Hello Christ, Goodbye Rio

May 6, 2008 at 3:02 am (Brazil, Uncategorized)

Rio de Janeiro – April 23

I had intended on buying some LPs while I was in Rio. I wanted to buy some Tropicalia records, had found the area of town where they were available and then found out that it was still holiday time in Brazil and that all the records stalls located in Centro would be closed for the day. I could have went the day before, when they would have been open (according to the hotel manager), but rain kept me indoors for most of the day.

Instead, we took a cab to Cristo Redentor to take in some views of Rio. We got dropped off at the base of the 710m peak, took the tram to the top and were entertained on the way up by a samba quartet and some spontaneous dancing. Music was everywhere in Brazil and I liked it. If you look at almost any nation in the Americas with a strong African presence (re: former slave colonies), they most likely have a rich musical history: Brazil and samba, Jamaica and reggae, Cuba and son and rumba, and the grandaddy of all slave colonies, the United States with the Blues, Jazz, Hip Hop, R&B and the fore bearers of Rock n´ Roll. In fact, the Tropicalia movement of late 1960´s Brazil started in Salvador, perhaps the ” blackest” area in the entire country.

The sweeping views from the summit of Cristo Redentor allowed us to take in the city´s geography. Copacabana to the left, Ipanema to the right, the Atlantic ocean out in front, favelas in between, Pao de Acucar further off in the distance, the Sambodromo behind along with the soccer stadium. Hills and islands dotted the horizon, all looked down upon by a giant cement Jesus.

At night, we hung out on the covered outdoor patio and watched movies with three Moroccans, brother and sister from Marrakesh, sister now based in NY, brother trying to move to Buenos Aires, and a cousin now living in the Virgin Islands. We had a flight to catch at 3am to Santiago and all three of them helped us pass the time with laughs and a shared sense of cynicism.

We grabbed a taxi to the airport just after midnight. The city was a ghost town. Anybody that has visited Rio will surely have noticed the abundance of graffiti on the city´s buildings. It´s as if the town becomes completely lawless after dark and nobody dares to do anything about it. Driving out to the airport felt a little bit like being on the set of John Carpenter´s “Escape from New York”. Prostitutes in neon hot pants lingered sweating and smoking cigarettes on the corners, other people sold liquor out of styrofoam coolers, stray dogs ran in packs across the roadways and junkies did their junkie lean in the creeping darkness of alleyways. The cab driver didn´t even slow down at red lights.

 

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City of Gaudi

April 21, 2008 at 11:11 pm (Uncategorized)

Barcelona – April 9

Perhaps no other architect is identified as much with a city as Antoni Gaudi is with Barcelona. His long undulating lines, unique facades and ingenious design have come to define Barcelona. Gaudi´s buildings were, as I imagine they are for alot of people, my main reason for coming to the city.

Fab and I began our Gaudi tour by visiting the Sagrada Familia, a Catholic church continuously under construction since 1882. I remember being first introduced to the church by Ron Maclean during the CBC´s Olympic coverage of the Barcelona Summer Games. The church is an explosion of design and imagination. A devout Catholic, Gaudi focused almost entirely on the Sagrada Familia for the last fifteen years of his life, even taking up residency in the building at one point, before passing away before its completion. Now somewhat the defining symbol of Barcelona, the church is due to be completed in 2026.

A twenty minute walk west brought us to La Pedrera, a private residence Gaudi was contracted to build by Rene Mila and Rosario Segimon. Built on the corner of two adjacent streets, the buildings flowing lines and balconies wrap around the corner, losing all measurable angles in the process. The building has five floors, with an open air octagonal atrium in the middle. The fourth floor contained a recreation of living quarters. The fifth floor contained models and blue prints of the building as well as some of Gaudi´s sources of inspiration. The roof top is the real thriller here. Chimneys shaped like bodies, ice cream cones and moulded clay are positioned around winding stairways and other nooks and crannies built for surprise and discovery. Fantastic.

We next visited Casa Batllo, yet another bizarre, fairy tale of a building. Although mainly a facade, the building eschews straight lines and looks like something out of a Doctor Seuss book. We could not enter the building so had to settle for standing in front of it and staring up in wonderment. High school students on tour from around the country milled about on the side walk, necking and horsing around.

From there we went to Park Guell, designed by Gaudi as a public space for the people of Barcelona and modeled after an English garden. Probably my favorite Gaudi spot, Park Guell had a colonnaded pathway, the columns built out of pieces of rock and shaped to look like palm trees. A wide piazza with ample seating looked out over more Gaudi buildings, all stunning and strange. The seating area was one long, continuous bench, shaped like a serpent, that provided private enclaves for park visitors. The bench was covered in a mosaic of broken tiles with contoured seats that Gaudi created by having his construction team sit naked in the wet cement.

We walked back half of the way to downtown before lifting our tired feet off the pavement and getting on a public bus. By time we got back to the hotel, it had started to rain and we were starting to yawn. In the morning, we would get on the train back to Madrid.

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Oh No, Not Again.

January 29, 2008 at 6:35 pm (Egypt, Uncategorized)

Cairo – January 21

We filmed in the morning with Yara in and around Cairo. Things went well. The city looked great through the viewfinder and her performance was spot on. I got everything I needed in a decent amount of time, with few delays and then we broke for lunch.

During lunch, Yara talked about Nasser and Sadat and what both of the men meant to Egypt. She also told us about working as a casting director. When we finished eating, we returned to the hotel to pick up Ash, who was going to take us out to Wadi Degla, a protected area of desert on the outskirts of Cairo.

When we arrived at Wadi Degla, I noticed that there was something wrong with the camera. The image in the viewfinder was blurry. At first, I thought that my diopter had moved out of place. Nope. Then I checked to see if the lens had something obscuring it inside the camera. Nope. Then I tried to clean the viewfinder. Not that either. Soon I realized that the prism within the reflex had come loose. There was no way I could finish shooting the film with the camera in that shape.

We returned to the hotel, I had a spazz in the room, then a nervous breakdown, then a cursing session and then Ash called over a photographer friend of his to see if he could fix the camera. The guy tried to bullshit me and tell it was a problem with the shutter. I played along, not want to insult him, but the guy clearly had no idea what he was talking about. As soon as he left, I ran upstairs and called my friend Craig Trudeau via Skype.

Craig said he would send me a couple of cameras. He actually drove to Fed Ex while we were talking on the phone. The cameras would arrive in a couple of days and the film would be saved. Probably.  

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