So, it's true. I made it back home. After a false start in Belo Horizonte where I sat in the airport (nay aeroporto, why not add a few extra vowels since everything else seems to take so long?) for eight hours. The word on the street was that a plane's landing gear had some troubles and nearly botched a landing causing the entire airport to be shut down. It didn't occur to me several hours later that the plane without landing gear was the plane that I would be taking to Sao Paulo. No matter. I waited and waited without anything even remotely resembling a clue. I don't speak a lick of Portuguese, and the translators who were traveling with us seemed, more than anything else, to just hate our constant questioning and mere presence. I mean maybe it's difficult to constantly hear 'hey, is it ok if we maybe eat today?' or 'could you tell this guy that his monkey is biting me?', but a little concern goes a long way. As an aside, and sorry if this seems rude, but it's been, and continues to be even at home, a very trying week. I vowed to myself as I was waiting in line at the airport that if I am ever responsible for the well-being of a group of hapless Brazilians in the states; wide-eyed, unsure of the language, but generally good natured, that I would, without a seconds hesitation, leave them on the side of the road for dead. It's just that I have come to feel that way in Brazil. So, I was waiting for news of any kind in a tiny airport in Belo Horizonte. I had ahead of me a flight to Sao Paulo then to Dallas, and finally to San Francisco. I could barely even understand basic numbers (three sounds like 'trash' if you have no teeth, and two sounds suspiciously like 'douche') and for the life of me couldn't work out what was going on. It actually sounded like someone was repeatedly paging Count Basie over the pa. By the time I made it on the plane and to Sao Paulo, the first of many stops on the way home, I had missed my connecting flight, in fact missed every last flight out of the country for the day. It was 2 AM and I resigned myself to being in Brazil for another day at an airport Marriott no less. It was not a well-documented time, but I think that this guy's expression of angry, distraught confusion pretty much sums it up for me as we seemed to both be in similar, if not the same boat.
Too much airport for me. After a night in an airport hotel, when I could have been at home in my own bed, and many many hours in third world airports I was reaching my breaking point. That point came at about 6:30 this morning in Dallas. As I was making my way from one flight to the next, and through customs, baggage reclaim, baggage recheck and then security, I was overrun by several passengers who were convinced that their connecting flights were already taxing down the runway, and their best bet was to push, shove and hop in and out of line where ever they saw fit. I was just nearing the mid-point of my already traumatic day, in fact I was waiting patiently, laptop out, shoes off, for my turn at the x-ray machine when some a-hole in a pair of flip-flops dips in front of me, dropping his bag ahead of mine and running through the metal detector. He then realized that he was still wearing his less than appropriate airport footwear and ran back, pulled off a chewed, leathery pair of sandals and dropped them amongst my things. I called him an asshole, but then I do that a lot and proceeded through after him. He began to gather his things and managed to seize a single sandal from between my bag and laptop. Then, as he outfitted himself with a lone flip-flop I noticed the second one in the tray with my sweater. I'm not necessarily proud of this, but it was a low moment in a week of low moments, so I grabbed the shoe, and before the guy could turn and see me do it, tossed it gingerly to the floor on the opposite side of the x-ray machine. I gathered my things, gave him a subtle hip check on the way out, and heard him say for the second time, voice cracking a little 'um, has anyone seen a sandal?'
Allow me to backtrack momentarily, if only to explain my particular state of mind. Rio was a hectic, catastrophic show, bookended by a pair of rather calm, relaxing days. Our hotel was a mile or so from Ipanema (unfortunately anything but romantic, more violent and dangerous). We had a hundred yards or so of private beach, and the whole complex was reminiscent of a resort. I usually detest the sheltered feel of those places, but when the alternative is being held up by an angry transvestite for the equivalent of 11 dollars in Brazilian cash, I'll take the pool side bar with unlimited Caipirhinas thank you very much.
The show in Rio was at what could easily be called a disused diaper factory, or maybe an old prison. It was a rickety old concrete building in one of the shadier parts of town that was in dire need of outside walls, something stronger than tarps for a roof, and air conditioning.
It was blazing hot, humid and smelled a bit like the Kentucky Derby, like horses and death. To combat the heat Bobby and I bought coconuts across the street. I guess this does look a bit like him nursing on one of his own massive man-teats.
And someone allowed me the temporary use of a fan as well. I use the word fan loosely. It more closely resembled an implement of torture, and if you consider standing in front of a fan blowing hot air in your face to be torture, then I suppose it was.
Before I make myself out to be a sensitive, whiny little guy, let me also point out that no sooner did we get ourselves situated in the place than a bat, the size of a small falcon descended on us (and my coconut) and came to roost just above my head.
The picture does it very little justice. It looked exactly like this close up:
We managed to brave the day, however and set it all up, tape it together and get it running. We even managed just enough time to make it back to our resort-esque hotel to sit pool side and have some dinner. It was all going so well, and then it began to rain...
And in buckets. It dawned on us that we were really in for it on the way back to the venue. It was a deluge. We found that the water was rising pretty rapidly in the streets and what flowed was more sewage than rainwater. The club, however, was relatively dry. Then the band went on, and what started as a little drip turned into a leaky hose and then gradually more of a waterfall. Paul commented after the show that there was a single stream of water dripping solely on his head for about 45 minutes. Water streamed off the balcony above my head and doused the crowd, and then all of the power on the stage went out. The band left the stage as I heard a frantic volley in Portuguese over the radio that sounded to me like someone shouting 'packing tape cannonball donkey kong' over and over. Maybe that means 'it is raining on the electricity.' Shortly thereafter all of the lights went out and we were left dark and silent in a room full of very confused kids. After a few minutes, by some minor miracle the lights came back on. There was a roar from the crowd which upset the sleeping bat who promptly swooped the first 3 rows before perching in the rafters, scaring the shit right out of a few dozen kids. The power gradually came back on and the band managed a few more songs before we were left to meander back to the hotel through flooded streets and unending traffic plodding through several feet of water.
I wish I could say that it was all an adventure.
