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Living it up in the Favela

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The most expensive real estate is by the sea, where the rich get second homes in Ipanema and Copacabana, while the cheapest property is found on the cities' 248 hills or morros where the poor are obliged to construct their shoddy abodes. For more than a century now, the municipality officially denies the existence of the population living on the hills and correspondingly denies the ebbs and flows of the civil war which is waged by the military police against the armed civilian leaders who preside over the slums. I became intimately acquainted with the bitter ills of Rio de Janeiro when I moved there with my childhood friend Patricia from Curitiba, in the state of Parana, in southern Brazil. I was twenty years old and had a slender build, a light complexion, and red hair that always attracted the attention of men wherever I went. It was a shocking transition from the cozy home of my parents, where I enjoyed the service of our maids, the safety, cleanliness, and infrastructure of a fairly affluent suburb, to living, a few months later, in a favela or slum called Morro Prazers, which consisted of, then as now, incongruous heaps of ramshackle hovels built with bricks and mortar. These communities extend over much of the Zona Norte, the northern zone, of Rio and high up over the sides of precarious cliffs in the Zona Sul, and they possess virtually no infrastructure except what the few local workmen are able to rig up. In these communities, justice is doled out by the donos, or owners, who deal cocaine, weed, and firearms, and who serve as judges, jurors, and executioners in the absence of government. Security is provided by the shirtless, shoeless warriors armed with AK-47's who patrol turf, pull the trigger for the dono, and fight rival gangs and the police. Believe it or not, I really liked living in the favela and became good friends with some of the most ruthless and feared gangsters in Rio and their profoundly humble, fun-loving neighbors, the good people of Morro Prazeres. In fact, the favela is the chillest place in Rio, when it's not dangerous. It all started because we were searching for weed.  
          At that time, Patricia and I were living at her mom's house, in a little suburb way outside of Rio, and we had to ride four buses just to get into the city, which quickly became expensive. It wasn't long before we had visited five or six favelas in succession without scoring any weed, and, in order to save money, we were obliged to borrow two t-shirts with the name of a local high school, which enabled us to ride all public transport for free. Thus attired in ugly over-sized t-shirts, we reached the only entrance to Morro Prazeres by a rickety train called O Bonde, which travels from the neighborhood of Lapa, a sketchy and lascivious night spot, over the old white aqueduct, and up the hill to Morro Prazeres. The train is not much faster than walking, and it is usually so full of people that you end up swaying perilously over the edge of the aqueduct with a five story drop below, but it beats the hell out of climbing hundreds of stairs. At the entrance to Morro Prazeres, we were greeted by six afrobrazilians armed with automatic rifles. They were gorgeous, tall, sweaty, ripped, with green eyes and dark, smooth skin. My friend and I looked them up and down, trying not to look in their eyes so as to conceal the desire in ours, because we knew better than to take one of those boys as a lover. They were polite and friendly, despite their fearsome appearance, and asked us to follow them up the final flights of stairs to the favela so they could ask their superiors about the maconha, which is Brazilian for weed. We hiked the decrepit stairs up to a natural veranda with a view of the entire city and Christ towering over and above us, refulgent and inscrutable, overshadowed by the sun at its two o'clock high. 
            There the guards asked us to wait, and we leaned against the railing, taking in the immense panorama of the valley. All around us and there below lay the vision of Rio's hardships, swaying in air thick with humidity, one atop the other, thousands of shanties, densely strung with clotheslines, kite-strings, and unsightly electrical chords. My gaze was then drawn directly across the way to the sculpted towers of commerce and the fount of culture and media. The office buildings and condominiums contained an immanent denotation- wealth. Courage. Enterprise. There was however, in the rise of those monuments, another value, symbolically bound to the slums and the very nature of the preservation of wealth- indifference. Indifference was the creeping truth of the whole scene. I turned my back on the valley and noticed a drab building. The Morro Prazeres community center, a small building which functions as a mini-municipal government and daycare center for the children of the neighborhood's working moms. After a few minutes, I started fucking around on my board, doing ollies and the like.  There were a lot of children about, and one of them, a handsome young boy of eleven years, came up to me, his eyes ablaze with envy, begging me, Posso tentar, quero andar de skate! Nunca viu un skateboard! Can I try it, I wanna skate, I've never seen a skateboard! I responded with some reservation, saying, you can try it, but don't run off with it, stay where I can see you. He snatched it and proceeded to bomb down a steep hill, disappearing from view immediately, after which I started yelling, more worried about him hurting himself than about the loss of my board. He had rushed headlong and shoeless down a burly decline I would never attempt, even after skating for three years.
            He appeared a few minutes later, looking nonchalant, saying it was no big deal, and I started thinking, this kid has talent, what if I could put together a board for him? We stayed there hanging out with the boy, Thiago, for about two hours, which is a pretty long time to hang out in a favela as an outsider. From the precipice, you can readily hear, in the distance, gunshots, and, at night, you can see the tracers of the bullets against the sky. Against this ominously beautiful background, the kids play, oblivious; families cook and eat dinner in relative tranquility while mother fuckers are getting capped literally outside their front door. Thiago told me about his mom, who was working in the Community Center, and about school, in which he said he was doing well. At the end, I took his phone number and told him that if I could come up with some skateboard parts during the week, I would call him the next week and come again to the favela. 
            That night, I asked some of my friends if they could score me a deck for my new nephew (Thiago called me 'Tia' or 'Aunt' from the very first), and, by the end of the week, I had one. Afterwards, I called and talked to his mom, with whom I had immediate rapport, which gave me more confidence that Thiago was a good kid and not a hoodlum after a handout. As the weeks past, I brought more skateboard parts, and at the end of a month, Thiago had a complete skateboard. He then single-mindedly devoted himself to learning tricks, still without wearing shoes, and, little did I know, he was passing all the ideas I was thinking aloud on to all the other kids of the neighborhood, spurring their imaginations, which is a singularly powerful force in the favela, as we were soon to discover.
            After skateboarding for only three weeks, Thiago told me, one afternoon, that he could ollie successfully off a three-step-drop.  I must have shown signs of disbelief, because he immediately grabbed my hand and began dragging me to the spot inside the favela where he had accomplished this feat. I was still reluctant to venture past the community center of Morro Prazeres, but Thiago reassured me that he had already asked the dono for permission to conduct me to the interior of the neighborhood, through its narrow, muddy alleys where only the residents are allowed. The idea was a bit terrifying to me, but I swallowed my misgivings and let Thiago lead the way. People eyed us suspiciously from their windows and Thiago strode forward intently, pulling me as I leaned back with apprehension. Then, a line of scantily-clad soldiers with machine guns came marching by and we had to stand against the wall to let them pass. Thiago hardly noticed, but a red-alert siren was going off in my head. Finally, we arrived at a little courtyard where Thiago's three cement steps were, and he let go of my hand and posted up at the far end of the cracked sidewalk. With a push from one calloused heel, he was rolling fast, and, when he came to the edge, he slammed the tail down with force, lifting himself and the board two or three inches above the top step and sailing over the next two steps to the ground. I covered my mouth with wonder, and he rolled over to my side, wide-eyed and impetuous as ever. Vôce ta sorprendida, tia? You're surprised, auntie? Porra Thiago! I replied, which, translates something like, holy shit Thiago! From then on, I told everyone I knew about him and he accompanied me everywhere I went, to the skatepark downtown, to parties, it wasn't long until it was suggested that Patricia and I move into his house. But, I'm getting ahead of myself... 
            Patricia and I wanted to organize events for skateboarders and graffitti artists in Rio de Janeiro as we had already for years in Curitiba. So, when we became better acquainted with the community of Morro Prazeres, we automatically started talking about the possibility hosting of a skate competition there. However, there were two things standing in our way, one was money, and the other was the Comando Vermelho, or the Red Command, which is a large criminal organization which controls the great majority of the morros of Rio. Little did we know, the kids, led by Thiago, were already pushing our idea to the dono of the favela, when that they had to ask his permission for something, which was frequent, because the community is tightly-knit. Every time I was with Thiago in Morro Prazeres, all his friends were asking me about the progress of our project; no sooner had the idea been conceived and the kids were relentlessly interrogating Patricia and I about results. All of them wanted to belong to that urban fraternity revered by the young and reviled by the old for which a skateboard is the principal badge of membership and, all of the sudden, we were seen as the conduit through which that membership would be granted. They were all expecting skateboards, shoes, ramps, regalia, the works, three times a day, knocking on our door, asking...
        The first step was to meet with the head of the Comando Vermelho for Morro Prazeres, to explain what we had in mind and to ask his permission to carry out our plan. We treaded up the hill to the unpainted and nondescript house where they sit, day and night, vigilant over their interests and their turf with the reports of the guards as their eyes and ears on the street. When we arrived, ten dudes between 15 and 30 were talking with the relaxed and lilting cadence of the geria do carioca favelado, or the slang of the thugged out Rio-resident, as they leaned back in their white plastic chairs with little glasses of beer from a forty ounce in a plastic coozy on the table. A dangling bulb shed wan light on decaying concrete walls. A heap of automatic rifles, handguns, and grenades were chilling anonymously in the corner. They were dressed in t-shirts and swimming trunks, with the occasional gold earring or machine gun slung over the shoulder. They already knew what we intended to do; we were basically summoned to be told 'no'. The leader of the group was a guy in his mid-thirties, who looked more like an electrician than a gangster. His hair was unkempt, there were holes in his shirt, his shoes were worn-through, and scars covered his forearms, but when he looked at me, there was a shine in his eyes, or maybe I imagined it, because then he said, gravely, We don't know you, we don't know where you're from, we don't trust you and you're not going to do this. The message was delivered with such finality that we were momentarily crushed, but I rallied and said to him, What is it that makes money for the CV? Instantly the atmosphere of the room changed as everyone narrowed their eyes and held their breath. The leader leaned back in his chair with a smile, tilting his head and folding his scarred forearms one over the other. Pois, he said between crooked teeth, eyes shining, A maconha e o cocaina fazem a grana aqui, tudo mundo sabe. Well, weed and cocaine make the cash here, as everyone knows. I took and deep breath and forced out my reply, which was, If you show the people that Morro Prazeres is safe enough to host a public event, more people will come here to buy both. Valeu, he said condescendingly, which is how cariocas say thanks, then he added, E como vôce acha financiar tudo isso? I answered with as much assurance as I could muster, Patricia and I are calling people we know to find the money and we'll get it. Then he focused his countenance on me. His eyes like battering rams; a gaze that had been trained watching people in the cross-hairs of a pistol. He said, The answer is no. Patricia and I walked out of there dragging our heels to a crowd of kids waiting in suspense. They could tell the answer from our downcast expressions and began wailing like professional mourners. It happened that the leader of the CV witnessed this spectacle as he was leaving on some errand, and when he saw and heard the consternation of the kids, he had a change of heart. When we were recalled to his rustic office, his tone was sympathetic and he told us that if we could find a way to finance it, he would allow us to host a competition in Morro Prazeres. 
            The next day, we were up early, industrious, calling local businesses to ask for sponsorship. We needed fruit and water, so we called a guy who ran a fruit stand and he agreed to donate several baskets of fruit and a few cases of bottled water. When I hung up the phone, Patricia said, what if we could do the whole thing on donations? My mind took off with rocket thrust. We could call skate companies, paint companies, apparel companies, they would want the promotion, to be participating in the event of a troubled community! They couldn't pay for better press, or the reputation it would give them as philanthropists. People will talk about it all over Rio! When I got a little carried away with my ideas, Patricia was always there to bring me back to Earth. Calma Michelle! She said, think about what we have to do first. What is the first step? So, we started calling skate companies, telling them about our project, and, after spending all morning on the phone, one company had pledged twenty pairs of trucks and wheels, another stickers and tshirts, and still another a dozen pairs of skate shoes. We were dumbstruck- that was several hundred Reais' worth of gear! Within a few weeks, the shit started rolling in, and before long, the young thugs of the neighborhood were sporting skate stickers on their machine guns. Meanwhile, we made an agreement with the people in the community center to store all the skate gear in a corner of their building until the competition. Over the next two months Patricia and I convinced so many companies to contribute that our supplies grew from a little bounty of equipment in the corner to several rows of stacked boxes and debris occupying a third of the space of the community center.                                       
by timtolka | 0 votes
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