List,
I recently returned from a 2 week trip to Salvador Brazil, have dealt with more important issues, collected my thoughts, and can start my trip report. Today is the start of Carnaval and that is as good a day as any on which to start my report.
Some background. This was my third trip to Salvador and fifth trip to Brazil. I have also been to Recife and Fortaleza. Last fall I bought some addresses from the Latin Euro agency and wrote the ladies. This trip was in part to follow up on those ladies I had written to who lived in Salvador. I had not received any responses from any ladies from Salvador by the time I left except for one lady who lived close to, but not in, Salvador.
I flew on Tam. The fare was $520 plus $100 in taxes. The flight was good, as usual. what surprised me was the Sao Paulo airport (GRU). It was a breeze going trough immigration and customs. This ease was in marked contrast to the fiasco I went through at GRU on my trip to Recife last year. It turned out that the airport is (was?) undergoing renovations and the work on the international arrival area had been completed by my current trip.
On previous trips I stayed at the Barra Turismo Hotel at the tip of the Salvador peninsula. This neighborhood, Barra, is active with MANY hotels of all qualities, many restaurants, several Internet cafes, tourist attractions such as the lighthouse and 2 forts, one of which is also a museum, excellent transportation in the form of taxis and buses. However, this activity gives Barra a bad reputation, ie there is prostitution about, (I saw the very same street walker who had propositioned me on my very first trip 3 years ago still working in the area.) On my previous trip to Salvador the lady I was corresponding with at the time told me she would refuse to see if the next time I came to Salvador I stayed in Barra again. The ultimatum made her very undesirable to me and I haven't contacted her since. But I did decide to stay at a reasonable priced hotel, the Oceanica Hotel, in the neighborhood called Ondina because I planned to explore the outskirts of the city and this was a better location than Barra from which to do that.
Some interesting changes I noted in Barra were that one Internet cafe, owned by a Briton who was married to a Brasiliera, closed down. Frankly, I was not surprised because the wife had a temper and little discretion. She threw tantrums in the cafe in front of customers and they frequently closed early with no advance notice to the customers. Another Internet cafe was bought by an American-Brazilian, (or Brazilian-American), I didn't catch which. In any case she said she has dual citizenship, though she appears to know English better than Portuguese. She is a new age, hippie-ish, Dharma type of person, but her cafe has ambiance. I spent most of my online time there. She bought the cafe from an Italian guy who was married to a Brasiliera. I had met them on my previous trip. He opened a bigger Internet cafe 2 doors down and a second one in the Pelourinho area of Salvador. His wife was pregnant on my previous trip and they told me they had a boy. His Internet cafe stressed the cafe part and I didn't care for it very much. Still, he and his family are doing well and are an example of the potential awaiting any of us.
The second biggest difference on this trip compared to my others was the proximity to Carnaval. The city transforms itself in preparation and those preparations start well in advance of the event. Viewing stands called camarotes (theater boxes) were being built along the routes for each of the 2 parades. The roads were being repaved. Police and first aid emergency outposts (big tents) were being set up. Private concerns such as apartment buildings and big hotels along the route were putting up barricades and boarding up glass fronts and doors to prevent people from climbing onto their property and/or damaging their property.
The biggest difference was the women. My other trips were in our summer, their winter. This trip was in our winter, their summer, and, boy, did that make a difference! The women were letting it ALL hang out! My trips to Fortaleza and Recife made me forget how beautiful and sexy Bahian women are. In those other cities the women are generally chubby around the waist so when they wear the low cut tight hip-hugger jeans, or bikinis, the fat from their stomachs and waists spills over the top of what they are wearing. The Salvador women were generally slimmer and less fat so the same clothing worn the same way made them look astounding.
