We All Get A Little Crazy

I wake with a bump as the plane lands in Rio. For some reason, despite not leaving the country, our bags and us go through International Arrivals which confuses everyone somewhat as we have to re-fill in official entry forms. I don't know if this will prove to be a good or a bad thing!?

Anyway I need cash badly so I try the airport cash machines. They have 3, I try 3, and 3 machines piss me off for 3 different reasons. I'm still cashless. The Portuguese only speaking Banco de Brazil doesn't cash Travellers Cheques for an unpronounceable (hence unrepeatable) reason so I reluctantly tuck in to and exchange some US dollars - $80 worth. I find Tourist Information. They speak English. Success! They book me into the "Dragoman" hotel for an extra night. Sweet success!

I find a taxi firm where I can pre-pay on Visa - only my Visa card gets rejected. Not wanting to use up 30 more precious US dollars I pay on my company Mastercard. My accountant is the best in the world, I'm sure she'll love the challenge of writing that one off! My taxi driver is a well dressed, straight laced, stern looking man and has all the personality and humour of a German Gestapo agent. He glares at me intently and speaks English slowly, "At Carnival, all us in Rio get a little... crazy." I don't think I want to see him get a little c-r-a-z-y. He scares me. We approach the hotel on the wrong side of a duel carriage way. He calmly looks around, states, "No Police" and bounces the car up and over the central reservation, through a red light, the wrong way down a one way street and abruptly stops. Staring dead straight ahead, not blinking nor looking at me, he announces our arrival at Hotel Paysandu. I gladly exit stage right.

In the hotel lobby there's a huge notice board for all the Dragoman Truck Trip guests. It looks like there are some 7 trucks of Dragoman people descending upon the hotel for the Rio Carnival. I check in to room 609 (dude!) on the top floor. It has air-con, a cold shower and a double bed. Bliss! I pass out for a few hours. On waking I hunt down the knife from my pack and slash open that damned bottle of water with the welded lid. It was very satisfying and the water tasted all the sweeter for it.

I wandered around the vicinity to get my bearings and find a HSBC bank - Visa card rejected. Arse. Food for the day was a bacon and cheese pizza with beer. And when they say cheese, they mean "**a**" cheese! In fact, too much cheese for I was all cheesed out. You could say I was even cheesed off, for I couldn't eat anymore cheese for days afterwards! I pay on my company Mastercard again, the Visa card is knackered.

I'm staying in Flamenco; sandwiched inbetween Copacabana beach and the town centre, it's more residential than touristy. Hence cheaper too, but it still has it's own beach. It is on this warm, floodlit moonscape in the early hours of the morning that I sat and polished off the rum in my hipflask, watching the waves roll in. I'm in Rio de Janeiro.

Posted by Steve Eynon