The Lost Girls

by Jennifer Baggett

  The crew from the restaurant showed up right behind us, along with a few new people we’d yet to meet. Within minutes the counter of Ana’s pass-through kitchen was loaded with wine, beer, liquor, and mixers. One thing was for sure: Our new friends certainly knew how to celebrate. They’d managed to throw a party together in a less than an hour.

  “A toast to the Americans,” Carlos said. “Especially the birthday girl.”

  “Yes, we are so pleased you are spending your last night in Lima with us,” added Ana, raising her glass of wine. “Salud!”

  “Salud!” Everyone clinked the glasses in their hands.

  It could have been the abundance of alcohol or just that twenty-somethings of any nationality rarely need an excuse to party, but Holly, Jen, and I managed to integrate seamlessly into our new group of Peruvian friends. I took it as a good sign when Marcus, the guy in the tapestry jacket, snatched the tiara off of my head and placed it on his own.

  “It is after midnight. Birthday is finished. Now I am the king of the party, no?”

  “Oh, let me take your picture!” said Holly, digging through her bag to find her camera. But before she had a chance, one of the other guys grabbed the tiara and plopped it on his head. Then someone else tried it on for size. Pretty soon everyone got a crack at my crown, with Holly documenting everyone’s fancy new look.

  I took my glass of wine over to a chair near the window. I watched the girls break it down Latin-style for a few seconds, then turned my attention to the view outside.

  Wow—how ridiculous was all of this? Just a few hours earlier, I’d been at an $8-a-night hostel with Jen and Holly, content to have a low-key dinner and a couple glasses of wine. Now the three of us were celebrating my birthday with a dozen strangers in a swanky apartment somewhere high above Lima. I knew that if I hadn’t bumped into Carlos again, the three of us wouldn’t be in this surreal situation. And had our entire interaction taken place in New York rather than South America, I probably wouldn’t have given him another chance at all. It would have been all too easy to decline his invitation, to claim that some other plans precluded me from attending his friend’s party.

  But that’s one of the unexpected peculiarities of traveling, especially for so long. I really didn’t have any other plans. The only friends I had now were the ones hanging by my side 24/7. Without a jam-packed schedule or an extensive social network to hide within, I suddenly felt free to gamble on new possibilities. I glanced across the room, watching both of my friends laughing hysterically at Marcus’s attempts to tango with Jen. For tonight at least, the risk had definitely been worth the reward.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Jen

  RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL

  AUGUST

  Perched on plush candy-striped bar stools at the Copacabana Palace hotel, Amanda, Holly, and I sat pondering our probable future as Rio de Janeiro vagrants.

  “Maybe we could sneak into the business center and sleep there tonight,” Amanda suggested. “I got a look at the room when I was checking e-mail, and it has tons of comfy couches.”

  I smiled weakly at her joke. Amanda, who was currently working on an article about South American honeymoon destinations, had been the one to score us two free nights at the legendary beachfront property through her press contacts in the first place. The 400 thread count sheets, private bath butlers, and room service were almost enough to make me reconsider my position on working on the road. But now, after forty-eight hours of bliss, the clock had run out on the luxury portion of our getaway.

  “Yeah, but even if we could do that, they know we’re not guests here anymore. And they’ll definitely be suspicious if we’re still lurking around after happy hour.” I sighed, wondering if we could shack on the white lounge chairs that lined the pool.

  “All right, Jen, you stay here and keep looking for hostels online while Holly and I scour the neighborhood for something we can remotely afford.” Amanda stood abruptly and scooped her tote off the ground. “I swore I saw a place called Yellow Banana, or something like that, when the taxi dropped us off here.”

  “There’s nothing remotely close to that name in the guidebook, but maybe we’ll get lucky,” Holly said just before grabbing the Lonely Planet guide and taking off through the lobby.

  Before touching down in the birthplace of samba, caipirinhas, and bikinis so teeny that they required their own waxing technique, we’d been told by numerous travelers to limit our days in Rio and instead hightail it north to the country’s most pristine beaches. Heeding their advice, we’d booked a flight to Salvador, Bahia, set to depart three days from now, and intended to visit as many of Rio’s iconic sites as possible in the next seventy-two hours. Unfortunately, we’d already spent half a day just trying to find a place to sleep for the night. Apparently, every single guesthouse, hostel, and B & B in town had been booked solid for weeks. At this rate, we’d have to venture into the favelas—the Rio slums made infamous by the movie City of God for their violent gangs and appalling living conditions—to find a room.

  I hoped we wouldn’t have to resort to that, but as usual we were making plans on the fly, waiting until we arrived in a new city to secure lodging. It wasn’t that we didn’t try to think ahead. But during the course of our travels in Peru, we’d found that it was inconvenient—and often futile—to prebook accommodations. Half the time we’d change our minds and detour to another destination at the last minute. Other times we’d stumble upon a place that hadn’t made the Lonely Planet pages but that we adored at first sight. Not to mention that walk-in clients could sometimes take advantage of cancellations, negotiate a better price, and, most important, see the rooms that are so often hyped in print—but may be horrifying in reality. This time we’d been lucky: thanks to Amanda, we’d been legit guests in one of the most luxurious and renowned hotels in the world—and the experience had more than lived up to the hype. Sadly, now it was back to our lives as backpacker ragamuffins.

  An hour later, after my intensive search through sites like HostelBookers.com and Hostelworld.com had yielded nothing but scarlet letter Xs (indicating no vacancies), I slunk over to the concierge and asked if he could ring a few of the grimier but cheaper hotels in the local area to see if they had any vacancies. I wanted to crawl under the Persian rug as his white-gloved hand dialed the first number. Half a dozen rejections later, I was on the verge of drowning myself in a nearby gilded ice bucket.

  Let’s face it, Operation “Yellow Banana” might be our last shot, I thought, as I continued to search online without much hope. Nearly an hour later, the girls returned with the day’s first piece of good news—the Mellow Yellow hostel would be happy to squeeze us in.

  As it turned out, our new digs offered a side of paradise that didn’t require crystal chandeliers, turndown chocolates, or room service. Mellow Yellow was the stuff of backpacker legend. Housed in a twisty, five-story loft space, the hostel boasted all the essential frat house trimmings: a full-sized bar and restaurant, pool hall, foosball table, beanbag lounge chairs, and a Jacuzzi. Not to mention a $10 all-you-could-eat-and-drink barbecue and enough debauchery on the part of its international inhabitants to create the ultimate MTV The Real World: Rio de Janeiro. Piling our bags in the corner, we headed to the upstairs lounge for dinner. Before long, we’d met loads of fellow “mellow yellowers” and were all planning which Rio hot spots to hit up after dinner.

  Luckily, we were so exhausted from dancing all night at Casa Roja—a hip bar set in a pink Tudor-style house in the charming Bella Vista neighborhood—that the severe lack of personal space in our room (a double “converted” to a triple) barely fazed us. But this was quite possibly the last affordable space in Rio, so we beggars couldn’t be choosers.

  Aside from afternoon jogs to Ipanema Beach—where we sat on the sand people-watching and sipping water from coconuts—Amanda, Holly, and I had remained on self-imposed Copacabana luxury lockdown during our first couple days in Rio. With such limited time left to explore the Carnival Capital of th
e World, we forced ourselves to get up and out of bed as early as we could.

  After refueling on açai berry smoothies from our neighborhood juice bar, Amanda, Holly, and I spent hours perusing the sprawling Feira Hippie de Ipanema outdoor market for cheap sundresses and jewelry and chatting with local shopkeepers. Strolling the city streets—which felt safer than we’d expected—the girls and I stopped periodically to listen to a bossa nova sidewalk band, browse art galleries, and sample bolinhos de chuva (doughnut balls) and sugared popcorn from street vendors. Everything and everyone in Rio seemed to move with a blend of equal parts syrup and spice that captivated us the same way Buenos Aires had.

  After snapping photos of the iconic Christ the Re deemer statue, perched with open arms on the peak of Corcovado Mountain, the girls and I took a gondola up the famous Sugarloaf Mountain. Settling at one of several tables at the top, we soaked in the 360-degree view of the city, and watched a local woman in a white lacy dress and head scarf dance barefoot through the crowd of tourists. As twilight painted streaks of navy and salmon across the sky, we made our way back down to the street level and hopped a taxi back to our hostel.

  Later that night, Amanda, Holly, and I were splayed out on neon floor cushions in one of Mellow Yellow’s relaxation rooms when our friend Morris from the night before popped in to ask us about our plans for later.

  “I assume you ladies are hitting up the favela funk party, right?” he asked. “I mean, you gotta come, it’s gonna be seriously wicked.”

  From the little we’d read about favelas in our guidebook, we couldn’t imagine that the notorious Brazilian slums, which were occupied illegally and often controlled by drug lords, would be an appealing or remotely safe place to party. But apparently the times they were a-changin’ in Rio. According to Morris, despite the often dangerous conditions, the favelas had become increasingly popular tourist destinations and “everyone who was anyone” went to the weekly raves. Still, we wondered if this was one of those After-School Special Moments we were supposed to “just say no” to. I mean, was it really safe to go traipsing into those formerly forbidden barrios?

  But after we consulted with other backpackers and receiving the same story, our apprehensions were mostly squelched. Apparently, the favela leaders were welcoming visitors into their ghettos in record numbers. Organized tour companies had even jumped on the bandwagon, conducting daily excursions into several of the better-known “hoods,” and were promoting the popular funk parties as 100 percent gringo-friendly events. I immediately conjured a vision of a Brazilian Don Corleone sitting on top of the hill ordering The Family to buzz us through the gates. I couldn’t possibly pass up the chance to see this strange social phenomenon for myself, especially since Mellow Yellow had rented minivans to safely escort backpackers, en masse, to and from the party and was doling out bracelets for VIP access at the club for only $2.

  After dashing downstairs to scribble our names on the 10 p.m. departure sheet (how dangerous could something with a sign-up sheet be, right?), we returned to our room to get ready for our big night on the shantytown. While Amanda and I swapped our cargo capri pants for wrinkled skirts and dabbed a bit of makeup on our faces, Holly sat on the bed with her laptop. At first I thought she was just waiting for us to finish our mini-transformations before starting hers, but a few minutes later she hesitantly said that she might not join us.

  “We don’t have to go if you don’t want to, Hol. We’ll just do something else,” Amanda said.

  “No, you and Jen should definitely go. I just really miss Elan, so I wanted to try to catch him on Skype and then maybe get some work done on my column,” Holly replied. “Plus, I’m beyond tired from not sleeping much last night.”

  “I hear ya. I was totally exhausted too earlier today. But somehow I got my second wind,” I said.

  “And of course I can’t let Jen have fun without me,” Amanda added. “But we’ll only go to the party if you’re absolutely positive that you’re okay to stay here alone.”

  “Oh, I don’t know. It’ll be hard, but I think I’ll survive,” Holly said, a look of relief washing over her face.

  At this point in our travels, I knew that Holly needed a little more alone time than I did, and I assumed from her reaction that this was one of those occasions. Still, knowing how much Holly had left back in the States, I was always a little worried that she’d get too homesick and quit the trip. I would have understood, of course. But after spending practically every hour of the past two months with Holly by my side, I couldn’t imagine continuing our round-the-world journey without her.

  With her perpetually sunny disposition that could overcome even the most frustrating on-the-road situations, Holly had taught me to face setbacks with more grace and to try to let go of things I had no control over—especially painfully slow connections in Internet cafés and differing travel priorities. And whereas I had a tendency to want to go wherever the travel winds blew, with no set schedule or limitations, Holly always had a new mission and motivated us to get up and get going each day. Always seeking to challenge herself physically (often with an impromptu hike or bike ride), and to immerse herself in the more cultural and educational sides of travel, Holly inspired me to push the boundaries of my own abilities and understanding of the world.

  “Okay, Corby. Try not to miss us too much, though,” I replied.

  “Impossible,” she said, grinning widely, hoisting her laptop onto her legs, and settling back against the wall.

  With just a small stash of reals and cameras tucked in our purses, Amanda and I joined a huge group of fellow hostelers—including a bunch of our new Irish/English/Aussie friends from the night before—and headed out of Mellow Yellow for our inaugural favela funk experience.

  Thirty minutes later, we’d crossed the city limits and were beginning the slow ascent up a steep hillside. As we drove deeper into the shadows, dilapidated houses, local watering holes, and makeshift food huts began speckling the narrow dirt roads. Suddenly my imagination started to run away with me: What if rogue militia popped out of the bushes with machine guns? We could be taken hostage and sold into slavery. Were we the only group of backpackers foolish enough to come up here? What if this was a suicide mission?

  Before we could ask if it was too late to turn back, we rounded a sharp bend in the road and caught up with an extensive caravan of cabs and combis. A massive crowd of club kids and bodyguard characters—decked out in tight spandex, gold chains, muscle shirts, and fluorescent Daisy Dukes—packed the streets, pushing their way toward a gigantic warehouse. Crude bundles of cable wire hung from the treetops, running in all directions, powering the venue and, it seemed, every structure in sight.

  Hordes of tourists poured from the vans, and the favela funk masters let us pass without so much as batting an eye. Ushered through the waiting line like cattle, we were quickly swept up in the torrent of partygoers. Along with hundreds of locals, we flowed steadily down a black-lit hallway before spilling out into a football-field-sized arena. The tin walls pulsed with reggaeton bass beats. An immense crowd bounced and swayed in perfect rhythm. And sweat formed steam clouds in the un-air-conditioned space, where a clothing-optional rule was in full effect. Most of the men were sans shirt, and nine out of ten women preferred bikinis to party dresses—the tenth opting for a tube top and booty shorts. You could hardly blame them, though, considering the sweltering heat and severe lack of oxygen.

  “This is insanity!” Amanda screamed. “I’m so glad we came!”

  “Me too! Although we’re seriously overdressed!”

  Hand in hand as to not lose each other, we wound our way through the throng of revelers, showed our wristbands to the burly watchman at the VIP entrance, and ascended to the top floor. Amanda and I danced, sweated buckets in the 100-degree heat, rocked out our best moves (all four of them), and sipped cocktails between guzzles of water. It wasn’t long before the guys in our group, who had all ditched their shirts by this point, insisted that all of the Mellow Yellow lad
ies accompany them in a salsa dance-off. Hours passed, until 4 a.m., when we realized our motor coaches were going to turn into pumpkins if we weren’t outside to meet them in a few minutes.

  Standing on the sidewalk outside the club, Amanda and I waited for our van while covertly playing fashion police with the outrageous characters that passed by.

  “I’m so glad you came out tonight. I was worried you’d bail,” I said.

  “And miss all this? No way? Besides, my eighty-year-old self told me that if I’d stayed in, I’d totally regret missing tonight,” she replied as a band of muscle-bound men walked by, smiled, and whistled before continuing down the shadowy road on foot.

  Laughing, I recalled the first time Amanda had mentioned her mysterious eighty-year-old self. During one of our countless 3 a.m. conversations in our freshman dorm, she’d explained that whenever she’d had a tough time trying to figure out whether she should take a risk or not, she’d ask, “What would the blue-haired, sun-parched, granny-panty-wearing future version of myself advise me to do? Would she tell me to stay in and study or go out and meet a cute guy?”

  I had immediately understood where she was coming from. I often justified my more impulsive choices with a similar rationale that “I’ll sleep when I’m dead” or “Live every day like it is your last.” I guessed that overachievers like us needed some excuse, however quirky it might be, to defy our own conventions and just have fun.

  “Well, my eighty-year-old self would have advised me to not act so bitchy to my friend Amanda when she wanted to hit up an Internet café to research an article,” I said.

  “What are you talking about? No, you haven’t,” Amanda said with a wave of her hand, then added, “I mean, I know you get frustrated with my writing, but it’s something I really want to do for myself. I guess I just don’t understand why it annoys you.”