The favela

Like any big city, Rio has its own sketchy areas. They are called “favelas”. According to statistics, 20% of the lower income population of Rio lives today in a favela.

The tram line was passing by one of these favelas so I decided to check it out. Not very long time after entering, a teenager carrying a handgun approached us. “Nothing new, just another tourist being mugged at gun point in Rio de Janeiro” I was thinking, but soon we realized he was looking for something else. It wasn’t my watch or my camera; instead he just wanted to make sure we weren’t armed. As soon as he realized we were unarmed, we were allowed to leave. Later we found out regular police doesn’t patrol favelas, so a militia is organized to keep things under control.

This experience convinced us to cancel the visit and instead hire a professional guide for a tour in the favelas. But later the same day we met some guys who were advertising tourist services in a square. We found out they were actually living in a nearby favela and they assured us nothing bad will happen should we choose to go back to the favela with them.

We waited until they finished the work and then we went back to the favela, this time even deeper. I was expecting something like I’ve seen in Slumdog Millionaire, but to my surprise nobody was living under cardboard over there. All houses had brick walls and utilities, the only bad thing being there is absolutely no space between the houses. Usually built on the hills, the favelas are separated by the rest of the city with tall, colored brick walls. I was invited inside a house to meet the family, we drank a few beers and then we took each others bikes for a spin (and Palomina was the star of the evening, of course!)

Contrary to our expectations, everybody was in a friendly mood so we left without incident. The only strange thing was to see so many guns in hands of children. But we were also loaded with dynamite (from the mine shop in Bolivia, still unused in the top case), so the situation was somehow even 🙂

Tags: architecture