South America: Rio de Janeiro

By Helen Thompson

Brazil is famous for rainforests and beaches, sun and sex, but also for Rio De Janeiro.

Colonial boulevards run parallel to blackened back-streets, favelas crawl up the sides of hills, far from the beaches that have been immortalised in song. Hot evenings turn boarded-up houses into packed salsa clubs, full of exhilarating drum-beats and breathless dancing.

All of this is watched over in solemnity by Christ, standing on his sheer-faced podium, high above the city, his arms outstretched as if about to lift his soapstone body into soaring flight.

Rio is Brazil’s crown, promising endless excitement, and endless danger. Looking down from Sugarloaf Mountain, the city seems to be interrupted by the humps of an enormous serpent’s back, writhing and curving as it hits the land, pushing tall, smooth hills abruptly up from the surrounding earth.

The buildings struggle to climb the sides of these, and huddle, defeated, in the flat stretches between them. The city is trapped between mountains and sea in an aspect of slight surprise, while the serpent’s tail disappears into the green ocean in a string of islands.

Definitive beach bodies fill Ipanema and Copacabana tanned and buff, the Brazilians play volleyball on these beaches that are famous more for the atmosphere created by so much physical perfection than for their own aesthetics.

The beaches are unremarkable strips of sand, backed by hotels and clubs with neon-lights, but are pleasant to stroll along, stopping to drink coconut milk fresh from the fruit, or eat the sweet, buttered corn-on-the-cob that is sold freshly steamed on all of Rio’s streets.

The crime rate in Rio is one of the world’s highest. Whilst wandering through the busy central streets, trying iced Acai, peering into the windows of elegant coffee houses and shopping in air conditioned malls, it is possible to forget this for a while, but a wrong turning can quickly lead you on to unfamiliar, deserted streets. Although only a few paces from the main roads, these can be frightening, especially in the dark.

During the day you can escape the city into the company of the 100-foot tall Jesus on top of Corcovado mountain, watching birds of prey circle above Rio’s majestic setting.

Then at night you can become entangled in the dance lessons and nightclubs of the city’s ferocious nightlife, and for a while you find yourself intoxicated by Rio.