In late evening / At noon / Wildlife

In late evening

As I have told you earlier, maybe repeatedly, life is not too bad here. Today, after Mika came, we went for a few beers on the beach. We were there idling, sipping beer, sitting on chairs, in knee-deep water, 30C water, 35C air, when the local bar owner appeared from somewhere with two beautiful tucunari-fish (in Finnish "viherahven"): nice two-kilogram predators, with white flesh, large bones, smooth taste. At once, I wanted to have one of them for dinner. We agreed on the price (8 euros) and time, 7pm. Later, at 7pm, we were back on the beach after having taken care of certain other practical issues and the man had grilled the fish. So, there we were: me, Mika, Ruby, and Jorge, on the beach, eating really delicious fish, with a dedicated waiter, and having the whole beach of several kilometers just for ourselves. Normally, you have this kind of paradise situation only in the movies (e.g. "Once upon the time in America", but skipping the nasty aftermath), but today we had it in reality.

But there is a snake in the paradise and he is stealing e.g. portable boat-engines. The Puxirum-project has for this reason agreed with the police that a pair of policeman will make regular rounds around the area even during the night. In return, the project pays some gasoline for the policecar, which, by the way, does not have the start engine. But the snake has retreated, at least for a while.

At noon

Mika is coming back from Finland today, which is great.

One needs some exercise, so I went for a walk. I thought that by going out early, I would find the heat just tolerable, but I was wrong. I walked from 1 hour by the river, on the seemingly endless white beach. It was quiet, nobody else there, and I had the beach all by myself. The sun was getting higher and higher, reaching more or less zenith by 9.30, making me suffer and sweat puoring and turning my nose into a leaking faucet. But it was nice. There are not so many places in the world as beautiful as this one, or as quiet. Of course, the peace is temporary, broken by motorboat, small aircrafts, waterjets, and all too many loadspeakers blasting some really monotonous Brazilian music, on late Saturdays and whole Sundays. By late Sunday, the peace resumes. In addition, in the morning, I was reading Gray´s book for the second time - it is getting better by second reading, visited (with Ruby) a preschool established by one woman from Sao Paolo, and just tried to survive the heat. A good way is to take a shower with clothes on...

Alter de Chao is, as I have written, a beuatiful place. The river Tapojos has a lakelike appendix here, and during this dry season, the lakes sandy shores become beaches, and one can walk to an island in the middle of the lake. The island has 7 small restaurants, one of which arranges a feast of peixe e caipirinja tonight. I was sold a ticket to this feast by somebody in the main square of the village for 10 reais (3 euros). I think I will visit the feast, after all they are serving what I long for. Dry season is now nearing its end, and water is more or less 4 meters below the level of rainy season. There has to be some serious rain upriver to fill up these huge areas (remember, the river is 15 km wide here, and drains to the Amazonas, which is much bigger river still).

Brazil is rather christian country. Every small village, and even many smaller communities, has its own church. Some communities have several: Maripa, the community I visited in the extractive reserve, had one protestant and one catholic church, which, they claim, creates some tension within the community. Alter de Chao has one church, a simple one in the main square. Santarem has at least 2 bigger ones. Sao Paolo had a nice chuch in the Prace de Se, in the centre. In Rio I did not visit any church.

Wildlife

One would assume, after seeing all too many documentaries about Amazonas and jungle, that one would see all kinds of animals just by looking out of the window here. Not so. It is, indeed, rather hard to see any wildlife here. There are some birds, of course (mainly urubus). Bats are everywhere, one is sleeping right here, on the wall of the balcony. In the extractive reserve, during our 3-hour walk through the forest, we saw only a few birds, and heard voices of several types of monkeys, but did not see any of them. There are also quite many pink river dolphins, but one has to take boat and sail some 20 minutes to see them. We will do that maybe tomorrow, or day after tomorrow. I have also seen one water snake, a few monkeys from the window of the car, and lots of small fish. So, if one really wants to see wildlife, one has to join some group going to the forest proper and walk around for several days. Or, one can visit some zoo...

Alun perin julkaistu kuukausikoosteessa "Blogs November 2004".