Around the World in 80 Dinners - Bill Jamison [129]
The women are incredulous that the Museum lacks a gift shop, but Mary discovers right before we’re ready to leave that the small administrative office sells a few souvenirs. Our group buys out much of the stock, including jewelry boxes, purses, magnets, and shirts, demurring only on the Barbie-style dolls in Carmen costumes. Cheryl even considers getting one of them as a girlfriend for Flat Stanley but settles for taking a photo of him flirting with the whole troupe.
Jan and Bill depart, trying to pressure Mary and Cheryl to hurry up. With the impatient ones gone, the office manager asks the dallying pair, “Would you care to try on a replica of a Carmen headdress?” It’s like asking our editor if she wants this manuscript on time.
“This is really heavy!” Mary exclaims. “How could she possibly carry and balance it on her head through one of those bouncy dance numbers?”
“Just stand still and smile like a pinup girl,” Cheryl says, taking her photo multiple times. Switching roles, Cheryl poses next, trying to be both coy and sultry in a Carmen way.
“You got it, girl,” Mary says. “Now take a big bow for the camera without losing your crown.”
“Oh no!” the manager intervenes. “Don’t try that. You’ll dump out the bananas.”
Among all of our destinations on this trip, only Bali has been on our priority list for longer than Salvador. Rio becomes a fine bonus on the way here, significantly exceeding our expectations, but we’re eager now to see the place that gave birth to Brazil and continues to define its soul.
A thousand miles north of Rio, approaching the spot where South America juts east into the Atlantic and seems to point directly at Africa, Salvador served as the capital of colonial Brazil for the first two hundred years of the nation’s history. For even longer, its port controlled most foreign trade, exporting great quantities of sugar, the white gold of the northeast, and the real gold and diamonds extracted from southeastern mines. Some of that wealth stayed behind, financing magnificent homes, grand baroque churches, and steady growth. At the time of the American Revolution, Salvador surpassed any city in the future United States in population and splendor. Within the Portuguese empire, only Lisbon eclipsed it in prestige.
Slavery made it all possible. By the middle of the sixteenth century, sugarcane cultivation dominated the economy in the Bahia and Pernambuco regions around Salvador. In the eyes of the landowners, the arduous, relentless work in the fields required chattel labor from Africa. Brazil became the first area of the New World to exploit African slaves, and the country maintained the practice longer than any other, up to 1888. Of the eleven million people sold into slavery in the Americas, almost 40 percent came to Brazil, more than to anywhere else.
That kind of heritage definitely leaves a legacy. A proud European poise remains in Salvador, ingrained in the mores in many ways, but the city is fundamentally African, more so than any other place on this side of the Atlantic. It’s not just the ancestry of the population—90 percent wholly or partially African—but more critically, the traditions the residents maintain. In religion, music, movement, food, and more, Salvador exudes an indigenous Creole spirit unlike any other on earth.
The vitality of the city almost overwhelms us on our first night. Our flight arrives late due to a delay in Rio, pushing us into the thick of evening rush-hour traffic, which creeps in this city of two and a half million people. The taxi takes us past industrial zones, high-rise office buildings, shopping complexes, and sprawling residential areas before finally reaching Barra, the seaside neighborhood where we’re staying. When our driver gets to the Monte Pascoal Praia Hotel, we dump our bags in our