Our Woman in... Brazil
Katherine Bagley
I've just returned Brazil where I spent two weeks working at the Painting Favelas project in Rio. The project's based in the bohemian suburb of Santa Teresa so I was able to combine some hard (and sticky) work with a bit of sightseeing in Brazil's lively capital!
I chose this project because it was short and I could fit it in with my work schedule (I only have four weeks of holiday to take every year). I'm distinctly lacking in Portuguese language skills so this seemed like the perfect project - I mean how hard can it be to paint without speaking the language? Luckily I was right and my poor attempts to speak the local lingo saw me through. I wish I could have spoken more with the locals though.
Three hours painting might not sound like much but when you're out in the midday heat and its too hot to wear much more that shorts and a Bikini top, it feels like a lot longer. We started by painting a community football area. Unfortunately for me, we had to climb five flights of stairs just to reach it, so I was knackered before we even started! Soon we were being helped by a bunch of local kids and someone (still can't work out who it was) came up with the idea of using hand prints… before we knew it colourful hands were flying all over the place and more than a little paint ended up on the volunteers instead of the walls!
Our first lunch was an "interesting" experience as we were introduced to ‘shackman’ a guy who runs a restaurant from his garage (the man actually parks his car in there at night). For a bargain $3 you could have a plate of Rice and beans with chicken or some other meat, complemented by chips and a luscious salad. Not bad and well deserved after a sweaty few hours painting.
As well as working at the project we also had time to visit all the usual tourist attractions - Christ at Corcovado and Sugar Loaf Mountain were my firm favourites and I can vouch for the fact that the views are incredible at sunset on a clear day!
At first I was a little worried about all the stories of how dangerous Rio could be, however in the whole time I was there never once felt threaten or in danger. Within the favelas you're looked after by the community. They know that you're there to help and they’re only to happy to make your stay as comfortable and enjoyable as possible. Though I was limited by the fact that I couldn't speak Portuguese, I'm sure that if you could the project would give you the perfect opportunity to learn about the problems they face on a day to day basis.
While I was there a couple of guys from some of the local projects organised a football game with kids from two of the favelas. It was great fun - especially when the guy I was travelling with (a member of the UK sales team who will remain nameless) split his shorts and had to go back to one of the home of a local woman to have them sew back together while the lady's husband looked on with great amusement. Needless to say were teased him mercilessly for the rest of the trip!
Staying in a volunteer house was somewhat daunting - you're sharing with people you don’t know and you're going to be spending a whole lot of time together - however, it made for a great social life and there was certainly never a dull moment. What's more, it meant that there was always someone on hand to accompany you to the local market or go for a beer at sugarloaf at sunset.
Overall my time in Rio was a really eye-opening experience. I've made a whole load of new friends that I'm sure I'll stay in touch with now that I'm back in the UK and I have an album full of photographs to remind me of my time here. It was great to do something worthwhile while I was away and I'm definitely planning to do it again this year but maybe I'll try out somewhere I Asia or even Africa next time…
