Cinema

Samba
Muse

As seen in VIP magazine

Noel Rosa, one of Brazil's most gifted composers will soon have his life told on the big screen by director Ricardo Van Steen in the film Poeta da Vila (Poet of Vila). Rosa was so called because he was from the Rio neighborhood of Vila Isabel. The sambista, author of such classics as "Conversa de Botequim" (Bar Talk) and "Com Que Roupa" (With Which Clothes), died in 1937 at the tender age of 27, a victim of tuberculosis. Van Steen hasn't yet set his mind on the actor who will play the composer, but he has already chosen the actress who will play Lindaura, the poet's wife.

She is the young model and rising TV star Camila Pitanga, who became a household name in Brazil after appearing at Globo network miniseries Sex Appeal (in English like that), which portrayed the life of models. That was the same show that also revealed two other promising actresses: Luana Piovani and Carolina Dieckman. She also appeared as Patrícia in the novela (soap opera) A Próxima Vítima

(The Next Victim) and then in another novela: Malhação (Pumping Iron). Now, at 21, she is dedicating herself to the theater. She is one of the rare young female beauty celebrities who has steadfastly refused a million-dollar offer to disrobe for Brazilian Playboy and other skin publications. "This is a gift, a big opportunity life has given me," said the grateful model and actress. "I am starting with the right foot."

"Poeta da Vila," budgeted at $5 million, is based on the biographic book written by Carlos Didier and João Máximo, but director Van Steen has already warned that he will not be telling the story of Rosa or the samba: "I want to talk about the love triangle formed by Noel, Lindaura, and Ceci."

Mourning

Hard
Goodbye

The premature death of Leandro from the country-music duo Leonardo and Leandro immersed Brazil in deep sorrow during a time when the seleção (the national soccer team) was cause for some apprehension, but mainly for celebration to the whole country. The intensity of the collective outpouring of grief was a surprise to Brazilians themselves since the singer wasn't a star and his music genre is snubbed by most of the nation's intelligentsia.

Leandro, whose real name was Luiz José Costa, was 36. He died June 23 of multiple-organ failure caused by a giant and rare Askin tumor in his thorax. Chemotherapy, two surgeries, nothing was able to deter the cancer, which took over practically the whole right side of Leandro's chest. It was April 20 and Leandro was fishing in a farm in the state of Tocantins when he felt the pain that took him to the hospital and the discovery of his cancer. It was too late though and the tumor was already as big as an orange. Crowds had gathered outside the Hospital São Luiz in São Paulo's south zone, since he had returned to the hospital after a cardiac arrest at home.

On April 28, Leandro came to the U.S. At Baltimore's Johns Hopkins hospital he underwent a biopsy that confirmed his Brazilian doctors cancer diagnostic. During his brief stay in the hospital Leandro used to sing the title song of his just-released posthumous album. It was the favorite tune of his career he said. Naively plain as all their songs, "Um Sonhador" (A Dreamer) brings now a harrowing feeling of premonition:

Eu não sei para onde eu vou
pode até não dar em nada
minha vida segue o sol
no horizonte desta estrada.

I don't know where I'm going
It might well amount to nothing
My life follows the sun
On this road's horizon

The singer, who loved to dress well and to smile, appeared bald—due to the chemotherapy—rolled into a Brazilian flag at his São Paulo apartment balcony celebrating Brazil' soccer victory over Scotland. The dramatic image moved the country and even led President Cardoso to call the singer's family to wish them the best.

Leandro left three children: Tiago, 13; Lyandra, 3; and Leandro, five months. He had been married and divorced twice. The mother of the two smaller children is former model Andréa Motta from whom he had separated a short time before knowing about his cancer.

During the 10-hour-long wake in São Paulo in the Palácio 9 de Julho, the state assembly building, Leandro's body was seen by a crowd of at least 20,000 people. Among the anonymous mob, who cried, prayed and sang some of the duo's hits, there were several celebrities and politicians. São Paulo state governor Mário Covas was there and so was senator Eduardo Suplicy, São Paulo mayor Celso Pitta, and former Justice Minister Íris Rezende.

Luciano, from another famed sertanejo duo, Zezé Di Camargo e Luciano, fainted. Chitãozinho and Xororó—still another duo— and Roberta Miranda also came for the farewell. The Fire Department truck transported the Brazilian-flag bedecked casket when it was time to take it to the Congonhas airport on its way to Goiânia.

Close to 100,000 people, including Vice-President Marco Maciel representing President Fernando Henrique Cardoso, followed the singer's body to the Jardim das Palmeiras cemetery for the burial on June 24. Said Maciel: "Leandro left a void and examples of love to the people and the music."

In Campos, state of Rio, 17-year-old Lídia da Silva Lima, soon after listening to the news of her idol's death, placed the duo's record with the cut "Pense em Mim" (Think of Me) and drank rat poison. She died 15 minutes after arriving at the hospital to where she was rushed.

Record TV network was rewarded for dropping its programmed world cup games in favor of the singer's death wall-to-wall live coverage. Record, which was getting a ridiculous 1% rating in the games jumped to a up to 24% rating, what placed it in first place among all TV channels. That's what happened for example during the broadcasting of Austria vs. Italy. So enthusiastic was Record with the instant feedback given by Ibope, the Brazilian Nielsen, that it almost skipped the game of Brazil against Norway.

Reporters Silvana Silva and Célia Serafim ended up crying on the air while showing the crowd emotions and Disk Record host Gilberto Barros seemed at times more like a fire-and-brimstone preacher, screaming among other things: "Leandro did not win the battle against death, but for us he became a national hero."

When the day games ended, the other networks—Globo, Manchete, and SBT—joined in the mourning with news and specials about Leandro. The next morning all of them covered live the funeral in Goiânia preempting the France vs. Denmark world cup game.

The shock over Leandro's death and the feeling of personal loss seem to stem from the fulminating power of the crooner's cancer. It took only two months from the day he felt strong back pains to the day he died. Some analysts also pointed out the agrarian origin of most of the population and a worldwide trend to value the simple and the country style represented by the sertaneja music.

Humble
Origins

Leandro was born August 15, 1961, the third of eight children. Their father, Avelino Virgulino, played viola (five-to-fourteen-string guitar) and Leandro started to play the guitar as a child. He and his seven siblings didn't have time to school though. Very early in life they started to pick up tomatoes with their parents who worked for a farmer in Goianápolis. To do their job the family had to wake up at 4 in the morning and walk six miles to be at work at 6.

In 1980, Leandro started to sing by himself in Goianápolis bars, after a day of work in the fields. It was 1983 when they decided to leave for Goiânia to try the show business. "Don't worry," said Carmen Divina, the mother. "If it doesn't work you'll always have a home to come back to." They never had to.

Their first gig was at the Canta Viola (Sing, Viola) nightclub. They would soon adopt the new moniker. Luís José and Emival Eterno became Leandro and Leonardo. At the time, Leandro was making a living as a salesman in a clothes shop while Leonardo worked in a pharmacy. They got the inspiration for their name from the twins fathered by the pharmacist.

Their first record in 1983—an independent production—was ignored. It was producer Moacir Machado, who that same year invited them to record for the 3M label after listening to them on a tape. "Solidão" (Loneliness) was their first regional hit, a song by Zezé Di Camargo, an unknown at the time, who would also become a country music sensation. Brazilian sertaneja music makes extensive use of duos. Leandro used to sing harmonies while his brother sang lead.

In 1985, their first CD, Leandro & Leonardo - Volume 1, with "Contradições" (Contradictions), sold 150,000 copies. The second, in 1987, containing "Solidão" (Loneliness) was a bigger success, selling 250,000 discs. In 1989, with their third album and the hit song "Entre Tapas e Beijos," (Amid Slaps and Kisses), they sold 1.3 million records. That was the CD that made them a national phenomenon. Except for the last album called Um Sonhador, all their CDs had the same name. There were 11 Leandro & Leonardo discs, distinguished from each other by a number.

They reached the top in 1990 with the release by the Continental label of their fourth CD with "Pense em Mim" (Think of Me), a catchy and saccharine tune about a man whose ladylove interest has eyes for another man. The tune sold 2.9 million copies and hit a chord with the middle and upper middle class in the South of the country. They were received by President Fernando Collor de Mello at Casa da Dinda, the presidential residence at the time.

This closeness to power brought also some heartache to the singing brothers. They were involved in a suit against Goiás governor, Agenor Resende, who in 1994 was accused of misuse of public funds. In exchange for 30 shows they had a runway and a lake built in their farm in Jussara, state of Goiás.

They had abandoned their cowboy outfits and adopted a dignified suited look. "Our secret is to play music that people like to listen to and to not complicate," Leandro told Brazilian Playboy. In 1991 they became the first sertanejo artists to perform at Rio's sophisticated pop music temple Canecão. It was their pinnacle.

A chorus of nouveaux riches, socialites and members of the thinking elite sang "Pense em mim." By then, they were selling more records than kid TV presenter Xuxa and romantic balladeer "King" Roberto Carlos, this one a best-seller for decades. Unheard for a country group they got their own monthly program on Globo network in 1992, the same year in which they also became cartoon characters.

A Legacy

Differently from their predecessor, the caipiras (hillbilly)—Leandro hated to be called a caipira singer—who sang about cattle and farms, the sertanejo crooners talk about love, lust and sex in their lyrics, as revealed in "Paz na Cama" (Peace in Bed):

Se de dia a gente briga
De noite a gente se ama
é que nossas diferenças
Acabam no quarto
Em cima da cama.

If we fight by day
By night we make love
Because our differences
End in the bedroom
On the top of the bed

Leandro and Leonardo have sold 20 million discs, including the 2.8 million for Pense em Mim, a record in the Brazilian music industry only broken recently by the pagode group Só Pra Contrariar. With the difference that the sertanejo duo sold their close-to-three-million when the record industry had only half the size it has today.

Passed their prime they were selling about 500,000 of their latest CDs. In their wake, other duos like Zezé Di Camargo & Luciano and João Paulo & Daniel were able to be very successful. When Leandro fell sick, Leandro and Leonardo were still very active and in demand doing two shows a week, charging a minimum of $45,000 for presentation. And with two "best of" CDs in Spanish they were poised to conquer Latin America.

They signed with BMG Ariola in October 1997. Um Sonhador (A Dreamer) was supposed to be the first of a series of new albums. Even though their records didn't sell more than 1 million copies since 1995, BMG on the strength of the tragedy has released their last effort with an initial 1.5 million copies.

Pense em Mim By Douglas Maio, Zé Ribeiro, and Mário Soares Invés de você ficar pensando nele Invés de você viver chorando por ele Pensa em mim Chore por mim Liga pra mim Não, não liga pra ele Não chore por ele Se lembre que eu Há muito tempo Te amo, te amo, te amo Quero fazer você feliz Vamos pegar o primeiro avião Com destino à felicidade A felicidade pra mim é você

Think of Me   Instead of thinking of him Instead of crying for him Think of me Cry for me Call me up No, don't call him Don't cry for him Remember that For so long I Love you, love you, love you I want to make you happy Let's take the first plane Bound to happiness For me happiness is you

Farewell

Brasília Is
Orphan

"All I want is to rest a little, my daughter," said Lúcio Costa, 96, in his husky, almost-inaudible voice, after drinking in bed from the coffee and milk cup offered by his daughter Maria Elisa who was sitting by his side, at his modest Rio apartment. Then he covered his face with his hands and let his head fall to the side. No pain, no prolonged disease. The man who created Brasília closed his eyes and peacefully went away. It was about 9 AM, June 13. As a friend observed: "He died like a little bird."

British urbanist William Holford, president of the jury that in 1957 chose Costa's project as the winning entry in the competition for building Brasília, commented: "His project is a work of genius and one of the greatest contributions to contemporary urbanism."

What are your plans for the future, asked Ronaldo Brasiliense, the reporter for Correio Braziliense, Brasília's most respected daily. "Simply to die," answered Lúcio Costa. "I dream with a tomb at the São João Batista cemetery, which I've already bought." It was October 6, 1997, and according to Correio, this was the last interview from the architect and urbanist who created Brasília, Brazil's modern capital. Costa was 95 then and received the journalist in his apartment in Leblon, in the south zone of Rio. Lucid till the end, he revealed that he would have done all exactly the same if he were offered another chance to redo his plans for the creation of the Brazilian capital.

Costa got his wish to be buried at the São João Batista, in the Botafogo neighborhood. Friends and relatives, though, complained about the little concern Rio's authorities showed for his death. State governor Marcello Alencar and Rio's mayor Luiz Paulo Conde didn't show up at the burial.

Long-time friend filmmaker Luiz Carlos Barreto interpreted the feelings of many others when he said: "This is a vexing and scandalous situation that a man of such importance is not paid homage neither by City Hall nor by the state government." Barreto thought that the authorities should have organized a public wake at the Culture Ministry building, one of the architect's many projects for the city.

Cristovam Buarque, the District Federal governor, however, came from Brasília for the funeral. Buarque has presented legislator two proposals: to give the name Lúcio Costa to the so-called eixo monumental (monumental axis) in the center of Brasília and to erect a monument to the city's creator.

The architect's father was Joaquim Ribeiro da Costa, a naval engineer from Bahia, and his mother, Alina Ferreira from the state of Amazonas. The architect was born in Toulon, France, on February 27, 1902, and lived in England and Switzerland. He was already 16 when he moved to Brazil in 1918. It was his father without consulting him who enrolled the son at Escola Nacional de Belas-Artes (National School of Fine Arts) setting the path that would make him famous worldwide. He graduated in architecture.

Costa had a collection of prestigious international titles and memberships. He was a Doctor Honoris Causa by Harvard University since 1960, and member of the American Institute of Architects, the Royal Institute of British Architects, and France's Académie d'Architecture. French President Georges Pompidou awarded him in 1970 the country's most prestigious medal, the Légion d'Honneur. Despite all the international titles, however, he was never made a honorary citizen by Brasília, the city that he created. "This does not bother me," he stated in his last interview.

Famous
and Poor

"I am neither a capitalist nor a socialist, I am not a religious or an atheist," he used to say to those willing to pin him down. He never became wealthy and in the last years of his life he survived thanks to the $1.200 monthly pension he received for his lifetime work as a public servant. In his rundown apartment the blinders were rusting, the carpet worn down, and the sofa torn apart.

Costa always reminded people that he got the Brasília assignment in 1957 in a public competition not as favor. The work was concluded in record time and Brasília became Brazil's new capital on April 21, 1960. He recalled in an interview that he was on a ship going back to Brazil from the United States when he decided to apply for a chance to build a new city. "All in Brasília was creation, it came from my head. It wasn't based in anything but my background as architect and urbanist," he said proudly.

The idea was to move Brazil's capital from an overcrowded Rio to a barren plateau in the geographic center of the country. It was President Juscelino Kubitschek de Oliveira (1956-1960) wish that the creation of the new capital would spur the development of Brazil's hinterland. A monument to modern architecture, Brasília has joined Venice and China's Great Wall in the UNESCO's World Heritage List.

The city was conceived as a celebration and a reminder of the balance of the three powers. The Supreme Court, Congress and the Presidential Palace are side by side at the end of the east-west main axis while the ministerial and other government buildings sit on both sides of the ample avenue. A second axis laid in a north-south direction houses residential districts. Superquadras (superblocks) for specific commerce and businesses were also created. Streets have no names, only number and letters. The city has been called hostile to pedestrians by Brasilienses (Brasília residents) themselves.

The explosive growth of Brasília always worried the Lúcio Costa. In his plan the city would have 500,000 residents by the year 2,000. Brazil's capital, however, is close to reach 2 million people. Even though he had asked that the city controlled its growth, Costa was proud of his creation. After one of his last visits to the city he commented: "The truth is the dream was smaller than reality. And the reality was bigger and more beautiful than the dream.''

The urbanist's work was always overshadowed by that of Oscar Niemeyer who was responsible for designing most of the important buildings in the new capital. "I created Brasília, the project is mine," says Lúcio Costa when asked if the paternity of the city should be shared with architect Oscar Niemeyer. He recognizes, however, that many buildings, like the Alvorada Palace and the Cathedral, created by Niemeyer became the striking post cards of the new capital.

It's been constantly repeated that the so-called Plano Piloto (Pilot Plan) for Brasília was inspired by the shape of a plane. "Nonsense," said Costa. "That is ridiculous. That's an acceptable analogy, but it would be total imbecility to make a city in the shape of an airplane. So it looks like a cross for those who like a cross, dragonfly, spaceship or bow and arrow. Each one sees whatever he wishes to see."

Advertising

Top of
the Heap

Which is the second best ad agency in the world? American giant TBWA Chiat/Day that's the one. The Yankee company got its runner-up prize during the recent 45th Cannes International Advertising Festival. And who came in first getting the Agency of the Year title? DM9DBB, the Brazilian ad agency which has the Microsoft account in Brazil and is the fifth largest advertising company in the country, having earned $262 million in 1997.

The prestigious Cannes prize is awarded to agencies that sum the most points in several categories including for nomination in all existing categories. The Brazilian agency earned 10 points, for example, for getting the Grand Prix. Created a mere 9 years ago, DM9 has been romancing the first spot for some time. It came in third in 1997 and in second in 1993. The agency, which is responsible for the current reelection campaign of President Fernando Henrique Cardoso, is led by colorful adman Nizan Guanaes.

Politics

He Loves
the Bomb

Doctor Enéas Carneiro, Brazilian presidential by diminutive Prona (Partido da Reedificação da Ordem Nacional—Party for the Rebuilding of the National Order) might be short in chances for winning—polls give him less than 5% of the votes—but he is certainly rich in promises. Among them he is vowing to end the problem of the Brazilian street kids taking them all from the streets. As a guarantee that he will stick to his promise he vows to renounce if the problem is not solved in six months. In another front, the candidate and medical doctor, who is running for the second time in a row, guarantees that he will build Brazil's A-bomb "so the world will know we are no illiterate Indians."

Culture

By the
Book

He was an ilumnist and one of the fathers of the Brazilian intelligentsia. Almost single-handedly he created the social sciences library of modern Brazil and for 40 years maintained and enriched it. Every student of humanities in Brazil encountered in the books they studied his last name, which was also the name of his publishing house. This man was publisher and editor Jorge Zahar, who died in Rio, on June 11 at age 78, during a surgery to change a mitral valve.

He was behind the Portuguese-version of such luminaries as Sigmund Freud, Marshall McLuhan, Herbert Marcuse, Erich Fromm, Wilhelm Reich, Melanie Klein, Jean Piaget, Jacques Lacan, Rosa Luxemburg, and Leon Trotsky. He was also the one who gave a literary presence, among others to Brazilian leftist thinkers like economist Maria da Conceição and President Fernando Henrique in his pre-politician phase.

Fearless in his cultural pursuit, this intellectual dared to publish Karl Marx in the late '60s, the most repressive phase of Brazil's military dictatorship (1964-1985). Between 1965 and 1969 Zahar Editores published O Capital (Das Kapital) and A Ideologia Alemã (German Ideology) by Karl Marx as well as Literatura e Revolução (Literature and Revolution) by Trotsky and the 1848 Manifesto Comunista (Communist Manifesto), from 1848, besides several works by French existentialist Jean-Paul Sartre. He specialized in publishing books that most of his colleagues would not touch due to its political explosiveness and high commercial risk.

A self-made intellect, Zahar, who was born in Campos, state of Rio de Janeiro, from a Lebanese father and French mother, never finished second grade. This didn't prevent him from being an avid reader and a true intellectual. "What matters to me," he once said, "is not essentially the profit, but the bigger pleasure of publishing works for college students and intellectuals."

One of the most successful works published by Zahar was Leo Huberman's A História da Riqueza do Homem (Man's Worldly Goods). First published in 1962, this work that became the vade mecum of Brazilian revolutionaries, has already had more than 300,000 copies printed, a feat in a country where some bestsellers sell as little as 3,000 copies.

It was in 1947 that Jorge Zahar and brothers Ernesto and Luciano founded, in downtown Rio, Livraria Ler (Read Bookstore). Zahar Editores would appear 9 years later. Their first book: Manual de Sociologia (Sociology Manual) by Runney and Meier, soon followed by Otto Maria Carpeaux's Uma Nova História da Música (A New History of Music). Along 40 years he would publish close to 2000 titles by foreign and Brazilian authors.

After selling his interest on Editora Zahar in 1983, the publisher started Jorge Zahar Editor with his children Ana Cristina and Jorge Júnior with the same philosophy of his old publishing house. He was the last of a generation of publishing idealists that also included Alfredo Machado and Ênio Silveira. Zahar was still a French wine lover and connoisseur and a movie buff, who started a film magazine in the '40s: Filme.

Zahar Main Titles:

Uma Nova História da Música by Otto Maria Carpeaux (1958)

História da Riqueza do Homem by Leo Huberman (1962)

O Eu Dividido by Ronald Laing (1963)

Psicopatologia da Vida Cotidiana by Sigmund Freud (1964)

As Fontes do Inconsciente by Melanie Klein (1964)

A Ideologia Alemã by Karl Marx (1965)

O Capital by Karl Marx (1967)

Análise Crítica da Teoria Marxista by Louis Althusser (1967)

Eros e Civilização by Herbert Marcuse (1968)

Revolução na Comunicação by Marshall McLuhan (1968)

Arte e Alienação by Herbert Head (1968)

Literatura e Revolução by Leon Trotsky (1969)

Reflexões de um Cineasta by Sergei Eisenstein (1969)

O Teatro Engajado by Eric Bentley (1969)

Vida e Obra de Sigmund Freud by Ernest Jones (1970)

Dependência e Desenvolvimento na América Latina by Fernando Henrique Cardoso (1970)

Rebeldes Primitivos by Eric Hobsbawn (1970)

Capitalismo Dependente e Classes Sociais na América Latina by Florestan Fernandes (1973)

O Seminário, Livro 1 by Jacques Lacan (1979)

Carnavais, Malandros e Heróis by Roberto Damatta (1979)

O Riso by Henri Bergson (1980)

O Suicídio by Emile Durkheim (1983)

Dicionário de Música Zahar (1984)

Os Anos de Autoritarismo with text by Paulo Francis, Paul Singer, Yan Michalski and others (1985)

Dicionário do Pensamento Marxista by Tom Bottomore (1988)

Dicionário do Balé e Dança by A. J. Faro and Luiz Paulo Sampaio (1989)

O Processo Civilizador (9 volumes) by Norbert Elias (during the '90s)

Sobre a Televisão by Pierre Bourdieu (1997)

Escritos by Jacques Lacan (1998)

Music

Vatapá
à Basquiat

One is a veteran from the state of Paraíba, the other a recent revelation from Maranhão. The first is Zé Ramalho, the second Zeca Baleiro, two musicians from two different generations representing the fertile northeastern poetry and music.

Together Zé and Zeca have recorded "Bienal" —the title refers to São Paulo international and traditional art biennial— a satire poking fun at the contemporary art world. The tune was written by Baleiro and will be one of the cuts of the musicians eagerly waited second CD to be released in 1999. Irreverent and cutting-edge, "Bienal" rhymes the Baiana (from Bahia) food vatapá with New York graffiti artist Basquiat. "The tune might have as subtitle: The struggle of the dematerialized matter," joked Zé Ramalho.

Says Baleiro: "People have always compared Zé Ramalho and me. It happens that our source is the same: Bob Dylan and the repentistas (popular improviser singers from the Northeast) ." Four years ago Zeca had already written another song taunting modern art.

Bienal by Zeca Baleiro Desmaterializando a obra de arte no fim do milênio Faço um quadro com moléculas de hidrogênio Fios de pentelho de um velho armênio Cuspe de mosca, pão dormido, asa de barata torta Meu conceito parece à primeira vista Um barrococó figurativo neoexpressionista Com pitadas de art-nouveau pós-surrealista Calcado na revalorização da natureza morta Minha mãe certa vez disse-me um dia Vendo minha obra exposta na galeria Meu filho isso é mais estranho que o cu da gia E muito mais feio que um hipopótamo insone Pra entender um trabalho tão moderno É preciso ler o segundo caderno Calcular o produto bruto interno Multiplicar pela valor das contas de água luz e telefone Rodopiando na fúria do ciclone Reinvento o Céu e o inferno. Minha mãe não entendeu o subtexto Da arte materializada no presente contexto Reciclando o lixo lá do cesto Chego a um resultado estético bacana Com a graça de Deus e Basquia Nova Iorque me espere que eu vou já Picharei com dendê de vatapá Uma psicodélica baiana Misturarei anáguas de viúva Com tampinhas de Pepsi e Fanta uva Um penico com água da última chuva Ampolas de injeção de penicilina Desmaterializando a matéria Com a arte pulsando na artéria Boto fogo no gelo da Sibéria Faço até cair neve em Teresina Com o clarão do raio da silibrina Desintegro o poder da bactéria

Biennial   Dematerializing the work of art of the end of the millenium I make a painting with molecules of hydrogen Pubic hair from an old Armenian Spit of fly, stale bread, wing of a crooked cockroach My concept seems at first blush A figurative neoexpressionist barrococo With a relish of post-surrealist art-nouveau Modeled in the reevaluation of still painting My mom once told me one day Seeing my work in the gallery exposed My son this is weirder than a frog's ass And much uglier than an insomniac hippopotamus To understand such a modern work You need to read the culture section To calculate the gross national product To multiply by the value of the water, light, and phone bills Twirling in the fury of the cyclone I reinvent Heaven and Hell. My mother didn't understand the subtext Of the art materialized in the current context Recycling the trash of the basket I arrive at a cool aesthetic result With God and Basquiat grace New York, wait for me, I'm coming I will scratch with vatapá dendê oil A psychedelic Baiana (woman from Bahia) I will mix petticoats of a widow To Pepsi and grape Fanta caps A bedpan with water from the last rain Ampoules of penicillin injection Dematerializing matter With art pulsating in the artery I set fire to the ice of Siberia I even make snow in Teresina With the light of the silibrina's flash I disintegrate the power of bacteria

Space

The
Rightest
Stuff

Next time around a civilian and a woman may have a chance, but the first Brazilian astronaut will be a man, a pilot, and a military. Brazilian authorities excused themselves telling that they didn't have a say in the matter since NASA, the American Space agency, warned that they have no time to train a lay person. The man chosen to participate in the ambitious sixteen-country International Space Station (ISS) is FAB's (Força Aérea Brasileira—Brazilian Air Force) captain-aviator Marcos César Pontes, 35, from Bauru, in the interior of São Paulo state.

Pontes must have the right stuff. He was picked among five finalists all of who were scientists or engineers, had impeccable health, extensive knowledge of English, at least 1,000 hours of flight as jet pilot, and had shown the ability to work under pressure and stressful situations.

This graduate from world-class ITA (Instituto Tecnológico da Aeronáutica—Aeronautic Technological Institute) in São José dos Campos (São Paulo state) has already flown more than 1.700 hours in combat jets, including the Russian Mig 29 and the Yankee F-15, F-16, and F-18. In 1996 he concluded his postgraduate course in naval engineering at the Navy Postgraduate School in Monterey, California. His training at NASA starts in August even though he is not scheduled to go into space before 2003.

The Brazilian monetary contribution to the project is negligible: $120 million spread over three years. The $40 billion space-station program will cost $ 2,1 billion a year to the participating nations. Brazil will also be in charge of building a pressurized platform for the cargo bay. The device will serve for storing experiments.

Brazilians are already thinking about their second astronaut and for that post Thais Russomano, 34, who has a doctorate in aerospace medicine, seems like a natural candidate. She was the first South American to graduate from the NASA civilian astronaut course taught at Wright State University, in Dayton, Ohio. For Russomano, the news that AEB (Agência Espacial Brasileira—Brazilian Space Agency) had limited its selection to military personnel was "a cold shower."

"I was very frustrated," she said, "because I had prepared all my life for that." The doctor for five years had frequented NASA's installations in Houston and Cape Canaveral and endured and passed all the tests that war pilot Pontes is now going to face. As for the new astronaut, he says that he intends to prove that the dream is possible. He was only seven when in 1969 American Neil Armstrong became the first man to walk on the moon surface. "I couldn't believe it," he said recently. "I thought that it was all a TV trick."

Food

Setting
the
Table

First Cancun and than the US. If everything works out as planned—and if globalization is really a two-way street—Americans soon will be eating less hamburgers and more quibes (a meat croquette), esfihas (meat-and-veggies-filled turnover) and other Middle-East-with-a-Brazilian-touch delicacies from El Habib, a ten-year old Brazilian food franchise. After conquering Brazil—El Habib has opened 105 restaurants across the country—the fast-food chain plans to go worldwide starting next year. The beach resort of Cancun was chosen as the first stop in the expansion program due to its international tourist population. But Cancun should be just the entrance door to the US and the rest of the world.

Diplomacy

We
Blinked
First

Brazilian consular officers in New York were expecting to move into spacious new installations on Avenue of the America close to the district known as Little Brazil. They became homeless instead and were forced by the US to take all of its belongings and personnel to a cramped office on Fifth Avenue already being used by the Brazilian government trade office.

After 50 years in the traditional Rockefeller Center, the Brazilian consulate needed to save some money and at the same time find larger quarters in which to house several offices now spread all over town. With a signed lease they communicated their new address to the US State Department sure that it would be a mere formality. Surprise. The answer was no. There would be no move before the Brazilian government agrees to heed an old Yankee revendication : exemption of the social security debt that the US has in Brazil. Without this the American government cannot sell the properties it bought in Rio when the city was still the capital of Brazil.

Washington argues that the Vienna Convention exempts diplomatic representation from tributes in the host country. Brasília counter-argues that it cannot do anything for the US without changing the law. For the record, as of December 1997, only seven of 87 foreign diplomatic representations in Brazil were paying their social security dues. With the US reprisal, the tax discussion that had been dragging its feet for more than one year now is getting the fast track.

Bureaucracy

A Chance
to Be
Counted

The Brazilian IRS has discovered recently that among its contributors there are 200,000 people who are older than 100. It also found out that more than 2.500 haven's yet celebrated their first birthday. In brief, from the 104 million names on its list, the federal revenue service (Receita Federal) believes that 64 million shouldn't be there. Many of them are dead, others have been registered more than once, don't exist or are too young.

To clean its database, the Receita is starting from scratch and asking every single contributor to reapply for a new number. People will have a second chance next year. Then, by 2000 who hasn't re-applied will have its CPF (Cadastro de Pessoa Física—Natural Person Register) canceled, and become unable to do things like getting a job, opening a bank account or buying a car. Brazilians living overseas who want to keep their old CPF may use the Receita's address in the Internet: http://www.receita.fazenda.gov.br 

For the renewal people are asked to give their CPF number, birth date, voting registration (título de eleitor) number and information on properties, cars, and bank accounts they might have.

Behavior

Love
on
Sale

Is passion on the wane in Rio? In the last three years at least 15 motels—in Brazil they are synonym for love nest—have closed their doors and their movement has fallen by 30% in recent months. Blame it on lack of money and not lack of hormones, says Rio's Sindicato dos Hotéis, Bares and Similares (Hotels, Bars and Alike). To deal with the crisis and draw clients the motels are reducing rates and inventing other promotions.

Motel Panda in the south neighborhood of Botafogo, for example, on weekends is allowing people to stay 12 hours for the price of six. Most of the motels, in which mirrors on the walls and often on the ceiling are de rigueur, have posted signs outside with promotions with hefty discounts. Couples are being able now to get suites with sauna and swimming pool for less than $30 and a more modest suite for $15.

Exploitation

Sex,
Lies and
Videorape

A videotape involving 25 girls between the ages of 14 and 18 engaged in hardcore sex became the box-office hit in recent weeks in Rio's favelas (shantytown). The girls shown on the tape say they were promised money and jobs and in some cases were threatened with death to be part of the production. They were all from morro (hill) de São Carlos.

Bar owners were charging $2 a piece for patrons willing to see the homemade porno movie. The case became public only after a 15-year-old girl told her mother that she had been raped. She went to the "authorities"—drug dealers, who are the ones who control many favelas—and they brought an end to the exhibitions. They were afraid real authorities would get involved drawing unnecessary attention to their trade.

Justice has finally taken action issuing an order for the arrest of Otávio Barros Filho and Roberto Apolônio. Both, who lived in the favela and were accused of rape by the girl, disappeared. Barros was the driver of a van who drove people downtown and Apolônio was the community leader.

World Cup

C'est
la Vie

Writing for Rio's daily Jornal do Brasil, novelist Roberto Drummond was the writer who best captured the poetry of the World Cup. Here's a sample of his poems in prose:

Canção da esperança brasileira Roberto Drummond Não, não vos trago lágrimas, nem funeral. Trago, brasileiros, esperança e vos convoco para a grande marcha da alegria, que nos levará ao penta no ano 2002. Guardai vossas lágrimas, meus irmãos e minhas irmãs: lembrai-vos de 1966, no rumo ao tri, também tropeçamos. Os sonhos são como os rios: não caminham em linha reta. (…) Não, não é hora de culpar ninguém. Não é hora de crucificar ninguém. Houve erros? Que eles nos sirvam de lição. (…) Não, não perdemos o penta: estamos apenas tecendo o penta, pois no ano 2002 só o Brasil - este nosso país que hoje é um nó na garganta - poderá ser penta.

Song of the Brazilian hope   No, I don't bring you tears or funeral. I bring, Brazilians, hope and I convoke you for the big march of joy, that will take us to the penta (the fifth championship) in the year 2002. Keep your tears, my brothers and my sisters: remember 1966, on our way to the tri, we also stumbled. Dreams are like rivers: they don't walk straight. (…) No, this is no time to blame anyone. This is no time to crucify anyone. Were there mistakes? May they serve us as a lesson. (…) No, we didn't lose the penta: we are simply sewing the penta, because in the year 2002 only Brazil—this land of ours that today is a lump in the throat—can be penta.

World Cup

After
the
Fall

After having created the most inventive front page during the World Cup—the CBD (Confederação Brasileira de Desportos—Brazilian Confederation of Sports) coat of arms with four and a half stars, the fifth one just half sewed, taking the entirety of the cover—to celebrate the victory against the Netherlands, Brasília's daily Correio Brasiliense didn't scrap the page it had prepared to celebrate de final victory. Brasil É Penta (Brazil Is Champion for the Fifth Time) it wrote beside a drawing of Ronaldinho holding the trophy.

And in small letters came the explanation: "This front page was aborted against the will of millions of Brazilians. It didn't arrive whole to your hands because it was barred by the most unhappy and simple question: the Brazilian Seleção (national team) decided not to enter the field yesterday."

 

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