It’s a Privileged View: Cantagalo Hostel Welcomes Tourists
Aug 8th
“É uma vista privilegiada,” – it’s a priviledged view – explains Cremilson Rosa de Oliveira as he sits atop his hostel in construction in the heart of Cantagalo, Rio’s 3rd oldest favela. The striking views of Copacabana and Ipanema beach from the top of a favela provide a fascinating, juxtaposed and accurate picture of Rio’s extreme inequality.
The hostel, to be named Alto Ipanema (High Ipanema), is set to open at the end of 2011, just in time for New Years and Carnival, and de Oliveira anticipates many more tourists through the hostel’s doors with the mega-events scheduled for the coming More >
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Rio Top Tour
Aug 4th
On August 30, 2010, the State Secretary of Tourism, Sport and Leisure launched a tourist attraction called Rio Top Tour in Santa Marta, Rio de Janeiro´s first pacified favela as of December 22, 2008. The idea of Rio Top Tour is to train residents to guide foreign tourists through their community to share and promote their proud culture and rich history. While the program itself is free for tourists, if you choose to hire a guide, a price is negotiated on an individual basis. As the Rio Top Tour´s one-year-anniversary is nearing, I decided to check it out.
Santa Marta is More >
Fifa Draws Protest
Aug 2nd
Saturday morning, July 30th, the World Cup/Olympics Popular Committee (Comitê Popular da Copa e das Olimpíadas), a coalition of diverse organizations, organized a march and rally starting in Largo do Machado and ending near Marina da Gloria to protest the social injustices the mega-event planning process has caused in Rio de Janeiro. Over 1000 people came out for the event. The rally was timely planned to culminate just outside as the preliminary 2014 FIFA World Cup Draws occurred inside the Marina da Gloria–an extravagant event costing Brazilian taxpayers R$30 million.
At the forefront of the march, people held a huge sign that read “Fora Ricardo Teixeira–Out More >
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Morar Carioca: What’s Not to Like?
Aug 1st
Say what you want about Morar Carioca, the latest incarnation of Rio’s favela upgrading programs, but you can’t claim that it’s lacking in ambition – at least not on paper. The initiative, which is actually an expansion and reboot of previous programs, aims to spend approximately R$8 billion to urbanize Rio’s over 1000 informal settlements by 2020. According to the Municipal Housing Secretary’s (SMH) promotional materials, for each of its projects, Morar Carioca aims to provide infrastructure and public services and their maintenance, a healthy environment with more public space, limits on future growth, land regularization, and improved accessibility – More >
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A Ride that Takes Courage
Jul 31st
If one happens to stumble upon Rio de Janeiro’s newest touristic hotspot, another over-the-top project provided by the PAC program, they would come across the trendy cable car that now spans the entirety of Complexo do Alemão. But they would have to make quite an effort to see deeper, past simply this attractive scenery of what is Brazil’s largest favela complex.
Certainly a medium of transport that is initially operating outside of peak transit hours, from 7:00 am until noon, cannot be considered useful to the general public. Except, of course, for the strong touristic appeal of this new installation. Furthermore, More >
