Day 15, Jan 18, 2006: My first day in Rio de Janeiro
As I mentioned in a previous post, Fernanda Cavalcante, a good friend of my friend Cristiany's, had offered to let me stay in her apartment for the four days I had in Rio. (Fernanda herself was still in Fortaleza, but a friend of hers, Paul Jurgens, was staying in the apartment while she was away. As it turned out, Paul, a total stranger to me before I arrived in Rio, was a good friend and a great resource for me during my stay in the city.)


My first daytime view in Rio. Despite living on the seventh floor, Fernanda
has a lovely rose bush growing in her bedroom window.





The first morning I was in Rio I went out for a walk looking (unsucessfully)
for a bicycle to rent. Despite having been warned many times about the city's
beauty, I was still unprepared for what I saw on that first walk: Corcovado
("the hunchback").





Corcovado, partially obscured by clouds, seen from Botafogo Beach





Statue of Simon Bolivar



That night, on the advice of a chance aquaintance, I went to check out the samba at one of Rio hottest nightclubs, Carioca da Gema. With Carnaval less than two months away every Wednesday night the club features a different one the great samba schools or Rio.


This parti- cular night Carioca da Gema featured the group "Imperio" and its
legendary leader Arlindo Cruz.





Standing room only! (unless, like I, you sat on the stairway up to the
lavatories)





Everyone seemed to be having a great time, dancing wildly and singing along
with the songs.






Arlindo Cruz of samba school "Império Serrano". Unfortunately, not having been a student of samba before arriving, I failed until afterwards to appreciate fully what I was seeing.