, coming up about now. Only on flying out of Belem later did I look back and see a suspension b ridge over a tributary river neat the town. This river does what it wants to do and people had better accommodate it rather than the reverse.
THE TOUR OF THE TOWN:
THE BOTANIC GARDENS OF GOELDI, AND ZZOO,
WITH A STOP AT THE BASILICA IN THE
MIDDLE OF A POLITIACAL PROTEST RALLY IN THE OTHERWISE SLEEPY DESERTED HOLIDAY
STREETS,
A VISIT TO THE OPERA HOUSE TO SEE THE
DANCE CONTESTATNS FOR AN INTERNATIONAL MERENGUE SHOW,
AND THE FASCINATING VISIT TO THE “CHECK
THE WEIGHT” MARKET AT THE PORT OF BELEM, BEFORE DEPARTING FOR A WALK THROUGH HE
FORT AND A FAREWELL LUNCH AT THE LUSITANIA
In the torpid heat and humidity, we slowly walked around the botanic gardens, to see the magnificent trees that had been preserved here, with the special animals of the Amazon running around as agoutis in the leaf litter, and sloths climbing the trees amid giant green iguanas, also had a series of caged animals like the giant Harpy Eagle that had caused such excitement on the last day as we came through he Narrows, and the jaguar, caimans, otters (they turn out to be very vicious in their territorial defenses and rip swimmers apart if they blunder into their territory and my favorites here—logs lined with turtles in layers all tying to get out of what I presumed to be hot water in the overhead sun. As we walked around the one of our members looking very much the foppish queen was Malcolm who had his cane stool in one hand as he waltzed about in his huge floppy hat which gave more shade than the biggest palm trees seen. Our group has at last become cohesive enough of a society that we can make jokes at each other.
We got back in to the cool buses, and I changed to what I assumed would be my last roll of film. At the Basilica, there is a 22 cm statue found in a site here by a fisherman who presumed it to be brought from some African Islamic site, but no one knows where it came from and how it got here. But it allegedly would return to its original place if he took it home to intercede through it, and the shrine built around it with all the wealth of the rubber boom, made this the centerpiece of this ornate basilica with all the materials imported from Europe except for some tropical precious wood. The special festival held each October had a copy of the statue brought out to be paraded through the streets, and the people revere this small object of veneration. As we looked at this basilica, which was being trimmed for a later wedding, we heard a booming loud speaker from a flat bed truck trailer and learned that there were two political protests going on with a lot of peasants screaming for land reform to the new Lula government, only a few weeks old. There were listless demonstrators parading with a few banners, which I took photos of while holding my ears. I watched as the shoppers in the kiosks around the central square were ignoring the demonstrators as thoroughly as I.
I was on a search for a mail drop to put the last of my postcards in, since I had written a few that needed sending out, but there were almost no mail drops to be found. Pedro the guide was so kind as to direct the bus driver to make a circuit toward the post office, and we finally stopped the bus to drop the cards in the only mail box we had encountered. That was a large vehicle for so small a payload.
We went to the Opera House, the first in Brazil, built in 1878 with almost all the fine items imported from Europe, again as a result of the rubber boom and the Belem trans-shipment point for the export of the hard-won rubber, “smoked milk” as the exhausted natives would collect it. As we came inside to discuss the further features of the Opera House, we saw a dance group set up on stage, and then a very energetic troop began a fast and athletic meringue. The fit and tawny women looked like dreams with one essential feature—they had to have very long black hair which they could throw around like a lion’s mane as they strutted through their moves. The rest of the group watched them perform along with the male dancers from whom they seemed to have no fear, since they could cavort in safety from the apparent predilections that could be detected.
The protests outside and the loud music inside, made it impossible to discuss the fine details of the historic nature of the Opera House nor its construction or place in Belem history. We had to move on to get out of both the protest and the noise levels at the Opera House. We did so and moved on to the most fascinating part of the whole tour—the market at the port, called the “check the weight” market. Over 30,000 kg of fresh fish are processed and sold here each day of the year—including this one, holiday or not. But there were other items as interesting in the market, almost all of them products of the Amazon, in great quantities and redundant sales aisles in the tent like covers of the market that resembles the Denver International Airport or the Haj Terminal at Jeddah.
BELEM AND ITS MARKET
Belem is at 1* 26. 50 S and 48* 30. 03 W. We disembarked at the port and took the tour returning to the port of the market which was regulated so it is called “To Test the Weight”—the earliest of the standard weights and measures. Belem is the capital of Para which has the biggest iron mine, the most bauxite, and the almost unlimited jungle resources of the Amazon which makes for a very big industry in fish and river crabs, but also for a huge and burgeoning world market for herbal medicines and the jungle products extracted in little jars for whatever is needed. Of course, the single most popular is the “Natural Viagra” which is bottled and sold, but to my view the active ingredient there is the salesgirl who is hawking it. She, like all the young women of this languid tropical port, is dressed in short shorts and tank tops with a contest among those who are trying to see how much cleavage they can display. It attracts attention and does allow them to produce their product—whether chopping Brazil nuts from their shells with a machete or filleting fish, with a crowd around them. There were unusual palm nuts that were said to be expensive and tasted like bread, and the Brazil nuts in large quantity. We moved over to the manioc market where there were large bags of manioc flour and also the sawdust like condiment they shake on the other things they eat, as I did on the pasta lunch I enjoyed at the Lusitania.
We saw the brightly colored peppers and spices that made a pastiche of color like the tile backsplash panels at Derwood. We walked around the market as one man called out “Hello, Visitors from another Planet!” He was right. We then got to the fish market, where huge catfish were being bisected and the many fresh water river fishes were being sold in volume. The river crab which scrambled around alive looks darker green than the Chesapeake blue crab, but is said to be as delicious. I saw a golden or peach colored sea fish with a line down its side which was very big, and may have been snook. But the bigger fish for the highest price here was the herbivore the Tambiqueno. I also saw very big slab sided tarpon from the ocean around the market, with some exotic fish I did not recognize—most of them catfish.
Pedro, or guide, talked about the religion in the area and in Brazil. The way he pout it is that Brazil “Used to be all Catholic, but now there are more Christians than Catholics in Brazil, since people want to learn God’s word rather than in the ceremonies of the church and its icons; that is even true among my won family.” We pointed out that Catholics were Christians so he modified his statement to say it was evangelical Protestants he was talking about.
There are over 2,000 mango trees in Belem, which were planted there long ago. There was a blight that affected a number of them so 13 % of the original trees were cut out by decision of the mayor. Pedro said that there is a leftist mayor and a right wing governor, and the combination has led to far more progress than any previous homogeneous governments. They are trying to restore the elaborate rubber boom architectural facades to the style of the downtown area. The old fort is standing with its cannons pointed over the sleepy fishing boats sitting next to the hundreds of vultures perched nearby eager for the scraps of the smelly market. Behind is the whitewashed façade of the cathedral, which I framed in the leafy branches of the mango tree in fort of it. There are no fruits on the mango just now, but they drop heavily in the Dec—Mar season. But people really worry about the Brazil nuts which drop 2 kg cannon balls from great height, and this is the “fruiting “ that can lead to serious injury to anyone in the bombing zone range below.
There is a ban on cutting mahogany, but a lot of other hard woods, like a variety of cedars are being cut regularly in Para state. There are saw mills and other industries along the river that depend on the Amazon rainforest, and there are not many ardent conservationists in the market, where you can also buy the parts of the Boto –the fresh water pink dolphin—also an allegedly protected species. Most of the untested claims for miracles seem to be in the “Phyto therapy” of the various unknown extracts sold in bottles, or dried leaves or roots along the herbal medicine market which people take very seriously here.
As I walked out of the hot sun at the fort, to return to the Lusitania to get the preferred drink I usually order in Brazil—the Guarana—I met a group of tourists following a guide. They had a series of badges which announced that they were the Travel Dynamics Group, and I realized I was looking at the next cruise passengers who would be boarding the Orion later today and steaming their way up the coast to the Orinoco before leaving at the Caribbean. After that the ship will be moved to Greenland and the Arctic, never having yet docked in Nassau Bahamas, (where it is registered as its “Home Port” for tax and international registration purposes) and with no plans to ever stop there. I looked up at the port and saw a second ship with a Nassau home port, which it has presumably also never visited, like the “Liberian registry” or “Panamanian freighter’ status of many tramp ship, but with fewer revolutions in the Bahamans, it seems more are carrying its home part papers. As I had watched from my port sided cabin window before disembarking for the final time, a container ship came by with the home port “Majuro” which I recall is in the Marshall Islands or somewhere in the Pacific. So, a “flag of convenience’ enables the ships to get certain advantages, as when we re-flagged the Kuwaiti oil tankers for the sake of the first Gulf War.
We had a superb lunch at the Lusitania while a guitarist played samba and bossa nova rhythms which we now know better since Xhe Artur’s description of each. The food and its variety were better than tat which was on the ship, sop we have no complaints about the sendoff, at which point the newcomers from the next Travel Dynamics joined in, and a number of the naturalists left to scatter along with us. I went to the waiting bus to get started on my long trip back—and if you can understand the rationale of how the “toucan flies” rather than the crow, the aircraft traffic for international flights is channeled out of Sao Paulo. That means I will fly over 2,000 miles south to get started on going north, and once I do that, I will be heading back south having overshot my destination by another several hours of flight. Go figure.