vindicação e vingança

jericoacoara

alright, salvador: you win. something tells me you always do. with mere hours remaining in our stay before a morning flight to fortaleza, the final judgment on salvador had pretty much been determined: glad to have seen it, but not up to expectations. still, with a free evening, why not go out and see if the place could redeem itself?

primeira paragem: acajaré lady. there's a feeling of attainment when you're able to walk up to a big black woman, dressed in full west african garb, in the middle of a busy plaza, and not only tell her 'the usual', but to have her know what that means. wanting to stretch my reais a little further, i opted out of dinner and instead went for an acajaré: a fried roll of manioc/flour, stuffed with a paste of okra, pureed beans, hot sauce (si!), and then topped with small, boiled shrimp. i'd been having them more or less every day, so what better way to conclude this leg?

segunda paragem: that noise. you know, that noise that was coming from somewhere over there. since you always hear the drums first, we walked towards where we thought we'd encounter live music, and found it in one of the pelourinho's narrow streets. turned out to be drums and then more drums, part of a corps consisting of one teacher and about a dozen students between the ages of 11-18 playing the full gamut from three basses to a pair of snares. even better, found a gent with a styrofoam cooler and a tall skol for 3 reais. also a fitting conclusion: walking among centuries old portuguese architecture, drinking a tall boy (or 2) and watching kids play bahian beats through the streets.

terceira paragem: felipé. following the drum procession to the largo do pelourinho, we stopped at a corner and met a bahian friend. he didn't so much approach us as just appear, and assumed our proficiency by speaking portuguese really fast. what followed was an forty-minute conversation about nothing and everything: (of course) how dangerous places are, favelas, mardi gras, beaches, soccer. maybe he thought we were cool (likely), maybe he was just really stoned (definite possibility), but he came up and talked to us, in the place full of beggars, touts, and prostitutes, just as people. not that anyone should be blamed for seeking something out of a gringo, but it was just nice that he didn't.

quarta paragem: capoeira. we had seen it before, this bahian traditional artform that descends from slaves. capoeira consists of two participants who simulate combat in the middle of a roda, whose members alternate playing instruments, singing a hypnotic chant, or taking their own turn in the middle. when we had seen it before, the participants may as well have been competing in beijing for all their muscles, flexibility, and acrobatics. this time, it was a bit slower, more melodic, and definitely more genuine. the sembe, playing the berimbaus, was a healthy dreaded man in his 60s. when two of the fighters got a little too combative, he chastised them saying that that business had no place in angolan capoeira. thus, we were able to walk back to our hostel in a little more of a happy trance that we had been nights prior.

quinta paragem: toilet, our room, in the middle of the night. either salvador was taking its mystic revenge for what i had said about it earlier, or my stomach was not agreeing with the dende oil from the acajaré. my guess: a little of both.