Barra- Coast of Salvador de Bahia
Barra is an area on the coast of the Salvador de Bahia. It has glorious sunsets. The Museum of Art Modern had a wonderful evening of Jazz on a Saturday night. It was a great place to watch the sun setting as it is beside a small beach and the sun sets on the lovely sculptures. However the art exhibition in a converted church was very strange. Here we had a display of gold dentures (not sure if painted gold or cast in gold). Then a recurring video of a face with gold painted mouth eating water melon seeds (at least that what they looked like until I saw they were moving and that they were bugs). A man washing his hands in blood was another video reel. OK so that was the church gallery. The sculpture garden was actually nice and had good sculptures. The painting gallery had a portrait of a man without a head; a weird painting entitled burial ground, a funny looking urinal beside the toilets and a space you had to walk into where there was a wall with spiky wire on top of it. It looked a bit like the Berlin wall. Nightmare.
In Salvador everyone was so unreliable. I used to go to a tango class which took me an hour by bus to get to. The class was often cancelled but no-one would tell you this in advance. Buses turned up mostly but could also get cancelled and you would wait for a bus that was never going to turn up. There is no way of knowing this in advance.
Take one Thursday night as an example. First the bus driver’s relief driver did not turn up so we waited almost an hour for a driver and then the original bus driver came back. He drove like crazy but, by then, there was a party on the bus so everyone was whooping and hollering (was actually fun – Brazilians are such a laugh) as we rounded each corner at breakneck speed. He wanted to get home early I think. The driver did not hear me ring the bell at the first bus stop or the second so by the third bus stop I went up to him and told him I had to get off. He said “I will take you closer” and landed me in the middle of nowhere so that in the end I had spent two hours getting nowhere. I went home!! That was my Thursday night. So it could be a frustrating place at times.
