Happy hour

At the gym today, heard what may be the other side of the story about the death of the dancer in the favela. Our gym teacher has a close friend in the police, who told him that the dancer had been arrested a month ago with a fair quantity of cocaine, and was probably released because of his contacts with Brazil’s main TV station, Globo. The word is that he was a known drug dealer. Who knows where the truth lies – either way, it’s a dirty story.

After a tedious day of dropping in and out of the internet, we went downtown for a Happy Hour to celebrate a friend’s birthday (the one-time Patotario’s partner). It’s a while since I’ve been there at night, and even longer for HH, but I loved it. We were in the old part, in a traditional bar, with tables out in the street, music everywhere. Walking back to the Metro afterwards, I appreciated some of the old buildings as never before (in daytime, with traffic, perhaps one doesn’t raise one’s eyes enough). The old cathedral – now supplanted by a modern building of doubtful taste – looked magnificent.

On the way there, I enjoyed people watching in the Metro, particularly one woman with a very striking face. Large eyes and an aristocratic air, strangely at odds with her gum-chewing and slightly shabby black clothes. I thought she might be a ballet dancer and she somehow held herself quite separate from the crowd, communing with herself and not seeming to require any support to keep her balance. She reminded me of our headmistress, a terrifying creature who had worked in the theatre and oozed drama from every pore. Her title was Lady Warden and I had never, until tonight, drawn the parallel between warden and gaoler – although I suppose I’m thinking of warder. Either way, I remember school as something of a gulag.

Of course, there had to be one person using their mobile.