This Email Is Huge
March 19, 2002

<< pre-blog email >>

Warning: This is another one of my novel length, catch everyone up emails. Estimated
reading time ... ??? Good luck.

Dear friends,

It's hard to believe I've been in Rio for almost a year now. This is the longest
stretch I've ever been out of the US and I realized the other day that I missed the
first Northeastern US winter of my life - something that I think I could get used to!
But on the flip side, Rio is brutally hot right now. 90 - 100+ everyday! It's
intense.

For those of you who got my last long email back in November I'm happy to say this
one will be a lot more positive. All of the swimming and physical therapy I've been
doing has helped my neck and arm significantly. It's still a daily balancing act, but
I'm feeling much better. The best part is that I've returned to playing the pandeiro
(more on that later).

From xmas until Carnaval (mid-Feb this year) it's really hard to get anything done
here in Rio. So, I pretty much went with the flow and put "real life" on hold. It was
a good opportunity to see some other parts of Brasil, as I've basically been in Rio
the entire time. I spent xmas with (my now ex-girlfriend) Rita in Minas Gerais and
was back for an amazing New Year's Eve on the beach in Copacabana. We then went to
Bahia (my first time), visiting Salvador and an amazing island called Boipeba.
Boipeba is still wonderfully under discovered and full of deserted beaches. Food is
cheap and delicious and the people are sweet, simple and have yet to learn to look at
tourists only as an income source. It was just an amazing place to visit and the
people had a lot to do with it. It's been an interesting experience to see how
different the people are in the various regions of Brasil.

A day after we got back to Rio back on Jan. 20th my mother and her boyfriend arrived
for a 3 week visit. I hadn't seen her in 14 months, so it was really a treat. It was
also the first contact I'd had with anyone close to me from back home since the
terrorist attacks. I gave them a pretty thorough insiders tour of the city and also
took them up to the mountains and to the colonial city of Paraty about 4 hours down
the coast from Rio. As they were here through the first few days of Carnaval (in Rio)
they got to experience street "blocos" as well as a night of the parades at the
Sambodromo. My mom keep saying she felt like she was in another world ... and she
was! It was great watching her face as she watched me conversing in portuguese.

While we were down in Paraty I had a pretty nice experience. I would up meeting a
really good guitarist/singer from Minas Gerais who was playing around the city. The
night we met, he invited me to come sit in the next day and after that he invited me
to play a gig with him. I had already done plenty of playing back in NYC and a fair
amount sitting in here in Rio, but this was the first time someone 'paid' me to play
pandeiro ... and not to mention, in Brasil! I was thrilled and flattered. Playing the
gig without any pain in my arm added to the joy. The money reminded me of a lot of
the jazz gigs I used to play back in NYC .... just about enough for dinner! ;-). I
was in São Paulo (for the first time) this past weekend and this same guitarist was
playing there and we had a nice playing reunion. He's going to try to arrange some
work for us in Paraty and he's also talking about recording a CD demo with me to try
to get some more gigs. Sounds good to me!

I think the time I've spent away from the instrument has helped me a lot. This
revelation came about as I sat in on a couple of different gigs back in Janurary. A
couple of pandeiro player friends of mine asked me if I had been practicing a lot
because my playing sounded different and more developed. I told them I had barely
even 'looked' at the my instruments over the last few months! To not interfere with
my rehabilitation I was trying to ignore the fact that I even owned a pandeiro (not
an easy task!). I only hope that I'll be able to avoid any future crisis with my
neck/arm and will be able to dig deeper into my playing. I've done quite a bit of
sitting in over the last few weeks, playing pretty hard and relatively pain free ....
yes!

So, lots of questions still to be answered. The first one being will I stay or will I
go back. It's a good question. Things are still unsettled enough down here for me
that it's hard to say. I just moved into my 7th place of residence (in Jardim
Botanico: positive- a view of the Christ statue from my window, negative- without a
doubt the hottest apt. I've ever lived in!) since I arrived last April. I'm
definitely getting tired of bouncing around like this and it's an adjustment for me
to be sharing apartments after living alone for 10 years in NYC. I've been unemployed
for the last few months, but I've started to give private English conversation
lessons and I think there's a good chance I'll be able to drum up enough students to
get by for a while. My options are limited as I'm here illegally at this point. I
want to finish up my pandeiro documentary, but I must say that now that I'm playing
again I'd rather play than deal with all of the craziness of completing a film
project. At least I have a trailer/demo done, so we'll see if I can get someone to
invest in it.

I'm definitely more comfortable here than I was during the first few months from a
social standpoint. I'm complemented on my portugues almost daily and at times I'm
even surprised at how I'm communicating ... especially since I've never taken a
lesson and don't study at all. I guess I took the sink or swim approach ;-). I can
make people laugh and I'm understanding humor in portugues ... very important for me.
I know quite a few people in Rio now and have some very nice friends. I celebrated my
34 birthday (ouch!) a couple of weeks ago at a bar where friends were playing and it
was nice to see the little cross-mix that showed up. I've learned what to expect from
cariocas, which has helped me to adapt and not get so frustrated (I'll have to
explain that another time). I'm definitely learning to be more patient (not easy for
a neurotic New Yorker!). In a way I almost feel like things are just beginning right
now as there were a lot of difficult times to get through.

My first name has proved to be quite an asset here. People in Rio pronounce my name
"Scotchie", which is also what they call Scotch Whisky. So, everyone seems to
remember my name and it's quite amusing. I pronounce it that was as well, as it's
pointless to prounounce it normally here (except to someone fluent in English).

Random Rio thoughts ...

There are some things that are hard to get used to. The young kids in the streets and
the tension created by the poverty. The police here are considered worse than the
criminals. The other night I watched a car full of them roll up on a couple of guys
outside of a bar where I was listening to music. The guys were just talking and
smoking a cigarette, doing nothing wrong. The cops jumped out of the car with guns
drawn, one of them armed with a machine gun. It's a common occurence and more often
than not they're just trying to shake people down for money. Nice.

The heat can be brutal and as much as I don't miss the freezing cold, a spring day in
NYC doesn't sound bad right now. I always wanted to live near the beach, but it's
nothing short of sad to see how polluted the water is here in Rio. But there are
other ways to cool off here. It may be hard for you to believe, but there are small
waterfalls right here in the city, in mountainous areas of forest ... about a 15 - 30
minute walk from my apartment. However, even in this case, one must keep in mind the
extreme contrasts of the city. You could bump into problems ... kids from the favelas
or cops looking for a shakedown.

There are some things here that just seem insane, but somehow become comical. The bus
drivers here are something else. Try to picture this ... The regular buses have no
AC, so they're hot as hell. You can't smoke on the bus, but the drivers do. They also
stop when they like to grab cigarettes or a coke. They drive as if the bus was a
Ferrari. They pop the clutch, tailgate, weave in and out of traffic and screetch to a
halt at lights. It's the most dangerous shit I've ever seen. The other night I
decided to go and hear music in Lapa around midnight. By chance, I happened to have
consumed quite a bit of 'cachaca' at home as was quite drunk by the time I got on the
bus. I sat up by the driver and was literally giggling as this guy ran through red
lights at what felt like about 50-60 mph!! At least I got to the club quickly ;-).

Being a "gringo". I think that it's very, very hard to shake that title. This is not
really a melting pot city at this point. People are always telling me I'm becoming a
carioca, but I know I'll always be a gringo. There are definitely prejudices to be
faced ... especially for a gringo playing pandeiro! But I think that slowly, but
surely, that fades a bit. Have to keep a sense of humor about it.

Many of you may have heard about the Dengue epidemic in the state of Rio de Janeiro.
It's carried by mosquitos and thousands of people have been infected (and quite a few
have died). I actually got Dengue back when I first arrived. Supposedly a "mild case"
- about a week in bed with high fever, body aches and a splitting headache. The new
strain of Dengue has a hemorraging effect and has killed people within 48 hours. The
front page of the newspapers have headlines about Dengue pretty much daily.

Well, I'm going to close this one now. For those of you who actually made it through
this overweight email I hope it wasn't too boring. I miss all of you and wish I was
able to stay in touch with more regularity. I hope all of you are well and please
stay in touch.

Scott

p.s. For all of my orphan friends from back in the web biz. I'm curious as to the
status of things back home. Please send stories. Layoffs are hitting down here as
well. Several friends of mine were just part of a 60+ layoff at globo.com where I had
been working.

Posted by Scott at 10:54 PM