Ilhéus, BRAZIL - 28 september 2002
Again, another night-bus where I did not sleep well. I hopped onto a local bus marked CENTRO. The local buses in Brazil had a stupid turnstile for passengers to pass through after paying.
I had my backpack, so I could not pass through the turnstile. I wanted to sit where the unpaids were sitting (the old folks and those with special passes and very fat people, I supposed) and simply turned the turnstile to increment the passenger count, but the inflexible fare-collector disallowed it. He rather peeled himself off his seat and helped carry my backpack across.
Still, he was very nice to ask me where I was heading, attempt to study my LP map, discuss with another passenger and decide I should be getting off right about here. This kind of helpfulness was deeply appreciated, especially since we could not speak each other’s languages.
I had long f-ed my Portuguese phrasebook, buried it deep in my backpack. I simply added a Portuguese twang to my Spanish, substituting the odd word in Portuguese if I knew them. When I spoke, most of the time, they seemed to know what I wanted. When they spoke, I usually was quite clueless, although I was improving in this area.
I recalled the time when I got off the train in Vienna, Austria and wanted to find out if a particular tram went to Westbahnhof. I asked two guys, “Er… tram… Westbahnhof?” At once, one guy pulled his friend away as if I was a leper and waved me away, “No English”. Well, I did not ask if you spoke English, idiots. ‘Westbahnhof’ was in German after all.
I found my pousada after a short wander around town in the drizzle. I was the only one in the whole pousada. I collapsed onto my bed and snoozed until after 1pm.
Night buses did not appear to be working for me. I seemed to require about half a day of catching up on my sleep when I arrived. But, it was alright today as Saturdays here in Ilhéus appeared to be as dead as Sundays. No shops were opened. No activities were spotted.
At a small restaurant, again, I was met with kindness and friendliness. The unassuming town of Ilhéus was really warming up to me. The owner attempted to explain to me what the food was, although I had not asked him to do so. A lady devouring her lunch nearby, kept poking me and asking me if the food was ‘bom’ [good]. A pretty little girl, whose mother popped in to buy a snack, sat at my table and greeted me nonchalantly, “Oi” [Hi].
As I walked around the quiet town around the peninsula, I heard blasts of fireworks and loud music from cars. These cars were running campaigns for the upcoming VOTA BRASIL election on 6 October. They were playing catchy jingles and blaring political messages. Perhaps the politician with the best jingle wins.
There had been numerous billboards, posters, flyers, flags put up and distributed by the campaigners to promote the politicians’ names and numbers. Brazil used numbers for electronic voting. So, besides the jingles, politicians with the most memorable set of numbers might just win, those with ‘1234’, ‘1111’, etc…
They did not stop at billboards, posters, flyers. They painted on walls, pasted behind road signs, everywhere with a space. To me, the campaigners were the worst vandals. And I bet, after the election, they would just leave them there.
Itacare, BRAZIL - 29 september 2002
I had heard high praises for the beaches in Itacare. It was about 2 hours by bus from Ilhéus. I had no clue that the best beaches were actually along the way to the town of Itacare.
Once I arrived, I followed the crowd and ended up on a crowded beach which was lined with restaurants and bars and packed with people. OK, this was not quite what I had expected but I was too lazy to go hunt for the perfect beach and simply made myself comfortable on a spot, lay down and slept.
That evening, before I ordered dinner, I gingerly asked for the price. “R$7”, the lady replied. I did not bring too much money along because I was spending the day at the beach but R$7 I had. I ordered ‘peixe, por favor’ [fish, please].
What was served to me was HUGE. I was so hungry, I tucked into the food at once before it dawned on me that there was no way this huge portion (perhaps, once again for two persons) cost a mere R$7. I now asked the old man who had served me how much the dish cost. “R$12”, he smiled. “R$12?????” Gosh, the worst nightmare of a diner… I did not have enough money with me. I explained to him I thought it was R$7. He said everything was R$7, except the fish.
Argh… I sat there, stunned. I even asked him sheepishly if I could just eat up half of the fish and pay R$6. Hahaaa… dream on. He looked at me with pity for a moment, then he simply smiled and said, “Coma… coma…” [Eat, eat] Gosh, they were SO NICE!
I ate with a heavy heart until I remembered I had brought my VISA card along. This morning, I had decided at the very last minute to bring it along. I had actually forgotten about it for a moment. After food, I asked if I could leave my bag here as a deposit for him, while I hurried to the cash machine. He insisted it was not necessary and let me go retrieve the cash. Brazilians are fantastic!!
When I returned to my pousada in Ilhéus, I chatted a little with the owner of the pousada. He was also very nice. I then regretted having bought the bus ticket out of Ilhéus for tomorrow. There was no one in the pousada except me and it seemed, the owner felt a sense of pity to see me go so soon. Yeah, perhaps I should have stayed longer to get to know Ilhéus a little better.
The only thing I knew about Ilhéus was that it is the home-town of one of Brazil’s most famous writers - Jorge Amado, and I had walked past the ‘rua’ [road] named after him many times.
Ilhéus to Caravelas, BRAZIL - 30 september 2002
I was heading south to Caravelas which was the jumping-off point to Parque Nacional de Abrolhas for some whale-watching. It apparently was the right season for whales to pop by.
It was an 8-hour ride to Teixeira de Fretas. I finished 100 Years of Solitude in two bus-rides. It is a fantastic book. I was totally in awe. Márquez might have just earned himself a new fan.
I arrived, had a late lunch and had to wait about 2 hours for the next and last bus to the coastal town of Caravelas.
The bus drove through the total darkness. Yet, despite the speed and the blackness of the surroundings and the people, the driver managed to spot the odd persons here and there along the road and regularly stopped and picked them up. It took 2½ hours to get to Caravelas.
What a long day of travel today. I flung myself onto my bed after a quick shower and plunged into a deep sleep. Best deal so far, R$15 (US$5) with private bathroom, TV and breakfast.
Caravelas, BRAZIL - 01 october 2002
And there was even an attached balcony which I only noticed when I awoke this morning.
Caravelas is a much smaller town than Ilhéus. I meandered around. An old lady, sitting by the doorway, smiled at me. She called out, “Japão? [Japan?]”. I shook my head, não. Nevertheless, she extended her hand, shook mine, stroked my arm, hugged me and kept repeating, “Qué linda, qué linda”. Err… loosely translated as “How pretty, how pretty”. Ahem.
More people passed by me with greetings and huge smiles. Caravelas was as friendly as Ilhéus.
After booking myself on a tour to the Parque Nacional de Abrolhas for whale-watching tomorrow, I went to the beach in the next town.
A typical Brazilian gesture I noticed is the thumbs-up sign. The Brazilians used that to say ‘all is cool’, ‘no problem’, ‘hey, I’m fine, how are you doing?’, etc… That was the sign given to me by the bus-conductor when I asked him to tell me where to get off.
Beach was not the prettiest but it was quiet. There were only a handful of people. I was practically alone. Perfect.
Parque Nacional de Abrolhas, BRAZIL - 02 october 2002
We left on the speedboat at around 8am. Most of us sat on the front part of the boat. As the boat sped through the waters, the waves got choppier and choppier and the ride got rougher. The boat flew sometimes and upon landing, huge splashes engulfed us. Soon, we were thoroughly soaked, our eyes stinging with salt-water. I had to wrap my camera inside my waterproof jacket to protect it.
We slowed down. Someone spotted a whale or two. Yeah, right over there. They surfaced just a notch and then, the tail flipped up and went silently down. Wow… I tried to imagine the sheer size of the mammal under our boat. It must be huge. And so gentle and elegant too… I was totally awed.
Before we arrived at the islands 3 hours away, we came upon more pairs of whales, usually mommy and baby. Some squirted water from their blow-holes. Some did little waves with their fins. I was waiting for breaching – that is when they jump out of the water and slam down. It would be awesome to see that.
We were paddled to an island which had colonies of birds which, unfortunately, due to ‘não compreendo o português’ [I do not understand Portuguese], I never found out the name of the birds. They were sitting there in their nests, brazenly staring at us. Some even tried to chase us away. Many had fledgings which were molting their baby feathers. They were nearly the size of their parents. It was fantastic to be so close to these birds. Frigate birds and vultures were flying above us as well.
Thereafter, the boat took us to another island and we went snorkelling or scuba-diving. Brazil is not famous for their reefs. If one had seen the reefs in the Red Sea or the Carribean, one would not be impressed here. But, let's not compare.
We returned at 5pm and I hurried back to my pousada as the last bus back to Teixeira de Freitas was at 6pm and I wanted to catch that to catch the 9pm bus to Belo Horizonte. I returned and showered hurriedly. When I was ready to leave, the pousada staff informed me that my small bag was kept in a safe and the elderly owner was the only one with the key and SHE had gone to Teixeira de Freitas. Huh?? Oh no… I had informed her I was returning at 5pm for my baggage.
We waited anxiously for her at the door-step. Then, I saw the 6pm bus pull away from the Rodoviária. Sigh… I waited til 7pm, before I decided that I just had to leave things as they were and not push it. I checked back into my room and stayed another night.
When I was having my dinner at a restaurant, the elderly lady came looking for me, gushing with apologies. I was with some German friends whom I met on the boat-ride today and they could speak Portuguese. They explained that the lady would not charge me for my room tonight as it was her fault I could not leave. Awww… that was so sweet. I told her not to worry as I did not buy any bus-ticket. She was finally pacified.
I was glad I stayed one more night and had a good rest. My skin was burning up with all the sun today and I was also thoroughly exhausted.
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